Dragon of the Mangroves takes place during the Second World War and traces the fate of two Japanese soldiers during the retreat of the Imperial Army from Burma under assault by British forces including the Gurkhas and Indian Army. Second Lieutent Yoshihisi Suma is in charge of a group of ‘tankettes’ about to be committed to a suicidal defence when he gets a sudden reprieve, a special mission to head a rescue mission to retrieve retreating soldiers from a defeat on an island/peninsula surrounded by mangrove swamp. Meanwhile private Minoru Kasuga, a machine gunner, is part of that retreat, forced back by the ferocious British attack the situation for him and the troops around him gets more and more desperate and as they try to escape the troops become prey to a terrible predatory creature of the mangrove swamps, the salt water crocodile.

Review by James ‘Grim’ Desborough

Skin and Bones is the second installment in Permuted Press‘ series of zombie anthologies, The Undead. It’s very much a case of what you see is what you get–which, of course, isn’t necessarily a bad thing, providing you like zombies.

The anthology opens with one of the strongest tales, David Wellington’s Cyclopean. The over-used ‘zombies working 9 to 5, no one even realizes they’re zombies’ theme is employed, but only lightly. Cyclopean is a fast-paced, entertaining and original zombie tale with Lovecraftian overtones.

Review by Leah Clarke

I’m a Gibson fan. I came up through the whole Cyberpunk thing – part of the reason I embraced the internet so readily – and followed onwards through the rest of his books as he became a publicly acceptable ‘important author’ rather than ‘just’ a science fiction author. Aside from a few short stories and things here and there I’ve read everything he’s put out from Burning Chrome to this, Spook Country.

Spook Country follows several different threads of stories and picks up on and carries along with a few bits and pieces from his previous novel, Pattern Recognition, which I loved and which suggests this may be part of a loose ‘trilogy’ much like his Cyberpunk trilogy (Neuromancer/Count Zero/Mona Lisa Overdrive) and his near-future trilogy (Virtual Light/Idoru/All Tomorrow’s Parties). This would seem to follow several patterns you can see in Gibson’s work…

Review by James ‘Grim’ Desborough

The Flash Fire Mini-Reviews are back with a mix of fiction, games and comics this week. Mages, Wizards, Witches and other spell-slinging heroes, villains and monsters make appearances in this collection of reviews.

We’re looking at a variety of magical styles, ranging from the dark and evil to the divinely inspired. I’m not talking about spellbooks here, but magic wielding characters or plots about magic in the world around them. We’ve got Harry Dresden, Willow and Redcloak alongside some Live-Action Mage and the Unwanted.

Anyway, let’s get on with those mini-reviews…

A Vampire Tale by David Wellington

After having read Monster Island, I was pleased to hear that Wellington was writing a vampire story. 13 Bullets is a modern action adventure with deadly vampires, great writing and a few clever plot twists.

The vampires in 13 Bullets are as inhuman as they get. Usually sometime after they’ve been turned they begin to lose all of their hair and mutate into their new, monstrous forms. They are incredibly strong, difficult to damage and often have an array of other powers at their disposal.

The dead are rising from their graves, so what can you do? Maybe grab a baseball bat and play some Zombie Baseball! Or grab that shotgun and sacrifice yourself for the good of the others. Of course, you can always get in your car and leave your friends in the dust.

Zombie Fluxx is an expanded version of Fluxx, a card game about change. The game changes as you play it, starting with the basic rule of draw one card and play one card. This will,of course, change when new rules are played.

Review by Graveyard Greg

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past year you’ve probably heard of Mass Effect and, since I’m always late doing these reviews odds are you’ve already played it, or – lacking the luxury I have of spending more time playing games – are still playing it. A brief summation then at the start of this review is ‘buy it, it is good’. Above and beyond Bioware’s existing reputation for creating good computer game RPGs this shows they’re masters of it and, until they perfect freeform AI for running roleplaying games this is about as good as the genre gets.

Review by James ‘Grim’ Desborough

Welcome to the second set of “Contest Edition” Mini-Reviews.

These are just some of the products offered by the sponsors of the Flames Rising Favorite Horror Game Contest. This week we sci-fi adventure mixed with medieval horror, zombies, pirates and more!

If you missed out on the first “Contest Edition” from last week, be sure to check out that mix of great games from other sponsors.

