Tag: recommendations

This week I want to acknowledge all of the things that this book series opened my awareness to. Kushiel’s Legacy (the first trilogy), is an amazing fantasy novel series from the early 2000s by Jaqueline Carey. You can find more about her and them at: https://www.jacquelinecarey.com/kushiels-legacy-trilogies/

I will be vague about the details of the story and world building, both of which are excellent and very complicated. They center on a fantasy version of a pre-industrial France, with a complicated monarchy and polytheistic religion, including a goddess of sex work, Namaah. The story centers around a young woman born into service of this goddess, then thrust by circumstances and fate (or gods) into a life of intrigue.

Oh My! These books introduced me to concepts about consent, kink, legacies, parenting, fostering, international politics, polyamory, war, succession and so much more. It also put all of this into a world where every single one of these things is sacred.

It changed the way I look at love, my body, politics, desire, relationships, marriage, religion, duty, maybe everything. Not that these books are a bible or a text to live you life by, no not at all, but they did open my eyes and expand my imagination as to how things could be. Knowing that things could be different changed my life.

I am rereading Kushiel’s Chosen right now, and while I have a different perspective on many things, I am grateful for the things I have learned from this series. I have grown a lot since I fell in love with Phedre, so glad her story opened so many doors for me.