‘Batman vs The Undead’ – Kevin VanHook and Tom Mandrake (DC Comics)

Every so often I have to stop and ask myself whether the whole zombie thing has just got a little too much now, at least for me anyway. I actually asked myself this question, just the other day, when I saw a book called ‘White Trash Zombie’ on the shelves in Forbidden Planet. The title looked pretty cool, it was the blurb that killed it for me there. Let’s just say that the rapacious need of Urban Fantasy to assimilate everything knows no bounds…
The bottom line is that if you have too much of the good stuff then it just gets boring after a while. It’s not even a question of something not being new anymore, more like it being the same as everything else. That’s not a good thing for me, not when I feel like I’ve already read the really cool stuff.

It’s a good job then that zombie fiction shares some of the same traits that can be found in zombies themselves. I’m talking about that sheer bloody minded ‘never give up and keep on going’ attitude that the walking dead possess in abundance. There may be some dross out there but there are still some gems to be found in the relentless tide of zombie fiction headed your way. Gems like ‘Batman vs The Undead’…
I missed this book when it first came out, not really following the DC line at all, but it eventually reached me via a trip to the library to pick up some books for Hope. I’m glad Sue keeps an eye open for books that I might like, this one was a bit of a treat.

Professor Herbert Coombs has been wrongly released from Arkham Asylum and is free to continue with his great work, reanimating the dead so that they might serve him. His quest takes him to New Orleans and a museum of the dead, talk about a great place to pick up raw materials…
Batman lies in wait for Coombs but will he be enough to overcome the ravening hordes of the dead? He may have allies but, as the dead grow stronger, they might not prove to be enough either.

‘Batman vs The Undead’ looks like a very quick read on the surface (no page numbers but it is definitely a slim volume) but there is a lot to grip you once you get going. Not least of this is Tom Mandrake’s artwork. This can sometimes feel a little rushed (although this happens when there’s action, an intentional move maybe?) but is dripping with atmosphere and tension for the rest of the time. Mandrake draws a mean zombie and that’s all you really need from a book like this, especially when the denizens of the museum come to ‘life’. It’s not just zombies either, Mandrake also has a fine line in vampires and werewolves. This book is full of panels that I could just sit and stare at, they are so well drawn.

With such a fine backdrop to work against, I more or less assumed that VanHook’s tale would be its equal. It was but only in parts. Things kick off a little too simplistically, Batman fights zombies and… that’s it. To be fair, zombies can’t do a lot else but even so, I felt like the story wanted to get going but couldn’t. As it turned out, I didn’t have long to wait but it felt like it.
When things finally get going, there were plenty of twists and turns to hold my attention but the ending (when we got to it) felt a little bit too… easy. The vampire ‘just happens to know’ where a powerful white witch can be found, just when they need her. A ‘super oracle’ (Doctor Fate) turns up, very conveniently, to warn the heroes off a particular path… The vitality of the plot does suffer from being guided a little too obviously.

There is a lot of vitality left though and that is what ultimately makes ‘Batman vs The Undead’ such an absorbing read (that and the artwork). The pace doesn’t let up for a minute and really gears things up for an explosive finale. You also get to see Batman's faith in science pushed to the limit by a foe that is entirely supernatural (and just keeps coming). Maybe zombie fiction is losing its freshness (pun definitely intended) but ‘Batman vs The Undead’ will keep me ticking over for a while yet.

Eight and a Quarter out of Ten

Which cover would you go for? 'Some Kind of Fairy Tale' (Graham Joyce)

You know how it goes... A UK publisher will send me a book and then a US publisher will send their edition of the same book. Sometimes it goes the other way round :o) I'm not going to read both of them but always end up wanting to give the 'other book' a chance at some blog time, so... The 'Which cover would you go for?' posts were born.

This time round, the UK and US editions of Graham Joyce's 'Some Kind of Fairy Tale' face off in a battle that will only be decided by your votes (which go in the comments section). First up though, some blurb...

