Below is the complete list of Caroline Peckham’s and Susanne Valenti‘s A Game of Malice and Greed books in order. For this series, the chronological reading order is the same as the order of publication.
Publication Order of A Game of Malice and Greed Books
with Susanne Valenti
- A Game of Malice and Greed (2023)
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A Game of Malice and Greed was published in 2023 and is listed as book #1 in the A Game of Malice and Greed series. - A Kingdom of Gods and Ruin (2023)
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Published in 2023, A Kingdom of Gods and Ruin is listed as book #2 in the A Game of Malice and Greed series.
About A Game of Malice and Greed
Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti’s A Game of Malice and Greed series is a dark fantasy romance built around fae power, gods, curses, betrayal, and a brutal contest where love and survival are never safely separated. The series begins with A Game of Malice and Greed, a story that carries the authors’ familiar taste for morally complicated characters, dangerous bargains, emotional intensity, and romantic tension sharpened by power imbalance and hidden motives.
The premise has the atmosphere of a dark fairy tale rather than a soft fantasy romance. A princess is placed inside a game where winning is tied to power, survival, and the fate of an empire already under threat. Around her are forces shaped by old magic, lost gods, broken warriors, shadowed thieves, curses, and the lingering consequences of lies told before the story begins. Peckham and Valenti use that framework to create the kind of world where nothing is purely decorative. A game is not just entertainment; a curse is not just background mythology; a romantic bond can become a weapon, a weakness, or the key to changing everything.
The series’ title captures its emotional territory well. Malice suggests cruelty, revenge, and the darker impulses driving the characters’ choices. Greed points toward hunger, possession, ambition, and the desire to claim what may not be safe to hold. Those forces are central to the authors’ wider style. Their romances often begin in hostile territory, where attraction is tangled with distrust and where characters must survive before they can fully understand what they feel. A Game of Malice and Greed follows that pattern through a more mythic, curse-driven lens.
Although the series is connected to the romantasy space that made Peckham and Valenti so popular, it has a different flavor from their academy and prison settings. Zodiac Academy uses a magical school and royal inheritance to build its conflict, while Darkmore Penitentiary relies on confinement and prison politics. A Game of Malice and Greed feels more like a darkly enchanted court-and-quest fantasy, with fae danger, divine history, and game-based stakes shaping the romance. It is less about learning a magical system in a school and more about surviving a world where old powers are still moving behind the rules.
The book also reflects the authors’ interest in characters who are not easily clean or gentle. Their fantasy romances often ask readers to sit with anger, obsession, betrayal, longing, and the possibility that love can emerge from places that look hostile at first. That does not make the emotional journey simple. In this kind of story, trust has to be earned through danger, and desire can expose as much as it comforts.
A Game of Malice and Greed is best understood as a dark romantasy series for readers who enjoy fae worlds, cursed love, brutal games, and high-stakes emotional conflict. Its appeal lies in the collision between fairy-tale imagery and darker adult romance energy: a princess caught in a deadly contest, a world shaped by gods and curses, and characters whose hearts may be as dangerous as the magic surrounding them.