Grave Importance by Vivian Shaw
Grave Importance (2019) is the third DR GRETA HELSING book by Vivian Shaw, following Strange Practice and Dreadful Company. For the best experience, you should read those books first, though it’s not strictly necessary. Each book’s main plot stands alone, but the characters’ relationships (including a romance) develop over the course of the three novels.
After the events of Dreadful Company,
November 26th, 2019. Kat Hooper´s rating: 3 | Vivian Shaw | Audio | SFF Reviews | no comments |
State Tectonics by Malka Older
State Tectonics (2018) is the third book in Malka Older’s CENTENAL CYCLE trilogy. The series is a Hugo finalist in the Best Series category. It did not end the way I expected it to!
(This review may contain spoilers for the previous books.)
At the end of Null States, the second book, the handful of main characters had uncovered a plot, not just against the micro-democracies,
August 12th, 2019. Marion Deeds´s rating: 5 | Malka Older | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Holy Sister (2019), the third and final book in Mark Lawrence‘s BOOK OF THE ANCESTOR series, is a satisfying, well-crafted ending to an inventive series. Lawrence, at this point a veteran in the trenches of Heroic Fantasy, wraps things up with what’s probably his greatest assurance of the series, and though the tropes on display will be familiar to fans of the genre (and of Lawrence’s earlier work), they add up to an engaging and often thrilling finale.
July 19th, 2019. Tim Scheidler´s rating: 4 | Mark Lawrence | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
Nyxia Uprising by Scott Reintgen
Nyxia Uprising (2019) is the fast-paced conclusion to Scott Reintgen’s NYXIA TRIAD YA sci-fi trilogy, an adventure with several teenage protagonists. It’s set both in space and on a distant planet called Eden that has two moons, an alien race called the Imago, and an abundant supply of nyxia, a malleable mineral with near-magical powers. These three books tell a single, unified story, and it’s impossible to appreciate this series without reading all of the books in order … and here is your obligatory spoiler warning for the earlier volumes,
May 17th, 2019. Tadiana Jones´s rating: 3 | Scott Reintgen | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Charmcaster by Sebastien de Castell
“But when an Argosi encounters something new — something that should not exist and yet could alter the course of history — we are compelled to paint a new card: a discordance.”
Charmcaster (2018) is the third book in Sebastien de Castell’s SPELLSLINGER series. In it, we see another nation in Kellen’s world, a different form of magic adopts Kellen, and the political situation convolutes in even more dangerous ways.
March 26th, 2019. Marion Deeds´s rating: 4 | Sebastien De-Castell | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden
Medieval Russia comes to life in Katherine Arden’s WINTERNIGHT TRILOGY, which began in Lesnaya Zemlya, a small village in northern Rus’ in The Bear and the Nightingale and continued in The Girl in the Tower. Vasilisa (Vasya) is a young woman with the rare ability to see and speak with the natural spirits or chyerti of the hearth, stables,
March 14th, 2019. Tadiana Jones, Bill Capossere and Marion Deeds´s rating: 5 | Katherine Arden | SFF Reviews | 15 comments |
The Hod King by Josiah Bancroft
If you haven’t read Senlin Ascends and Arm of the Sphinx yet: Please stop here and go get them. I recommend Hachette Audio’s versions because they are absolutely brilliantly performed by John Banks. Read the rest of this review at your own risk — there will be mild spoilers for Senlin Ascends and Arm of the Sphinx in my review.
I am so conflicted.
January 22nd, 2019. Kat Hooper´s rating: 4.5 | Josiah Bancroft | Audio | SFF Reviews | 6 comments |
“Fear was the superpower they all possessed. And unlike Midsummer’s monsters, there was no limit to the number of people they could control with it.”
Vic James wraps up her hard-hitting DARK GIFTS fantasy trilogy with Bright Ruin (2018), which picks up right where the second book, Tarnished City, left off. This series is set an alternative version of our world where a minority, called the “Equals,” has powerful magical gifts.
December 6th, 2018. Tadiana Jones and Jana Nyman´s rating: 4 | Vic James | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | 8 comments |
The Descent of Monsters by J.Y. Yang
Every page of J.Y. Yang’s newest TENSORATE novella, The Descent of Monsters (2018), carries a pervasive and steadily-increasing sense of dread. But when the primary character announces straight off that “You are reading this because I am dead,” it’s hard not to wonder how and why that comes to pass, and which event will be the one which ends Tensor Chuwan Sariman’s life.
Note: It will help to read The Black Tides of Heaven and The Read Threads of Fortune before beginning The Descent of Monsters,
August 28th, 2018. Jana Nyman and Marion Deeds´s rating: 4.5 | JY Yang | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |
King of Assassins by R.J. Barker
Note: THE WOUNDED KINGDOM is intended to be read in sequence, and as such, some spoilers for Age of Assassins and Blood of Assassins will be inevitable as I discuss King of Assassins (2018).
Girton Club-Foot’s star has risen dramatically since we first met him — no longer a gawky and insecure fledgling assassin, he’s matured over the past two decades to become the Heartblade of King Rufra,
August 8th, 2018. Jana Nyman´s rating: 4 | R.J. Barker | SFF Reviews | no comments |
...as well as the 1932 sequel, "Topper Takes a Trip"!
It's such a rich and ancient ambience - in many ways the plot itself doesn't matter, I just like strolling…
I didn't know he wrote Topper!
Best new book: Play of Shadows by Sebastien Sebastien de Castell Honorary mention for The Naming Song by Jebediah Berry…
Best read for August was Karel Capek's War With the Newts, another one of his acerbic fables about the human…