Smorgasbord Fantasia

Mark Lawrence is a writing machine. How else do you explain this writing phenomenon who has gone on to give us a dozen books (That's FOUR completed trilogies, guys!) across fantasy and science fiction - and continues to push the envelope, when it comes to the dazzling brilliance, characteristic of his every single work? Inching higher than ever, with every single novel that has come out. Let me take a moment here to express my gratitude and awe at the sheer dedication of this Thorn Guy to his craft and the manner in which he has continued to entertain us and force us to think, throughout these last twelve books that's been excellent, excellent stuff. So now - the new book. The Girl and the Stars , the opening book in this series called T he Book of the Ice , is set in the same brutal world of Abeth, slowly succumbing to ice. Yeah - the same world. that Nona and her Sisters are trying to save. But the story of the Red Sister and the subsequent sequels were set in this na...

With Titan's Day , the second book in the Carter Archives , Dan Stout takes us back to the gritty town of Titanshade. It's an absolutely stunning sequel to his debut, Titanshade - that was one of the most refreshingly original urban fantasy noir that I read (earlier this year actually, prepping me up well for this superb follow-through on the Carter archives) - building up and adding more depth to our cynical scarred cop-hero and of course, the superbly crafted world of Titanshade. It's been six weeks to the events that transpired in Titanshade, when  Carter and his new-in-town Mollenkampi cop-buddy partner Ajax discovered a treasure-trove of Manna, underneath the drying oil fields on the outskirts of Titanshade. Carter is now a local hero, is missing two fingers and is also on desk-assignments and routinely due for medical check-ups to ascertain the after-effects of such massive exposure to the magic thingy. So, finally out on his first 'street' assignment...

Trance , produced and directed by Anwar Rasheed , the by-word for 'cool' in Malayalam cinema, had a lot riding on it. Anwar was directing after eight long years. (Ustad Hotel was his last outing in 2012, a landmark movie that won a National Award) and this was also touted to be Fahadh Faasil 's greatest movie of his entire career. In a career studded with magnum-opus roles, this was indeed a tall claim and so we waited, with bated breath to see how Trance was going to turn out. Trance, as the word perhaps denotes, is a visual psychedelic rollercoaster that fucks with your mind and poses uncomfortable questions to our society, done up in signature uber-cool slick stylish frames. But one that ultimately fails to impress, falling prey to a convoluted messy second half, fraught with inconsistencies, overstaying its fabulous set-up and premise carefully stitched up in the taut, brilliant first half of the movie. Trance is about drugs. Covertly about the psychotropic on...

I frankly haven't read Paul McAuley 's previous works and so I was in for a pleasant surprise, when the premise and concept of War of the Maps , his latest novel, hooked me in easily. War of the Maps is a science fantasy concept set in a gorgeously realised sprawling artificial world, spinning around artificial suns, birthed in the aftermath of multiple galaxies colliding with each other. [ If that didn't hook you in, then I don't know what will!] The anonymous hero, referred only as the lucidor, who is an ex-lawkeeper in this nation that calls itself Free States, is on the hunt for an escaped convict. While this is the central tenet to the whole plot. this becomes wrapped up within a much larger 'doomsday' plot, where an alien species has invaded the borders of this 'settled' world and this war is threatening to go out of hand. The lucidor is on the move, tracking this mad genius psychopath known as Remfrey He, whose evil genius and ambition know...