The Phoenix Keeper was… nice (with one exception). Very pleasant. “Wholesome”, no bad feelings or ugly arguments or messy morals.

The plotting is tidy and by the book, straightforward and quite readable. Aila's always got some small victory to celebrate and always some hurdle or potential complication looming ahead to propel readers forward. Aila herself is very sweet tempered and dedicated, but suffers from some REAL rough social anxiety (also potentially autism?) and occasionally is a bit self-involved or lets some prejudice or other–like her college experience Luciana–cloud her judgement. Luciana–the rival in the rivals-to-lovers romance–initially comes across as a bit prissy, but is partially just responding to Aila's prejudice and is actually a level-headed hard worker.

Maclean's prose is lovely. Very solid, very readable, there are lovely and varied descriptions of the zoo grounds and different animals, including Aila's pet carbuncle (I'm picturing the carbuncles specifically from FFXIV btw).

The Phoenix Keeper is a “clean” romance, so no intimate scenes, and one kiss. In fact, it's so absurdly clean I don't think I even encountered a real curse word. Like, you can leave this book out around your grandparents without worry.

The Phoenix Keeper takes place in a fantasy version of our world. I presume MacLean did this to sidestep any possible political messiness or fallout, and avoid any bad vibes detracting from the feelgood romance and character interactions. It's not overwhelming to keep in mind as you read, and there's frequent references in the story.

Something that bugged me is that this is an f/f romance, but Aila spends the first half of the book flirting with and dating Connor, a guy. This wasn't advertised anywhere in the blurb and I didn't come here for it! Worse, it means I spent half the book annoyed and anxious. I've been screwed, I've read books pitched as f/f books that were actually m/f books. Almost every sapphic woman has had a similar experience. All I'm saying is: label your goddamn tins. I would've still read the book, but I wouldn't have spent half of it with bad feelings.

*4.5 stars*

This was so cute and sweet. A very fun story with the perfect amount of romance and mystery. A lot of people have different definitions of cozy fantasy, and while this is certainly not without conflict or stakes, I personally think this book is cozy.

I thought the first half of the book was a little slow but still enjoyed the building of this modern world filled with magical creatures. While that setting was a little jarring at first when the main character gets out her laptop to watch a live feed of a phoenix nest, it felt more natural as the story progressed. The romance was really sweet and seeing the characters grow was fun. I thought the mental health representation was done really well. This toed the line between whimsical and academic really well and I think it will definitely be enjoyed by fans of books like the Emily Wilde or Lady Trent series.

The audio was nice and the narrator was very enjoyable to listen to.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ALC of this work. All opinions in this review are my own.

plot-wise, this leans closer to contemporary fiction. an animal nerd with social anxiety having her dream job: working at a zoo. except the zoo is filled with mystical magical beasts like phoenixes, kelpies, griffin, dragons, etc. reminded me of The Natural History of Dragons because it's really nerdy. wasn't hooked until I reached 50% mark. the romance was verry slow burn, and the last 4 chapters (not including the epilogue) got my heart racing at the end of my seat because PHEW that was intense!

the narrator's performance was amazing. i especially loved how she voiced Luciana. but overall it's so good.

i just wish there's more illustrations of the beasts, each one of the species, because that would be extra wonderful.

Cosy Fantasy, aka mostly chilled pace. Slightly annoying and whiny MC. This reminded me a little of The Ornithologist's Field Guide to Love, which I abandoned halfway through (bored). I was tempted here as well. Are magical animals the new, trendy thing besides cosy stories about bookshops?

What is it all about?

“As head phoenix keeper at a world-renowned zoo for magical creatures, Aila's childhood dream of conserving critically endangered firebirds seems closer than ever. There's just one glaring caveat: her zoo's breeding program hasn't functioned for a decade. When a tragic phoenix heist sabotages the flagship initiative at a neighbouring zoo, Aila must prove her derelict facilities are fit to take the reins.“ (from the book blurb)

Aila was hard work. Suffering from anxiety, scared to speak to patrons, no social skills to speak and very self-centered. The main conflict with her frenemy could have been solved if they had just talked to each other. She basically hates her because she laughed at her in college.
I might have enjoyed this predictable story more, if I hadn’t disliked Aila so much. She was way too selfish and immature for a woman of almost 30. Being an introvert with anxiety issues is no excuse for being ignorant of others, including the needs of a best friend. And despite supposedly being this huge expert on phoenixes, she failed at a very obvious part of her job. I realize that all of this was on purpose to move the plot along, but it didn‘t endear her to me.

