Ilona Andrews is probably best known for her Kate Daniels series, but she is also (along with husband and co-author Gordon) the author of a paranormal romance series about life on “the Edge,” a borderland between a world full of magic (the Weird) and our mundane reality (the Broken). (It should be noted that while I’m classifying the books as paranormal romance, due to the structure of each novel — the books each feature the love story of a couple who end up in a happily ever after at the conclusion — other reviewers have considered them “rustic fantasy” or “unclassifiable.” Thus, your mileage may vary.)

Edgers are a unique bunch, full of enough magic that they can pass between parallel worlds — usually. Some have too much magic to survive crossing into the Broken. Others don’t have enough magic to survive crossing into the Weird. Thus, the Edge is full of exiles, con artists, criminals, and people who are generally down on their luck. Those misfits make for compelling heroes, and with book three, the series has just started to hit its stride into an overarching plot, giving it a great potential to draw readers from beyond the paranormal romance readership.

On the Edge

When Rose graduated from high school, she made a mistake: at the party for all the Edger seniors graduating from Broken high school, Rose showed off the full extent of her magical talent. She flashed white — which means that she showed her magic was just as strong and skilled as the “bluebloods,” the nobles of the Weird. This made her a prize not only in the Edge, but also for prospective suitors (read: breeders) in the neighboring Weird. After attempts to kidnap and coerce her, Rose has given up on trusting anyone, and is focused on providing a home for her two younger brothers, George and Jack, with what little money she makes in the Broken. When Declan, a blueblood from the Weird, shows up on her door step, she thinks he’s just another source of trouble.

In fact, Declan and trouble show up in the Edge at the same time, but the real danger isn’t a blueblood interested in winning Rose’s hand, it’s a pack of evil, magic-eating hounds raised by a powerful magical artifact that has fallen into the wrong hands. Keeping her friends and family safe will take all of Rose’s magical talent — and will require her to put a little bit of faith in the mysterious blueblood. Unlike most paranormal romances, On the Edge never reveals Declan’s perspective, so while it’s no surprise that he’s the hero, his motivation is kept delightfully secret. The characters are fun, and Rose’s brothers feel like real children plagued by magical problems. The novel is a fun entry into a cool new world.

Bayou Moon

The second book in the series stars William, a changeling who shape shifts into a wolf, who was a pivotal secondary character in On the Edge. Raised in an orphanage and then a military boarding school that trained him to be a killer, William doesn’t believe he’ll ever be the type of man to have a family. He certainly doesn’t expect to get involved in a romance while he’s on a secret mission for the Mirror, the spies who work for the Weird kingdom of Adrianglia. Having been burned by the Adrianglian government once before, William isn’t eager to get involved, but the Mirror gives him the opportunity to hunt down a changeling butcher from the Dukedom of Louisiana, a monster named Spider who has literally traded his humanity for monstrous abilities. While William was in the Adrianglian military, he fought Spider twice before, failing to kill him both times, but surviving their encounters — a feat no other soldier or agent has matched.

The mission leads him to Cerise Mar, whose parents have been kidnapped by Spider and the Hand, the Dukedom of Louisiana’s secret service. Cerise and her family are fighters, descendants of exiles from the Dukedom of Louisiana and native magic users of the Mire, a swamp region where only the toughest can survive. Cerise practices an old form of swordplay — bending her flash around her sword blade to make it sharp enough to cut through any man or monster — that makes her almost as deadly as William.

The narrative switches perspectives to include both hero and heroine as they try to figure each other out — the more traditional paranormal romance style — but remains adventure (and horror) heavy for the genre. Spider and his minions are all modified by magic — some of them have tentacles, others have gills, and all of them are twisted beyond humanity into nightmarish creatures. But with heroes who are deadly — and who don’t mind killing when it’s called for — it’s good to have villains that are so utterly in need of killing.

Fate’s Edge

Book three ties together the first two novels by bringing Jack and George — now twelve and fourteen — back as major characters, while continuing the plot where Bayou Moon left off. The Hand and the Mirror remain engaged in their cold war, and the theft of an artifact from a neighboring nation sends both organizations scurrying to recover it. Kaldar, Cerise’s cousin and a scoundrel, is the Mirror agent sent to make sure it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. When he finds the thief, Audrey, he discovers that not only is she amazingly gifted as a lockpick, but she’s completely uninterested in a life of crime and is determined to go straight with a job in the Broken. The theft of the artifact was her last job — one she did only to keep her father and brother out of trouble. Because she refused to take part in the hand off after the job was finished, Audrey had no idea of the object’s power, or that so many governments would want it back. If the Hand were to get the artifact, all of the Edge would be in danger, and Audrey’s guilt over her part in the theft makes her agree to join Kaldar in getting it back. Stowaways Jack and George also make their first attempts as agents for the Mirror, making the romance novel into a spy thriller and a coming of age story wrapped into one.

The stakes rise throughout the novel, pointing to coming war between Adrianglia and the Dukedom of Louisiana. With two years of time passing in the world between each book, it won’t take long until the two scene-stealing kids of On the Edge grow up enough for their own adventures. In the meantime, it will be a long wait for book four — especially since the release date has yet to be announced!

Review by Alana Abbott

Related posts:

1. Flash Fire Mini-Reviews! (Second Attempt)

Available at Amazon.com

Story: A teenage girl, Tory Brennan (related to the famous –or infamous—Temperance Brennan of BONES) becomes curious about a mysterious disappearance that happened well before her time. With several of her friends (Sheldon, Ben and Hi) they all begin to search for clues. To complicate matters, the kids hang out on an island that is home to numerous scientific experiments. Before long, they stumble upon more than they expect. Due to a series of events related and unrelated to their investigations, they become infected with an experimental virus that transforms them into werewolves – of a sort. Now, instead of being just friends they are a pack, bound to each other through good and bad. There’s a good mix of the scientific and the supernatural in this novel.

Characters: Unlike the female leads in some YA books, Tory Brennan is a strong, intelligent girl that doesn’t let her emotions get in the way of discovering the truth. Her friends are all boys, but that doesn’t stop her from being herself. As for the rest of her crew, (Sheldon, Ben and Hi), they are equally interesting characters and it’s entertaining to read along with their adventures.

Overall: While the story itself was pretty good – who doesn’t like an underdog, heh, heh – I will say that I wasn’t too fond of the ending. It was pretty predictable and somewhat disappointing in that. But then, it’s YA, written for a tween/teen audience, so I guess a little predictability is to be expected. Also, the point of this novel is to establish characters and a situation that will play into other stories later, so again the weak wrapping-up of the ending can probably excused.

I would recommend it for anyone interested in YA, especially teens.

Review by Nancy Greene

Related posts:

1. Strange Angels Fiction Review
2. The Summoning Fiction Review
3. Midnight Alley Fiction Review

Available at Amazon.com

Gwen Frost is back at Mythos Academy, and she’s got a new attitude. In Touch of Frost (reviewed here), Gwen was a poor little Gypsy girl, stuck out of place at an academy full of warrior kids and wishing for her old life. While Gwen is still no warrior — and still wishes that her mother’s death had never happened — she’s got a new mission: get awesome, fast, so she can live up to the expectations of Nike, her patron goddess. At the end of the first book, Gwen was chosen to be Nike’s champion, and she has no intentions of failing.

Unfortunately, someone is trying to kill her.

Unwilling to run to the authorities for help, Gwen plans to solve the mystery of the person attacking her on her own. In order to keep herself relatively safe — and to keep tabs on her suspects — she has to go on the school winter holiday to a ski resort, which she’d previously been hoping to avoid at all costs. Valkyrie BFF Daphne is thrilled that Gwen is coming, and assures her that the trip will be just the thing she needs to get over the broody Spartan, Logan, who professed feelings for Gwen but insists on tongue wrestling with another girl. And, in fact, Gwen meets a cute guy on the trip, but he disappears any time he might be spotted with her. Something fishy is happening, and it’s up to Gwen to get to the bottom of it — and maybe find some new allies in the process.

