Smorgasbord Fantasia

Nettle & Bone that released last year, is my first book by T Kingfisher. And I am so thrilled to have discovered her amongst the many other new authors, I am slowly discovering. [ On an aside, having made a conscious decision to make sure I go back and pick up acclaimed books that I missed out on from last two years, I can claim this has turned out to be such a liberating and happy coincidence for me!]  There are at least 2 more T Kingfisher books in my back-burner list that I am immediately bumping to the top of my TBR, after the marvellous find that Nettle & Bone turned out to be. This turned out to be an epic fantasy that mixed up dark fairy tale with your typical hero quest, albeit with a nice twist. Nettle & Bone is an adult dark fantasy book I never knew I wanted.  Told from the first person point of view of Marra, an unassuming thirty-year old who has spent the majority of her formative years in a monastery, away from the politicking mess that is her own mi...

 Hello! Giving you a glimpse of some of the most-sought after titles releasing later this year, on this week's Waiting for Wednesday blog meme, we feature this book from Orbit books - For the Wolf by Hannah Whitten  - an up and coming twist on one of our favorite fairy tales (Red Riding Hood)  The first daughter is for the Throne. The second daughter is for the Wolf. For fans of Uprooted and The Bear and the Nightingale comes a dark fantasy novel about a young woman who must be sacrificed to the legendary Wolf of the Wood to save her kingdom. But not all legends are true, and the Wolf isn't the only danger lurking in the Wilderwood. As the only Second Daughter born in centuries, Red has one purpose-to be sacrificed to the Wolf in the Wood in the hope he'll return the world's captured gods. Red is almost relieved to go. Plagued by a dangerous power she can't control, at least she knows that in the Wilderwood, she can't hurt those she loves. Again. But the legend...

This book, Gideon the Ninth (part of a proposed trilogy called the Locked Tombs ) from TOR about necromancers crossed with weird lesbians and stuffed to the gills with tons of swashbuckling sword-fights was a readers’ favorite world over. In fact looking at the glowing references and the reviews, this one’s a writers’ favorite too. As well as a blogger universe’s darling. It took me a good long year to land my hands on this one. Perhaps in good time , because Harrow the Ninth is all set for a bumper release in the first half of this year. So Gideon the Ninth, I can safely claim, is nothing like anything I have ever read before. Is that a good thing? Where your writing cares nought for a rat’s ass about established guard rails and thwarts preconceived notions about a mixed-genre narrative, skewering them repeatedly and by a good long measure. I say, fuck yeah! Take the snark levels of Shrek the Ogre and dial it up to a level thousand and one. Mix parts of Harry Potter,...

The Monster of Elendhaven hit the bookshelves right around Halloween and this seemed like the perfect excuse to burrow deeper into your night sheets, dim the lights a bit and snuggle down to devour this perfectly wicked, deviously plotted horror novella from Jennifer Geisbrecht . It's a fascinating piece of work, in all its perfect allure - balancing character, plot and masterful world building on a razor thin platter, building up into a bleak crescendo of horror and violence. It's the kind of rare book that comes along once in a while and the writing is so sharp and lucid that the wounds linger far beyond that last page turned, forcing you think about the subtle contexts hinted to, around social injustices, homophobia, the power-play and even capitalism to some extent. So Johann is the 'monster' of Elendhaven, a foul dying city birthed out of magical violence, which never was able to sustain the industrial revolution that swamped over and is now, just in its ...

"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...

Bumping this meme up on my blog after a long while now - Wanted to bring back the attention to the acclaimed debut - Blackwing by Ed McDonald   one of the most assured debuts to have aced the scene, breathing in new life and direction to the grim and dark sub-genre. So Ravencry - Book Two in the same series is out in June and we cannot wait to dive in. Back to  the bleeding edge of the world, Misery. Four years have passed since Nall’s Engine drove the Deep Kings back across the Misery, but as they hurl fire from the sky, darker forces plots against the republic. A new power is rising: a ghost in the light known only as the Bright Lady manifests in visions across the city, and the cult that worship her grasp for power even as the city burns around them. When Crowfoot’s arcane vault is breached, an object of terrible power is stolen, and Galharrow and his Blackwings must once find out which of Valengrad’s enemies is responsible before they have a chance to use it. T...

Angus Watson 's fantasy spin on historical facts continues to regale us - in his latest series, West of West . I had thoroughly enjoyed the Age of Iron - a historical epic, the first in a political sword and sorcery series that was sheer fun, full of pulse-pounding action and some unforgettable characters, brimming with that gallows humour. The series sought to shed light on the pre-christ era and the roman conquest of the south brit isles - with of course creative liberty in terms of the magic and the gory action which probably defined those times. And now with this one, You die when you die - he turns his attention to the Vikings - setting out to explore their little-known exploits on the American soil, the first intrepid explorers who dared to go beyond set boundaries. His treatment stands out - converting that research into believable and highly entertaining fiction that still rings deep and true in some fashion. I know some of my favourite fellow bloggers have love...

Retellings of classics have the potential to be spectacular or disastrous. Alice in Wonderland has been tried before - though I confess I haven't read the written form of such retelling but having watched a few adaptations on TV I came away sorely disappointed. Like the big screen never could justify that mad gleam in the Hatter's eyes - as matched perhaps by the twisty imagination of one such as Lewis Caroll. And with this book, Alice - Christina Henry takes a swan dive into that deep dark rabbit-hole and definitely emerges a winner! A book that is dark as sin and racy as hell on jet-fire, Alice is a masterful and disturbing retelling of the classic laced over with many layers of darkness and intrigue. Magic is unexplained as in a fairy tale - but one for kids, this is not. It's a fairy tale gone horribly wrong - more a fantastical thriller set in a madman's darkest nightmarish setting called the Old City, a far cry from the Wonderland. The story starts in a ...