The eventual romance made me mostly roll my eyes. There was no chemistry between the characters. Definitely nothing burning brightly, as the cover mentions. If you want to read a romance novel, this isn’t it.

There is some action towards the end that is nice enough. But again very predictable and I had really lost my will to live at that point and didn’t care. I was rooting for the kelpie to eat the bad guy.

The fantastical world is just place names stuck to an otherwise contemporary setting, with mobiles, livecams and tex-mex food. Swap the magical animals with the usual zoo inhabitants and the fantastic place names with standard locations and it would have worked just as well. It felt very lazy. There wasn‘t any attempt at world building to make this world interesting or give it any depth.

I mostly lost interest during the second half of the book. I was pretty sure what would happen and was spot-on with all major plot points.

Unlikeable and immature MC, formulaic barely-there romance and a pointless Fantasy setting. 🐦‍🔥🐦‍🔥
The audio was done well, considering the whiny MC. 🎧🎧🎧🎧
Very generously rounding this up to 🐦‍🔥🐦‍🔥🐦‍🔥 because of the audio.

I doubt I will recommend this to others and I won‘t read anything else by the author.

I received an advanced copy of this audiobook from @HachetteAudio through NetGalley. All opinions are my own and I was not required to give a positive review.

Aila loves taking care of her animals in the magical Zoo, but she especially loves her female Phoenix. What she doesn't love is interacting with the patrons. Painfully shy, she bungles most of the speeches she has to give. But when the opportunity to breed her critically endangered Phoenix arises, Aila decides to tackle the challenge. Even if she has to talk to board members, reporters and her nemesis in the griffin department - Luciana.

The Phoenix Keeper is a cute, low stakes cosy fantasy that I enjoyed very much. I loved getting to know the fantastical animals and Aila's character growth.

Aila is a very exhausting character. She is trapped by her fears of public speaking, people in general and is the epitome of a workaholic. She struggles with seeing more than her problems and is at the same time super aware of them. She has a therapist, for God's sake! Some readers may struggle to connect to her and will not understand her struggles and actions (aka she should just get "over it" or "get on with it"). As someone who has faced similar problems, I can understand her very well. Her friends and colleagues are much more outgoing and friendly and I love her best friend Tanya.

Stephanie Bentley, the narrator of the audio book, portraits Aila's struggles and passion for Phoenixes very well and I enjoyed listening to her thoroughly.

The story was somewhat predictable. The struggles until the gets approved for breeding her Phoenix, the love story (sapphic!), the poacher plot... But while this is not groundbreaking new plot, it is cosy and cute and was kind of a palate cleanser between high stakes political intrigue and murder most foul for me.

Thank you to Netgalley and Hachette Audio for the download of this audiobook!

Sat down, and finished this in one day. Really cozy and lovely.

Synopsis: Head phoenix keeper at a magical creatures zoo, Alia is quiet, anxious, and has dreamed of phoenixes her whole life. The breed is quite endangered, and after a neighboring zoo has its new phoenix chicks stolen by poachers, Alia is determined to start up her zoo's breeding program after 10 years. But, she only has two months to make this dream come true. So unfortunately, she must get over her deep grudge for fellow (perfect) zookeeper Luciana, and ask her rival for assistance. Impossible. Especially when Luciana is more concerned with using phoenixes in her show rather than a conservation exhibit. Now not only does the breed's future fall into her hands, but also the fate of her job, and maybe the fate of her love life.

