★Leong, Julie. The Teller of Small Fortunes. Ace: Berkley. Nov. 2024. 336p. ISBN 9780593815915. pap. $19. FANTASY

DEBUT This story begins as an immigrant’s dilemma, as Shinarian fortune teller Tao travels throughout her adopted country, Eshtera. She takes no big risks, she tells no big fortunes, she just keeps her head down as her birth nation and her new country teeter on the brink of war with each other. She’s lonely, until she tells a small fortune that turns out to be large and finds herself in the middle of someone else’s big journey that might just turn out to be her own. She tells the mercenary Mast that he’ll see his daughter at home. But his daughter has been missing for months, and Mast hasn’t been home. Now he won’t let Tao out of his sight until her fortune comes true. Tao’s journey turns into a quest for a missing child, a lost purpose, and a found family as she opens her heart and finds belonging. VERDICT Leong’s debut is a delightful cozy fantasy that will appeal to fans of Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree and A Pirate’s Life for Tea by Rebecca Thorne.