Smorgasbord Fantasia

Revenge is a dish we are all very familiar with – We have seen this in movies made immortal by Lee Marvin ( Point Blank ) and Quentin Tarantino ( Kill Bill ) – With a name such as “ Best Served Cold ”, Abercrombie makes no bones about what this book is going to be about. But heck, this is Joe Abercrombie we are talking about.  The lord of grim dark , an entirely new sub-genre that he has breathed life into and carved himself a bloody throne out of. So when news comes out that Abercrombie is penning a revenge novel set in the cruel grim world as that of the First Law trilogy, you can’t help feel the goose-bumps break out all over your arms and you wait on a bed of nails until you can dive back into the gore-spattered, crazy dark world slick with blood, sweat and grime, where seasons may change but the only constant thing is death and treachery.  While First Law was mostly Abercrombie’s attempt at skewering the standard fantasy tropes and introducing us to som...

Orbit has always been one of my favorite fantasy publishing houses and the 2014 cover reveal of some of the most anticipated "to-read" titles in Science Fiction and Fantasy is a glorious spread of some of the most heart-achingly beautiful book-covers ever! Below are a few which I, personally thought were absolutely bewitchingly mind-blowing (Add to that, the fact that these are some of the series or stand-alones written by the new reigning masters of this genre!!) A Dance of Shadows by David Dalglish (Shadowcloaks # 4) Haern is the King's Watcher, born an assassin only to become the city of Veldaren's protector against the thief guilds. When Lord Victor Kane attacks the city, determined to stamp out all corruption, foreign gangs pour in amidst the chaos in an attempt to overthrow the current lords of the underworld. And when a mysterious killer known as the Widow begins mutilating thieves, paranoia engulfs the city. Haern knows someone is behind the t...

I would like to do this more often – pick up two contenders, books that I read and put forth a study in contrast. Today we will spend some time getting under the skin of a fourteen year old assassin called Thomas Cale and compare him against the peerless Buddha, the Enlightened One. The Left Hand of God by Paul Hoffman and Buddha 8-part series by Osamu Tezuka : Probably an odd choice of books to compare but an excellent choice of books to contrast. Two series that I’m currently reading through present an excellent dichotomy in the styles of epic fantasy that deserves a discussion. Both the books, while couched in a larger gamut of “epic” fantasy [And don’t get me wrong – they are most decidedly E-P-I-C, simply in the staggering scope of characters and intermingling plots], I think they are a strange fit on that bookshelf. Both series deal with the matter of faith and absolution in completely different opposing manners and yet, manages to charm and wriggle their way ...

The Troop is Nick Cutter’s homage to Stephen King and Scott Smith –He openly acknowledges and candidly admits to “Carrie” being a big inspiration that propelled him to write in this genre – a horror novel that is said to be the cross between Lord of the Flies and The Ruins.  I got an ARC from the publisher on NetGalley and was sold on the mouthwatering premise on offer . A book that has spooked even Stephen King?   I mean, c’mon that guy is the grandfather of horror itself right? So the byte-sized back-of-the-book summary: A troop of boy scouts go camping on a far-away island off the coast of Canada for a stormy weekend. But the cheer soon turns to spine-chilling horror when they encounter a haggard stranger dragging himself up the beach – infected with a horrific affliction that turns him into skin and bones within hours – a biogenetic horror mutation that will spread like crazy. Stranded on the island without any lines of communication and their only boat sa...