In Touch of Frost, Jennifer Estep created a fun new world that mixes world mythologies in a delightful mashup, with Loki and his Reapers of Chaos as the ultimate villains. In Kiss of Frost, Estep raises the stakes: Gwen is more involved in the world now, and more willing to accept that this life-or-death situation is her new reality. For better or for worse, Gwen Frost is a part of something bigger than herself — and Estep does a great job of making that both a moral decision and a personal one. But although the main movement of the story is mythical, Gwen’s concerns are grounded in a teen reality: she feels like the third wheel when she hangs out with her friends; the boy she has a tremendous crush on doesn’t seem to want her that way; and her desire to put her nose into other people’s secrets always causes her more trouble than she wants. In Gwen’s case, that last normal problem is enhanced by her gift of psychometry — the ability to see memories held in an object — and it’s that gift that gets her off to a very dangerous start in Kiss of Frost.

One of the best parts of Kiss of Frost has less to do with Gwen’s personal tale and more to do with free will and fate. In one of Gwen’s classes, there is a discussion about how even monsters have free will — even the creatures twisted by the Reapers have the potential to choose their own fates. The idea of free will vs. fate is one that has strong mythic resonance; in Greek mythology, especially, a person is governed by the Fates and has no choice about his or her destiny. Estep’s work playing with this concept takes the books beyond a fun, lighthearted urban fantasy series for teens and moves it to the next level.

Kiss of Frost is a great sequel, and in many ways a stronger book than the first entry into the world. With four more books to look forward to in the series, it’ll be a fun ride — maybe with a topsy turvy version of Ragnarok to close things off!

FTC disclosure: I received the e-ARC of this novel from the author.

Review by Alana Abbott

Related posts:

1. Exploring the Mythos Academy with Jennifer Estep
2. Touch of Frost Fiction Review
3. The Darkest Kiss Fiction Review

Available at Amazon.com

After I received an advanced copy of Ty Schwamberger’s novella The Fields, I turned the first pages and immediately began reading kudos by notable authors and magazines such as Gary A. Braunbeck and Shroud Magazine. I never judge a book by its cover, but I do start judging books by their praise. And with an introduction by Jonathan Maberry (Rot and Ruin, Patient Zero), I was excited to start reading.

Jonathan Maberry starts off his introduction stating “The Fields is a morality tale. With Zombies.” Maberry then explains to the reader that zombie tales are more than cannibalistic and mindless corpses. These tales, if written with feelings and responsibility, remind the reader zombies are people and they have life and their own stories. This is what Ty Schwamberger accomplishes with The Fields. He, as many authors have tried but failed, brings out the emotion of the characters but not just the living, but the dead also with much success.

The opening chapter sets The Fields pace; quick with that sense of emotion that is mentioned in Maberry’s introduction. The reader is drawn in as Billy Fletcher, son of plantation owner in the Deep South, is racing through the darkness with zombie in tow. Schwamberger describes Billy’s friendly relationship with the former slave now turned zombie Samuel. Yes, that could happen and yes, if you’ve studied American history, friendly relationship between slaves and owners did indeed exist. With not giving away too much of the plot, Billy survives the zombie encounter.

The novella moves on to an odd and unexpected meeting between Billy and a man named Abraham, a long since forgotten friend of Billy’s deceased and “hard son-of-a-gun” father. The plantation is in dire straits and Abraham promises Billy that with help, the plantation can once again be resurrected to its former glory, the days before the Civil war.

Unsure of Abraham’s motives, Billy keeps himself from revealing too much about the past few years of his life and about his father’s death until Abraham’s cryptic mannerisms gets the best of Billy. Billy then explains the past years and again, Abraham offers help. This help is sinister. To transform the plantation back its glory days involves exhuming the dead slaves from the plantation cemetery to revivify the slaves and the plantation.

Billy scoffs. But by the end of the day, he is overcome by exhaustion by tending to the tobacco fields and the livestock alone. He is clouded by flashbacks of his father’s brutality against the slaves. Billy relives moments of slaves being tied up and beaten. He even relives his own abuse by his father for simple mistakes such as arriving at school late.

The writing of the beatings is brilliant. The sounds of the whipping stick come to life through Schwamberger’s descriptive writing. The reader can nearly feel every whip and the pain that the slave and even Billy endure. More so, the reader is able to relate to Billy’s struggle for parental acceptance. Like many children today, Billy feels he hasn’t lived up to their parents’ expectations, especially his father’s.

And with another meeting with Abraham, Billy decides it’s time that he makes his deceased father proud of his son for the first time.

The pace of The Fields picks up from here. It was already fast-paced but now it’s an enjoyable and emotional rollercoaster. Billy knows he has to follow through with Abraham’s continuing offer of help, to exhume the dead slaves. What Billy will find out from Abraham though, it’s not the slaves or the plantation that Billy is truly resurrecting.

The chapters to follow describe the dead as they appear in old zombie movies from the 1940s and 1950s, mindless field workers who go about their work (ala White Zombie staring Bela Lugosi). Schwamberger even pays homage to the Haitian form of zombification, harmless zombies kept mindless in order for them to help their masters. This is where the originality comes in. Schwamberger doesn’t create typical flesh-eating zombies, he draws his influence from old school horror, a practice getting lost by today’s influence from AMC’s The Walking Dead and the George A. Romero generation. It’s Schwamberger’s ability to ignore the typical and easy copout of the modern zombies that leads to the surprise ending, which deserves its own praise. The reader will never see it coming.

The press release for The Fields, with its many well-know author kudos, is dead on with their praises. The Fields isn’t your average zombie tale. It’s much more. It’s a game changer. It delivers what the genre is suffering from, which is originality. It negates the typical overrun town and city streets of the gut-thirsty walking dead so typical of the majority of novels, novellas, and anthologies. The Fields brings emotion, ignites the need for unity, highlights the important struggle of family responsibility and above all, brings fun back into the zombie genre. Schwamberger also reminds us; the dead have a story to tell and to live.

Review by Howard Allan

Related posts:

1. The Zombie Feed Press announces the release of THE FIELDS by Ty Schwamberger
2. Revolt of the Dead Fiction Review
3. After Twilight Fiction Review

Available at Amazon.com

Hunting the Moon Tribe by David Agranoff
Publisher: Little Otik Books

David Agranoff’s Hunting the Moon Tribe is an interesting and well-thought out coming of age story that spans the globe. It starts us out in China with a soon-to-be-former Red Guard, Yuen, and his wife, Elsa, at the time of the birth of their son. Without much warning, they are attacked and this sets up the story of a centuries-old war that will eventually lead to California and the life of a young man that is about to awaken to his destiny.

Vampires of a different sort, martial arts, dreams and difficult choices take center stage. Enrich is a bullied American high school student. He decides to learn martial arts to combat the daily attacks, but what he doesn’t know is that he is training for the biggest battle of his life.

Hunting the Moon Tribe reads, in some aspects, more like a YA novel. It has the feel of the movie, THE FORBIDDEN KINGDOM, starring Jet Li and Jackie Chan. But there’s some language and situations that make it likely that it wouldn’t necessarily be categorized as YA. Either way, it’s a pretty enjoyable read and not bad for the author’s first novel (he’s published other works before this, but Moon Tribe was the first novel he wrote).

The battle scenes have a nice flare, are fast-paced, and the romantic interests — particularly between Enrich and “the woman of his dreams”, Azeya — are well-done. The differences in time periods and cultures are also dealt with in an even way, lending the story a sense of balance so it never feels like it’s about commandeering another culture for the purpose of telling a stereotypical Americanized tale.

Overall, a very good read.

Review by Nancy O. Greene

No related posts.

Available at Amazon.com

Blood and Bare Bones Review:

Story: A man’s purchase of a used computer leads to an unfortunate discovery. Soon, he’s on a mission to save his fiancee from the clutches of a madman and an insidious cult. But in the small town where she’s held captive, he discovers that nothing is exactly as it seems. Once he crosses paths with a father and son monster-hunting team, his world unravels. Death and dark magicks lurk around every corner.

Characters: The characters are pretty solid. Donald, the protagonist, is believable as an ambitious and caring, if somewhat bumbling, man that eventually finds the strength to fight evil. Brian and Sam, the father-son team reminiscent of SUPERNATURAL, are favorites in this story. There are a host of other characters that are solidly written. The only problem is some of them aren’t present very long in the story, but that’s part of the suspense.

