The Chonicler Recommends: Reading List for Castora
Welcome Readers!
Today, we’re looking back on 2025 and welcoming 2026 with a handful of book recommendations.
In October 2025, Arenanet released its sixth expansion Visions of Eternity for Guild Wars 2. During this adventure, the Commander found themselves chasing the Inquest down and sailing through treacherous seas to the strange land of Castora. Veiled in Seer magic, a seaside dotted with floating islands, magically-imbued forest brimming with dangerous dinosaurs and ruins of a long-dead civilization—allowing the Inquest to study this island was risky business. Amidst secrets kept by our close ally Isgarren, accusations against the Tyrian Alliance and an enticing proposition from the head of the Inquest, Director Vloxx, the commander is left at a crossroad. To allow the Inquest to reach their goal and disrupt the status quo of Tyria or stop them in their tracks before it is too late. This decision may have vast repercussions throughout Tyria, but we will have to wait and see what happens once the story resumes.
As we await for the story to unfold, let’s allow our Commanders to take a moment to read a good book and clear their minds for what lies ahead.
Whether you prefer the sandy beaches of Comosus Isle or stopping by Pub Canach, sit back, relax, and enjoy this selection of books.
The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd
If the absence of Castora from any known maps of Tyria is what intrigued you about Visions of Eternity, then Peng Sheperd’s The Cartographers (2022) is perfect for you.
Dive into the life of Nell Young. Daughter of cartography academics, Nell lives and breathes maps. However, following an incident involving a gas station highway map at the New York Public Library, the relationship with her father grows tense. One fateful night, Nell’s father is found dead in his office and the same map appears to be the cause of it all. Soon enough, Nell realises the strangeness of the map—something that should not be there piques her interest.
Throughout this novel, Shepherd devotes her prose to the environments and locations her characters find themselves in, bringing the reader back to the importance, usefulness and meaning of cataloguing one’s own surroundings. In the same stroke, she grounds her characters in these places making the reader feel the looming presence of past actions weighing on their minds and how these brought them to where they are in the present day.
All in all, The Cartographers is a pleasant tale of family, secrets and betrayal with a whimsical emphasis on maps.
“Cartography, at its heart, was about defining one's place in the world by creating charts and measurements. Nell had lived her life by that idea, that everything could be mapped according to references and thereby understood. But she could see now that she had been paying attention to the wrong references. It was not a map alone that made a place real. It was the people.”
- The Cartographers, Peng Sheperd
His Majesty’s Dragon by Naomi Novik
Seafaring & skyfaring journeys, war and dragons—these themes are quintessential to
Guild Wars 2 and Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series.
Novik’s first book in the series His Majesty’s Dragon (2006) is a simple, yet effective premise. What if dragons existed during the Napoleonic Wars?
The story follows William Laurence, captain of the HMS Reliant in the British Royal Navy, as his ship captures the spoils of a French vessel—a dragon’s egg. As his ship makes its way back to England, the egg hatches and Laurence is forced to choose between his life at sea or a life in the Aerial Corps as the dragon’s handler.
Novik’s series explores the deep bond that can exist between dragons and humans in this alternate history. While England treats their dragons as merely tools to wage wars with, Laurence & Temeraire soon realize how other cultures view dragons. Friendship and loyalty are the core tennets by which this book resonates.
However, the threat of Napoleon is always looming in the background and Novik’s descriptions of warfare are insightful and evocative, but never gratuitous. The brutality and cunning with which dragons engage in aerial combat always feels like ballet dancers wielding cutlasses.
The seafaring journeys in the novels are reminiscent of the Commander’s travels to Castora, while the relationship between humans and dragons has a certain Aurene quality to it.
Looking for a tale of unconvential friendships wrapped in a military red coat?
The Temeraire series is for you.
“Dragon intelligence was a mystery to men who made a study of the subject; he had no idea how much the dragon would hear or understand, but thought it better to avoid the risk of giving offense.”
- His Majesty’s Dragon, Naomi Novik
The Invisible Life of Addie Larue
by V. E. Schwab
What if no one could ever remember meeting you?
This has been the life of Addie Larue for the past few centuries. If she remains out of someone’s sight for more than a moment, that person forgets ever meeting her. Due to this curse, she has had to adapt her life through thievery and trickery to survive day after day. Until she meets Henry, a bookstore clerk who says three fateful words “I remember you”.
Schwab writes a century spanning tragedy as the reader experiences all facets of Addie’s grief when it comes to her curse and the life she left behind: anger at her decision, flirtatiously bargaining with the Faustian entity who cursed her, depression & acceptance of her fate, but ultimately defiance when she encounters Henry.
This novel plays with the trope of one who is cursed with knowledge they are physically unable to share and turns it on its head. Schwab makes her protagonist into a blank space with no roots, left unthetered—a non-entity to the world. She becomes a void of knowledge in people’s mind—a missing day, a forgotten evening.
Throughout Visions of Eternity, the Commander is unknowingly travelling with someone with a very similar curse—Isgarren. We discover that he is unable to speak of and returns to Castora as magical spells & barriers prevent him from assisting the Commander in the discovery and exploration of this new continent. Having defied the laws of the Seer long ago, Isgarren was cursed and banished by his own people. However, as time passed the magics have weakened enough for him to follow us on our adventure in an attempt to break this curse. Every curse has its rules and every rule its limitations—similar to Addie’s predicament.
I highly recommend this novel if you’re seeking a tale of magic, intrigue, tragedy, and love.
“..it is sad, of course, to forget.
But it is a lonely thing, to be forgotten.
To remember when no one else does.”- The Invisible Life of Addie Larue, V. E. Schwab
Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree
If you’re more interested in Canach’s ventures and the opening of his new pub for all those shipwrecked on Castora then this might be the story for you.
Legend & Lattes takes a special interest on what adventurers do when their fighting days are behind them. After years of adventuring, Viv decides to settle down with the treasures she’s accumulated as a mercenary. Refurbishing an old stable in the city of Thune, Viv opens a shop selling an intriguing concoctions invented by gnomes—coffee. As she sets down her roots and acquaints herself with the town’s locals, life seems to be good, until thugs and ex-colleagues hear of her newfound success.
Baldree’s characters are the heart and soul of this series. The dichotomy between Viv harsh exterior and her internal desire for deep, meaningful connections with those around her is the core thesis of Baldree’s novel. Together with Tandri’s business-oriented mind, Thimble’s cooking prowess, and Pendry’s musical talents, they form a loveable cast of characters who push each other towards betterment and acceptance of who they can truly be.
Legends & Lattes is one of those cozy stories you read wrapped in a blanket by the fireplace with a nice hot drink. Its introspective characters and emphasis on community will warm your heart and make you yearn for more.
“After twenty-two years of adventuring, Viv had reached her limit of blood and mud and bullshit. An orc’s life was strength and violence and a sudden, sharp end—but she’d be damned if she’d let hers finish that way. It was time for something new.”
- Legends & Lates, Travis Baldree
Thank you for reading our latest recommendations.
If you want to read these books, make sure to get them from your local bookstore or library.
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