Plot: I wasn't really sure how I was going to feel about this since it's a very light fantasy with a smaller plot, but I was very impressed and stayed intrigued the whole time. The entire vibe was so cozy and magical but still felt rooted in reality. There were many real and important conversations about conservation, anxiety, and overcoming fears. Although the pacing was a little slow throughout the entirety of the book, I feel as though if you know you're heading into a cozy fantasy, then the pacing is fine. I also was truly not expecting the twist and the ending to come to such an action sequence, but it didn't feel strange or out of character. My only real complaint is that I wish the world was expanded a bit more. There were a lot of magical creatures that were mentioned and ones that were completely new to me, which was fun, but the rest of the world, apart from names mentioned, felt like a mystery. Alia didn't even leave the zoo for the first 100 pages, making the world seem quite small.

Characters: With cozy fantasies, the characters are the ones that have to bring it together, and they did not disappoint here. Aila was really easy to fall in love with, and watching her struggle with her anxiety and fears and attempting relationships was really heart-warming. Luciana was also a really great character and balanced out Aila really well. Although I wasn't giggling and kicking my feet over the romance, it was still overall really sweet. For me, the story is about Aila and her journey within relationships, not necessarily the relationship itself. The supporting cast was also great, and I feel a large part of that supporting cast was actually the animals themselves. I grew very attached to a lot of them, and as an animal lover myself, this really scratched an itch I didn't know I had.

3.5 stars. (Rounded up to 4).

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit for this ARC. And thank you to Fairyloot for creating the most beautiful edition of this book.

Thank you for letting me review this book! I actually really loved the narration! I think the narrator did a fabulous job. When it comes to the story, I loved that the topic of poaching was brought up and also the passion that conservationists have. LOVED the LGBTQIA+ rep and also the anxiety rep! It was a little hard for me to believe the fmc was in her late twenties, but besides that it was a great book!

Thanks to NetGalley for the Audio ARC!

Narrator and production quality - fantastic, loved it!

I can say with confidence that The Phoenix Keeper has become one of my favorite cozy fantasies. A female main character with anxiety, stage fright, intelligence, and is highly self-motivated?? Sign me up, I resemble this remark! And a magical zoo....I never knew I needed this book but boy howdy did I.

I laughed, I cried, I squealed, I sighed, I hated the poachers and loved the mischievous birds. I loved every second of this story and the characters and the setting and I left feeling like I had a warm hug and I really, really wish this zoo was real.

For a cozy fantasy, I loved the soft elements of course...how tender the relationship between Tanya and Aila is and how warm I felt thinking about Aila's pride in her phoenixes.....but I'd be lying if I said one of my favorite parts wasn't the bite of the romance. The banter (before and after getting together), the spicy thoughts of the meek and anxious FMC.....it was the perfect balance the rest of the cozy and it was SWOON worthy for sure.

Seriously I have no notes, this was exactly what I wanted and I sorta wanna start over and read it again right now....I can't recommend this highly enough!

Thank you to NetGalley & Hachette Audio for the ALC.

This is a cozy fantasy about a young woman who’s a Phoenix Keeper at a zoo with magical creatures.

The narrator was wonderful and I liked the idea of this, but the FMC drove me nuts for the first 60% of the book. She has almost crippling social anxiety and at times I wondered if she was actually written to be neurodivergent with how she interacted with others, but that felt like something that would have been mentioned then as she’s been seeing a therapist for 3 years by now. She just came off as so self centered. Everything was about what she wanted, her best friend was helping her to fix up the Phoenix area to try and relaunch the breeding program, while also trying to get her own volunteer program going. Alia couldn’t be bothered to even remember this and even had the audacity to be upset when Tonya had things to do for it after work instead of helping Alia with her pity party.
Also, as she was trying to get things set up, under a severe time crunch and after multiple times insisting she’d do what she needed to for the birds, she refused to ask for help from another character because she didn’t like her…

Honestly, if it wasn’t for the other characters, I probably would have DNF’d this book, but I loved her friend Tonya. Alia does finally realize what a self centered jerk she’s been but again, it was 60% of the way through the book. The rest of it was pretty predictable, from how the love interests would play out, to who the villain of the story was and why.

That being said, there were some cute moments and I loved the queer rep in this story. Again, the narrator did a wonderful job, she’s probably part of what kept me engaged.

