ELITIST BOOK REVIEWS

Dave Duncan is one of those guys that has been improving his trade for years. From this experienced writer comes SPEAK TO THE DEVIL (Amazon). Duncan’s offering here is set in an alternate historical version of 15th-century Europe. It has all that you would expect from that time period; knights, feudalism, oppression and religion, all with the addition of magic and a fake country.
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Isaac Asimov was an author of ideas. In the case of his Foundation series, it’s about the possibility of using science to predict the fall of a Galactic Empire far in the future. Hari Seldon is the brainchild behind mathematical sociology, aka psychohistory: predicting the future based on the actions of a large population. Unfortunately, the future is bleak, with a thirty-thousand-year dark age on the horizon. But Hari also predicts that it’s possible to close that gap to only a thousand years by safe-keeping human knowledge using his Foundations.
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WARNING! PATHFINDER (Amazon) is not a fantasy book, it is science fiction. I repeat. PATHFINDER is not a fantasy book, it is science fiction.

I know what you’re thinking. Wait a minute. It totally looks like a fantasy book. Yep. I read the premise, it sounds like a fantasy book. Yep. Doesn’t it take place in a fairly medieval setting? Yep. You know, horses and wagons, swords and magical type stuff happening? Yep. I mean doesn’t it even have a sword on the cover for Pete’s sake? Yep. And you still think it’s a science fiction book? I do.
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THE HAMMER (Amazon) is KJ Parker’s third stand-alone book since the completion of her Engineer Trilogy, all of which have ostensibly been set in the same fantasy world. Though, if you know anything about her past works, you’ll know that her fantasy (fantastic as it is) isn’t necessarily “fantastical”, as magic is curiously absent throughout most of them. The thing that they do have though is character, and setting, and story. This is one of the many reasons why I love her stuff so much. Just good reading. Well, that, and they make me laugh.
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The best part about this February? No, it isn’t the manufactured holiday of Valentine’s. No, it isn’t the fact that there are only 28 days in it, thus making this work-month blissfully shorter. The best part of this February is Joe Abercrombie‘s THE HEROES (Amazon).

THE HEROES is about a hill called The Heroes. It is a useless hill that both the armies of the Union and the North want… mainly because the other side wants it. Before you ask why these groups are fighting over this useless hill, there are two things you should know. First, Bayaz is in this novel (if you’ve read the First Law trilogy, you know why this is important). Secondly, this is a Joe Abercrombie novel. People in war make stupid decisions.
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We apologize for the delay of this review. It somehow fell through the cracks, and no one is more upset about this than us. Why? Because TWELVE (Amazon) is an amazing, amazing novel. Jasper Kent, the author, has given us in the US (all you UK readers have known this forever) one of the best books of the year.

Call it Alternate History, Alternate Historical Fantasy, Fantasy, Horror or Alternate Historical Horror… it doesn’t really matter. All you need to do is read it and enjoy it for what it is:

Completely awesome.
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STALKING THE DRAGON by Mike Resnick (Amazon) is apparently the third in the John Justin Mallory series of fantastical detective stories. It was reprinted by Pyr a bit ago, and I hadn’t read a whole lot by Resnick, so thought I’d pick it up.

Our story starts out with a brief intro of Mallory, the detective and main character of our story, staring into a magical mirror on Valentine’s Day and getting ready to take his partner out to dinner. Then this big, hulk of a man with horns on his head hires Mallory to find his prize-winning, toy dragon by 4pm the following day, at which time it’s supposed to compete in a pet show (think dog-show and you won’t be far off). Normal detective-like happenings ensue.
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Let’s get this out of the way right at the beginning. Catherynne M. Valente is made of magic. She is composed entirely of some strange magical awesome that I would love to have just a fraction of. Are we clear on that? Good. Let’s move on.

This particular brand of awesome is THE HABITATION OF THE BLESSED, Volume One of A Dirge for Prester John (Amazon). The work is based loosely on the legends of Prester John–stories told between the 12th and 17th centuries in Europe. These legends told of a Christian King ruling a lost land full of countless wonders. From this Catherynne M. Valente weaves her own unique narrative to bring those legends and that man to life.
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A while back I read and reviewed a collection of short stories titled SWORDS & DARK MAGIC (EBR Review). Hopefully after reading that review you went out and grabbed a copy, because it was fantastic. One of the surprise stories contained in that anthology was The Deification of Dal Bamore by Tim Lebbon. It was a dark, grim and violent tale that impressed me and left me with the desire to read more of Lebbon’s work.

Set in the same created world as Dal Bamore, Lebbon’s new novel, ECHO CITY (Amazon) took some of the interesting concepts from the short story and twisted them even more. The short answer is that ECHO CITY is a great read… for a certain kind of reader.
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