Hidden Treasures: Azanian Bridges by Nick Wood
A.F.E. Smith
Hidden Treasures is a series that reviews small press and digital first SFF. Okay, so this is technically science fiction rather than fantasy. But even if you’re a die-hard fantasy…
Harry Potter Should Have Kissed Some Boys: An Argument For Queer Characters In Main Stream Fantasy
Leo Elijah Cristea
Harry Potter should have kissed some boys. Or Hermione should have kissed some girls. Even just some passing lip-action between any of the main cast would have been sufficient. Even…
Dominion Cover Reveal & Extract
Overlord
A lot of Fantasy-Factioners will have read and enjoyed Peter McLean’s Drake by now. If you’ve not, it’s about an anti-hero named Don Drake who is forced to carry out…
Saint’s Blood by Sebastien De Castell
Charlie Hopkins
How do you kill a Saint? Falcio, Kest and Brasti are about to find out, because even Tristia’s most powerful Saints are turning up dead and the entire country is…
The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps by Kai Ashante Wilson
Jonathan Thornton
Tor’s novella series was started in 2015, with the aim of promoting this shorter medium. The line includes both established authors and those just making their debut, and has included…
Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off #2: Cover Up?
Geoff Matthews
We’ve had a look at the covers to all 30 books on the Fantasy-Faction list for the Self-Published Fantasy Blog Off and picked our favourite three. Why did we do…
Foundations of Fantasy: The Epic of Gilgamesh
Ryan Howse
More than any other genre, fantasy tends to examine ancient epics. Whether it’s the study of archetypes and ectypes, or a historical understanding of narrative itself, or simply a desire…
The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu, Translated by Ken Liu
Sonia Grace
The Three-Body Problem is about aliens. It’s also about Revolutionary China, Communism, and human nature. There’s a fair bit of philosophy thrown in, some well-explained math, and a computer game…
Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off #2: The Self-Pub Strikes Back
Last year’s Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off gathered a lot of interest across Twitter, Facebook and forums. At Mark Lawrence’s request, ten influential websites, bloggers and over 250 authors got together and…
Languages In Fantasy
Language in fantasy: is it an outdated, often academically-gratuitous addition that bogs down a story and its world, or a clever quirk of setting that adds a sprinkle of the…
Fantasy Medicine – Part One: Healthcare, Magical and Mundane
B. Pine
Fantasy, whether epic, high, or sword-and-sorcery, would not be very exciting if the characters were as susceptible to death and disability as we are in the real world. The truth…
Using Scrivener To Store Your Research & Notes
Adrian Faulkner
If you enjoy writing, it’s quite possible that you’ve heard of Scrivener. The writing software, available for both Mac and PC, is a firm favourite for both published and unpublished…