For all those with fantasy in their hearts, who dream of seeing queer-love expressed in fantasy, this is the one for you. Magical zookeepers, queer love - must I say more?!

I really enjoyed this book. I read both the physical version and the audiobook version. I thought the audio was very well done. The narrator really brought the world to life. I loved the physical version as well (I got the Illumicrate editions with beautiful artwork). I think this story would have done well as an anime-- there are such good visual descriptions of the different magical animals. It was so colorful, I could imagine it would be so beautiful to see it in an animated version.

This is a cozy, fantasy story. The stakes are low (we are saving endangered species not the world). Though our main character would say the stakes are very high! It took me a bit to get into (maybe 20%) but once things started happening with the phoenixes I was hooked. It was such a cute, wholesome story. Hearing about the different magical creatures was a delight. And it was fun seeing Aila grow into her roll as phoenix keeper. I loved seeing her grow more attached to the humans at the zoo, not just the animals. I has to re-read the blurb. I feel that the marketing bills this as a romance and the romance is very much just in the background. So if you go in expecting a love story, don't.

Thank you to NetGalley and Hachette Audio for providing an eARC of this audiobook.

Gosh this is so fun and sweet and cozy. The narrator right away makes you engage with the socially awkward nerd of an MC and the entire magic creatures zoo. The cast of characters are so personable as well. Really enjoyed this one as a restorative book between heavy reads, but not without some serious points about animal rights and conservation. Will look forward to more from the author in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley and Hachette Audio | Orbit for the opportunity to listen to The Phoenix Keeper by S.A. MacLean and narrated by Stephanie Bentley in exchange for my honest review.

This book, while intriguing on the surface with its unique premise of magical zookeeping, ultimately left me with mixed feelings. The story follows Aila, a head phoenix keeper struggling to save a critically endangered species while dealing with rivalries, zoo politics, and a love triangle. The concept is imaginative, with an array of mythical creatures, including phoenixes, dragons, and thunderhawks. However, the execution felt more YA than adult, despite the protagonist being in her late twenties.

Aila is where the story falls short for me. Her stubbornness, naivety, and general immaturity make her difficult to root for. Her reluctance to engage with essential aspects of her job, like marketing and public relations, felt unrealistic for someone in her position. Her treatment of her best friend, Tanya, was frustrating, as Aila consistently took her for granted, sidelining her efforts.

The romance doesn’t fully blossom until the final 20-25%, although there's mention of a love triangle there never really is one. This might disappoint readers expecting a stronger romantic element throughout. On the fantasy front, while the magical creatures are a delight, the world-building didn’t go much beyond them. The setting felt underdeveloped, which was a missed opportunity given the potential richness of a world populated by such fascinating beasts.

The narration by Stephanie Bentley was a bright spot. She brought Aila’s anxiety to life with sharp, high-pitched yelps that effectively conveyed the character's emotional state but also became grating at times.

Overall, the book shines in its portrayal of zookeeping and the magical creatures, but the plot and character development left much to be desired. The story’s twists are predictable, and the pacing makes it difficult to stay engaged. This book might appeal more to a younger audience, but as an adult fantasy, it misses the mark.

I had no clue I wanted to read a zookeeper romance, but it was exactly what I wanted. There is so much information about the animals, plus their personalities. It is easy to fall in love with the animals, but especially the birds. Aila has so much social anxiety to overcome, but in the process she finds people she can count on as well as those that challenge her. I was pretty sure of the bad guy early on and it made sense that Aila didn’t see it coming. I loved the way she was able to use her skills to keep all the animals safe. Overall it was wonderful to spend time at this special zoo.

Cute animals, cute love interests, and cute plot. Aila struggles to find the confidence to ask for help, talk to the cute boy she likes and brave speaking publicly. All while dealing with someone she was humiliated by. Her dream is to breed phoenixes but she needs help to get her only chance. Her best friend, the cute dragon keeper, and her college enemy are the help she gets.

I have never read a cozy fantasy before but it fits the description perfectly. You’re rooting for Aila from the start and you can generally see the twists and turns coming but love them anyway. The story flows beautifully and brings conservation alive in a way I didn’t feel possible. I really wish I could visit the San Tamculo Zoo.

