Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

Rating: 2.5

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Gloriana, or The Unfulfill’d Queen: Reader Unfulfill’d

Gloriana, or The Unfulfill’d Queen: Being a Romance by Michael Moorcock

Gloriana (1979) is Moorcock’s homage to Mervyn Peake (author of the Gormenghast saga), and fittingly, is a lush tale of intrigue told in thoroughly British prose. At times brilliant (especially in the descriptions of the seasonal festivities), often captivating and humorous, often sluggish and overly subtle, ultimately unfulfilling, it’s a book I recommend borrowing from the library before buying. Not everyone will enjoy such decadence.

Speaking of decadence,

Clan Daughter: Weak follow-up

Clan Daughter by Morgan Howell

After reading King’s Property, the first book in the Orc series, I could see a lot of room for improvement.

The main character, Dar, was really hard to enjoy reading about and she was just a little too lucky a little too often for my taste.

Book two… Wow, can you say “more of the same”? And 80% of the book is a boring journey which sets the stage for interspecies love and actions on the part of the Orc mothers that totally contradicts everything we have been told about them.

December 28th, 2007. John Hulet´s rating: 2.5 | Morgan Howell | SFF Reviews | no comments |

A Distant Tomorrow: Mindlessly entertaining

A Distant Tomorrow by Bertrice Small

Five long and peaceful years have passed since the Winter War the people of the Outlands fought and won against the greedy nation of Hetar. But Gaius Prospero has not given up his scheme to become emperor, and after an unexpected and tragic blow, the Fairy woman Lara is pulled towards her distant and elusive destiny once again.

Unexpectedly Lara finds herself in a distant land across the sea know as Terah where, with her newfound powers, she manages to banish an evil curse and earns the love and adoration of the ruler Magnus Hauk.

December 19th, 2007. Guest´s rating: 2.5 | Bertrice Small | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Magic Steps: Not Pierce’s best

Magic Steps by Tamora Pierce

Magic Steps is the first book of the Tamora Pierce quartet entitled The Circle Opens. Featuring the characters of The Circle of Magic quartet, this new series continues their story by exploring how each of the four main characters — just coming to grips with their powers in the previous books — now handle the challenge of becoming teachers themselves. Unfortunately, Pierce has decided that one of the prerequisites of this new experience is that the four protagonists — Sandry,

Chainfire: Better than last few

Chainfire by Terry Goodkind

The good news about Chainfire is that it is a much better than book than the previous one, Naked Empire. The bad news is that Naked Empire set such a low standard that this isn’t saying much. Chainfire isn’t awful, like Naked Empire. It isn’t even all that bad (except in parts). But it also isn’t all that good. Mostly it’s a serviceable novel moving us toward the series’

December 5th, 2007. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2.5 | Terry Goodkind | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Armageddon’s Children: Bridges the gap

Armageddon’s Children by Terry Brooks

“I Will Grow Up to be Like My Mother…”

Best known for his expansive SHANNARA series set in a typical fantasy-realm of swords and sorcery, Terry Brooks is also the author of the WORD AND THE VOID trilogy, an urban-fantasy concerning the entropy of our world fought against by Knights of the Word. Although both series seemed unconnected (despite a few hints that the world of SHANNARA was set thousands of years into the future, a world built on the foundations of our own,

November 30th, 2007. Rebecca Fisher´s rating: 2.5 | Terry Brooks | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Veil: Two out of three aint’ good

VEIL by Christopher Golden

The Veil series, by Christopher Golden, is something of a mixed bag. The first two books, The Mythhunters and The Borderkind, are fairly good. I enjoyed the world created in The Mythhunters. The books are a new take on some of our well-known characters from various fairy tales, legends, and pantheons. The legends of The Veil, however, are to children’s bedtime story characters what Stephen King‘s Pennywise is to circus clowns.

October 25th, 2007. Guest´s rating: 2.5 | Christopher Golden | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Tunnels: There’s better YA fantasy out there

Tunnels by Roderick Gordon & Brian Williams

Tunnels is the first book in a new YA series that has gotten a lot of hype recently. How does it live up to the hype? In mixed fashion.

The book focuses on Will Burrows, son of amateur archaeologist and local museum curator Dr. Burrows. The two go on amateur digs together and a reference is made to a large discovery Dr. Burrows made that was “stolen” by a more famous archaeologist.
We learn all this relatively early and are further introduced to Chester,

Goddess of Light: Go read Goddess of Spring instead

Goddess of Light by P.C. Cast

Workaholic interior designer Pamela is on a business trip to Las Vegas. Reeling from an abusive marriage, she’s hoping her heart isn’t entirely dead yet. She accidentally weaves her desire for romance into a spell binding the goddess Artemis to her aid, and Artemis sends her brother Apollo to woo Pamela.

Apollo and Pamela fall in love, of course. I didn’t think their relationship was developed as well as Lina and Hades’ relationship in Goddess of Spring. It seemed more like Apollo and Pamela fell into bed a couple of times and then declared themselves soul mates.

September 26th, 2007. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 2.5 | P.C. Cast | SFF Reviews | no comments |

The Hidden Stars: Overwritten and uneven

The Hidden Stars by Madeline Howard

A small band of wizards and warriors must find the lost royal child prophesied to end the reign of an ‘evil’, self-proclaimed goddess-empress. Adapting that main plotline from Willow, Madeline Howard’s novel The Hidden Stars further combines several Tolkien-esque elements (wondrously dexterous elves/fey; vastly powerful wizards; not nine but twelve misshapen servants of the villain) to create an initially promising but unfortunately disappointing fantasy experience.

Many fantasy plots have been explored time and again.

July 1st, 2007. Rob Rhodes´s rating: 2.5 | Madeline Howard | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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