I love the characters, and each has a distinct flair, though I do wish we learned more of them along the way. Viv recruits Cal, a hob carpenter Tandri, a succubus who manages the day-to-day and artistic needs of the shop Thimble, a softspoken rattkin baker Pendry, a shy bard and other charming Thunish residents to assist her in her entrepreneurial journey.

If the book is a latte and the plot is the rich, welcoming aroma of the roast, the characters are the creamy flavor that balances the bitter with an extra something special. This story exists to make you feel good, to whisk you away, and let you bask in the warm fuzzies contained within its pages. Legends & Lattes won’t ask you to grapple with moral quandaries. But the challenges all feel surmountable, owing to the low stakes advertised on the book’s cover. A run-in with a local strong-arm turns into an unexpected interaction, and the sudden return of former bounty hunters complicates Viv’s life. Viv contends with the challenges of opening a business and advertising an unfamiliar product (coffee is known to other cities, such as Azimuth, in his world). That feeling sticks throughout, making for a refreshing and cozy tale worth your time.īaldree tells a simple story here, adorned with little flourishes that draw you in and make you want to bundle up in the friendly world he’s created. The novel radiates the same sort of rich warmth you feel in your belly after a sip of a freshly brewed latte. Legends & Lattes reads like a fresh cup of coffee. As the tagline says, Legends & Lattes is a novel of high fantasy and low stakes, and it certainly lives up to this promise. She also deals with would-be wrongdoers who seek to interfere with her success for their own gain. The novel follows Viv as she builds her business, introduces coffee to the denizens of Thune, and befriends people throughout the process.

Scalvert’s Stones are fabled to bring good fortune if placed near intersecting ley lines, so Viv hides hers beneath the foundational stone of her newly purchased cafe. After removing a Scavlert’s Stone from a spindly Scalvert Queen’s skull, she heads to Thune to begin anew.

Legends & Lattes stars Viv, an Orc barbarian who gives up a life of brutal battles to run a coffee shop. Instead, they’re content to revel in the warmth of friendship and love and Travis Baldree’s Legends & Lattes is my latest cozy fantasy obsession. These books don’t require vast, epic worlds or heartbreaking stories. Once in a while, a book comes along that doesn’t burden itself with the lofty expectations that so often run rampant through the fantasy genre.

Legends and lattes by travis baldree