I really loved how the narrator (Stephanie Bentley) showed off Aila’s quirks and anxiety while still being clear and enjoyable. It really brought the story to life and made me want to keep listening (even when I should really but it down). It was clear when someone else was talking and what was happing in the story. The only downside for me is not having the map and images and animal information that appear in the book and ebook.

Although Aila is 28, the book is perfect for YA and older readers alike, I would happily recommend this to students, colleagues or friends. The writing doesn’t come across as too mature for younger audiences or too childish for older. Thank you to Orbit and Hachette Audio for the audio version of this book via NetGalley.

How about a cozy fantasy set in a Zoo for magical creatures with one of the cutest sapphic romances ever? If that sounds amazing then you definitely don’t want to miss this book.

I am finding that cozy books have a hard time of finding balance between fun character and relationship development, slice of life comfort, while still having a meaningful plot that continues to move the story forward. The Phoenix Keeper does all this very well and at just the right pace. I loved the story, the characters and all the animals.

If you are looking for a feel good book you can binge in a day or two, this is about the best cozy book I have read I a while!

I was able to listen to the audiobook as I read a long thanks to Hachette Audio for allowing me access to an ALC through Netgalley. This audio is very well done and really captures the tone of the book well. Stephanie Bentley does a fantastic job of creating different voices for each character. It enhanced my reading experience a great deal.

This cozy delight was soooo good! Sweet zoo keepers care for mythological creature residents at the zoo - they have magical attributes that humans hunt them for. As a result, they are critically endangered. The zoo is working within a network to try and rebuild the creatures’ dwindling numbers. Poachers and oddity collectors threaten newly hatched baby phoenixes. Those sweet zoo keepers would give their own lives to keep that from happening. Aila is a passionate phoenix scholar with abysmal social skills. She was a dynamic and interesting main character to follow. Her best friend and other supporting cast members were equally endearing. I had fun in this world and recommending it anyone looking for a cozy fantasy with an animal heavy theme.

The narration for this audiobook performed by Stephanie Bentley was highly enjoyable. I thought she embodied Aila really well. I also really enjoyed how Bentley handled the humor throughout the story. I absolutely recommend the audiobook version of this story if you have access to it!

Thank you NetGalley, S. A. MacLean, Hachette Audio, and Orbit for the audiobook ARC and eARC of this super sweet delight.

There's a lot to like about this book including the setting and some of the side characters! Slightly uncomfortable and weirded out by how often the MC mentions how pale she is and her spice tolerance for food. The romance was such a small part of the book, but the marketing made it out ot be much larger.

Thanks so much to NetGalley and Hachette audio for providing me a review copy!

I want to start off with the things I enjoyed about this book before I dive into the issues I had, so on that note, the easiest praise I have is for the cover: ABSOLUTELY STUNNING. The cover artist nailed the phoenixes, and the style is so simple yet intricate - as a person who unfortunately judges a book by its cover a lot of the time, I'm always appreciative of an eye-catching design. I also want to compliment the narrator, who did a wonderful job bringing the story to life and whose voice offered both clarity and quirkiness to the individual characters. The audio quality itself was also very crisp, and a delight to listen to overall.

Now for the actual story. I had...a few issues with it, to say the least. Firstly, I think this book suffered from a marketing campaign that steered readers' expectations in a direction that is quite different from the plot. When I began this book, I thought it would be a cute, cozy, sapphic romantasy (as per the promotional material), and what I got was a slow-moving, dull story barely able to call itself 'fantasy', and definitely with more of a YA feel than anything else. Maybe if I had gone in with accurate expectations I would have a higher opinion, but sadly that just wasn't the case.

