Reviews :: Book Genre :: Fantasy :: Page 24

I’ve been waiting anxiously after the events of DUST AND LIGHT (EBR Review) to continue the series, and finally I can know what happened to Lucian in ASH AND SILVER (Amazon).

Turns out that his struggles in DUST were just the beginning.
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Yet another story that comes at a time just rife with new offerings from the fantasy author after a short hiatus. SAVAGES (EBR Review) and the serial novel THE TWO OF SWORDS (Amazon), are two full novels that were released just a few months apart from one another. This one is something more along the lines of a novella, but it’s also one that I didn’t expect given the recent outpouring of new material. Can’t say that I’m disappointed though. In fact, I was far from it.
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With all the popular YA novels out there sporting wishy-washy teenage ‘heroines’, it’s time to introduce you to a classic that does it right. For the kids of my generation there was Robin McKinley’s THE HERO AND THE CROWN (Amazon), the winner of the 1985 Newbery Medal Award.

Aerin is the only child of the king. The problem? She’s a girl. Since her deceased mother was a foreigner (and it’s whispered she was a witch), and Aerin has inherited her pale skin and red hair, she’s snubbed and ignored. She discovers a book about the dragons that used to threaten Damar, and on her own learns how to make kenet, an ointment that protects the wearer from the effects of fire, and trains herself to fight dragons. When word comes that a local village is being terrorized by a small dragon, Aerin with the kenet and her father’s old war horse, goes to fight it. Unfortunately, it’s not only the smaller dragons who begin to return.
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Me to Vanessa: “I can’t wait to find a real gem, a diamond in the rough, some unknown phenom.” Ding, ding, ding! I’ve think I’ve found one in HALF-RESURRECTION BLUES (Amazon), Daniel José Older’s first in a new series of dark urban crime fantasy, Bone Street Rumba. This ghost story diamond has plenty of polish, its facets expertly cut within the dirt and grit of its setting.
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When AN APPRENTICE TO ELVES showed up in my mailbox and I saw Elizabeth Bear and Sarah Monette’s names on the cover I totally squeed.

Until I discovered it was book 3 in the Iskryne series–how had I not heard of Bear’s new stuff? I loved her Eternal Sky series–start with RANGE OF GHOSTS (EBR Review); I read Monette’s MELUSINE and was meh about the story but not her writing craft, which is pretty amazing. I stomped around grumpily for a bit, but decided to dig in anyway without even looking up the first two books. Turns out you can read this book on its own.

Set in an alternate Norse/Germanic wintery island in the north, the men of Iskryne can bond with the local telepathic wolves, with whom they defend the populace from trolls and wyverns. But a new threat is creeping its way into the land: the Rheans (alternate Romans) are intent on conquest, and have the resources to do it.
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I wanted to like this book, was ready to love it after reading the intriguing prologue, but the rest of THE LEOPARD (Amazon) did not hold up to its early, fleeting promise. What a mess.
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This series keeps getting better and better.

Here we are in book 3 of Marie Brennan’s Lady Trent Memoirs with VOYAGE OF THE BASILISK (Amazon) and our heroine, Isabella Camherst, is sent on an expedition to research dragons on sea and on land. Along for the ride is her young son Jacob; Jacob’s nanny Abigail; and Tom, Isabella’s research partner.

With Isabella on board, they are bound for an adventure.
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That Brandon Sanderson guy keeps pumping out books. Like, a lot of books. MISTBORN (Amazon) was, in a large sense, the book series that put Sanderson on the map, and it remains some of his best work. Sanderson is an author known for his epic fantasy, and since finishing the Wheel of Time series, increasingly known for large books like THE STORMLIGHT ARCHIVES (EBR Review). However, the Mistborn books remain smaller (clocking in around 300 to 500 pages), and this book is no exception.

SHADOWS OF SELF (Amazon) continues the story set forth in ALLOY OF LAW, following Wax, Wayne, Marasi, and Steris as they continue hunting down criminals and the darker conspiracy hinted at at the end of ALLOY OF LAW (EBR review). Unlike the first book, the second book is filled with flashbacks to Wax’s origins as a lawman out in the Roughs, and we get to see some of the supporting characters and backstory that formed the character he is.
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When I first heard that Joe Abercrombie was going to write a YA series, I was a little skeptical. My impression of his books at that time hadn’t exactly meshed with the ideals that YA raised in my mind. On the flip side, I was also kind of excited because sometimes the sheer mountain of content that came buried within each Abercrombie novel was frequently a major aspect of its own. Keeping within the relative boundaries of the YA genre, however, could give him a chance to really focus on the two aspects of writing that he really does best: character and story. The story thus far has been one that I’ve enjoyed. Based on what I’d seen in the first two, some aspects I thought were good but others not so much, I was cautiously optimistic when beginning this final novel that it’d all turn out amazing. I wish I could say that it had.
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Polyhemia is asleep and has been for three hundred years, until Luck wakes her up with a kiss. Only, he’s no prince, and it certainly wasn’t the kiss of True Love. Which would explain why she keeps falling asleep, why her memories are fuzzy, and why her dreams are so odd–the curse was only sorta broken. Luck, you see, is an enchanter, and uses his kiss/magic to wake up Poly and deliver her to the Council because they think she’s the princess.

Only she isn’t.
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