It is Christmas afternoon and Peter Martin gets an unexpected phonecall from his parents, asking him to come round. It pulls him away from his wife and children and into a bewildering mystery.


He arrives at his parents house and discovers that they have a visitor. His sister Tara. Not so unusual you might think, this is Christmas after all, a time when families get together. But twenty years ago Tara took a walk into the woods and never came back and as the years have gone by with no word from her the family have, unspoken, assumed that she was dead. Now she's back, tired, dirty, dishevelled, but happy and full of stories about twenty years spent travelling the world, an epic odyssey taken on a whim.


But her stories don't quite hang together and once she has cleaned herself up and got some sleep it becomes apparent that the intervening years have been very kind to Tara. She really does look no different from the young women who walked out the door twenty years ago. Peter's parents are just delighted to have their little girl back, but Peter and his best friend Richie, Tara's one time boyfriend, are not so sure. Tara seems happy enough but there is something about her. A haunted, otherworldly quality. Some would say it's as if she's off with the fairies. And as the months go by Peter begins to suspect that the woods around their homes are not finished with Tara and his family...

My copy has been waiting, on the pile, for me to be in the mood to pick it up, mood is so important to my reading choices these days... It will be read though.
But what about those covers? Check em' out,

The US Cover.

The UK Cover.

My money is on the UK cover, purely because it doesn't look like a badly staged photograph with a smoke machine just out of sight... I've never been a fan of 'photo covers' actually; if they're not done right then they look awful and I'm yet to come across one that looks 'right' to me.

That's what I think anyway, how about you? Go on, leave a comment :o)

So, I was asked a whole load of questions...

And I answered them all over at A Fantastical Librarian. Click Here to see what led me to talk about zombies, the publisher/blogger relationship debate, strawberry Fruitella and Peppa Pig :o)
Don't stop there though! Once you're done reading the interview, stick around to see what else Mieneke has going on at her blog. There's plenty of it and it's all good...

‘Doctor Who: The Curse of Fenric’ (1989)

You might see a few of these posts appear, over the next couple of days, due to a combination of my working round the corner from Forbidden Planet (money is made to be spent) and Sue & Hope being elsewhere for a couple of days. I get to watch some Doctor Who instead of ‘Happy Feet’ or ‘Peppa Pig’. It’s. Like. Heaven…

Anyway...

If you talk to people (of a certain age) about Doctor Who the conversation inevitably includes the phrase ‘hiding behind the sofa’. It just does. Having seen a couple of really old episodes I have no idea why people felt the urge to do this back in the day but there you go.
We certainly never hid behind the sofa in the eighties when I did the bulk of my ‘Doctor Who watching’. This was probably because our parents kept telling us it wasn’t real (although thinking about it, I imagine they were trying to convince themselves so they didn’t end up hiding behind the sofa again…)
I never hid behind the sofa, not once, but there was one story that scared me so much that, when I went to bed, I hid under my duvet and didn’t come out until the next day. That story was ‘The Curse of Fenric’ and I watched it again last night. A couple of Southern Comfort & cokes made the whole thing a little less scary but I still found myself locking the back door. There were noises out in the garden…

The Doctor and Ace find themselves at a secret military base, during the Second World War, where elements of the British army are about to lure their Russian allies into a deadly trap. A far deadlier trap is about to be sprung though as an ancient evil stirs beneath the waters of the bay and an old Viking Curse comes to fruition. Only those with faith will survive and, even then, they may not have much left afterwards…

I’m as guilty as the next person of thinking of the old Doctor Who series as slightly shoddy affairs with wobbly sets and guys dressed up as aliens who are always conveniently defeated at the very last second. ‘The Curse of Fenric’ is actually a really sly piece of horror that creeps up on you and delivers chills right when you least expect them. I’m talking clawed hands rising out of the sea to drag down soldiers and a church under siege by mouldy looking vampires that have risen from a watery grave (they do look suspiciously rubbery but no less scary for that). There are really nasty echoes of ‘Night of the Living Dead’ here and watching ‘The Curse of Fenric’ did have me wondering if that was where it all started for me and my love of zombies. Maybe…