To call this a 'romance' is such a stretch. Is there romance? Sure. Is it a significant enough element for the book to brand itself as 'romantasy'? Absolutely not. But, again, the misleading marketing has pitched it as sapphic romantasy, which is baffling when A) for the first 60% of the book, the main love interest is a guy, and B) the queer romance is underdeveloped, rushed, and overall a small part of the story. This book is more about animal conservation than anything else - obviously, an important topic that deserves attention, but why not flaunt that as the main selling point, then? Also, Luciana

In addition, I struggled with the whole 'fantasy' aspect of the book. Mainly because the only magical elements (literally, at all) were the creatures at the zoo, and even then they were hardly worthy of the name. It was cool seeing these unique animals, but I feel like urban fantasy was the wrong choice for the setting - why not steer into the magic of it all, and create your own high fantasy realm? Especially if the only magical thing about the creatures themselves is their appearance. For the most part, it felt like an ordinary zoo, and the author's lengthy descriptions about these mythical creatures' wonder grew tedious when they all acted like ordinary birds from the real world.

Another issue I had was the 'coziness'. Sigh. I love a heartwarming, low-stakes story, but there is a difference between cozy and boring, and unfortunately I found this book to fit into the latter category. I feel like nothing happened for most of the book, and the things that did happen were so painfully slow or dull that I struggled not to put the book down. Not only that, but it's hard to feel any semblance of a 'cozy' atmosphere when the main character's immaturity is making you cringe every other page. As a neurodivergent, I appreciate the anxiety rep, but having Aila's fears and spirals put under a constant spotlight was mentally exhausting, and only steered me further away from a positive reading experience. She's also just an arrogant, self-centred person for most of the book, not to mention a horrible friend and terrible employee. Anxiety doesn't make you a bad person, but Aila hides behind her mental health issues like she can lay the blame of all her problems on that and her introverted nature. She's a truly exhausting protagonist (who also acts like a sixteen-year-old rather than someone in their twenties?)

The majority of the book was spent getting ready for these big things to happen, and then when they did, these big things would just fall flat and fail to pack the punch the author intended. For example: Aila's zoo getting a new phoenix. A key aspect for the zoo's phoenix program, but it really didn't change what we as readers experience; we still see Aila fussing over her birds (except now she has one more), stressing about everything, and caring for the animals like normal. There was nothing new or unique to draw us in, just more of the same cycle where Aila observes her animals and finds new problems. Then we have an action sequence at the end, which was both predictable and just...meh. We knew nothing bad was going to happen, and I find it really hard to believe that the security would have been poor enough for a break-in to happen. Like, the author rationalised everything with cut camera cords and drugged guards, but considering these phoenixes have already been targeted once, as if they wouldn't have more stringent protocols in place.

I wish I had kinder things to say about this book, but all in all I was quite disappointed once I'd finished. There were certainly some highlights, just not enough to outweigh the sluggish narrative and misrepresented plot.

Thank you Hachette Audio and Netgalley for an early copy of the audiobook for review!
I had really high hopes for this on as an animal lover (especially magical animals) but sadly I was not a fan of the main character. It's 100% a cozy fantasy (although romance is a big part of the plot) and in general cozies are either hit or miss for me- with this is being the latter unfortunately. There were low stakes, and I was further bored by the flat characters that acted like caricatures. I was able to predict the plot within the first 15% so the "twist"/ reveal felt like it took ages because I found it obvious.
The humor wasn't my kind of humor and it read young- the main character (Aila) felt more like 16 as opposed to 28, which is only added to by her severe social anxiety and inability to communicate with anyone. I'm a socially anxious girlie myself so I get it, but this was next level and constant secondhand embarrassment was painful. Like there's a scene where she's trying to flirt with her crush and does it by calling him smelly 😖.
The side characters weren't much better. Luciana's version of flirting is being mean (very high school) and the enemies to lovers felt so forced. Actually both relationships felt rushed and forced. It’s just not a long enough book to introduce a fantasy world with magic, introduce and build romance between a couple, have something happen, then romance with a different pairing all in 500 pages. Not to mention, it’s not until halfway through the book that she even goes on her first date.
It wasn't all bad though- I thought the audiobook narrator did a great job and the bits with all the different magical animals were fun (I always love a unicorn cameo). I also appreciated the rep in this: we get a bi main character, as well as lesbian, bi, and trans side characters. I definitely would read this authors' future works because even though I had some issues, this was a debut.