Alyssa’s Library | The Unbroken (Magic of the Lost, 1)

The Unbroken (Magic of the Lost, 1)

C. L. Clark

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On the far outreaches of a crumbling desert empire, two women—a princess and a soldier—will haggle over the price of a nation in this richly imagined, breath-taking sapphic epic fantasy filled with rebellion, espionage, and assassinations.

Touraine is a soldier. Stolen as a child and raised to kill and die for the empire, her only loyalty is to her fellow conscripts. But now, her company has been sent back to her homeland to stop a rebellion, and the ties of blood may be stronger than she thought.

Luca needs a turncoat. Someone desperate enough to tiptoe the bayonet's edge between treason and orders. Someone who can sway the rebels toward peace, while Luca focuses on what really matters: getting her uncle off her throne.

Through assassinations and massacres, in bedrooms and war rooms, Touraine and Luca will haggle over the price of a nation. But some things aren't for sale.

“A perfect military fantasy: brutal, complex, human and impossible to put down.” — Tasha Suri, author of Empire of Sand

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Posts about this title from Alyssa’s Library

Alyssa’s Library\ \ alyssa\ \ • Sep 29 2025

in honour of a certain book coming out and just the state of the world, here are some books with trans, non-binary, and genderqueer characters that you should read. it’s so incredibly important to continue to uplift these voices and i hope you all enjoy these and feel free to comment some more recommendations!\ \ fantasy & sci-fi\ - the spirit bares its teeth / compound fracture by andrew joseph white\ - the unbroken by c. l. clark\ - the blighted stars by megan e. o’keefe\ - pet by akwaeke emezi\ - faebound / the final strife by saara el-artifi\ - these burning stars by bethany jacobs\ - she who became the sun by shelley parker-chan\ - lakelore by anna marie-mclemore\ - hammajang luck by makana yamamtao\ - the witch king by h. e edgmon \ - the city beautiful by aden polydorous\ \ -her majesty’s royal coven by juno dawson\ \ -light from uncommon stars by ryka aoki\ - a bone in his teeth by kellen graves\ \ -brighter than scale swifter than flame by neon yang\ \ -mistress of lies by k m enright\ \ -cemerety boys / the sunbearer trails by aiden thomas\ \ -sorrowland by rivers solomon\ \ -seven devils by laura lam and elizabeth may\ \ romance\ - a gentlemans gentleman by tj alexander \ - make room for love by darcy liao\ - love & other disasters by anita kelly\ - i wish you all the best by mason deaver\ \ -felix ever after by kacen callender

TRANS BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS

27 books

Posts about this book from across Bindery

chronicallybookish\ \ Kaley\ \ • Jul 23

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Disability Pride Readathon Recommendations ft. 20 disabled creators + authors!

Learn more about the Disability Pride Readathon: https://chronicallybookish.binderybooks.com/item/5Rafar4S0p8u5nIBb14Z/

Learn more about the books: https://bookshop.org/lists/disability-pride-recs-chronicallybookish (If you purchase a book from this link I make a 10% commission and you support indie bookstores!)

Follow the Creators & Authors: Rochelle (@goodmornindreamer) Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/goodmornindreamer\_/

El (@ermreading) Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ermreading/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@ermreading

