A fabulous YA introduction into the world of high fantasy.

This book is a must read if you like: YA high fantasy, Tolkien, and unique villains.

About the Book:

Title: Fog & Fireflies
Genre(s): Fantasy
Author: T.H. Lehnen
Published by: Aspen & Thorn Press
Date Published: January 2, 2026
Format Read: AudioBook
Where I Got It: NetGalley gave me a copy of this book.
Stand alone or series Number: It is a stand alone book.

Snapshot: what do you need to know before you pick up the book.

Profanity: None.
Intimacy: None.
Violence: Descriptions of war injuries, tense situations.
Themes: Coming of age.

My Thoughts

This book has a dark feel, but it is written for YA so it isn’t extremely dark.

I don’t have the attention span for much high fantasy, but the YA made this very approachable. I took it in small chunks and it took longer than I usually take to listen.

I thought this book had very unique takes on time travel, old gods, and different species.

I really like the part where you start to realize the fog can do more than just move and hide things

.It moved a bit slow sometimes.

I thought the narrator worked fine. Sometimes I wished they had gotten a female narrator.

Overall, I really liked the book and I’m grateful I got an opportunity to read it.

Description

With refreshing echoes of golden age fantasy, Fog & Fireflies is a novel that brings together an imaginative world and fantastical cast of characters to explore the difference between growing older and growing up.

“Why do we grow more scared as we get older?”

Hundreds of seasons ago, a wizard’s war scarred the earth, leaving a malevolent fog blanketing the land, and carrying the settlements within it like ships adrift at sea. The phantoms the fog creates are deadly to adults, so children must guard the walls now, and care for each other.

Ogma watches the fog from the walls of her windmill town. What felt like a game as a child becomes more of a creeping dread with each season she gets older.

“Because we know better.”

Ogma’s town is attacked—caravaners who roam the fog in inhuman forms have come to kidnap the children, and Ogma is lost in the fog. She must find hope, find courage in herself, and find her friends.

A novel for readers who enjoy rich worldbuilding in the style of Hayao Miyazaki, a unique cast of creatures and characters that harkens back to L. Frank Baum and Arthur Rackham, and the bonds of found family akin to the work of Maggie Stiefvater and Makoto Shinkai.

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