Once upon a time fairytale retellings were a rare thing, but nowadays, everyone seems to be doing it. S. Jae-Jones‘ debut, Wintersong (2017), promises a tale of the Goblin King fused with Germanic folklore. So how does Jae-Jones‘ contribution to this over-saturated genre fare?
Wintersong centres around Elisabeth — or Liesl, as she’s known — the unremarkable and “unlovely” eldest daughter of a musician. Like her father, music is the true love of her life,
March 10th, 2017. Ray McKenzie´s rating: 3 | S. Jae-Jones | Stand-Alone, Young Adult | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
The Last Harvest by Kim Liggett
YA horror novel The Last Harvest (2017) focuses on hidden secrets within a small town and the unreliability of one’s senses. Taking a page or two from Ira Levin’s classic novel Rosemary’s Baby (1967) and clearly inspired by instances of “Satanism-related moral panic,” Kim Liggett serves up a tale of teenagers inheriting a dark legacy — and whether that legacy is mental illness or something more sinister is at the core of her story.
March 3rd, 2017. Jana Nyman´s rating: 4 | Kim Liggett | Horror, Stand-Alone, Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
There is an old saying that goes: Evil never dies; it merely sleeps. And when that evil awakes, it does so soundlessly — or almost so.
Nick Cutter has built upon the foundations laid by Stephen King, H.P. Lovecraft and Clive Barker to deliver a thoroughly thrilling novel that should be on the lists of top horror of 2017. There were points where I actually smiled while reading Cutter’s Little Heaven.
March 2nd, 2017. Jason Golomb´s rating: 4.5 | Nick Cutter | Horror | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |
The Raven’s Table: Viking Stories by Christine Morgan
Christine Morgan’s work has appeared in various anthologies, such as History is Dead, a Zombie Anthology, and Uncommon Assassins. Her work is closely related to role-playing games and she is a dedicated gamer according to her website. The Raven’s Table: Viking Stories is a story collection of her Norse or Viking-themed works. The collection includes poetry, adventure, fantasy and horror in a couple of flavors. Five of the eighteen pieces are original to this collection.
February 28th, 2017. Marion Deeds´s rating: 3 | Christine Morgan | Horror, Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Smash by Sara Latta & Jeff Weigel
Smash, written by Sara Latta and illustrated by Jeff Weigel, is a clear and concise explanation for young people of the standard model of physics (including the newly discovered Higgs Boson) and in particular of how the giant CERN supercollider contributes to furthering the model’s accuracy/completeness. Saying the book is aimed at the young, however, does it a bit of a disservice, as it works just as well for adults looking for that same clarity and concision.
In tried and true format,
February 25th, 2017. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4.5 | Comics, Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Coco Butternut by Joe R. Lansdale
Coco Butternut, which came out in January 2017, is a short HAP AND LEONARD novella written by the inimitable Joe R. Lansdale. You may already have read some of these East-Texas, sort-of-detective stories, or seen episodes of the television show on Sundance. While Coco Butternut has no supernatural elements at all that I can spot, it is a fast-paced, enjoyable read with perfectly timed banter, strange and wonderful characters, and perfect,
February 23rd, 2017. Marion Deeds´s rating: 3.5 | Joe R. Lansdale | Edge, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Infernal Parade by Clive Barker
This is an unfortunately disappointing collection of microstories from Clive Barker, an author who helped define my reading experience in mid-1980’s junior and high school. The six very loosely connected stories that make up the 88 pages of Infernal Parade (2017) were originally provided as exclusive companions to collectables made by McFarlane Toys in 2004. I believe these are part of a larger macroverse of characters published in Barker’s 2014 novella, Tortured Souls: The Legend of Primordial.
February 16th, 2017. Jason Golomb´s rating: 2 | Clive Barker | Horror, Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough
Louise is an insecure single mom who, one night, meets and kisses a dashing stranger. She’s mortified the next morning to find that the stranger, David, is now her boss. Her married boss. Then she (literally) bumps into David’s wife, Adele, and the two of them hit it off.
Despite her best friend’s warnings that all of this is a bad idea, Louise falls in deeper: into a full-blown affair with David, and into a close friendship with Adele. In particular, Louise and Adele bond over their shared experience with night terrors.
February 15th, 2017. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 4 | Sarah Pinborough | Horror, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 6 comments |
Miranda and Caliban by Jacqueline Carey
Miranda and Caliban is a twist on Shakespeare’s The Tempest, ringing one major change on the play: what if Miranda and Caliban were in love?
Our tale begins years before the events of the play; we first meet Miranda as a child, assisting her father Prospero in the ceremonial magic that will bind the “wild boy,” Caliban, and the spirit Ariel to his will. From there, Jacqueline Carey alternates between Miranda’s point of view and Caliban’s,
February 14th, 2017. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 4 | Jacqueline Carey | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
All Our Wrong Todays by Elan Mastai
Tom Barren lives in a near-utopian version of our world in 2016, the world that Disney and science fiction optimistically imagined in the 1950s that we would one day have, complete with flying cars, ray guns, space vacations, and other Amazing Stories and Jetson-like technology. There’s a single compelling reason for this: in 1965, a man named Lionel Goettreider invented an engine that produced unlimited clean energy, in the process giving himself a fatal dose of radiation, but also becoming a historic figure on the level of Albert Einstein or Sir Isaac Newton.
February 9th, 2017. Tadiana Jones´s rating: 4 | Elan Mastai | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |
What a fascinating exploration of Edwige Fenech's contributions to the giallo genre! I love how the post highlights her unique…
Pretty challenging book. Cut by half, speed up the cadence. Trying to figure out the plot, the main point of…
Thanks for the kind words, Marion! Coming as they are from a professional writer, they are much appreciated!
Wonderful review, Sandy.
The "body count" bothered me a bit less because being dead seemed more like an inconvenience than anything else... unlike…