It’s not all about the obvious horror though. The horror of war is examined in pretty close detail, for a show that was Saturday teatime viewing, and you get to see how this affects people’s faith in different ways. It all boils down to how much you believe in what you’re fighting for. When the curse of Fenric really takes hold this can mean the difference between life and death (yours)…

The story itself is very tightly plotted (with a couple of exceptions) and shows roots in previous stories. It all ties together very well although I had very little idea what Ace was talking about half the time (attempts at deep and meaningful falling flat here) and I did have to wonder how effective the big villain really was. I mean, would you kill off your troops when the battle was still being fought? No, me neither…

Sylvester McCoy makes up for a lot of this though with a dark, brooding performance that hints at a battle fought outside the confines of the TV show; a battle that I wouldn’t mind reading more about.

All in all then, ‘The Curse of Fenric’ is as unsettling now as it was back in 1989 and it stands up pretty well to the test of time. It’s not often that one of these DVDs has me looking for the book but I’m seriously tempted…

Adam Christopher at Forbidden Planet (again!)

From the press release,

Following his astounding debut, ADAM CHRISTOPHER will be reading from and signing an exclusive limited edition of his new novel SEVEN WONDERS (Angry Robot) at the Forbidden Planet London Megastore on Thursday 6th September from 6 – 7pm.


Tony Prosdocimi lives in the bustling Metropolis of San Ventura – a city gripped in fear, a city under siege by the hooded supervillain, The Cowl. When Tony develops super-powers and acts to take down The Cowl, however, he finds that the local superhero team Seven Wonders aren’t as grateful as he assumed they’d be…

"This is traditional heroism with a decidedly wicked and iconoclastic twist. Inventive, engaging, bewitching, and delightful, a feast as much for fans of the tropes as for the innocents amongst us." - Greg Rucka, New York Times bestselling author of Alpha, The Punisher and Batman

“A blast of pure pleasure. This is Watchmen meets NYPD Blue, while The Incredibles stroll by; fast-moving action infused with Christopher’s infectious love of pulp fiction and the superhero genre.” - Philip Palmer, author of Version 43, Hell Ship and Artemis

I have a copy of 'Seven Wonders' waiting to be read although I still have a copy of 'Empire State' waiting to be read as well. I guess I just haven't been in the mood for superhero fiction just recently (which is probably why I couldn't get into 'Turbulence' the other day). Will definitely give it a go though, have any other bloggers read 'Seven Wonders' yet?
 
As far as the signing goes, I really want to go but Thursday evenings aren't good these days. We'll see what happens there...

A Quick Question About M. John Harrison

No, not that question... And not that other question either ;o)

There's a lot of other stuff going on right now and I totally missed the publication of Harrison's 'Empty Space: A Haunting'. If it hadn't come through the door yesterday morning I would have probably missed it completely...

An alien research tool the size of a brown dwarf star hangs in the middle of nowhere, as a result of an attempt to place it equidistant from everything else in every possible universe. Somewhere in the fractal labyrinth beneath its surface, a woman lies on an allotropic carbon deck, a white paste of nanomachines oozing from the corner of her mouth. She is neither conscious nor unconscious, dead nor alive. There is something wrong with her cheekbones. At first you think she is changing from one thing into another -- perhaps it's a cat, perhaps it's something that only looks like one -- then you see that she is actually trying to be both things at once. She is waiting for you, she has been waiting for you for perhaps 10,000 years. She comes from the past, she comes from the future. She is about to speak...

I was about to get stuck in (despite everything else) when I realised that 'Empty Space' is actually the third book in a trilogy, 'Light' and 'Nova Swing' being the previous two. So my question is... Have any of you guys read 'Light' or 'Nova Swing'? I'm trying to get a feel for how well 'Empty Space' might stand on its own as I don't really have the time to go back and get caught up.

