Reviews by Writer Dan

Seems like forever ago that we had someone comment on the site that we should check out this series. (Bonus points to anyone that knows where that suggestion is located…) So it’s been sitting at the back of my head ever since then, just worrying away at my sanity, while I watched my TBR pile ebb and flow. In fact, I’d all but forgotten about it when I came across an available audio book copy at my local library. Public Libraries ftw yet again.
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This book is one of the 2020 releases that I have been most excited to get to read. Short of the next Expanse book or the next (two!) Dresden Files books, this was it. After reading FOUNDRYSIDE (EBR Review) this guy’s stuff again rocketed to the top of my list. The only problem with that? You may be familiar with the phrase, “The bigger they are the harder they fall”? Yeah. It fell hard. This reading experience is going to stymie me for a while.
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Mark Lawrence’s Book of the Ancestor trilogy (EBR Archive) was easily one of my favorite fantasy reads of recent years. The time I spent with Nona in the world of Abeth was some seriously good reading. So when I heard that the author was doing another series on the same world and that he was cruising through the writing (have already heard of significant work being accomplished on book 3 of the series), I was uber excited to get into it.
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I used to just stop reading a book when I figured out I wasn’t going to like it. Ah, those were the days. These days, I find myself not only rationing toilet paper by the square and thinking more than twice about dashing over to Walmart for a single item, but also that I feel like I just have to finish everything I start reading. It’s a scarcity mentality. There just isn’t time anymore to go around reading 20 or 30 percent of a book and then bailing on it just because it doesn’t fit my fancy. How to find a way to know *ahead of time* whether I’m going to like a book or not though? Read other reviews before reading any books? That won’t exactly work out in my favor. Then I’m behind all the time. Any ideas? Any suggestions?

Not like it’ll help me now though. 🙂 Here we go!
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So here I stand with another self-published fantasy novel at the completed end of my reading schedule, ready to write a review for you our reading public. What ho! you might say, “knowing” that we here at EBR would never deign to dip into the slush pile of self-publication by choice and thus thinking, perhaps, either us liars or yourselves the subject of a slip in the space-time continuum. But don’t worry your pretty little heads. There’s a part of me that is, as well, equally surprised to be bringing you my thoughts and feelings about such a book, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Because more than anything else, I like to be pleasantly surprised. Only problem is that this read was anything but a pleasant surprise. Instead…

It was a bloody brilliant evolution of sheer story-telling genius.

And now I get to share that experience with you.
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I don’t often go out wandering amidst the self-published story crowd, but I was vaguely not-paying-attention on Twitter a while ago and ended up making a request for an eArc without realizing from whom I was making said request. That story is not this one (you have to wait until Friday for that one), but after making that first request and paying attention to what that author was doing, I ended up making a couple of other requests from self-published authors that were in his circle, and this is one of those.

Without being too specific, I can definitely say that I have been pleasantly surprised with both of those I’ve read so far. Count me lucky, but more likely blame the buzz about this year’s instance of Mark Lawrence’s Blog-Off for steering me in the right direction. Because otherwise, I likely wouldn’t have ever come across this author or his book anytime soon. And can I give some kudos to the artist of the cover art? Was totally one of the things that made me take the plunge and read this one. Check it out.
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Despite my constant frustrations with the Science Fiction genre, I keep finding myself pulled back into its orbit. I can’t help but love all of the things that make great Science Fiction great. I tried to start this one a number of times, and just wasn’t ever able to get into it. But, instead of passing on it altogether, I’d stick it back in the TBR pile for another chance. I even tried to listen to the audiobook but bailed on that pretty quickly because I felt like I seemed to be missing a lot of the story. And then, as I did once long ago with Memories of Ice (EBR Archive), I decided to just push through and do it. Feels good to be on this side of the divide. Only took me five years to get here…
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After reading Christina Henry’s THE GIRL IN RED (EBR Review), I couldn’t wait to find out what other tales she’d been telling that I didn’t yet know about. That first one was a brilliant take on the simple tale of Red Riding Hood, and I was hoping to find more of the same in this one, which is obviously pointed at the classic tale Alice in Wonderland. There have been enough versions of both these tales told that it might seem as if we really don’t need another. One of the great things about storytelling though is that even if the ideas and plots are pillars of stability in our minds, a new tale can still be just as invigorating and fun to read as if everything were brand new. And these stories? They’re pretty new. There’s enough of both the familiar and the new that they end up being really great reads. But here I am getting ahead of myself a bit.
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At this point in my “reading career” it is often somewhat easy to look at a book cover, read the first couple pages, and then determine whether a particular book is going to be “my type”. This time I didn’t even have to read any pages. Just the cover alone gave me a pretty good idea that this book wasn’t exactly going to land in my wheelhouse. And that’s exactly why I decided to read it. This is me trying to branch out. Although, truth be told, I’m branching out within the context of the books that get sent to us by publishers/editors/etc. Still, you never know what you’re going to find when it comes to reading a new author. May just end up reading a book that was nothing short of fantabulous.

Spoiler alert: this one wasn’t.
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So it’s been a minute since we were involved with the Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off run by Mark Lawrence, and I constantly find myself torn over the fact that we aren’t involved anymore. This annual contest is doing sooooo much good in finding some really good authors that have taken the self-publication route. Whether they plan on sticking to their guns for the long term or are hoping to gain the attention of a traditional publication house, you can’t deny the fact that the efforts Mark Lawrence (and all of the online review houses involved) is making for these authors is nothing but pure gold. Recently, we were approached by the author of a finalist in the current incarnation of the contest for a review, and I couldn’t help but accept.
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