Shockers: There are so many twists and turns in this story that you never quite know what’s going to happen (though there are a few predictable moments and character actions. Look out for those that seem as though they might save the day). On some levels that’s a bit of a disappointment, because it starts out as a pretty traditional and exciting horror/thriller/suspense tale. But traditional heroics don’t always pan out, and just when you get a bit attached to a character, they’re gone. But it does work overall for the tale, because, again, nothing is as it seems.

Recommend: Yes. The middle gets a bit muddled, and some of the subplots get crossed at times, but that’s offset by the HOSTEL feel of some of the events that take place, as well as the suspenseful nature of the tale. Overall it’s an engrossing story.

Review by Nancy O. Greene

Related posts:

1. Afraid Fiction Review
2. Personal Demons Fiction Review
3. Crimson Orgy Fiction Review

Available at DriveThruHorror.com

I’m a huge fan of The Wizard of Oz. I’m old enough to remember CBS playing it annually; therefore, I watched it annually. I’m eager to see new tales set in Oz (though I’m generally let down), so the chance to review this book promised a fresh look. The blurb on the back of this book promises an insane Alice (in Wonderland) and Dorothy (Wizard of Oz) being tracked by something fantastically evil while they search for a tornado . . . they can use to escape Earth. It was exactly the kind of American Gods read I was looking for, so the question becomes this: Did the book live up to my own hype for it?

I found that Schnarr’s writing is a relatively fresh style. He doesn’t often show his writing roots in his own words. Schnarr’s story contains an excellent mix of the surreal. There are McDonald’s Happy Meals at the Mad Hater’s (not a typo) tea party. The White Rabbit is a drug pusher.

The story contains a great deal of frank (I hesitate using the word explicit) drug use and sexuality. The first chapter alone is saturated in it (the rest of the book cools off immensely). It isn’t on the level of Luke Davies’ Candy, but it is an adult read.

The two chief characters are both well-written. Alice is a heroin user going through a psychological episode while Dorothy, a Lesbian storm-chaser, tries to convince doctors she didn’t try killing herself. I’m biased, so I thought Dorothy was the better character of the two. Alice remains too extroverted, even her manipulations are brazen. Dorothy, with her stuffed Toto (she knows it’s stuffed), has manipulations and motivations I found much more satisfying.

The book contains minor typos (“the” instead of “they”). These are few and far between and always a case of an omitted word or another similar word being used instead of a helpful wrod that spell-check would catch. They didn’t overly distract.

While I’m usually disappointed with a childhood icon being used (poorly) in modern stories, Schnarr didn’t disappoint me. This tale becomes quite the page-turner (you guys know Dinosaur-I print out all my stuff) that leaves you rooting for the good guys. If you like the bending of familiar ideas (like in the before-mentioned American Gods), you’re going to like this book.

Review by Todd Cash

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2. This is My Blood Fiction Review
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Back in 2009, when I was still able to keep up with the League of Reluctant Adults on a regular basis, I eagerly awaited the release of Tempest Rising, Nicole Peeler’s first novel.* Like other members of the League, Peeler is totally snarky, really smart, sexy verging on smutty, and a ton of fun to read in her online posts. So it was no great surprise when I loved Tempest Rising. The fourth book in the series, Eye of the Tempest, just came out last month, and I sifted through my TBR pile and caught up on books two through four this week. They’re fast reads, with qualities that verge on paranormal romance but plot and worldbuilding that, in my qualifications, keep them firmly in urban fantasy. Here’s the breakdown on each book, but the overarching verdict is: give them a chance! They’re funny, fast paced, and completely engaging. Jane’s a fantastic hero, who’s far stronger than she realizes – and not in the warrior woman way. Getting to know her, and her world, is a great ride, but beware: she’s a horrible influence. You might find yourself avoiding responsibilities to read more about her adventures.

Tempest Rising

The series kicks off when Jane True, a twenty-something bookseller who has no idea about the supernatural world around her, finds a murdered body. Things are instantly complicated: she discovers the murder while night swimming, something she shouldn’t be capable of doing in the dangerous waters of the Old Sow whirlpool off of coastal Maine. Figuring out how to report the crime is only the first hurdle, and Jane finds herself embroiled in a supernatural murder mystery – and discovers that she herself is half-selkie, with the potential to manipulate the magic of water. Guiding her into the brave new world is Ryu, a sexy baobhan sith – similar to a vampire – investigator who feels the same attraction to Jane she feels to him. But while Ryu seems interested in Jane for his own benefit (feeding and sex), barghest Anyan (a large man who takes the form of a huge dog most of the time) and gnome Nell are Jane’s real support – and, aside from Jane’s internal monologue, divided between her  constantly arguing libido and virtue, it’s Anyan who steals the show. It’s a strong debut, with the purpose of introducing readers, like Jane, to the crazy world Peeler has created while also taking them on a fun ride.

Tracking the Tempest

In Tracking the Tempest, Jane once again finds herself in a supernatural murder case – this time because of her relationship with Ryu. (“Ah ha!” my inner reader cheered. “I didn’t trust him to be good for her.”) It isn’t that things aren’t coming up roses between Jane and Ryu – the sex is still great, after all – but that someone is after Ryu: Conleth, a fiery, half-ifrit who was raised as a lab rat, has the baobhan sith’s number. Seeing Jane, another half-human, changes Conleth’s plans, however, and Jane finds herself becoming the object of Conleth’s obsession. To make matters worse, Ryu wants to take their relationship to the next level—which to him means that Jane should give up everything to be with him. While the plot of this novel is divided neatly between relationship crisis and solve-the-murder crisis, Peeler deftly weaves the two together, so that Jane’s brooding over her love life never takes precedence, and the murder mystery is never too far from Jane’s wry commentary. Better yet, Ryu, who I never wanted to like, turns out to have unexpected redeeming qualities – and Jane’s realizations about their relationship (and about her friendship with a certain barghest) help Jane to grow into a self-awareness she needs to face what comes next…

Tempest’s Legacy

As if Jane’s world hadn’t been through enough upheaval, she has to face loss head-on when her selkie mother is murdered before Jane’s longed-for reunion. Unwilling to be left out of this investigation, and despite being at odds with Ryu, Jane teams up with Ryu and Anyan to investigate a connected string of murders in the Borderlands – an area where half-humans are embraced, rather than scorned (as they are in the Territory, where Jane lives). Jane’s desire to become strong transforms into an unwillingness to feel – and she begins to risk becoming as cold as the people behind the murders to solve the crime. Jane is no great sleuth, here or in previous books, but her insight – usually having to do with being human, or loving books – often helps break the case. It’s also the way that she cares about protecting her friends that shows her true strength – not that her growing strength as a magic user can be dismissed. The book ends with another upheaval, this one political, as the structure of the supernatural world crashes around them, and a mysterious older power, who Jane calls Blondie, reveals herself as another player in the game.

Eye of the Tempest

Get ready for a cliffhanger. Eye of the Tempest opens the world of Jane True wide and deep as Jane gets her Cthulu on. The Lovecraftian references are just the beginning: Rockabill is at risk, and Jane has to team up with Blondie – who she’s still not sure if she trusts – in order to save the place she loves. When Anyan and Nell are taken out of the picture, Jane’s really on her own trying to save the world – and discovering that she’s actually far more capable of some world-saving than she’d ever have believed. Meanwhile, her supernatural identity has been outed to her father, and his heart problem has been cured with magic, changing their entire relationship. The book ends with a near climax (the double entendre is intentional) and a frustratingly urgent lead in to book five… which won’t be released until Spring 2012.

You heard it here, gang – I need more readers to join me in desperately waiting for more of Jane’s adventures. Pick ‘em up at the bookstore or on your e-reader, but be aware: putting them down might be a challenge.

* which, like the other books in the series, I purchased on my own.

Review by Alana Abbott

Related posts:

1. Flash Fire Mini Reviews: Kate Daniels Series by Ilona Andrews
2. Flash Fire Mini-Reviews (Back from the Dead)
3. Flash Fire Mini-Reviews! (Zombies)

Available at Amazon.com

SHADOW FALL is the third book in the Shadowchasers series by Seressia Glass. You can read my review of SHADOW CHASE, the second book in the series, here at Flames Rising.

