Fireheart Tiger, by Aliette de Bodard

Tor.com, ISBN 9781250793270 February 2021

Thanh is a princess sent off at twelve as a hostage to another, allied nation Ephteria. Her experiences over the next ten years include falling in love with Princess Eldris, who will someday be Queen of Ephteria, and surviving a fire that destroys a palace there, and kills a lot of people. 

In the course of escaping that fire, she meets Giang, a servant girl from her own country of Binh Hai, who helped her get out of the burning palace, and whom she could never locate afterward.

Now she's back in Binh Hai, the least favored daughter of the Empress, and nominally responsible for managing negotiations with Ephteria. Ephteria has been growing stronger, a threat at least as much as an ally and trading partner, and negotiations will be tricky. Along with the more usual members of the delegation, Princess Eldris has come, and she has her own plans.

The Past Is Red, by Catherynne M. Valente

Tordotcom, ISBN 9781250301130, July 2021

I'm honestly not sure how I feel about this one. No question it's well-written, with some interesting characters.

It's set on a floating garbage patch after global warming has wiped out human civilization, as the rising oceans has drowned the land. The people surviving call the garbage patch the story is set on Garbagetown. Brighton Pier, the actual Brighton Pier, has been equipped with engines, and is traveling, apparently, among various floating garbage patch settlements. Early on, Garbagetown engaged in the Great Sorting, and one result is that, whatever you need, you know where to go to get it--assuming it's part of the wreckage of the civilization now called Fuckwits, that collected in this garbage patch.

Elder Race, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Tordotcom, ISBN 9781250768728, November 2021

Lynesse Fourth Daughter is not her mother's favorite daughter. Indeed, she's barely acceptable, not learning to be diplomatic, reliable, a potential leader of the nation of Lannesite, which her mother rules. Indeed, she has done shocking things, like walk up the mountain to the tower where the sorcerer, Nyrgoth Elder lives. The sorcerer hasn't emerged since the days of Astresse Once Regent.

Lynesse's first trip up the mountain was as a child, just to see the tower and possibly the sorcerer. Court functionaries etched her down, and she got in the worst trouble ever.

Now, as an adult, she has headed back up the mountain again, with serious intent, because something monstrous is attacking neighboring polities, sending refugees fleeing to Lannesite, and her mother the Queen, and her advisors, think it's just the normal contentions among the lesser polities of Ordwood. They'll take in refugees, but not mobilize to take any action against the claimed demon, who surely doesn't exist. Lynesse has gone to the tower to awake and summon the sorcerer.

Nyrgoth Elder isn't a sorcerer. He's an anthropologist, second class, and when awakened from stasis, he's feeling very isolated, suspecting that the authorities that left him there may no longer exist.

A Spindle Splintered (Fractured Fables #1) by Alix E. Harrow (author), Amy Landon (narrator)

Macmillan Audio, ISBN 9781250824486, October 2021

It's Zinnia Gray's 21st birthday, and she does not expect to have a 22nd. Due to an industrial accident when she was a young child, she has a rare genetic disease, and no one with this disease has lived past 21. She's become quiet and not outgoing, but she does have one good friend, Charmaine--or Charm.

Charm has planned a perfect birthday party for Zinnia, built around the story of Sleeping Beauty, in the tower of an abandoned prison. Zinnia is not too sure about the perfectness of this, especially when she sees the spinning wheel, and its spindle. Nevertheless, Charm persuades her to prick her finger on the spindle--and finds herself falling through the multiverse, seeing a long line of "Sleeping Beauties." She calls out to them, and one calls back.