Smorgasbord Fantasia

A weird western zombie? I was definitely intrigued when I heard about David Towsey 's daring debut, Your Brother's Blood that promised to be a fun mashup but what I wasn't expecting was the emotionally draining narrative and a deftly executed story that never loses its tight personal focus till the surprising climax. Yes - I'm late to this party and I discovered David Towsey's excellent debut pretty late ( this book was released in 2013 by Jo Fletcher Books ) but I'm glad I did and I really am jazzed up now that I've finished the intriguing story. Are there more books set in this universe? ( Edit: The trilogy is now complete - with Your Servants and Your People (2014) and Your Resting Place (2015) ) So at the heart of this story is unflinching faith - gone a bit too extreme in it's interpretation. The biblical references are very strong - be it the character names like Thomas, Mary, Sarah, Samuel or the very cool transcriptions from 'Counc...

Bradley is one of the genre's finest talents pushing the boundaries and scope of fantasy. And he proves it again in fantastic style with the Twelve Kings in Sharakhai , first book in the Song of the Shattered Sands series. His first series,  Lays of Anuskaya introduced us to a russo-mythology inspired world with a touch of the forgotten Ottoman culture in lush detail. The Twelve Kings takes a step further and takes us right into the heart of a captivating and wondrous world of a desert civilization where Gods grant power to mortals, the undead walk the sands at night and subterfuge and intrigue rule the day. So Twelve Kings is set in the bustling desert metropolis of Sharakhai , a trading city in the middle of the great sprawling desert. A city that has slums, fighting pits, sprawling mansions, sheesha-denns and tea houses, communal baths and palaces on the hills jostling for the attention of the citizens. The fighting pits sees brutal competitions between champions of ...

So Barry Allen ( Flash , the fastest superhero in town) and his nerdy gang of friends & family have made their definitive mark on us. Season One is over and boy! What a rousing tale, safe to say that the speedster has zipped through our hearts, huh. So Flash started out strong building up on the basic foundation we grew to love from Arrow (fellow superhero from the DC Comics world!) and then as the season moved beyond the mid-season finale with the introduction of ‘reverse-flash’, things really started to zing up. Going on to really hit it out of the park by the season finale, thus setting our expectations pretty high for the oncoming season two. You know when I saw the premiere, I wasn't impressed. How would this skinny youngish looking fella carry the weight of the world on those frail shoulders ? And zip around at express speed saving the world from Apocalypse? But hey, Grant Gustin went on to blow past me doubting dorothy. In fact, the whole series showcases no...

Serial fiction isn't new. It's been around for centuries now - but what Serial Box is bringing to this way of storytelling is a super fine collaboration that might just be the next big thing after the Particle Accelerator Explosion. Missing the grit of Daredevil or need that fix of Breaking Bad or are you biting your nails down to bits waiting for the next season of GoT? Well, here's good news for you! Serial Box is bringing to your reading device a pulsating new series that is a combination of supernatural horror and police procedural, sixteen episodes of monster hunting, magic and non stop fun. Officially launched on Sept 16th, I got a chance to read the first episode of the series, Bookburners - Badge, Book & Candle. Written by a team of authors including Margaret Dunlap (Eureka), Mur Lafferty (The Shambling Guide to New York City) and Brian Francis Slattery (Lost Everything), the group is lead by rising genre star Max Gladstone (Three Parts Dead and t...