House of Leaves is a peculiar novel, not precisely one thing and not quite another. It isn’t quite a dark fantasy novel, it isn’t quite a horror novel, it isn’t quite a piece of kafkaesque surrealism and isn’t quite a cohesive work of fiction. It is at once pretentious and deep, confusing and captivating, disturbing and curious. The thrust of the story, which is really several stories, is the discovery of a peculiar manuscript by ‘Johnny Truant’ a no good tattoo artist and deadbeat who, thanks to the manuscript, seems to start a slow descent into madness. The manuscript came to him via Zampano, a crazy old man who died and from whom Johnny effectively stole it. The manuscript itself is an examination, investigation and critique into a strange film called The Navidson Record which records the peculiar happenings at the titular ‘House of Leaves’ a place owned by Navidson, his wife and their children and where the house takes on a sinister aspect as it shifts shape and time and seems to try and swallow them up, all of which is supposedly documented on a peculiar film that is doing the rounds.

Review by James ‘Grim’ Desborough

The subtitle of this 2007 Permuted Press offering is ‘A novel about zombies.’ This isn’t entirely true. Ross fills his days with selling bootleg horror movies, cheating on his two-timing girlfriend and hating life in general. He feels trapped in a vicious circle of uselessness.

Just as he begins to resign himself to the mid-twenties twilight he seems unable to escape, he starts to notice men in radiation suits, following him. Filming him.

Review by Leah Clarke

I am an unabashed Peter F Hamilton fan. I was initially introduced to his work by my great friend (and co-writer on The Munchkin’s Guide to Powergaming) Steve Mortimer through his Mindstar series (a bio-modified psychic detective of sorts in a post-warming, post flood, post ‘socialist’ Britain) and then followed on through the brick-like Night’s Dawn series and on into Pandora’s Star. Most of his books I have liked I great deal (apart from Misspent Youth) to the point where I even negotiated, and held for a year, the RPG rights to Mindstar and Night’s Dawn – but nobody was interested in pursuing it.

Review by James ‘Grim’ Desborough

Great for writers and game designers, I’ve never come across a more thorough and massive work detailing creatures so rare you may not recognize them. There are two, other books in the series entitled, The Element Encyclopedia of 5000 Spells and The Element Encyclopedia of Witchcraft. If either of those two books are as down-to-earth and fact-filled as this one, I wouldn’t hesitate to buy either one to add substance to my fantasy stories.

Welcome to another collection of Mini-Reviews here on Flames Rising!

This week we are going to focus on some of the cool products published by some of the sponsors of the “Favorite Horror Game Contest” and the creative games they have released. Next week will be a few more of sponsors’ products. Including amazing art and funny cards.

So sit back and enjoy this collection of zombies, cannibals, strange creatures and nightmare cities…

We’re suckers, so we bought the collector’s edition. In this edition you get a nice tall box that you feel bad about throwing away, a six inch or so plastic figurine and… that’s it. *rattles the box, turns it upside down* yes… that’s all you get. No art book, no strategy guide or hint booklet. Just the plastic figurine. They didn’t exactly go all out. To make matters even more annoying they’ve plastered a ‘not for resale’ tag across the front of the game box so you can’t even trade in the game. After the wonderfulness of the Bioshock collector’s edition this was… a little aggravating. If you’re going to have a special edition and charge that much more for it you should really push the boat out a little and this just wasn’t the case with Assassin’s Creed.

Review by James ‘Grim’ Desborough

Starring the voices of Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Doug Jones and John Hurt

What do vampires, an ancient goddess and Hellboy have in common? In this animated feature film, Hellboy and all his friends take on myth in his signature, sardonic style. True to the mythos, there is a touch of good versus evil mixed in with some savvy backstory and character development.

Review by Monica Valentinelli

Michelle Belanger lends her soprano voice to this musical selection by Nox Arcana.

Like their other selections, Blood of Angels is based on a theme. In this case, the idea that the “Watchers” alluded to in myth and religious texts were angels that fell from Heaven to fall in love with humans.

Round three of the Flames Rising Flash Fire Mini-Reviews series is here!

This week we’ve got a vampire theme going on with a mix of fiction, comics and games. Some vampire hunters might even make an appearance as well. You can’t have the monsters without giving the heroes a little screen-time too. So, grab your garlic, watch your neck and enjoy!

Independent films often struggle with their ability to attain audiences and garner recognition. I like to think that some of these lesser-known films are self-aware, either stretching their boundaries to be a “great” film, or toying with conventional filmmaking to experiment with the media.

Review by Monica Valentinelli

As the last of the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is the finishing touch to a series full of magic, mystery and friendship. Having read all of the books, I’m sure that fans of the series have either already picked up this book or will shortly. Still, there are interesting things to point out here that have left many readers feeling a little bit unsatisfied with the events that have happened here.

A Japanese terror movie remake is frequently a bad idea, but an American horror movie that looks like one is worst. “Wind chill” tries to tell a declared true story in a Japanese way. That means to use a claustrophobic atmosphere, an aesthetic style and especially a plot based on spirits that want revenge. But in the end, it’s just a nothing-happens movie with bad acting and lazy direction.

Review by Douglas Lobo