Permanent Objects

A collection of miscellany

Archives for February 2026

52 IN 52, Book #7: The Ruin of a Rake by Cat Sebastian

Ahh, the last of the series! Unsurprisingly, I also really enjoyed this one, although admittedly I think it was my least favorite of the trilogy (although, to be fair, it being my “least favorite” of a series I liked a lot still means I enjoyed it more than many other books I’ve read).

This book follows Lord Courtenay, famously a rake and a libertine, as he falls in with Julian Medlock, self-made man who has taken it upon himself for his sister’s sake to rehabilitate Courtenay’s image. The two men don’t get along at all; Julian is condescending toward Courtenay and Courtenay seems to enjoy pissing Julian off. Of the three books in this series I think this one gets closest to the enemies-to-lovers trope, and also is the only book where the conflict is actually about interpersonal harm done by one party to the other instead of being a conflict to do with class or expectations the way it was in the previous two books.

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52 IN 52, Book #6: The Lawrence Browne Affair by Cat Sebastian

In this book, which is a continuation following The Soldier’s Scoundrel, we follow Georgie Turner as he takes a new job with the famously insane Earl of Radnor in his dilapidated manor. Georgie is meant to be using the job as a way to get away from a deal gone bad and to brainstorm ways to get his old gang off his tail, but unexpectedly he finds himself rather taken with the mad Earl and enjoying his role as secretary. But the past does have a way of catching up to people, and Georgie is no exception.

As with the first book in this series, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked it! One thing I appreciated about the first book and am now beginning to feel is a theme for Cat Sebastian is that the homophobia and societal expectations of Edwardian England (or Victorian… honestly I can’t tell) are present on the fringes, but they aren’t the driving force behind the conflicts of the story. It comes up when it’s appropriate for it to come up, but otherwise the characters are able to recognize their mutual attraction and act on it, and although there is obviously a need to be discreet about their relationship, there’s no excessive shame or internalized homophobia about it. I find this really refreshing in comparison to some other historical gay romances I’ve read.

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52 IN 52, Book #5: Not Dating Material by Saxon James

On the surface this book is basically right up my alley. I love a good-boy-bad-boy romance, especially with one big punkass—see also The Nightmare Before Kissmas or The Entanglement of Rival Wizards—and the marketing definitely made this book seem like it would deliver! Our main characters here are Molly, a golden retriever type who’s recently moved to Seattle, and Seven, his heavily tattooed, avoidantly attached, black cat energy roommate. Molly wants nothing more than for a man to love him, and Seven is assiduously avoiding romantic relationships. What could go wrong, right?

Unfortunately, where this book fell a little short of my expectations is mostly in the characterization. Everybody in this book is a mess. Molly seems to base his entire self-worth on whether men find him fuckable and is embarrassingly eager and willing to date basically any guy who looks his way; Seven, as mentioned above, is extremely avoidantly attached and struggles with expressing any kind of emotion; Xander, Seven’s foster brother, has debilitating medical anxiety and an unhealthily codependent relationship with Seven; none of these people are in therapy or seem to have any intention of getting into therapy until literally the last couple pages of the book. And, like, you guys! You’re in Seattle! You can throw a penny in the air in Seattle and hit three queer and traumatized people on the way down! There are so many community resources and mutual aid resources that could help them deal with their traumas and they’re not availing themselves of a single one. Jeez!

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52 IN 52, Book #4: I Am Agatha by Nancy Foley

Honestly, I was a little surprised by how much I enjoyed this book! It’s a bit outside my usual genre preferences, but I decided to give it a try anyway based on the sapphic and somewhat mysterious angle, and I’m very pleased I did. I Am Agatha is the story of eccentric and somewhat misanthropic artist Agatha Smithson, who in her late sixties/early seventies moves to New Mexico and builds a house on Mesa Portales. There, she strikes up a friendship with Alice, the widow who owns the land where her house sits, and that friendship becomes a relationship that ultimately challenges everything Agatha believes about herself and what it means to move through the world.

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52 IN 52, Book #3: Graverobber Whiskey by AM Kelly

Graverobber Whiskey is the second book in this graverobber series by AM Kelly, following Graverobber Blues which I reviewed last week, and once again it follows Will Ashton and the motley crew of mages and mage-adjacents that comprise Ashland Investigations and associates. The book picks up less than a year after the events of Graverobber Blues, telling the story of an unexpected visit from a medium from overseas who seeks Ashton and Dirty Henry out for their assistance investigating the disappearance of her brother. The investigation, which feels like a bad idea from the start, ends up having unexpected consequences for all parties involved.

Thank you to the author, AM Kelly, who provided me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

This is where the spoilers start, beware!

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52 IN 52, Book #2: Graverobber Blues by AM Kelly

Graverobber Blues by AM Kelly is the first in a series that follows Will Ashton, a necromage (aka necromancer) in South Carolina who has a place at a magic school, a beautiful girlfriend, and a very big secret—that “Will” is secretly short for Wilhelmina. In order to prove to herself, her school, and her lover’s uncle that she is talented and worthy, Ashton attempts to undertake an audacious heist-slash-experiment that would elevate her reputation. Her plans are foiled by an even more audacious and talented necromage with ambitions that run counter to her own, and they go head-to-head against each other in a battle to see who can get there first that takes place entirely over the course of one South Carolina night.

This comment doesn’t really fit into the 5P structure below, but I do want to muse on it a little. Ashton is such an interesting character to me because despite being someone who is somewhat on the outskirts of society herself—in particular, being a woman who loves another woman, and being someone who has had to disguise herself as a man in order to achieve anything academically—she is so extremely dedicated to upholding and adhering to the social structures that have forced her into that position. She hates the way her lover, Rosheen, is spoken to and treated as a woman and a healer, but then turns around and admonishes Dirty Henry for behaving rudely to his social betters. Even when things start to really break bad in the story, Ashton seems convinced that she can just go to the dean of the university and tell him and he’ll take care of everything, seemingly without considering that the dean of the university represents the exact academic system that rewards the privilege of money and gender. Another character in the story, J.P., is a former Underground Railroad participant, and Dirty Henry’s wife is Black and his son is biracial, and Ashton does seem to understand that racism is a symptom of a fucked-up society. But also, Ashton is a white woman pretending to be a man in pursuit of academia, and because her race and her (assumed) gender grant her the privilege of chasing that goal, she seems unwilling to really do anything to challenge the status quo and in fact devotes quite a bit of time to trying to convince people who are decidedly below her on the social pecking order that they should fall in line too. This could honestly be a really interesting angle for Ashton’s character development, as it becomes increasingly apparent to her that continuing to adhere to these social mores is not only not going to have the outcome she wants, but will also be actively damaging to the people she’s growing to care about, so I’m interested in seeing where AM Kelly will take it in future books.

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