An exhibit at an Egyptian museum and a dark mystery is the focal point for Kira Solomon and the other characters in SHADOW FALL. The events that happen in this book dive into Kira’s murky background and the reactions of all those around her — which aren’t always positive.

While this book does dive into a mystery, I felt the pacing was more character-driven than plot-driven. By that, I mean that while there is a dangerous and very real threat Kira must resolve, what’s more important in SHADOW FALL are the details we learn about her character. While there was action, I wasn’t surprised by the events that happened because there were a few scenes I felt were drawn out a little on the predictable side. Admittedly, I felt torn. I understood why we needed to watch Kira struggle with her past in order to pursue her future, but I didn’t feel the time-sensitivity of the danger up until I got back to the museum. That, to me, was the shining moment of this book. The trial Kira faced, her reaction, and the scenes following that from Khefar’s point-of-view were nothing short of spectacular. While I didn’t mention much about the romance in SHADOW FALL, that’s part of the story and the conflict that unfolds alongside the mystery. It’s well integrated and it complements the rest of the plot.

Would I recommend this series to someone else, regardless of what I thought about the pacing? Absolutely. There is a deeper story here, one for careful readers. That story is the battle we all face between what we think is “dark” and “light.” Can you have good without evil? Can you be a good person and have a dark side? Can you acknowledge that it’s healthy and perfectly normal to have a darker side?

In many ways, this series is a blend of urban fantasy with more literary themes, and that’s part of the reason why I think it’s worth a read. Glass manages to write not just for one audience, but two or even three, so if you’re remotely curious about an urban fantasy with an Egyptian flair, I encourage you to dive right in.

Review by Monica Valentinelli

Related posts:

1. Shadow Chase Fiction Review
2. The Snow Queen’s Shadow Fiction Review
3. Claimed by Shadow Fiction Review

Available at Amazon.com

NIGHT VEIL is the second book in the Indigo Court series by NYT best-selling author Yasmine Galenorn. It follows the story of Cicely Waters who found herself inexplicably drawn to Grieve, a Fae Prince, then torn from his side. This story is the second in the series and may not be as powerful if you haven’t read the first book, so please keep that in mind when you’re reading this review and you’re worried about spoilers. My review of NIGHT MYST was published during our Vampire Week, and we do have a NIGHT VEIL excerpt you can read at your leisure.

One of the reasons why I like this series, is because Galenorn presents the darker side of magic, vampires, Fae and other creatures. This is not the happy-go-lucky world where everyone winds up together. It is at odds with itself and there are very real, very short-and-long term consequences that come from living in a world where power is not necessarily a good thing. The romance, and all flavors therein, follows suit. In some ways, this book takes risks with topics normally taboo in fiction (e.g. hedonism) but does it in a way that impossibly makes perfect sense. What would you do if you were a centuries-old vampire with all these powers? One who still felt the urge to have sex? What pleasure would sex have for you after the first 50 years? 100? 1,000?

The reason why the risks taken in NIGHT VEIL made perfect, total and logical sense to me, was because Galenorn doesn’t dive deep into the darker side of sex — she plummets into the nature of a vampire. If this was a story about a human (for lack of a better word) at odds with a human like Lannon Altos, then I would stop reading the series altogether because certain topics are difficult for me to read. But here? Within the context of all the forces that are acting against Cicely in her quest to save not only her lover and her friend, but the town and the world as she knows it, too? I’m totally fine with it, because Galenorn isn’t afraid to “beat up” her characters, to guide them through the crucible to find their personal power.

In NIGHT VEIL, Cicely isn’t the only one who falls on hard times. It seems that everyone has either something to lose or something to gain as war brews between the vampiric Fae and everyone else. Kaylin, too, has a journey he must go through to deal with a demon that threatens his life.

There are three, other books in the Indigo Court series. This book introduced many new characters and you learn more about Cicely’s identity and her part in the overall war. You also discover more about the Fae and the vampires here, and why no one is as well-intentioned as they seem.

Who will like this book and this series? If you prefer your worlds to be dark and dangerous, if you like your heroines to fall and rise and fall and rise up again, if you want a war that has been brewing for hundreds of years — you will love the Indigo Court series and NIGHT VEIL.

Review by Monica Valentinelli

Related posts:

1. Preview of Night Veil by Yasmine Galenorn
2. Taste of Night Fiction Review
3. Scar Night Review

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I have been a Sherlock Holmes fan for as long as I have been able to read. I have over a dozen books devoted to the Great Detective, and I have spent more than a year working on a series of essays examining the original stories written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. So it’s no surprise that Flames Rising asked me if I wanted to review a (nearly) all-new anthology of “uncanny tales” featuring Sherlock Holmes. It’s even less of a surprise that I accepted.

In my collection of books, I own a couple of anthologies that take different directions for Sherlock Holmes – one of science-fiction stories, and one combining Sherlock Holmes and the Cthulhu Mythos – so in reading this, I tried to put aside my “slavish fanboy” hat and read them with an eye towards different takes on the Great Detective. In such anthologies, I personally look for two elements: fidelity to the core of the characters and elements of the Holmes canon, and novelty to present a new take or slant on familiar faces. How does this new anthology hold up?

“The Comfort of the Seine” by Stephen Volk is set earlier in Holmes’ life, when he was still a young man going to university. It’s written in first-person from the perspective of Holmes on his death-bed writing a letter to Inspector Lestrade, and talks about Holmes falling in love with a Parisian flower-girl, who then dies mysteriously. The story takes a few twists and turns (which I won’t spoil), and a couple of times it stretched credulity, but overall I found it to be a dark but entertaining story, giving some power and tragedy to Holmes’ choice of vocation.

“The Adventure of Lucifer’s Footprints” by Christopher Fowler is in the classic Holmes formula, a first-person account told by Watson about a case in 1888. It follows along the lines of stories like “The Adventure of the Sussex Vampire” in which Holmes is presented with a supernatural situation and attempts to disprove it. The story ends up a bit uneven (it’s not clear whether Holmes is actually accepting the supernatural conclusions he’s coming to or not), but overall it’s not bad.

“The Deadly Sin of Sherlock Holmes” by Tom English is told in the third person, with a few glimpses into the situations or other characters impacted by the story. This tells of an evil book of sins penned in the 1400s by an ancestor of Moriarty. Although Holmes comes to embrace the supernatural option in this story, it feels plausible. The tale overall is very dark and contains quite a bit of conflict around the nature of faith and sin – not a traditional Holmes story, but very good despite that.

“The Color that Came to Chiswick” by William Miekle leaves me conflicted. It has slightly irritating “steampunk”-ish levels of technology (in this case, medical technology, such as germ theory and modern approaches to dealing with it) and is clearly a Cthulhu mythos crossover. As such, I found it to be on par with some of the stories I’ve read in anthologies such as those in “Shadows Over Baker Street” – slightly unsatisfying both to fans of Lovecraft and Doyle. It’s an adequate story for all that, but it doesn’t stand out much.

“From the Tree of Time” by Fred Saberhagen is the only story that isn’t written specifically for this anthology. It is, of all things, a Dracula/Holmes collaboration case, with Dracula narrating the story to an unnamed first-person narrator in the late twentieth century. Surprisingly fun, and appropriately short – the story devotes only the words needed to convey the story and no more, keeping it tight and enjoyable before the novelty wears off.

“The Executioner” by Lawrence C. Connolly details how Holmes might have survived Reichenbach Falls, by being brought back to life. It’s a first-person story from the perspective of Holmes, and the story contains a healthy blending of the fiction of Mary Shelley. It’s one of the more unusual stories (it’s hard to explain without spoiling the core surprise of the story), but it’s full of Gothic flavor.

“A Country Death” by Simon Kurt Unsworth is a story set around the time of Holmes’ retirement, told from the third-perspective. The story has an unnecessary twist early on around the identity of the detective (it gives the impression that Holmes is the detective, but it’s the death of Holmes that is the object of the story). The only real touches to the Holmes canon are the fact that Holmes is the victim and it is centered around his bee-keeping during his retirement, but otherwise it ends up being a good horror story with some mystery trappings, instead of a mystery story with some horrific elements.

