Shout-out to "Babel, or the Necessity of Violence" by R.F. Kuang. I've had it up to here with magical school stories, but Kuang squeezes blood from the stone with this tale of power/knowledge, colonialism, identity, and belonging.

Shout-out to "The Black-Tongue Thief" by Christopher Buehlman - down and dirty fantasy that doesn't leave out the humor