Welcome back to Goodreads Monday! It’s been a very hot minute since I did one but I figured I might as well get back into it! This weekly meme was started by @Lauren’s Page Turners and it invites you to pick a book from your TBR and explain why you want to read it. Easy enough, right? Feel free to join in if you want to! I’ll be using a random number generator to pick my books from my insanely long GR Want-to-read list.

This week’s featured book is The Midnight Lie (The Midnight Lie #1) by Marie Rutkoski. This is a YA fantasy published earlier this year and it has a 3.96 rating on Goodreads with 1k+ reviews.

Where Nirrim lives, crime abounds, a harsh tribunal rules, and society’s pleasures are reserved for the High Kith. Life in the Ward is grim and punishing. People of her low status are forbidden from sampling sweets or wearing colors. You either follow the rules, or pay a tithe and suffer the consequences.

Nirrim keeps her head down and a dangerous secret close to her chest.

But then she encounters Sid, a rakish traveler from far away who whispers rumors that the High Caste possesses magic. Sid tempts Nirrim to seek that magic for herself. But to do that, Nirrim must surrender her old life. She must place her trust in this sly stranger who asks, above all, not to be trusted.

Set in the world of the New York Times–bestselling Winner’s Trilogy, beloved author Marie Rutkoski returns with an epic LGBTQ romantic fantasy about learning to free ourselves from the lies others tell us—and the lies we tell ourselves.

Why do I want to read it?

I’m pretty sure that this gorgeous cover is what stopped me in my tracks the first time I came across this book. We don’t like admitting it but we all cover judge and I pretty much added it to my TBR because of that! 😂 After reading the synopsis and seeing quite a few reviews, I did hear mixed things but I became even more intrigued and I’m looking forward to giving it a try. I haven’t read anything by Rutkoski before although based on reviews mentioning it, her Winner’s Trilogy is quite a popular series, and this is apparently set in that same world.

Have you read The Midnight Lie or is it on your TBR?