“Sherlock Holmes and the Great Game” by Kevin Cockle is an irritating story about how all of Holmes’ detective work is actually the result of a magic knife, and that all of Watson’s accounts are lies to cover up the fact that Holmes just points a knife at the problem and manages to solve it. The core of the character, in my mind, is completely shattered by this premise, and it was hard for me to enjoy the story at all as a result.

“Sherlock Holmes and the Diving Bell” by Simon Clark confused me. In the investigation for a supposedly immortal man trapped in an old diving bell for five years, Holmes deduces the existence of psychic powers while discounting the concept of immortality. There’s also a reference to saving a young girl that doesn’t seem to have anything to do with anything else. It’s in the classic “first-person Watson” format, but I just couldn’t wrap my head around what this story was trying to accomplish – it felt like half of the story was missing.

“The Greatest Mystery” by Paul Kane is another first-person Watson story in which Holmes fights Death itself. Like “The Great Game,” I found the premise flimsy (although the story at least takes a while to unveil it), and there’s a nice reference to a canonical story, but otherwise I just couldn’t get into this one.

“The House of Blood” by Tony Richards takes the moniker of “the immortal detective” literally in this third-person story. Holmes realizes after his death at Reichenbach that he cannot die nor does he age, and over time he finds himself in modern-day Vegas. Although the previous few stories had similarly unusual premises, this one charmed me because I felt the essence of the character was preserved. The ending was a bit awkward, but how Holmes comes to slowly accept the supernatural (even though he himself is evidence of the existence of the supernatural) feels right. I would read an entire novel of modern-day Holmes from Tony Richards.

Finally, “The Adventure of the Six Maledictions” by Kim Newman is by far the gem of the book. This story takes up nearly a quarter of the whole anthology, but it is worth every page. Surprisingly, this story doesn’t even have a whiff of Holmes and Watson in it – instead, the main characters are colonel Moran and Professor Moriarty! Like Kim’s well-known novel “Anno Dracula,” he mixes a number of great references to other stories together into one rich mythology: explicit references to books like Jewel of the Seven Stars and The Maltese Falcon, as well as passing notes to the A. J. Raffles and Arsene Lupin stories. Moran as a narrator is vulgar, racist, arrogant, and wonderfully entertaining while doing it. While I would read a novel of Tony Richards’ Holmes, I would read an entire series of Kim Newman’s Moran.

Conclusion: Every anthology ends up having a few stories that don’t appeal, and this one is much the same. But most of the stories are good for a variety of reasons, and the last two stories are absolutely worth the price of admission. If you are a fan of Sherlock Holmes and novel approaches to well-loved characters, this anthology is well worth a look.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Review by Eddy Webb

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This is a wild ride that seems to sneak into every corner of your brain. OK – I am a geek, and one who grew up in the 1970s and 1980s, roughly contemporary with the character of James Halliday, who in the book created the most amazing and pervasive system that combines MMORPG with VR and social network and even e-learning… So I ‘get’ (or should that be ‘grok’ – or perhaps not, the one bit of pop culture that’s neglected is the written word) just about every reference, even most of the videogame ones, despite my only ever becoming competent at a single one… which, of course, turns up at the heart of the final challenge!

The story is simple: geeky deprived kid figures out a puzzle that’s baffled thousands if not millions of people ostensibly brighter and certainly better-resourced than he is, wins the prize and the girl. But the way in which it is told is as immersive as getting online in the OASIS system, engulfing you with 1980s icons such as D&D’s Tomb of Horrors module, early primitive videogames and classic SF movies in a swirling synthesis that resonates with so many memories. Whilst I have the edge of having lived through the rise of the videogame, seen my characters fall in the Tomb, watched the movies and coded early websites, it doesn’t matter if you didn’t… the references are never so obscure that you cannot find them out quickly even when they’re not explained then and there, and the whole basis of the geek mentality, obsessing over the gathering of trivia about shared interests is familiar even to those who don’t share it to quite that extent.

Even if I do have to confess that when I got to the segment based on Tomb of Horrors I didn’t need to open my copy to know what would come next… told you I’m a geek, and one with an eidetic memory come to that!

Never mind first person shooter, the whole tale is told from the standpoint of the hero, the geek kid living in squalor, his prized possession his OASIS interface provided by the public school system, much of which has gone online – a whole planet-full of identical virtual schools in which real students enrol and guide their avatars through virtual halls… at least you don’t get a wedgie or a swirly, even if there are as many jocks and rich kids and beautiful ones to be found here as in a real bricks and mortar school. And you can see it all in your mind’s eye, as vividly as he – Parzival – sees it projected onto his retinas.

The characters, too, are richly portrayed, be they real or virtual; both Parzival’s friends and rivals, you have no difficulty imagining that this could all be… I was about to say ‘real’ but is that the right word for a virtual reality? There’s a sense of ‘this could be’ – even one of wishing it was… this encapsulates a lot of the magic that is found in a shared world, one based on common knowledge and pursuits, that can be referenced and argued about with the passion that we geeks reserve for what we all like: and this book has joined the list.

Review by Megan Robertson

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This is poetry! Even when it is prose… I mean, that the writing flows smoothly, honed turns of phrase that draw you in and create pictures in your mind.

The plot continues to follow, in the main, the exploits of Thomas Cale, who is now brought to prominence as the recognised – at least by some – embodiment of God’s own anger, his innate talent for violence being viewed as divinely inspired, and thus admired by an organisation as partial to using force to impose what they see as the will of God on others. Given privileges surprising to one of such young age and lack of experience, he is given battlefield command of Redeemer forces where his unorthodox tactics and personal leadership bring results… mirrored by turbulance in the higher echelons of the church hierarchy as plotters seek power and even the Pope’s throne.

It’s a compelling tale that sweeps you along, eager to find out how Cale will prosper, what will happen to other people – both those with him and those in subordinate plotlines based around some of the people he met earlier and who have scattered across the world. Ultimately the question is: given that Cale is the Wrath of God made flesh, will that wrath fall where the Redeemers expect?

The backdrop of the land is richly wrought, with a strangeness that is somehow familiar. This is in part due to the use of names – of places, of things – taken askew. The Ammonites are a people, not a bunch of fossils. Place names you can find on a map exist, but as somewhere else. Simmon’s Yat. The Quantocks. The whole sweep of the political situation is again both familiar and strange. Echoes of mediaeval Church involvement in matters secular, but wrought larger than even Rome dared, with regular military force used in true Machiavellian style as politics by other means. Internal struggles, of vital import – literally life and death – to those involved, yet unnoticed by the man in the street, who may just about realise that there’s a new Pope without a glimmering of what went on to ensure that the ‘right’ man got appointed… let alone what was discovered about the last one!

It’s an epic, sweeping tale in a land one would love to explore more fully (although maybe on holiday or viewed in a documentary rather than as a place in which to live!). Snippets of places, cultures, people that are glossed over yet are ripe with promise, somehow you feel sure that there’s more to be known about them even if it doesn’t suit the storyteller to talk about them just now… the feeling of ‘alternate reality’ is strong in this one, and you’re torn, longing to discover what happens yet knowing that once you’ve found out you’ll have to leave.

If you like worlds that have a life of their own, where you feel certain that there’s just as much life down other streets as there is down the one that the story takes you, you will enjoy this. You’ll also relish the knowledge that even amidst realms ruled by the powerful and remote, ordinary people can achieve mightily, affect the very course of events… and that all people, great and small, struggle with themselves and with their associates, shifting relationships, truly the human condition even in someplace that existed only in the author’s mind… until his words brought it to such vivid life in mine!

