This novella may only be 102 pages long, but each and ever page of In Shadows We Fall drips with palace politics, intrigue, and deception. Madson’s Aurealis award-winning prequel to the Vengeance trilogy, rips along at a blistering pace leaving the reader no time to pause and catch their breath. Let alone stop to reflect as, in a pitched battle of wits, the Empress Li plots the downfall of her God-Emperor husband, the Emperor Lan.
While Andrew Taylor beautifully evokes the stifled atmosphere of New York City under siege during the War of Independence (also referred to as the ‘Revolutionary War’). And gives us a plausible enough character in the guise of Mr. Edward Savill, a clerk for the American Office based in London. The over-all arcing storyline could have done with some judicious (if not) ruthless editing to bring the unwieldily mess into a more manageable read.
I so wanted to ‘like’ EXTRAORDINARY PEOPLE by Peter May but, in the end, this one was a little too staged, with sluggish pacing. Moments that could have and should have been tense, and dramatic, were lost amid the travelogue descriptions that sucked up more than their fair share of page length. It’s all very well to set the scene, but quite another to go on and on with too much incidental detail, that it becomes tedious.
The Last Smile in Sunder City is a dark urban fantasy and the first book in a planned series, the Fetch Phillips Archives, which promises a great deal more in depth world building and character development. And, even for a debut, Arnold packs it in—for a world that once ran on magic nothing will ever be the same. Every conceivable magical creature, and there are some that even defy imagination, the loss of magic has been devastating.
Ack-Ack Macaque by Gareth L. Powell, is a cleverly plotted and thoroughly immersive alternative future in which you believe a monkey can fly a spitfire. With its well-drawn characters, page-turning intrigue, and clever plot twists—never mind, several neat surprises I never saw coming—it will have you chugging back the strong coffee way into the wee small hours of night, just to finish it. This is one of those reads that, just when you think the stakes couldn’t get any higher, Powell dials up the adrenalin and ups the ante.
The world building in Race the Sands treads familiar ground and gives us an Egyptian style setting and culture, living along a great river—the Aur—surrounded by desert. A fabulous dressed fantasy city, the Heart of Becar, and the usual slew of towns and villages with people focused with making a living off the land. Where Race The Sands differs from the standard tropes, is two-fold. The spiritual needs of the population are administered to by Augurs, and not priest.
Oh dear, where do I start? Let’s get this one out the way first, billed as Kill Bill meets High Plains Drifter, RED NOISE is neither. It lacks the finesse, the heart, the emotion, and most importantly, the brutal action that peppered both Kill Bill and High Plains Drifter or any damn spaghetti western. RED NOISE should be a cracking good read given its premise, a lone gunman who comes to town, get’s ripped off, and decides to clean out the bad guys and save the day.
This is a wonderfully written story about four young people, ranging in ages and backgrounds, set during World War Two, detailing all the horrors and ravages of war, and its effects on those struggling to survive. Vivid and sometimes, horrific moments punctate the spare prose of each character’s short chapters. The four main characters: Florian (the Knight) a young Prussian with a mysterious stolen artefact, Joana, a Lithuanian nurse, and Emilia, an idealistic and damaged Polish girl who, at 15, is pregnant after being raped by Russian soldiers.
Nahri is a young woman living by her wits on the streets of Cairo, running lucrative cons and healing rituals and staying one step ahead of being caught. She knows nothing about who she is or where she came from, but knows she has a gift for languages, and can heal herself from just about anything. It’s while she’s conducting an elaborate con of a young woman possessed by a daemon spirit, that Nahri’s story takes a turn when she accidentally summons a fiery, good looking djinn warrior.
Today I want to talk about some of my favourite SciFi books from years gone by. In fact, two series by an author you just might never have heard of or ever read. Brian M. Stableford — The British-born Stableford has written well over 50+ novels, but I want to highlight two of his earlier series from 70s that, for me at least, epitomised the kind of science fiction being written back then, that I was reading.
