Smorgasbord Fantasia

Holy Sister by Mark Lawrence marks the end to the glorious proceedings in the grim world of Abeth: Where the ice is advancing and that corridor of life is receding. We cannot wait to get back to the enthralling story of Nona Grey and her friends, hunted down by heretics and religious zealots alike. I cannot wait for the epic conclusion [ And with that, it will be the third complete series by one author, that I have read and completed, say wooooot!] They came against her as a child. Now they face the woman. The ice is advancing, the Corridor narrowing, and the empire is under siege from the Scithrowl in the east and the Durns in the west. Everywhere, the emperor’s armies are in retreat. Nona faces the final challenges that must be overcome if she is to become a full sister in the order of her choice. But it seems unlikely that Nona and her friends will have time to earn a nun’s habit before war is on their doorstep. Even a warrior like Nona cannot hope to turn the tide ...

Koode is a special movie, in more ways than one. It came into the headlines for two big reasons: It marked the comeback of two of the most loved Malayalam cinema personalities on this one project; Nazriya Nazim was doing a big-screen comeback after a long while and Anjali Menon helming the movie was doing her first movie, after Bangalore Days. It also had Raghu Dixit doing the music for a mallu movie for the first time. With that weight of hefty expectations dragging it down, I really was a bit skeptical about the movie. But I needn't have worried. Koode soars high, just like the dreams of the protagonists of this movie. This is a story about a disjoint family trying to find their broken rhythm in life after their darling daughter dies at a very young age of twenty, due to a congenital breathing disorder. Koode, means 'Together' in Malayalam and that is the underlying theme of the whole movie - as Prithviraj 's character Joshua nursing bone-deep bitterness about...

So The Gutter Prayer by Gareth Hanrahan  ranks right up there, in terms of my most anticipated books of 2019  and the pre-publication buzz has been nothing short of fantastic. I stalk Gareth on his blog and followed his reddit AMA  and so no wonder, when I got approved for the ARC for Gutter Prayer, I was way over the moon, sun and all the stars. Now having breathlessly finished his gut-punchy debut, I guess I finally know what all the fuzz was about. And well deserved, I might add. Grim-dark by way of New Weird (Think China Mievelle) Gareth has built  an immensely intricate and detailed world in his accomplished debut, The Gutter Prayer. Friendships, betrayals and forgotten myths come alive in a mad chaotic tale set in the ancient city of Guerdon - a crumbling metropolis that runs on alchemy and broken faith. Three unlikely allies go up against ancient guilds, a corrupt watch and a horde of demons from the underworld as the world around them gets caught up ...

So Tom Holland is back - that delightful little package of non-stop chatter, action and goofy jokes now heads to Europe(?). A wonderful teaser and we can't wait for him to come back ( from the dead!)

So James A Moore continues to smash all the rule-books of "how to write epic fantasy" with this lush, absolutely mad, terrifying conclusion to the series, Tides of War - with this third book, Gates of the Dead . If you been following me or the series, then you should know James' new series has been a raging favorite with me over the past two years, 2017 & 2018 - with first two books in the series being absolutely bonkers and so much fun to read. James gleefully takes an axe to the norms of writing by skewering conventional tropes - I mean, where else would you find the protagonist surging in and killing the followers of a set of blood-thirsty capricious gods' - for having kidnapped & sacrificed his family, right in the beginning of the first book of the series! This in itself, would be fodder enough for a good three book series. But no, James blows your conventional expectations away to kingdom come - and churns out this mad tale of vengeance that s...

Ok, so we admit it. We went to watch Aquaman purely because of Jason Drogho Momoa . (And well,  the redhead, you gotta love'em, eh) But how much of beefy brawn surf humour and undulating wavy underwater hair-wigs can you tolerate, when you really just walked in hoping for a super hero origin story right? Well, seems like you can take almost three stinking hours of it. So Aquaman , the latest salvo from the sinking DC ship just about has enough ballast to keep the ship afloat a bit more, I guess. It's filled with mind blowing action set pieces, crazy CGI and ...yawn...ennui-inducing plot lines. Don't get me wrong, It's not a bad movie but I clearly was hard-pressed to find that soul buried deep under all that recklessly inventive CGI effects ( Octopoid drummers, Shark rides, Killer Sea Horses the list is endless!) and the boring politicking of the Atlantean princes that just didn't end. Towards the sozzled climax full of colourful water-gun plasma explosion...

So 2018 was a satisfying year for me - in terms of reading goals, I crept back to a yearly target of 40 + that I had missed last couple of years in a row. So this year, maybe I will up my target to 50 books. And looking at the amazing spread ahead of me, I cannot resist myself! It's going to be another wonderful year with some fantastic titles coming out, some series-ending, some middle books, a few new series starters by ever-favorite authors and quite a few stand-alone books that promises the sun, moon and stars. Here's a few that I picked out, which I personally am quite kicked about. Gates of the Dead by James A Moore. This swirling chaotic and yet spellbinding tale of Man vs God ( vs Demons vs Zombies and lots more!) that is Tides of War, is heading off the cliff in this third installment and I am getting ring-side tickets to watch this madness. Brogan McTyre is a man on a mission, to slay the Gods. He doesn't really have a choice because the fickle capricio...