Review by Megan Robertson

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Midnight at the Spanish Gardens is not the kind of book I normally review for Flames Rising. It is certainly a fantasy novel, but the fantasy elements don’t actually end up being all that important: the book revolves around the choices that people make in their lives, and what they might do differently if they had it to do all over again — or if fate or chance had played out the events differently. But while it’s not truly a dark fantasy, I wanted to review it here after reading an ARC from the author because this is the type of book that held me and didn’t let me go. I actually stood in a doorway the first night I was reading it, intending to walk somewhere to put it down, expecting to head off to bed for the night, but I flipped page after page in my nook and kept reading, standing there, for probably twenty minutes. Then, realizing I clearly wasn’t going to stop, I gave up my rational decision to head to bed and sat down and read more instead. Not only that, but even when I wasn’t reading the book, I was thinking about it. That experience tells me that this is a book worth sharing.

In the opening of Midnight at the Spanish Gardens, Alma Alexander introduces Olivia, an unhappy woman who clearly wishes for a life that had gone differently. She’s going to a familiar old restaurant, the Spanish Gardens, to meet with friends she hasn’t seen for more than twenty years, to catch up on their lives. It makes her nervous, as she parted with some of them on bad terms: Simon, who was her lover, betrayed her by turning her brother’s war stories into a novel; Ellen, her best friend, was the woman Simon turned to for comfort after the fight, and a pregnancy (and marriage between the two of them) swiftly followed. In avoiding those two, she’s also avoided Quincey and John, people who might otherwise have been better friends. One by one, each member of the quintet is given the opportunity, unknown to the others, to see a different version of their own lives. The enigmatic bartender Ariel hands each one of them, in turn, instructions on how to see a different path, in the knowledge that, only for a moment, they will have the memories of both lives, and they will have to choose which one is theirs.

The decisions each of them makes at the end come down to different matters: for one it’s the chance to be a star or the role of a mentor; for another it’s true love or the children she’s brought into the world. Sometimes the choice is one of pride, other times of intellectual exercise. But the question beneath each of them — what have I done in this life that’s worth keeping? — has a resonance beyond the magic that gave them the choice.

Alexander’s language is lovely and poetic, but she never lets it get in the way of the story she’s telling. The imagery is beautiful, the setting is compelling, and the character of the mysterious and magical Ariel, a Messenger (for Fate? for God? we never find out), is compelling. But it’s the characters that drive this story, in all of their imperfection, in all of their passion or disconnection or feeling of failure. And the conceit is one that will linger — if you saw a different life, a different path you might have taken, would you trade the joys and failures of this one for the joys and failures of the other? What would you sacrifice for the things you truly care about in your own world? The magic of looking at your own life through the lens of the Spanish Gardens and take a little wisdom away may well be hidden within the novel’s pages, no tragic choice required.

Review by Alana Abbott

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Chilling Tales: Evil Did I Dwell; Lewd Did I Live
Edited by Michael Kelly
218 pages
Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing

Horror is a subjective state; what one finds horrifying another might find merely gruesome or grotesque. It is within this ambiguity I find myself regarding Chilling Tales: Evil DId I Dwell; Lewd Did I Live. There was horror within to be sure; also within was loneliness, isolation, despair, and a lot of really good writing.

The 18 “Spine tingling Tales” contained in this volume represent work of some of Canada’s brightest writers. This is pointed out carefully in the editor’s introduction as a rarity, and while I had heard of several authors in the contents page, I was largely unfamiliar with all of them. In that respect I am grateful to Mr. Kelly for assembling this slate of authors into whose work I now wish to delve further. Mr. Kelly goes on to mention two other all-Canadian anthologies, including Tesseracts Thirteen, edited by David Morrell and Nancy Kilpatrick, and Evolve, a collection of vampire tales edited by Nancy Kilpatrick. Both volumes are also published by Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy.

Standout stories for me in this collection included “Tom Chesnutt’s Midnight Blues” by Robert J. Wiersema and “404″ by Barbara Roden. Both are among the first three tales and get the anthology off to a great start. “Tom Chesnutt’s” is about a philandering folk singer who inadvertently causes his wife’s death. She haunts him now, not actively rattling chains and moaning but rather showing up at his gigs – a phantom only he can see – as a reminder of his misdeeds. “404″ is a distressingly familiar tale about office workers who discover their comrades simply disappear one day. As their numbers dwindle and their isolation increases, they each find themselves coming under the watchful eye of their supervisor.

“King Him” by Richard Gavin is told almost in a fairy-tale manner, about a brother and sister living alone in a small community. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that sanity is a fragile creature, and there are things than can enter this world that can cause sanity to crumble, bit by bit. Leah Bobet’s “Stay” emphasizes the isolation or northern Canadian winter, as a produce truck goes off the road near the tiny town of Sunrise. Since the produce will spoil before a replacement truck can get through to take it away, the townsfolk hold a feast, finding the fresh, exotic fruits and vegetables most welcome. The truck’s driver proves to be more than he appears – or perhaps less – and the townspeople must decide what to do about him.

“The Deafening Sound of Slumber” is Simon Strantzas’ busy tale of a man overly sensitive to noise who’s best option is working nights in a sleep research facility. This was a chilling tale indeed with a clever, intriguing concept, but I felt its effectiveness somewhat lost by the distracting foibles of the narrator. It could easily have been every bit as good by minimizing or leaving those bits of character development completely out of the story altogether; I found the man more aggravating than anything and it broke my sympathy for the character. Ultimately I was relieved at his demise, which I’m not certain was the author’s intent.

Likewise in Nancy Kilpatrick’s “Sympathy for the Devil” I found it difficult to sympathize – or even identify with – the main character because he’s such a turd of a man. In the end, he has a change of heart and feels contrition over what he’s done, but it doesn’t save him. His epiphany feels too forced, too (literally) last-minute to work, and his end is a fitting one. In “My Body” by Ian Rogers on the other hand, I found the mystery of the story intriguing, and was in the dark about the reveal until nearly the end.

I found myself perplexed at the inclusion of a number of these stories, particularly Suzanne Church’s “The Needle’s Eye”. While an excellent story, there is nothing particularly horrifying about it, unless one has a phobia about eye injuries. It is a bittersweet tale about medical personnel fighting against a new, lethal plague in Africa, and frankly I found the ending happy and hopeful despite the disability the protagonist has to contend with for the rest of his life – which seems to me the antithesis of the anthology’s theme. Still, it’s difficult to find too much fault with “The Needle’s Eye” itself; it is a great story well told.

The sense of isolation and despair is a strong, unifying undercurrent in this book, and that state of mind can be horrifying of itself, but mostly these stories convey the heavy oppression of loneliness and isolation. They were very effective stories – well-written, pacing and character development were good – but I found it difficult to call them all horror, or even dark fantasy, though some were closer than others. Being clearly labelled as a “Horror and Dark Fantasy Anthology” (it even says so on the back cover) I couldn’t help but feel a tiny bit cheated, though in truth, the term “Dark Fantasy” is a pretty broad and vaguely-defined category. Certainly nearly all were enjoyable stories and I found them entertaining at the very least, but not chilling or spine tingling as billed. Possibly this is a case of personal taste; I urge you to read the anthology for yourself and decide whether or not I’m right. The high level of quality of the tales in this collection is well worth the effort in any case.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Review by Bill Bodden

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If you follow Jim Hines’s blog, you know he’s been experimenting with electronically self-publishing short stories, many of which originally appeared in print publications. His first collection, Goblin Tales, did well enough that he’s releasing another group of six tales, Kitemaster and Other Stories, in mid-August. I caught Jim’s note for reviewers and volunteered, and I think this is another strong group of stories, mostly for the lighthearted fantasy crowd. Three of them I’d previously purchased via fictionwise, and have been favorites of mine since the first reading, but three were brand new to me, and I think all are solid stories — even the one that left me with something akin to the willies over a series of puppet deaths. But we’ll get there in a minute.

“Kitemaster” is the title story of the collection and also the opener, a tale in which a young, untrained peasant with a talent for kite magic is captured by rebels and forced, due to threats against her hostage brother, to work against the Imperial army. Nial is a sympathetic heroine, and the setting evokes ancient China without getting too specific — the use of manned kites to fly scouts has a historical basis, but much of the rest of the setting is invented, with only a slight Chinese flavor. The real star of the story is Osa, a spirit kite, who aids Nial in her plans to outwit the general who has captured her, and possibly help save the Emperor.

