Search Results for: castell

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The Last Dangerous Visions: Disappointing

The Last Dangerous Visions edited by Harlan Ellison & J. Michael Straczynski

Short story collections by their nature are hit and miss. The classic, almost unavoidable go-to review is calling a collection a “mixed bag” or noting only “some of the stories hit.” Honestly, I wish I could go that far with The Last Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison (kind of) and J. Michael Straczynski (kind of), but the disappointing reality is that most of these stories rather than some “didn’t hit” for me,


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Play of Shadows: In which the play’s the thing

Play of Shadows by Sebastien de Castell

Welcome to Play of Shadows, in which, in the fabled city of Jereste, our Hero, Damelas Chademantaigne, flees a duel and takes refuge with a Theater Troupe. Our young Hero faces many adversaries, among them a Duellist, (the Vixen); An Assassin, (the Black Amaranth), and a dreaded vigilante army (the Iron Orchids), while he Confronts Undesirable Truths from the Past, and is charged by a Duke to perform A Play that will Reveal the Truth and may destroy Jereste in the process.


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Crucible of Chaos: With apologies, as always, to the author

Crucible of Chaos by Sebastien de Castell

Estevar hauled up on his mule as Castle Aramor came into view through the dampening fog. The mule turned back with a baleful look.

“I know, I know. Do you think I’m enjoying this foul weather any more than you are?”

The mule dipped its head and turned it slightly aslant, looking upward at Estevar, as if to note that while they both shared the same weather, only one of them had the other’s weight as additional burden. A substantial weight at that Estevar had to acknowledge.


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Sunday Status Update: May 28, 2023

Marion: I’m about one third of the way through Matthew Pearl’s 18-year-old novel The Bookaneer, which I’m liking more now that our narrator has arrived in Samoa and we’ve met Robert Louis Stevenson and his family.

Bill: Since our last update I read:

  • The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence: sure to be on my Best of ‘23 list
  • The Essential Peter S. Beagle: Volumes I and II by Peter S. Beagle:  an excellent (no surprise) collection of Beagle’s short stories
  • Witch King by Martha Wells: A good fantasy with an intriguing set of characters
  • The Malevolent Seven by Sebastien de Castell: admittedly a  bit disappointing though enjoyed parts
  • For the Love of Mars by Matthew Shindell: an interesting look at our changing thoughts about the Red Planet over time
  • The Ugly History of Beautiful Things,

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The Malevolent Seven: Bitterness needs nuance

The Malevolent Seven by Sebastien de Castell

Sebastien de Castell’s 2023 antihero novel The Malevolent Seven has good magical action and lots of sarcastic banter. It has an emotionally tortured male main character in a world that is filled with suffering, death, betrayal and a sense of hopelessness that swamps every action. Generally, I enjoy de Castell’s work, but while this book had enough to keep me reading, ultimately, it doesn’t rank among my favorite works of his.

I say, “enough to keep me reading,” because I very nearly put this book down during the first 50 pages.


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Crownbreaker: God-killing is never easy

Crownbreaker by Sebastien de Castell

In 2019’s Crownbreaker, the final book of the SPELLSLINGER series, Kellen Argos, once Ke’Helios of the House of Ke, is expected to kill a god.

This isn’t the weirdest thing the protagonist of Sebastien De Castell’s fantasy saga has been asked to do, but it’s probably in the top two. Strangely, nearly everyone Kellen knows—his father, his Argosi mentor Ferius, even the queen he is pledged to protect, all want him to do it. I don’t think those folks have ever agreed on anything before.


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Sunday Status Update: March 26, 2023

Marion: I read  Crownbreaker,  the final book in Sebastien de Castell’s SPELLSLINGER series. I’ve skipped one book in Kellen’s adventures, and it’s the one before this one, but I think I kept up well enough. Kellen is sent off to kill a god in this one, but as always, his real problem is his relationship with his powerful, loving, manipulative, lying father. Now I’m reading Elsa Sjunneson’s Sword of the White Horse, a second world fantasy based on the Ubisoft game Assassin’s Creed,


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Tales of the Greatcoats Vol. 1: A fond return to a warmly remembered world

Tales of the Greatcoats Volume 1 by Sebastian De Castell

“So I’m only in one of these nine Greatcoats stories?” Brasti asked, pausing his work.

“Yes,” De Castell replied. “Though to—”

“But Kest gets two?”

“The man knows talent when he sees it,” Kest said, skimming through the pages of Tales of the Greatcoats. “I especially like how you have me win a duel without actually fighting the duel. And … Hold on, I’m in only two?”

Brasti snorted.


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Sunday Status Update: January 2, 2022

Marion: I finished M. A. Carrick’s The Liar’s Knot, and enjoyed every minute of it. I sent off interview questions to the two writers who comprise that author, and look forward to providing that interview and a giveaway in the near future. I finished up Louise Erdrich’s The Sentence, a nice bit of metafiction about Tookie, who works in a bookstore owned by a writer named Louise. Tookie is haunted by a ghost of Flora, an annoying regular customer, who is now haunting it (she didn’t die there,


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Thoughtful Thursday: 2021 Books We Can’t Wait For! (Giveaway!)

Here are some of the books we can’t wait for in 2021!

Hover over the covers to see what our reviewers said about each book.

Which books are you looking forward to this year? One commenter wins a book from our stacks OR we’ll send you the Kindle version of your choice of one of these:

If you’d like to get email notifications about our GIVEAWAYS,
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