Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews
Magic Bites (2007) is an exciting urban fantasy with a unique premise and detailed world-building, somewhat marred by an unsatisfying twist in the story’s central mystery.
I give Ilona Andrews a lot of points for creativity here. In Magic Bites‘ near-future setting, magic and technology come and go a bit like the weather; when magic is working, tech isn’t, and vice versa. The shifts are unpredictable, but it can be assumed there will be several per day.
January 9th, 2008. Kelly Lasiter, Tadiana Jones and Kat Hooper´s rating: 3 | Ilona Andrews | Audio | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Sword-Edged Blonde by Alex Bledsoe
A foaming tankard for public libraries. If mine hadn’t featured Alex Bledsoe‘s engrossing debut novel, The Sword-Edged Blonde, I doubt I’d have ever discovered it.
Granted, I only discovered it because of the quasi-garish cover and title (neither of which has much to do with the actual story), picking it up just to shake my head at one more piece of fantasy trash. But then I read the cover blurbs from Charles de Lint and Orson Scott Card,
December 30th, 2007. Rob Rhodes, Kat Hooper and Greg Hersom´s rating: 4 | Alex Bledsoe | SFF Reviews | 9 comments |
This is just the sort of faery novel I’ve been missing. Who knew I needed to be looking in the young-adult section?
Wicked Lovely is adapted from one of my favorite off-the-beaten-path fairy tales, a Scottish tale of the turning seasons. In it, the Winter Queen attempts to prolong the cold season by keeping the Summer King and his bride from marrying and coming into their full power. Melissa Marr‘s version features a Winter Queen who has diminished the Summer King’s power permanently,
December 29th, 2007. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 4.5 | Melissa Marr | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
If your taste runs along the likes of George R.R. Martin — dark, gritty fantasy that reads like historical fiction — then Winterbirth, the first novel in Brian Ruckley’s The Godless World trilogy, is for you.
The gods got fed-up with their creation and left it to its own demise long ago and this world feels like just that. It’s a cold, dark, and violent, place that’s full of rugged highlands, foreboding forests, and misty,
December 6th, 2007. Greg Hersom and John Hulet´s rating: 3.5 | Brian Ruckley | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Gifts of the Unmage & Spellspam by Alma Alexander
Despite some rough spots, Alma Alexander’s Worldweavers series is an intriguing new entry in YA fantasy. At least based on the first two books in the series: Gift of the Unmage and Spellspam. The series is set in a world roughly akin and contemporaneous with our own, save that people can use magic and there are other “polities” such as dwarves, Alphiri and the Faele. Into this world a little over a decade ago is born with lots of fanfare and media coverage,
December 2nd, 2007. Bill Capossere´s rating: 3.5 | Alma Alexander | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Ed Greenwood tries something a little different with Dark Lord. The main character is an author of both fantasy and other fiction who is magically tied to his created world of Falconfar and who has the power to shape this magical land with his ideas and words. It’s not a bad premise, but it would take some really great writing to avoid being too much of a personal fantasy.
Dark Lord is not a long book and it’s packed with lots of action. I felt like I was reading some of the Forgotten Realms books…
November 25th, 2007. John Hulet´s rating: 3 | Ed Greenwood | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Magic Lost, Trouble Found by Lisa Shearin
Lisa Shearin is the Janet Evanovich of fantasy.
She writes with a fun, unpretentious style, and she has mastered writing with humor. In many ways, this is better than Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series. Raine Benares is competent, whereas Stephanie bumbles her way through her adventures, surviving by luck and instinct rather than skill. That joke wears thin after a while. (At least on me — since there are thirteen Stephanie Plum books out, then she obviously still appeals to a lot of people.) Raine is the type of girl who rescues dudes in distress.
November 9th, 2007. Tia Nevitt (guest)´s rating: 5 | Lisa Shearin | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
You know how sometimes a book, or a movie, or a concert gets so hyped up in the press and you have such high expectations that when you finally get around to reading/seeing it, it disappoints? That’s what I was worried might happen when I decided to read The Name of the Wind. I purposely came to it late, hoping to wait until Patrick Rothfuss was nearly finished with the trilogy before I starting it. But, the book has received so much attention that it became inexcusable for me,
November 6th, 2007. Kat Hooper, Ruth Arnell, Terry Weyna, Greg Hersom and Skye Walker´s rating: 4.5 | Patrick Rothfuss | SFF Reviews | 18 comments |
There have been several reviews of Maledicte that make comparisons to Jacqueline Carey. Some say Maledicte is a cheap imitation, and others that Maledicte is far too good to be compared with Carey’s work. I’m not enough of a literary critic to tell you who is the better writer, Jacqueline Carey or Lane Robins, but I will say that I’m not surprised the comparisons are cropping up. I’m a big fan of Carey and I’m always looking for beautiful,
November 5th, 2007. Kelly Lasiter, Kat Hooper and Robert Thompson | Lane Robins | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
The Scent of Shadows by Vicki Pettersson
Vicki Pettersson has come up with a cool and original idea for the paranormal genre: an on-going battle between good and evil that corresponds to the signs of the zodiac.
I loved the way that Pettersson used comic books to keep the history of the conflict and she really did a fantastic job portraying kids in a comic book shop.
The main character in the Zodiac series is the only fly in the ointment. Joanna Archer just seems to be a bit inconsistent.
November 5th, 2007. John Hulet´s rating: 4 | Vicki Pettersson | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Mine too, but to be fair, he's the only Iraqi torturer I know, fictional or otherwise. He has a great…
COMMENT Sayid ... my favorite Iraqi torturer!
Would you believe that this was the first time that I ever read it? SO glad that I finally caught…
LOVE The Big Front Yard!
Always my pleasure, Marion! And Part 2 of this review should be appearing soon....