In “Untrained Melody,” another untrained magic user, Laura, is roped into the beginnings of learning how to be a bard when a dwarf drags her on a mission to undo the magic she’s inadvertently done. The setting this time is a modern one, and Laura is just trying to make ends meet. She also has, as her instrument of choice, an accordion. The plot may be serious on this one, but the trappings are all comedy, and the banter between Laura and the dwarf, Al, sparkles.

Three of my favorite Jim Hines stories follow: “Blade of the Bunny,” a sword and sorcery tale about two thieves outwitting a crooked wizard; “Over the Hill,” which features three granny warriors teaching a young, chainmailed lady guard the ropes of dealing with bandits (against the girl’s own better judgment); and “Spell of the Sparrow,” a sequel to “Blade” in which the daughter of the two thieves helps to undo a lovespell on her father. These stories worked for me on first read and they continue to feel like fantasy to come home to — while the settings are nonspecific, the trappings are easy to recognize. These characters could show up in your D&D game and you’d feel in good company (even if the grannies from “Over the Hill” did have to tug your ear to make sure you were following their lead). In some cases, that flavor detracts from the overall story, but in this case, it’s as though the story is speaking a language the readers already know, so Hines can get right to the meat of his tale. “Blade of the Bunny” has a love story at its heart — it’s about two people who haven’t really realized they’re in love until they’re in the thick of a quest together and have to outwit their employer to win. “Over the Hill” is, in some ways, about the powers that come with age — and a soldier uses every weapon she has available to her. The three elderly leads are fantastic; they’re reminiscent of the witches from Terry Pratchett’s “Discworld” books, with that same ability to see the truth of things, but with warrior skills in their backgrounds. “Spell of the Sparrow” offers up how stubbornness and a lack of nobility can sometimes be the strengths that make a relationship work — even in the face of evil magic — and how listening to your children really can come in handy.

Up until this point in the collection, all of the stories have similar trapping and similar themes — they’re definitely fantasy, and while there’s humor, they’re not necessarily joke stories. Even “Over the Hill” has characters with real depth and goals, even if they complain about their bodily functions and the effects of prunes. “The Creature in Your Neighborhood” is a departure from the tone of the rest of the collection, and it’s a direct parody of Sesame Street, but in a twisted, alternate reality where a werewolf has infected one of the puppets. The short becomes a horror story told in the structure of a children’s television show, and the result is… bizarre. It’s clear that Hines is a parent himself, and it feels like after watching Sesame Street one too many times, he was ready to get even, or at least subject the characters to horrible suffering. In some moments, it works, and I’d guess that for some readers, it’ll work all the way through. I may still be a bit too fond of the Sesame Street gang to gleefully watch as their counterparts spiral into murder and despair. Had it been in a collection with some of Hines’s other stories (“Nothing but Meat” or “Brainburgers and Bile Shakes: A Love Story,” for example, which feature cannibalism and zombies respectively), I think I’d have read it differently; in the context of the previous stories, it kind of made me want to sing, “Which of these things is not like the others?” (That may say more about me than about the story itself!)

As a bonus conclusion, Hines is offering a sneak peek into his new series, which starts with Libriomancer and is scheduled to release in 2012. If the excerpt is anything to judge by, this is going to be a series well worth following.

Overall, I felt the collection might have benefited from a short introduction about why these pieces were selected for the collection, or just offering a little bit about how the collection came to be, but the very short afterwords for each story filled a lot of that need. It’s a strong collection with several excellent pieces, and at the price Hines has mentioned ($3.99), it’s about 66 cents per story. This is a great entry point into Hines’s work for people who haven’t read his other series; fans of his earlier books won’t be disappointed.

Review by Alana Abbott

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Hot off the presses, Ghost Story is the 13th installment in the Dresden Files series by Jim Butcher. At this point in the series, I would like to point out that if you haven’t read Changes or some of the earlier books, then this review will likely contain ***spoilers***. Be kind to the reviewer, folks.

First things first: due to the way characters are interwoven throughout the fabric of the plot, I would recommend that new readers do not pick up “this” book as the first one. While Butcher does a fine job of trying to facilitate the back story to remind readers who some of the existing characters are, the emotional gut-wrenching reaction that you may have as a reader will fizzle and pop like a dud firecracker.

As the title suggests, this is a Ghost Story. Yes, Harry Dresden is dead. Yes, Harry is a ghost — or is he? No, Harry does not start off with any magical powers from his considerable arsenal of spells, either. What he does have, however, is the ability to solve a mystery through sheer force of will. This particular novel has more worldbuilding in it than some of the previous books, in part because the mechanics of ghosts, shades, etc. are often different from one another. I liked some of the worldbuilding, true, but wanted to know more about what the living were up to. (Truthfully, I could read a whole book just about Murphy…)

Here, Harry’s perspective bobs and weaves through time and matter, to highlight the consequences of the last book’s ending. Remember, Harry didn’t “just” kill a member of the Red Court. He obliterated all of them. In the grand scheme of things, that type of act will leave a mark. The price that Harry had to pay? Was it his life? (Um, can’t tell you that.) So, where can we see the near-devastating effects?

The answer lies with what his friends have had to deal with. In the wake of the destruction of a very old, and very ancient vampire society — there’s a power vacuum. Rules (whether their moral/lawful or not) have been erased. To fill the void, the petty thugs and sorcerers climb over each other for what little power they can gain. New groups, like the Fomor, orchestrate primarily from behind-the-scenes. The vacuum, however, doesn’t just exist because of what Harry did in the last book — there’s also some loose ends that need to be tied up for the “good guys.” Murphy and the others, well… She’s tough-as-nails and I’m happy to see it.

Other characters from previous books also show up in Ghost Story. I enjoyed seeing more of these characters, because they balance Harry’s brashness and magical power out. A few of them, like Mort, drive the plot because Harry’s friends are in the middle of a fight for their lives and the safety of Chicago.

As I mentioned earlier, I feel that Ghost Story would best be appreciated by people who have either followed all of the books or who have, at the very least, read Changes. I’ll be curious to see readers’ reactions to this particular book, because at the end of the day, it seems to me that Harry Dresden will always play by his own rules.

In the end, I felt Ghost Story acted as the catalyst to the next book in the series because of the way some of the plot threads were tied up. To tell you any more — what I liked and what I didn’t — would definitely reveal too much of what Ghost Story is about.

Review by Monica Valentinelli

Related posts:

1. Summer Knight (Dresden Files Book 4) Review
2. Grave Peril (Dresden Files Book 3) Review
3. Fool Moon (Dresden Files Book 2) Review

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The Magician King is a novel penned by author Lev Grossman that follows after the events of The Magicians. Before I go any further, I want to point out two things: first, you may want to read my The Magicians review or our preview of The Magicians to help you recall the plot. Second? If you haven’t read the first book, I’m not certain you’ll enjoy this one as much, for reasons which I’ll get into shortly.

As I mentioned above, The Magician King takes place after the events of The Magicians. Because of that, fair warning: I feel there is no possible way I can write this review without spoiling something for someone… So be kind to the reviewer. Please.

A common complaint among readers I hear is whether or not magic has a “cost.” Grossman’s books marry the real world and the magical one, by diving into this current wholeheartedly. The deeper we get into the world of Fillory, the more we realize that “cost” may not necessarily be related to the law of physics. While there was tragedy and terror in the first book, here the “cost” runs the whole spectrum — the worst of which happens to the main characters, Quentin and Julia.

The Magician King is a departure from the first book, in the sense that some of the accompanying characters we saw in The Magicians either fade into the background or are already there. I don’t have a feeling — good or bad — about this, but as an author myself I do notice when the structure of the story changes. Here, there are two types of plots that weave in-and-out of one another: what happened to Julia and why King Quentin must find seven keys to save Fillory. While you might expect that this is also mirrored by setting (e.g. Earth and Fillory-type places), that is not necessarily the case.

Balancing real world problems with wonderment and discovery is a tough job for any author, and here I felt more drawn to Julia and her mysteries than to the fantastical elements of Fillory. I feel that this is my reaction as a result of the quest portion primarily taking place off-stage. So, by the time we get to the crucial moment, that anticipation I would normally feel isn’t as potent because of the different emphasis on location, foreshadow, and character.