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34 books

Wanderland Reads\ \ Sayer\ \ • Mar 20

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Disabled sapphic people exist. You know this, I know this, but sometimes it feels like the greater book community does not, in fact, know this. We love, date, build relationships, and navigate intimacy in ways that deserve space on the page.\ \ Romance as a genre has not always made room for our stories.\ \ Many books still center on able-bodied characters. And while there is nothing wrong with that, when disability does appear, it often shows up as something to fix, overcome, or use as emotional motivation for another character. Disabled characters become symbols instead of people.\ \ I'd love to see the focus shift to something different.\ \ Stories where disabled sapphic main characters hold agency, desire, complexity, and full lives. Stories where disability shapes the relationship without reducing the character to it.\ \ Moving beyond harmful tropes\ \ A few patterns show up again and again in romance.\ \ The cure narrative treats disability as a temporary obstacle. By the end of the story, the character improves or is “fixed,” often through love. The way I wish love could cure my chronic illness or disability.\ \ The inspiration narrative turns disabled characters into lessons for others. Our role centers on teaching resilience rather than living a full life.\ \ The caregiver dynamic creates an imbalance. One partner exists to provide care, while the other becomes dependent in ways that remove autonomy.\ \ Desexualization appears often. Y'all disabled people FUCK. Disabled characters rarely receive the same level of desire, attraction, or explicit intimacy as able-bodied characters.\ \ These patterns limit storytelling. They flatten characters and reinforce harmful assumptions about disability and worth.\ \ Stronger stories move in a different direction.\ \ They allow disabled characters to want things. To make decisions. To be messy. To experience joy, frustration, attraction, and connection without being reduced to a single trait.\ \ Disability and autonomy\ \ Autonomy should sit at the center of disabled sapphic romance.\ \ Seeing characters navigate questions around independence, support, and control over their own lives. These questions can shape how relationships develop.\ \ A partner may offer help. The key question involves how that help gets negotiated.\ \ Does the disabled character maintain control over decisions?\ \ Do they set boundaries around what support looks like?\ \ Does the relationship respect their independence rather than override it?\ \ Good romance pays attention to these dynamics.\ \ Support does not mean taking over. Care does not mean removing agency. The relationship works because both people respect each other’s boundaries and needs.\ \ For readers, this often leads to more grounded and intentional relationship development.\ \ Disability and intimacy\ \ Romance often relies on narrow ideas about intimacy. Fast pacing. Physical attraction that follows predictable patterns. Assumptions about what bodies should do and how.\ \ Disabled sapphic romance can and should challenge those assumptions.\ \ Intimacy becomes more intentional. Characters communicate clearly about needs, comfort, and limits, and tbh this isn't any different than how it should be with able-bodied characters either. Physical connection may look different from mainstream portrayals.\ \ Some stories focus on slower pacing. Others show adaptive approaches to physical intimacy. Many highlight emotional connection as central rather than secondary.\ \ These shifts do not reduce the romance. They deepen it.\ \ Desire remains present. Attraction remains central. The difference lies in how characters express and negotiate that connection.\ \ The role of communication\ \ Communication carries more weight in these stories.\ \ Characters talk about access needs. They discuss boundaries. They name what works and what does not.\ \ This creates a different type of romantic tension. Instead of relying on miscommunication or avoidance, these stories often build connection through honesty.\ \ Vulnerability becomes part of the relationship from the beginning.\ \ Readers get to watch two people learn how to understand each other in real time. That process often leads to a stronger emotional payoff.\ \ Intersectionality matters\ \ Disability does not exist in isolation.\ \ Race, class, gender identity, and culture shape how disability gets experienced. Access to care, community support, and safety vary widely depending on those factors.\ \ A disabled sapphic character who is also a person of color will navigate different challenges than a white disabled character. A working-class character will face different barriers than someone with financial stability.\ \ Stories that acknowledge these layers feel more grounded.\ \ They show how systems intersect. They also show how community, culture, and identity shape relationships in complex ways.\ \ What meaningful representation looks like\ \ Readers often ask how to identify strong representation.\ \ Look for characters with full inner lives. They have goals, fears, desires, and flaws that extend beyond their disability.\ \ Look for relationships built on mutual respect. Both partners hold agency. Both contribute to the relationship in meaningful ways.\ \ Look for stories where disability exists as part of the character’s life, not the entire story.\ \ Look for joy. Disabled characters deserve happiness, pleasure, and connection without the narrative framing those experiences as rare or surprising.\ \ When possible, look for authors with lived experience. That perspective often leads to more nuanced and grounded storytelling.\ \ Where to find these stories\ \ Disabled sapphic protagonists appear across genres.\ \ Contemporary romance often explores chronic illness, mental health, and day-to-day access needs.\ \ Fantasy and science fiction create space to imagine different bodies, different abilities, and different systems of care.\ \ Historical fiction can explore how disability was understood and navigated in earlier periods.\ \ Speculative fiction often pushes these questions even further, asking how societies might function if access and care looked different from the start.\ \ An invitation to read with intention\ \ Disabled sapphic romance expands how we understand love.\ \ It shows relationships built through communication, respect, and adaptation. It challenges narrow ideas about desirability and intimacy. It reminds readers that care and autonomy can exist together.\ \ These stories deserve attention.\ \ If you have read a disabled sapphic romance that stayed with you, share it. If you want to see more of these stories, talk about them. Recommend them. Support the authors writing them.\ \ What you read and what you share shapes what gets visibility.\ \ And these stories deserve to be seen.\ \ Here are a list of a handful of sapphic stories that I have read and enjoyed, and some on my TBR!\ \ The Unbroken by C.L. Clark\ \ Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant\ \ The Never Tilting World by Rin Chupeco\ \ Thirsty by Jas Hammonds\ \ Treasure by Rebekah Weatherspoon\ \ Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner\ \ Nine of Swords, Reversed by Xan West\ \ Ascension by Jacqueline Koyanagi\ \ Join for free or login

Disabled Sapphic Protagonists in Romance

8 books

chronicallybookish\ \ Kaley\ \ • Nov 6 2025

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november book club pick!

