The End: Self-Pubbed Blog-Off
Well here we are. The end. It’s finally come. Oddly enough, I don’t mean this in a bad way. When I asked my fellow reviewers here at EBR if they wanted to participate in this contest, they said yes… but were worried. I shared that concern. Would we be able to get through a single novel? Would we be happy picking a winner? Would any of the novels be good? Adequate, even?
In our original slush pile of 26 novels, we finished exactly two. THE THIEF WHO PULLED ON TROUBLE’S BRAIDS and SAND AND BLOOD. We ended up sending THIEF on to the final round with a score of 7/10. Very respectable.
If you want details on what we thought of that original batch and our process for reading those pieces of fiction, we published a few articles here, here, here, and here.
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Kickstarter: Gamut Magazine
I come bearing tidings of a new, amazing Kickstarter campaign. This one should interest readers and authors alike.
Gamut Magazine. From the text of the Kickstarter: “Gamut will be a website (and eBook) with a wide range of voices—genre-bending stories utilizing the best of genre and literary fiction.”
This e-zine will feature and publish fiction and non-fiction in the genres of Fantasy, SF, Horror… and, well, everything. As the head of this proposed magazine, Richard Thomas (a true professional), says, “Anything done with innovation, heart and emotion—that’s what I want. Everything I enjoy reading and writing typically leans toward the dark side, but I have been known to embrace lighter work, and humor, now and then. It just has to MOVE me. And I like to be surprised.”
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Doctor Sleep
Stephen King is one of those authors I continue to pick up despite the fact that I’m frequently frustrated by the way his books end. There’s just too much good he does right to completely sign off and avoid reading his stuff. This is most especially true when it comes to the way his books begin. This book was one that I was really intrigued with and considerably interested in reading because it’s a sequel to THE SHINING (Amazon), which is probably one of the most preeminent ghost stories ever written. A really creepy book. Was hoping for much the same from its sequel.
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Black Wolves
BLACK WOLVES starts with Kellas, one of the king’s Black Wolves, an elite military unit designed to hunt down the remaining demons and enforce the king’s law. Dannarah is the king’s daughter who yearns for a life other than the one where she will be married off to a foreign prince. We are introduced early on to a world rich with details, politics, religion, and a varied landscape. All within the first 90 pages.
And then all of the sudden Kate Elliot propels us 40+ years into the future. Yes, I howled in frustration. I was just getting to know these characters and now they’re…. old? Turns out, that’s exactly when the real story begins.
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The Fortress in Orion
I’d missed this book in the lineup of new Science Fiction, and honestly hadn’t thought to look, but was reminded about it when the second book in this series showed up in a new batch of books to read. The relatively short page count and the fact that it was only number two in the series prompted me to pick up this book first so that I wouldn’t be ignorant going into number two. As it turns out though, I needn’t have worried overly much. By way of resurrecting an old review method of mine, here is this book in ten words:
Military man and operatives waltz through mission to supplant dictator.
Immediately after reading it, I read the first few chapters of book two, and I’m having a very difficult time believing that the first eight words of that book’s ten-word summary wouldn’t be identical. Setting that opinion aside for now though, here’s the skinny on this one.
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Riders
Gideon is the Incarnation of War. Yes, one of the horsemen of the apocalypse. One day he was in Army Ranger training, doing a routine parachute jump… only, the impossible happens. Neither his chute nor his back up deploy like they’re supposed to and Gideon hits the ground, dies, and is miraculously resuscitated. But that’s not the only inexplicable event to happen. Despite severe injuries, he’s back on his feet a week later, a new cuff on his arm seems to be part of his body, and then demons show up at his sister’s college party.
Daryn, a strange girl who convinces him that the demons are after him, gets him to safety and explains what’s going on. Some renegade demons want a key to a realm where they can escape Hell and set up their own purgatory. One such key was nefariously stolen and now the four horsemen–or at least four teenage boys who can currently wield their powers–are summoned to protect the key until it can be returned to its rightful angelic owner.
Phew. Did you catch all that? In RIDERS we are taken on a wild ride–and not just because Gideon is afraid of his crazy war horse.
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Blood Kin
I don’t mention cover art all that much in my reviews. It’s likely a failing of mine, but for some reason or another it only very seldomly comes up when I’m putting together my thoughts on a book. This time around though, I really have to mention it because it not only introduced the setting of the novel just perfectly (worth a thousand words and more), but also gave me a solid image to build upon while reading the beginning of the book, which was quite good all on its own, but brilliantly set when paired with the cover.
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The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss
Our heroine’s life is currently a sad state of affairs. She’s been unemployed for a year, living off the generosity of a roommate who doesn’t demand rent. Her boyfriend cheated on her with his dental hygenist. And now Dahlia’s bank account is so depleted she’s even considering accepting a job as a private detective–and is hired to discover who stole the Bejeweld Spear of Infinite Piercing from an MMORPG character’s account.
It sounds like an easy $2000. A fool and his money are easily parted and all that. Alas, it doesn’t turn out so simply, especially when said fool Jonah turns up dead.
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The Boy with the Porcelain Blade
I had THE BOY WITH THE PORCELAIN BLADE (Amazon) in my Amazon.com cart forever. Several months. So of course, I had it ordered and bought it from a local Barnes and Noble. I’m a pretty fast reader, and THE BOY is not a very long book at all. I knocked it out in about an hour and a half, including rereading a few chapters.
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Giveaway: Poseidon’s Wake
Update 2/2/2016: Dan O. from Swansea MA is our winner! Congrats, your book will be on its way soon.
The final installment of Alastair Reynold’s Poseidon’s Children series POSEIDON’S WAKE Amazon) is finally here.
The publisher sent us a hardback copy (it’s a big one) and Elitist Book Reviews would love to send it to one of our lucky readers.
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