The Lone Wolf Café is a cute F/F sapphic romantasy and the first book in a series by Sydney Wilder. Originally published in 2025, this reformat and re-release is 434 pages and is available in hardcover, paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links throughout. For Kindle Unlimited subscribers, this book is currently included in the KU subscription library to borrow and read for free.
This is very much a cozy romance with two F/F protagonist misfits and both have secrets to hide and lots of baggage. Sarcastic, found family, female MCs, werewolves and magic, and lots and lots of drama (which could be resolved with 3 minutes of honesty, but they can't risk it all to open up to one another).
The characters manage to be distinct and well delineated and readers won't have trouble keeping them separated. It is quite trope-y, with a "mean girls" subplot, but the magic system and world building are engaging and believable (for the genre). The little elementals/familiars are especially appealing and sweet.
The unabridged audiobook has a run time of 11 hours 9 minutes and is read by Autumn Wolff. She has an odd unpolished voice and sometimes difficult modulation. The characters aren't especially well delineated and are sometimes difficult to distinguish from one another. The actual sound and production quality were not up to Audible's usual standards for the read. (I received an ALC, so the final cut could be much more polished).
Three and a half stars. It would be a good choice for public or home library acquisition as well as for a buddy read.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
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