We are very cool I promise 😎 #booktokfyp #bookclub #fantasybookclub #romancebookclub #disabilitybooks

5 books

Wanderland Reads\ \ Sayer\ \ • Oct 21 2025

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Speculative Fiction as a Labratory

18 books

Alyssa’s Library\ \ alyssa\ \ • Sep 29 2025

TRANS BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS

27 books

chronicallybookish\ \ Kaley\ \ • May 23 2025

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June Book Club Pick!

Six of Crows!!!! Whether you’d be rereading or reading for the first time—you should join us!!

4 books

chronicallybookish\ \ Kaley\ \ • Apr 28 2025

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May Book Club Pick + June Voting Options

Did you know I run a disability-themed book club over on Discord?

Diversify With Disability alternates each month between Fantasy and Romance books, always with an emphasis on disability, chronic illness, and mental illness representation.

We’ve read books like Out on a Limb by Hannah Bonam-Young and The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon. We’re currently finishing up To a Darker Shore by Leanne Schwartz—and will even be doing a Live Q&A with her in early May!

Our May read will be Reel by Kennedy Ryan, and we are currently voting on our June Fantasy pick! (Voting closes 11am PT May 1st)

You can get access to the book club discord by following the FREE tier of my Bindery (link in bio!)—plus all the other benefits of that free subscription.

5 books

Peppered Ink\ \ Mary\ \ • Mar 27 2025

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A mini family day trip (and a few giveaway reminders!)

For a chance to win what ELSE I picked up from those bookshops, be sure to subscribe to my Bindery… 😘

3 books

Written Reveries\ \ Krystal\ \ • Mar 21 2025

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Trans Rights Readathon 2025 Recs & TBR

Trans Rights Readathon 2025 Recs: A Psalm For the Wild Built & A Prayer for the Crown Shy by Becky Chambers Pet & Bitter by Akwaeke Emezi Light From Uncommon Stars Ryka Aoki Most Ardently by Gabe Cole Novoa The Sunbearer Trials by Aiden Thomas The Final Strife by Saara El-Arifi House of Frank by Kay Synclaire The Deep by Rivers Solomon Legendborn by Tracy Deonn The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse The Vanished Birds by Simon Jimenez TBR: Somadina by Akwaeke Emezi Model Home by Rivers Solomon She Who Became the Sun and He Who Drowned the World by Shelley Parker-Chan I Feed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me by Jamison Shea Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto The Unbroken by C. L. Clark

#bookrecommendations #bookish #bookstagram

21 books

Peppered Ink\ \ Mary\ \ • Mar 11 2025

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Poll:\ \ What do you do to keep track of your want-to-read pile?\ \ I'm not sure when I started doing this, but at some point, I decided that books I couldn't immediately treat myself to got a quick photo instead so I would remember to return to them.\ \ Whether or not that's a suuupper smart idea is... debatable. I love having a visual reference for when I CAN treat myself, but it also means that my neverending TBR stays neverending.\ \ Who else does something similar? Let me know!\ \ Join for free or login

Does anyone else take photos of books they want??

11 books

Skies Press\ \ Emma\ \ • Feb 17 2025

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Genre Fiction Books by Black American Authors (My B&N had not one single table set up)

I think a few of the booksellers at this location follow me so if you see this 👀👀👀 “accidentally” send it to your manager. 🧍‍♀️ There are DOZENS of tables at this store alone and not one was set up for Black History Month when I was there twice last week. We should be celebrating black voices in publishing all the time, but to not be doing so at a bare minimum of during BHM?? There’s like 4 different subgenres of romance tables but not one Black Voices table, c’mon. Anyway here’s like 30 books I quickly pulled off my own shelf, a mix of books I’ve read and loved and books on my TBR 📚 #booktok #bookrecs #tbr #barnesandnoble #fantasybooks #horrorbooks #yabooks #bookshopping #sacramento #booktoker #emmaskiesreads #books

13 books

Sapph-Lit\ \ Nina\ \ • Feb 10 2025

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Happy Black History Month from Sapph-Lit 💗

Remember that Black history is also American history, it doesn’t stop & start in just one month. These books are for every month of every year! Read up, open your purse, and buy titles you’re interested in from indie bookstores 🫡✨

48 books

Sapph-Lit\ \ Nina\ \ • Jun 28 2024

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Pride Month Reading List: FANTASY

Sharing the slide I forgot to include in my IG carousel, now expanded to 10 incredible sapphic fantasy reads.

10 books

Sapphic and Proud \ \ Amivi\ \ • May 13 2023

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#fantasybookrec #beastsofprey #bloodscionbook #yafantasyrecs #blackfantasybooks #rageofdragons

8 books

Fantasy & Frens\ \ Zoranne\ \ • Mar 17 2023