This is a solid outing from Matthew Palmer, an author that knows his stuff. SECRETS OF STATE, is a thriller with all the right ingredients, that hit all the right notes. The characters are nothing new, but familiar territory is okay as long as there is enough elsewhere to make up for it. And while the plot is nothing new either—terrorists stealing a nuclear weapon to blow up a city—again, that was okay, as the author came at this from a slightly different angle, with a new view while covering old ground, which freshened up a doomsday scenario with likeable enough characters that were engaging.
STATE OF TERROR, a taut, tense, whiplash-inducing thriller, is so up to the minute in world events it seems like the authors, Hillary Clinton and crime fiction author, Louise Penny, had a crystal ball to look into scrying possible scenarios … no, wait … they did. In the form of Ms. Clintons and her years as Secretary of State. Her experience and skill, among other things, provide the backdrop to this immensely addictive thriller.
This chess-inspired 8th outing of the cranky melancholy police investigator, Arkady Renko, is a fast-paced romp through the underbelly of corrupt police/politicians/media in Putin’s crumbling modern Russia. Where just about everyone has an agenda hustling from the streets to the highest office, for everything from stolen goods to billion ruble contracts. And where Cruz Smith’s cast of well-drawn characters are all doing their best trying to avoid being collateral damage amid the warring factions.
Let me just say up front, this is not a book for the faint of heart, and would definitely be PG-13 if not higher given some of the content, themes and descriptions. Including some grisly deaths. But that said, all of it is within context to the world in which this story is set. It’s a dark, definitely bleak story, and yet? And yet, the author, Robert Jackson Bennett, does something unique amid all the darkness he gives us hope, he gives us humour and plenty of courage, as his characters fight through the harsh realities of their lives and situations.
I truly had high hopes for this debut novel from author, June Hur, given its subject material, late 18th to early 19th century Korea, in a period of scandal and turmoil. Catholic priests were risking life and limb to infiltrate Korea and spread the word of the One God. And while Hur uses this as the backdrop to her novel, I felt it missed the mark. The Silence of Bones could have been so much more than just a murder-mystery.
First of all, let me start by saying I thoroughly enjoyed Velocity Weapon from beginning to end. And, like any good roller coaster ride, this one starts off with a few gentle reveals, and slowly—at first—builds up to a number of startling revelations, as you crest a peek, wondering what the hell is coming next and then? Suddenly you are being plunged head first over a dramatic cliffhanger, rolling at breakneck speed towards the next clever twist in the plot.
Not all fantasy has to be grim. After having a back and forth chat with an online friend about fantasy reads, I admitted I had never read GRRM and was not likely too, ever. The truth is I’ve not read a great deal of fantasy over the last 4-5 years and it took the likes of the masterful SA Chakraborty and her Daevabad trilogy to rekindle my love of the genre before Covid hit us hard.
This incredibly short novella by Alastair Reynolds—all 176 pages of it—offers so much promise but, for me at least, it failed to deliver. I think if the author had bothered to write a full-length novel and added better depth to both the story itself never mind the characters, it might have been an over-all better read. As it is, there is a total lack of credibility to the time travel aspect and theory, which, while an intriguing idea, is not expounded upon at any length or depth.
THE ASHES OF LONDON by Andrew Taylor is a well plotted murder-mystery set amid the aftermath of the Great Fire of London, in 1666, and the political turmoil following the Civil War. Wherein a number of the ‘Fifth Monarchists’ continue to fan the flames of sedition long after the failed Commonwealth in the belief they can still bring about the installation of King Jesus; And a heaven on earth. The intertwining threads of this story are seen through the eyes of the two main characters: James Marwood, caring for his ageing father who’s suffering from the onset of dementia.
From the minute I saw the cover for Captain Moxley and the Embers of the Empire by Dan Hanks, I fell in love with it and knew I had to get my hands on a copy. Well, the cover conveyed everything this brilliant piece of escapist fun promised, and then some. A blisteringly fast-paced archaeological adventure populated with a number of dynamic characters, hell bent of either saving the world, or destroying it.