Smorgasbord Fantasia

Christina Henry's darker take on the fairy tales has been nothing short of riveting. I personally was a huge fan of Alice and this summer, Christina ups the ante, with The Girl in Red - a terrifying post-apocalyptic take on Little Red Riding Hood.

Check out the amazingly gorgeous cover:



Here's the official blurb:

From the national bestselling author of Alice comes a post-apocalyptic take on the perennial classic "Little Red Riding Hood"...about a woman who isn't as defenseless as she seems.

It's not safe for anyone alone in the woods. There are predators that come out at night: critters and coyotes, snakes and wolves. But the woman in the red jacket has no choice. Not since the Crisis came, decimated the population, and sent those who survived fleeing into quarantine camps that serve as breeding grounds for death, destruction, and disease. She is just a woman trying not to get killed in a world that doesn't look anything like the one she grew up in, the o…

"Waiting On Wednesday” is a weekly meme that first originated at Breaking the Spine but has since linked up with “Can’t Wait Wednesday” at Wishful Endings now that the original creator is unable to host it anymore. Either way, this fun feature is a chance to showcase the upcoming releases that we can’t wait to get our hands on!
Tor has now excelled the art of finding short novella length absolute gems of stories. In that same vein, comes The Monster of Elendhaven by Jennifer Geisbrecht, termed "dark as an oil-slick and iridescent with feral humor, bruise violet-prose" by Indra Das, author of Devourers. Absolute screamer of a description, eh. And based on the opening lines of this book -  I know this is going to be a blast of a dark fantasy story!


The Monster of Elendhaven is a dark fantasy, a twisted tale of revenge set in an original world as oily and real as Jack the Ripper’s London. After a thing with no name washes up on the docks, empty, alone, and unable to die, he…

So yet another trilogy by Mark Lawrence! Done and dusted. Holy Sister marks the end of the trilogy, Book of the Ancestor tracing the emotional and physical journey of Nona Grey, from the time she entered the order of the sisters as an orphan, till she becomes a holy sister, giving herself up to faith and prayers in this whole series that has been built up on religious imagery. If Red Sister was about Nona's early transformation into a fearsome fighting machine and her physical transformation, Grey Sister saw Nona embrace the dark magics to tap into the magical reserves within her and also manipulate the threads that shaped this world. So this, was a fitting conclusion as she finally decides to embrace the black of a holy sister because, she realizes that the world can never get enough of the prayers to heal.



And what a world! Mark's packed in some dense world-building into this planet where the sun gets weaker everyday,  a planet where four different humanoid races each with …

"Waiting On Wednesday” is a weekly meme that first originated at Breaking the Spine but has since linked up with “Can’t Wait Wednesday” at Wishful Endings now that the original creator is unable to host it anymore. Either way, this fun feature is a chance to showcase the upcoming releases that we can’t wait to get our hands on!   2019 Gutter Prayerwas one of the most original and wholly exciting grim-dark fantasy book that came out. Gareth Hanrahan completely had my heart with his soaring debut - and so I am definitely super excited about Book-II in this series. So, ta-da presenting book two, TheShadow Saint:


Thieves, dangerous magic, and a weapon built with the power to destroy a god clash in this second novel of Gareth Hanrahan's acclaimed epic fantasy series, The Black Iron Legacy.

Enter a city of spires and shadows . . .
The Gutter Miracle changed the landscape of Guerdon forever. Six months after it was conjured into being, the labyrinthine New City has become a haven for c…

Congratulations. You have made it to the end of a ten year long, 22 movie-franchise third and arguably, the most spectacular phase in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. If your eyes are prickling with restrained tears or you are just full-out bawling your lungs away, then don't feel bad. We are in this together. We did avenge, some yes. We managed to piece it all back together, of what was left of the smoking mess that the do-gooder Thanos' left sautéing on the Terran stovetop with that "snaptocalypse" at the end of the Infinity War. MCU has evolved into an epic, with Iron Man being one of the first of the lot to be introduced to us and then we had this ensemble of superheroes take centre-stage in our hearts. And so with the Avengers: End Game, the third phase 'The Infinity Saga" is over [technically it is going to be spider-man 2 that will call the wraps on it], a marvellous wrap to the proceedings.



Russo brothers, you guys should take a bow. Because this was f…

DC has really been struggling to get their act together but in Shazam! I truly believe, that they have found their most "bankable" superhero. The irony being that it essentially took a sillier premise of a fourteen year old kid forced to take on the mantle of the world's "pure-hearted" savior to actually save them the blushes.



The question posed by the movie seems logical enough. What happens if a fourteen year old kid is granted super hero powers? The answer is in the hilarious scene when Billy and Freddy, teenage boys - one a nerdy DC super-fan, the other in the body of a newly-anointed superhero still figuring out his prowess - go inside a super-market to try out 'adult' gimmicks. This sort of sets the tone for the entire movie. Firmly tongue-in-cheek, irreverent to the core and yet, balanced by a believable 'super-villain' in Mark Strong playing the role of Dr. Thaddeus Siva, who takes on power in its corrupt form [ as gifted by the seven s…