All comments welcome :o)

'Avengers: Hawkeye' - Gruenwald, Grant, Lee, Byrne, Heck (Marvel)

I never got round to seeing the 'Avengers' movie (that's another one I'll be waiting for on DVD...) but I couldn't help but see all the posters, I'll bet you couldn't either, and found myself wondering who the grumpy looking guy was. You know, the one with the bow and arrow...

Turns out that the grumpy looking guy is Hawkeye; one of the only Avengers (as far as I know) who doesn't have a superpower, he's just very fit and good with a bow and arrow. Is that enough to be a member of the world's mightiest group of heroes though? That's what got me intrigued and when I saw the 'Hawkeye' collection on offer in 'The Works' (it's always worth checking out 'The Works' if there's one in your area)I couldn't help picking it up.

As with the 'Earth's Mightiest' collection, that I read recently, there wasn't really anything here that made me immediately want to rush out and get caught up with Hawkeye's adventureds. It was a fun and somewhat absorbing read though (with artwork that may be dated but is easy to get into) so I can't really complain :o)

From what I could tell here, Hawkeye has never really featured in his own comic so there was only a few mini-series that were eligible to be collected here. With there only being so much you can pack into a mini-series, what you get then is essentially Hawkeye facing off against the foe du jour and, eventually, coming out on top (unless he's fighting an Avenger then it defaults to a draw). It doesn't look like much of a plot, on the surface, and it isn't really. Luckily for the reader though, the writers do attempt to flesh things out as much as they can with a few insights, here and there, into what actually makes Hawkeye tick.

There may not be much room to show us but what we do see hints at a very interesting character who I think deserves a little more screen time than he actually gets. Hawkeye doesn't have any superpowers and knows that he has a lot to live up if he's going to be an Avenger; he's a guy who pushes himself to his limits and sets himself really high standards to follow. When he fails (through no fault of his own) Hawkeye can sink into a real depression although he never gives up trying to do the right thing. You've got to admire a guy who is never going to quite cut it, in the illustrious company that he keeps, but never lets that beat him. That's what kept me reading anyway.

Another approach that the writers take here is to flesh things out a little further with tales of Mockingbird, the SHIELD spy who falls for Hawkeye. The reader gets a little extra background on another character (and a more covert part of the Marvel universe that I was never really aware of) and this helps Hawkeye's character develop a little further. Everyone wins here I think (although having said that, the Mockingbird/Huntress tales do shift the attention from the guy who is meant to be the whole point of the book...)

Mockingbird's tales are a little deeper in nature because of the subject matter, espionage and loads of double crossing intrigue. As a result then, the book as a whole offers a good balance between 'beat em' up' and spy tales. Things don't have a chance to get stuck in a rut here as we're constantly switching between different types of stories.

'Avengers: Hawkeye' looks fairly straightforward on the the surface then but there is plenty going on once you get more into it. Ultimately it didn't prove enough to be really inspiring but it was plenty enough to make for a fun weekend read (especially given the hangover I was nursing at one point but that's another story)

Eight and a Quarter out of Ten

A couple of books arrived in the post...

And I just wanted to quickly mention them before I run off and start getting ready for work tomorrow.

Arrested by the Ald, scholar Bon Ugane and merwoman Leki Borle find themselves on a prison ship bound for the island of Skythe - a barren land and the site of long-ago wars.
Warped and ruined by the ancient conflict, survival on the island is tough and its original inhabitants are neither friendly nor entirely still human. But something else waits on the island, a living weapon whose very existence is a heresy. Destroyed many years ago, it silently begins to clutch at life once more.

For my money, Tim Lebbon doesn't get the attention he deserves as a very fine writer of... well, whatever he turns his hand to really. Check out a few of my reviews and you'll see what I mean. Give 'Echo City' a go if nothing else. 'The Heretic Lands' has muscled its way into the top end of the reading pile so you can expect a review soon(ish).

