One Way by S. J. Morden
Frank Kittridge is a middle-aged convict, doing time for killing his son’s drug supplier. His wife has divorced him and moved away with their son; he hasn’t heard from either of them since he went inside. He’ll never see them again and will die in prison serving his 120-year sentence. He’s not a typical murderer; […]
#SPFBO 5 Cover Contest
Last year’s cover contest was splendid. Each of the ten bloggers nominated the top three covers from their batch before voting for their favorites from the final pool of thirty. There were some truly stunning gems fighting for the title, which eventually went to Benadict Patrick’s entry Those Brave, Foolish Souls from the City of […]
SFF and Queerness – We Need To Do Better
We’ve just said goodbye to June, month of queer visibility and pride (and gender-nonconforming visibility and pride, too—which many people (but not all) feel belongs under the umbrella of “queer”, and for sake of conciseness, I’m going to group the terms together here), in 2019, and I’m still standing here, yelling into the void about […]
5th Annual Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off: An Introduction
Hello, to all the followers of the SPFBO (Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off) the competition that began with an idle thought in the shadowed recesses of Mark Lawrence’s mind and is now in its fifth year. Some of the previous winners and finalists have been picked up by traditional publishing houses and some authors have turned down […]
One Word Kill by Mark Lawrence
In January 1986, 15-year-old Nick is told that he has cancer. He begins chemotherapy and struggles to maintain as much of a normal life as he can. But a girl has joined his Dungeons and Dragons group, and a mysterious man has started following him around—a man who looks curiously familiar. Nick is drawn into […]
What If… – Guest Blog by Tom Lloyd
Writing—It’s all basically the same whatever genre, right? No, of course I don’t believe that! If I did, I’d be trying to make my fortune in romance or something. There are a few reasons why I’m not (much to the disappointment of my friends, family and every person I’ve had to tell, “No, not that […]
Unicorn Mirror: A Compendium of Unicorn Lore
Introduction: The Ethereal Glimpsing of a Unicorn “The unicorn lived in a lilac wood, and she lived all alone. She was very old, though she did not know it, and she was no longer the careless color of sea foam, but rather the color of snow falling on a moonlit night. But her eyes were […]
Quill by A. C. Cobble
Quill is the first book in a new series, The Cartographer, by A. C. Cobble (author of the Benjamin Ashwood series). It is a fantasy wrapped in steampunk, inside a buddy cop story—except that in this universe sorcery (spirits) is present alongside the industrial revolution. Duke Oliver Wellesley, the youngest son of the king, and […]
Seven Blades in Black by Sam Sykes
Seven Blades in Black is the first book in The Grave of Empires series. The central theme is the contest for power between mages—those with any magical or superhuman ability—and non-mages—regular humans. Before the events of this book, the Empress—a mage from a lineage of powerful mages—gave birth to her first child and heir, who […]
Chronicles of Ancient Darkness by Michelle Paver – Series Review
Chronicles of Ancient Darkness is a six book historical fantasy series by British author, Michelle Paver. The series consists of Wolf Brother, Spirit Walker, Soul Eater, Outcast, Oath Breaker and Ghost Hunter. It is aimed at younger readers, but can be enjoyed by a range of ages. We follow a twelve-year-old boy, named Torak, who […]
A Fantasy Geek’s Guide to YouTube: Vampires
Vampires. They’re better than zombies. I’ve demonstrated this conclusively in a previous article. From True Blood to Let the Right One In to V Wars, vampires are all over literature, films and TV and they show no sign off stopping. But let’s talk about vampires as they appear in that little corner of the world […]
Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant
When I first said I wanted to review this book, I mentioned the prologue as what drew me in. That wasn’t entirely true. While I did enjoy the prologue (and I’ll mention the chills it gave me later on), it was the title that really caught my eye. How could it not? There’s something enticing […]