I don’t think this story could have been written any other way, because Julia’s tale had to be told. I “hear” Grossman’s voice when I read about her depression, her unbearable obsession with magic and her need to feel human. Quentin, on the other hand, also has a story to tell, but it’s one of regression — not progression. Despite all of the loss and all of the power he has, Quentin is “still” human. He’s still curious, whether or not he should be. He grieves. He struggles with leadership.

And he’s still — almost to a fault — naive.

After reading this story, though, I’m hoping there’s another book Grossman will toil endless hours over. I expect that novel would be a deeper dive into forbidden territory. While he only scratches the surface here, I want him to let loose with wild abandon the wonders and terrors that await us in…

Well, I can’t tell you that. Because that really would spoil the story for you.

If you pick up The Magician King, do it because you care about these characters and what happens to them. Don’t pick it up because you want to see more of the world, even though that is here, too. After all, this story is less about Fillory and more about what the relationship that we, as humans, are supposed to have with magic — and each other.

Review by Monica Valentinelli

Related posts:

1. Peril at King’s Landing RPG Review
2. The Magicians Fiction Review

Available at Amazon.com

In Summer Knight, Harry is dealing with the after effects of Susan leaving. He spends day and night trying to find a cure for her vampirism. To no avail. Anger and depression are the mainstays of his life now. He doesn’t eat. He doesn’t bathe. He doesn’t see any of his friends, whom are really worried for him. Harry has isolated himself in a manner that is hardly healthy.

After meeting his friend Billy (and surviving both simultaneous attack from both a ghoul and a drive by shooting), Harry finds out that Billy has set up an appointment for him. Harry goes and meets the client, to find out that is is Mab, Queen of the Winter Court. She asks him to find out whom killed a man named Ronald Reuel. She also tells him that she now his purchased debt to Lenanasidhe, and she is willing to cancel the debt…after he does three favors for her. This is the first one and Harry really doesn’t have much of a choice. You do NOT say no, to the Queen of Air and Darkness, so therefore he is now the emissary for Winter.

So Harry has to find out who murdered Reuel, whom he finds out was the Summer Knight. Then he has to investigate both Summer and Winter to find the answers. He finds out there are six queens, three from each.

The Lady, the Queen, and the Mother. He met the Summer Lady Aurora, whom tried to get him to stay with her to ease his pain. He then met the Winter Lady Maeve, whom tried to seduce him. The funny thing is both of these were traps, just in different ways. Which show how dangerous both can be.

I have talked about in previous review, how much I have enjoyed the friendship between Harry and Karin Murphy. It really takes off here as Harry finally tells her what is going on in the supernatural world. Things have changed and Harry realizes that he needs her help. But in order for her to really help, she has to be clued in as to what is going on. He had wanted to protect her from this, but now he knows in order for her to stay alive, she needs to know. I loved this, and it shows how their relationship has grown over the series. She helps him fight off the Ghoul and a huge plant monster, but gets hurt in the process and has to drop out of the fight.

The introduction to the Summer and Winter court has brought a new dimension to the series. The Fae are immortal, and love to make deals with mortal. The only problem is, they are very deceitful, and mortal rarely get the better of them. But even beyond that, you have two sides of the same coin. The only thing they normally are worried about is each other, they are neutral on the affairs of others.

We also get a glimpse into the White Council a bit. Ebenezer McCoy was Harry’s mentor as a child. When the White Council wanted to execute him for the murder of Justin DuMorne. Harry had used dark magic to defend himself against DuMorne. Ebenezer then introduces him to three of the High Council. Listens-to-Wind, Martha Liberty, and the Gatekeeper. In the White Council Meeting, it is brought to it’s attention that the Red Court will stop the war if they hand over Harry. Harry is given once chance, he has to somehow get The Winter Court to grant passage. Or he will die. Also you get to really see how much the Warden Morgan hates Harry.

Then there is Elaine Mallory. Harry’s childhood sweetheart, whom he thought had betrayed him, but was also dead. She just shows up, out of the blue. Harry is really confused about this, cuz he thought she had betrayed him to DuMorne, but finds out she was under thrall to the wizard. Then he finds out she is the emissary of Summer and it gets even more complicated.

In the end Harry is betrayed, beat up, almost killed in a farie war that he stopped, avoids execution from The White Council, and kills a high ranking member of the Sidhe.

All in a day’s work.

I love the fae in these books. They are so different, but equally manipulative. I find this amusing, cuz if you aren’t careful you will assume that just because Summer is warm and friendly, that they aren’t manipulating you without you even knowing it. The plot of how the after effects of the Vampire War and this made for a great story. Adding some history with Elaine was a nice touch as well.

Review by Stacey Chancellor

Related posts:

1. Ghost Story (Dresden Files Book 13) Review
2. Grave Peril (Dresden Files Book 3) Review
3. Fool Moon (Dresden Files Book 2) Review

Available at Amazon.com

Again, I am trying not to spoil too much. But some things have to be said.

Grave Peril starts with a new character. Michael Carpenter, Knight of the Cross. For some reason the ghosts of Chicago have been going crazy for the last few weeks, and Harry and Michael have been running all over the place trying stop them. Michael is a great addition to this serious, because he brings a character that faith driven. Oh, and he has the holy sword Amoracchius, which was created by one of the nails that was used to crucify Jesus. Awesome.

Combined with plots dealing with Harry’s fairy godmother (Leanansidhe of the Winter Court of Fae), and ramifications of his actions in Storm Front with a Red Court Vampire named Bianca…this is the book that starts to move the serious toward being a great one.

Harry and Murphy’s relationship was better after Fool Moon. Still not great, but better. Even to the point where with a few other CPD members, they took down a seriously twisted sorcerer named Leonid Kravos. So things are better.

Another big step for Harry is the fact that he realizes he loves Susan Rodriguez. I love the conversation with Harry and Michael where Michael asks what his intentions are towards her. Being a servant of god really ads something to the conversations they have. Both men are trying to do what they think is right, but the way they get to that decision comes from different places. Love, love, love it. The conversation I am talking is that Michael asks Harry if he loves her, and he struggles even saying it out loud. He has had a rough life where so many people have abandoned him.

So Harry finds out that something called A Nightmare is coming into people dreams and then just attacking them, leaving them in an almost state of insanity. It just takes away part of their soul. This was a bit creepy to me, but it worked.

The climax of this story is that Harry is invited as a representative of the White Council to a party celebrating the promotion of Bianca to a higher rank in the Red Court. Harry knows it is probably a trap, since she wants to kill him. But along with Michael, he, eventually he goes because he needs answers to some of his questions. The funny part? It is a masquerade party and he went dressed AS a vampire.

Here he meets Thomas Raith, a White Court vampire, and his girlfriend Justine.

A lot of shit does down after this. Susan and Justine get captured by Bianca. Harry is forced to try to trick Lenansidhe (since she wants him to be her magical boy toy), Murphy gets attacked by the Nightmare and is barely alive, and Harry loses Michael’s sword.

Harry fights his way to Bianca to save that he loves. A woman that has been infected and changed by the Red Court. Bianca offers him a compromise. Dresden gets Justine, his magical items, and safe passage; in exchange, Bianca gets to keep Susan. If Dresden refuses and tries to rescue Susan, there will be war between the vampires of the Red Court and the White Council. Which was the primary reason for all of this anyway. In the end, Harry is forced to do something that will have serious consequences, but something that he never actually hesitated to do. In order to save the woman he loves. He attacks and kills Bianca, therefore breaking the Unseelie Accords and starting a war between the White Council and the Red Court. Damn.

Yeah, Harry can be a bit of a self-righteous freak show sometimes, but I understand that.

My favorite quote in the series, is in this book.

“For the sake of one soul. For one loved one. For one life.” I called power into my blasting rod, and its tip glowed incandescent white. “The way I see it, there’s nothing else worth fighting a war for” -Harry Dresden

With the addition of a few characters and plots lines, the series really turned in a great direction. This was the book that got me hooked on the series.

Review by Stacey Chancellor

Related posts:

1. Ghost Story (Dresden Files Book 13) Review
2. Summer Knight (Dresden Files Book 4) Review
3. Fool Moon (Dresden Files Book 2) Review