Forty pages into Vellum, I was dazzled. Hal Duncan‘s debut novel appeared to be every bit as phantasmagoric as the tidal wave of advance hype was claiming it was. A hundred pages in, my initial delight was morphing into skepticism. Yes, Duncan is a remarkably assured stylist, but is there any direction here? Is there ever going to emerge a cogent narrative to involve me beyond the author’s obvious gift for lovely and visually evocative prose? By about 175 pages,
November 13th, 2010. Thomas M. Wagner (guest)´s rating: 1.5 | Hal Duncan | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
A Princess of Roumania by Paul Park
When I was a preteen, I was a sucker for books about everyday, average girls who turned out to be long-lost princesses of some obscure country or other. A Princess of Roumania is an original take on that old trope, looking at that girlish fantasy from a couple of new angles.
The story begins during a typical summer vacation for high-school student Miranda Popescu. She’s an average teenage girl in every way, except that she has hazy memories of an early childhood in a distant land and a handful of objects that seem to corroborate those memories.
June 26th, 2010. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 4 | Paul Park | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
PERCY JACKSON AND THE OLYMPIANS by Rick Riordan
Rick Riordan’s five-book series takes the world of Greek mythology, complete with gods, monsters, titans, Mt. Olympus, heroes, etc. and weaves it into the modern world under the premise that as the gods are manifestations of Western culture and move as the culture moves. And so when Athens was the pinnacle, Mt. Olympus was in Greece, but now that the seat of Western power has moved to America, Mr. Olympus is on the 600th floor of the Empire State Building. We all move through a sea of mythical creatures but we don’t see any of them thanks to the cloak of the Mist,
June 6th, 2010. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4 | Rick Riordan | Children | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Cry of the Icemark by Stuart Hill
The Cry of the Icemark has some excellent imaginative material to work with, but it’s almost as if once the author struck gold with the idea, he decided to leave it lying in the ground. The Cry of the Icemark therefore ends up disappointing more than rewarding.
It follows 14-yr-old Thirrin, princess and heir to the throne of Icemark, a small northern kingdom threatened by an aggressive massive southern empire and its never-lost-a-battle general.
May 28th, 2010. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2.5 | Stuart Hill | Children | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Shadowfall is the start of yet another fantasy series and much of it will sound familiar to fans of the genre. There is a military order of skilled knights with a secret sect, a pantheon of gods, not one but two special swords (not to mention a special dagger), lots of folks with hidden origins, a small band fighting against overwhelming odds, and a quest to undertake to save the world.
Despite the oh-so-familiar trappings, however, and despite some flaws of execution,
May 15th, 2010. Bill Capossere and Greg Hersom´s rating: 4 | James Clemens | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Touched by Venom by Janine Cross
I’ve been tempted by Touched by Venom for a long time. The cover art is sensual; the blurb is intriguing and contains a promising quote by Jacqueline Carey, one of my favorite authors. Something held me off, though, until recently, but I finally broke down and bought Touched by Venom used.
First of all… yowza. I thought I was into dark fantasy. Little did I know, compared to Touched by Venom,
April 2nd, 2010. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 2 | Janine Cross | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Singer’s Crown by Elaine Isaak
When I picked up The Singer’s Crown and read the back of it, I thought it sounded pretty generic, but an instinct told me that I should pick it up and give it a try. I don’t know, perhaps I’m desperate for another Carol Berg or Lynn Flewelling. I’m not exactly sure what tree I was barking up here, because Elaine Isaak’s work made this review less of a “Did Not Finish” and more of a “Barely Began”.
February 8th, 2010. Beth Johnson Sonderby (guest)´s rating: 0.1 | Elaine Isaak | SFF Reviews | no comments |
One for Sorrow, Two for Joy by Clive Woodall
One for Sorrow, Two for Joy is one more in the vein of animal kingdom books, the classic one of course being Watership Down. Sorrow doesn’t approach the skill, majesty, or emotion of Watership Down but that’s hard to fault it for, as few books do. The problem is not that it doesn’t hold up well against a classic but that it doesn’t hold up well against your average book either.
January 11th, 2010. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2 | Clive Woodall | Children | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
Singer of Souls by Adam Stemple
Singer of Souls is simply a wonderful little fantasy novel. It’s especially impressive when you take into account that this is Adam Stemple‘s first adult novel (he previously collaborated with his mother, author Jane Yolen, on children’s music books).
The story follows Douglas, a Minneapolis street musician who is addicted to heroin. Trying to get clean, he decides to go to Scotland (where his grandmother lives) to try and make a fresh start. In Scotland, Douglas makes a living as a street performer.
August 30th, 2009. Stefan Raets´s rating: 4 | Adam Stemple | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Beyond the Pale by Savannah Russe
Savannah Russe starts with an original premise: What if a vampire became a spy for the U.S. government? Daphne Urban has survived five hundred years and schmoozed with royalty and Romantic poets. These days, though, she’s suffering from ennui. When the government makes her an offer she can’t refuse, she’s resistant at first, but soon realizes her new job is the most excitement she’s had in over a century.
Trouble is, Daphne makes a rather bumbling spy. I realize she’s new to the whole secret agent thing,
June 25th, 2009. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 2 | Savannah Russe | SFF Reviews | no comments |
No, Paul, sorry, I don't believe I've read any books by Aickman; perhaps the odd story. I'm generally not a…
I like the ambiguities when the story leading up to them has inserted various dreadful possibilities in the back of…
COMMENT Marion, I expect that my half-hearted praise here (at best) will not exactly endear me to all of Ramsey…
Ramsay Campbell was all the rage in my circle of horror-reading/writing friends in the 1980s, and they extolled the ambiguity.…
Oh boy, I wish I could escape that Neil Gaiman article, too. I knew already he’d done reprehensible things but…