The game is afoot!


London's geniuses are being picked off by a vicious killer, and Emma Bannon, a sorceress in the service of the Empire, must protect the next target, Archibald Clare. Unfortunately he's more interested in solving the mystery of the murders than staying alive . . .

In a world where illogical magic has turned the Industrial Revolution on its head, Bannon and Clare will face dark sorcery, cannon fire, high treason and the vexing problem of reliably finding hansom cabs in the city.

Is Steampunk the new Urban Fantasy? I for one hope so, I really do (but I'm pretty much indifferent to nine tenths of Urban Fantasy so there you go). It would be refreshing to see something else on the shelves I have to say. I will give 'The Iron Wyrm Affair' a go but 'The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities' is a slice of Steampunk that looks far more appealing right now. Look out for a review of that instead.

Cover Art : 'The Goon #40' (Shameless Fan-Boy Edition)

In the absence of anything else to post today (it's been a slow day like that...) have a little cover art action courtesy of Eric Powell and 'The Goon'...

Back in his teenage days when Prohibition was going on, Goon used to hot-rod moonshine past the law for fun and profit. That is, until he ran into a gang of gearhead rockabilly ghouls out for blood!

Issue 40 is up for pre-ordering apparently :o)

It's no secret that I love 'The Goon' and I reckon that if you give it a go then you'll love 'The Goon' too. Cover art like this is one of the reasons why. I haven't read this issue yet (obviously) but I'll tell you now that the art inside will be just as good as what's on the cover. I like being able to pick up a  comic with that in mind :o)

So give 'The Goon' a go then, if you're into gorgeously drawn pulp stylings then you really can't go wrong with this title...

'Doctor Who and the Tenth Planet' - Gerry Davis (BBC Books)

When I was a kid, if you missed an episode of Doctor Who that was pretty much that. If you wanted to find out what happened then you had to rely on a friend at school having seen it and that they were happy to tell you. If that wasn't bad enough, by the time I was old enough to watch Doctor Who I'd already missed something like twenty years of episodes that wouldn't be released on video for at least another ten years. Thank goodness for the Target novelisations then (and the library bus that used to park up by the shopping centre); I was able to catch up on a whole load of stuff, some of which I wasn't even aware of until I saw it on the shelves.

BBC Books have been quietly republishing these books, just recently, and I thought it would be fun to have a read and revisit a few childhood favourites (to see how they've stood up to the passing of time and also because I've needed a little comfort reading just recently). I vaguely remember reading 'The Tenth Planet', years ago, so was pleased to see it on the list of re-issued books...

The Doctor and his companions find themselves at the North Pole where a military base has picked up signs of a tenth planet that has entered the solar system and is approaching Earth. As the planet draws closer, it begins to drain energy from Earth at a startling rate. The Doctor knows of this planet, and what will soon be visiting the Earth from its surface, but as the Cybermen attack, and take over, the base the Doctor is unable to help in the way that he normally would. The Doctor is dying...

The whole point of the Target novelisations was that, on the whole, they were very faithful to what you would have seen in each episode. It was basically like watching a DVD but in book form. I think the problem here though was that sometimes the book could be a little too faithful and this didn't transfer very well to the page. This was certainly the case with 'The Tenth Planet' with a lot of attention being paid to the plight of a spacecraft caught in the pull of the (tenth) planet Mondas. I'm sure this would have been suitably tense on the screen but here all we get are a lot of 'technical speak' that doesn't really tell the reader what is happening. When the fate of the shuttle is finally revealed I was surprised to see that it was in that much trouble in the first place...

