Browsing all articles tagged with self-publishing.
A Wind from the Wilderness by Suzannah Rowntree – SPFBO #6 Finals Review
Hunted by demons. Lost in time. Welcome to the First Crusade. Syria, 636: As heretic invaders circle Jerusalem, young Lukas Bessarion vows to defend his people. Instead, disaster strikes. His family is ripped apart. His allies are slaughtered. And Lukas is hurled across the centuries to a future where his worst nightmares have come true… […]
The Brightest Shadow by Sarah Lin
“When Epic Fantasy Meets Cultivation” Sarah Lin is best known for revolutionizing the English-original cultivation (or xianxia) subgenre with her late 2019 release, Street Cultivation. Instead of cultivators wearing flowing robes and belonging to martial sects who dueled in quaint towns and countrysides, it featured gritty back alley duels and mobile apps that measure energy. […]
Becoming an Author: With Advice from Those Who’ve Done It
Introduction You might have a lot of time on your hands due to 2020’s pandemic and have been meaning to finish that novel you’ve been dreaming about publishing. You might have participated in Camp NaNoWriMo or are in the middle of the official NaNoWriMo now. Or maybe you have never written anything beyond an essay […]
Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off #6: Our Round One Winner
When we began posting our semi-finalist reviews at the beginning of this week, we didn’t know which book we would be sending on to the finals of the sixth annual Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off. In fact, the deliberations went on until late Thursday evening for our US team members, early Friday morning for the Europeans in […]
Where Shadows Lie by Allegra Pescatore – SPFBO #6 Semi-Finals Review
Today we review the last book of our thirty-book batch in the sixth annual Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off with our fourth semi-finalist Where Shadows Lie. How this book stacks up against the other members of our final four will be revealed on Friday, October 30th. The Chosen One is dead. Magic is going haywire. Time is […]
Shadow of a Dead God by Patrick Samphire – SPFBO #6 Semi-Finals Review
Among the coincidences of topics and titles in the sixth annual Self-Publishing Fantasy Blog-Off, Fantasy-Faction had not only four books with dragon in the title and five titles containing shadow, we also had three that played with noir tropes in a fantasy setting: Blood Under Water (reviewed here), Tales of the Thief-City (another semifinalist; reviewed […]
Shields in Shadow by Andy Peloquin – SPFBO #6 Semi-Finals Review
Today we present the second of four semi-finalists in the sixth annual Self-Publishing Fantasy Blog-Off. The order of reviews posted this week does not indicate any rank or likelihood of being named the finalist, which will be announced on Friday, October 30th. In a weird, one might even say, fantastical, coincidence, three of the four […]
Tales of the Thief-City by Gareth Lewis – SPFBO #6 Semi-Finals Review
We close out the sixth annual Self-Publishing Fantasy Blog-Off with four semifinalists, the highest rated books in our batch. We will share the scores when we name the finalist on Friday, October 30, and the order of the reviews posted this week should not be taken to imply the rankings of our final four. Today […]
Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off #6: The Fifth Five Fall + Our Picks for Semi-Finalists
Now is the winter of our discontent… All right, it’s not winter, and whether contented or not with today’s outcome, the nine authors still in the Fantasy-Faction batch can stop biting their nails, for today they learn their fate—or at least whether they’ve made the semifinalist cut. Once again, the experience of art is subjective, […]
Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off #6: The Fourth Five Fall
The last month of Phase I of the SPFBO is always a nail-biter for authors who remain in the competition, and it is with great sympathy that we say goodbye to our next five from the Fantasy-Faction batch. This week’s titles feature cool magical animals and shifters as well as some classic struggles between good […]
Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off #6: The Third Five Fall
The third group to be eliminated in this year’s SPFBO includes some really creative and ambitious explorations of intriguing themes, from gender roles to capitalism, to the nature of power and love. As we say with each batch we let go, just because a book appears on this page doesn’t mean it’s unworthy of love, […]
A Wizard’s Sacrifice by A. M. Justice
Spoiler Warning: This review contains mild spoilers for A Wizard’s Forge. Please read with caution if you have yet to finish book one. Conquering fate takes sacrifice. Victoria of Ourtown believes two things: the bright, wandering star in the heavens is an abandoned spacecraft which brought her ancestors to this world and that destiny and […]