The rest of the book is a lot better, in this respect, with a clear picture painted of what is going on. The white backdrop of the North Pole does a good job of highlighting the drama being played out and there is plenty of drama with the Doctor out of action and his companions forced to fall back on their own ingenuity if there is to be any chance of survival. This was quite an interesting spin on what you'd normally see in a Doctor Who book or TV show (at least it was for me) with a lot of the focus on the companions Ben and Polly. Both of these characters really rise to the challenge (Ben in particular) and the reader gets a tale that feels a lot fresher as a result (even though you know how it has to end). The Cybermen come across as very slow and cumbersome but are no less fearsome for that and I couldn't help but wince, on certain occasions, as I just knew that one of the human characters was about to get their comeuppance...

At only a hundred and fifty seven pages long, 'The Tenth Planet' is a quick read and maybe one that isn't up to a deeper examination. It does its job but no more than that and that makes me wonder if the book (or any of the others in the series) would appeal to people who weren't already fans of the show. I enjoyed it though; there's a lot happening with an air of suspense that you don't normally come across in this setting. Looking forward to reading the next one...

Eight out of Ten

Some Solaris Cover Art...

A couple of books, from Solaris, arrived last night and they got me thinking... You're a publisher with two books that you want to sell really well. Cover art sells a book (no doubt about it, if not to serious fans then definitely to the casual browser) so what do you do? This is what Solaris did...

Did the cover art budget only stretch to a 'book and a half' or are people banking on 'Besieged' being the book that shifts the most copies? Hardly seems fair on 'Hush' either way. I would have thought that if you want both books to sell then you give both of them a decent cover...

Out of some weird sense of solidarity (what? I'm tired...) I'll be giving 'Hush' a go as soon as I finish 'Mockingbird', even though I haven't read the prequel 'Greatshadow'. Sometimes you've got to stick up for the little guy ;o)

'Elric: The Balance Lost Volume 2' - Roberson, Biagini (Boom! Studios)

The Eternal Champion is cursed to forever wander the moonbeam roads of the multiverse (in many incarnations), fighting for both Law and Chaos but always bound to serve the needs of the Cosmic Balance. He will never know a moments peace and will die when an unfeeling multiverse no longer has any use for him. I, on the other hand, get to read all these stories and have a fine time doing so (not having to worry about my own cosmic allegiances and whether I will perish at the hands of my own traitorous sword...) I definitely get the better end of the deal here :o)


The standard of the tales is consistently good, to the extent that I'm now happy to venture outside Moorcock's original books and check out works in the same setting by different authors. Enter one Chris Roberson, an author whose work I have never been able to get into (let alone finish) until he started work on the 'Balance Lost' series. I would have picked these books up anyway, no matter who the writer was, but I thought that Roberson did a very good job with the first volume. Check out my review HERE and you'll see what I mean.

When I saw Volume 2 on the shelves then... Well, I didn't need much of an excuse to pick it up ('Bad day in the office blahblahblah... Oh look, comic book!') and take it to the counter straight away, fighting not to open it and start reading before I'd paid. Volume 2 is a lot of fun again and it looks like some of the issues I had with the previous book aren't issues anymore.

Eric Beck was a computer game designer plagued by dreams that have turned out to be so much more... Beck's dreams are in fact the reality of the multiverse and his many guises as the Eternal Champion. Now Eric Beck faces a fight that he is unprepared for but must succeed in; nothing less than the fate of the multiverse itself is at stake as the Cosmic Balance has been lost leaving Law and Chaos free to drag whole worlds into oblivion. Beck, Elric, Corum and Hawkmoon must travel into realms hitherto unknown, if they are to put things right, and they are up against enemies (of both Law and Chaos) who will take some beating.

The real danger lies out of sight though. Who is pulling the strings that have finally enabled the gods to go to war...?

While Volume One was all about setting the scene (a little bit too much if you ask me...), Roberson lets the story have its head a little here and the result is a pulp caper in all the best traditions of Moorcock. The stakes are high (they can't get much higher in fact) and the action is furious as a result. It doesn't let up for one moment and I found it incredibly easy to keep turning the pages bceause of this. We're talking a lot of fun here, plain and simple.

With the scene having been set, Volume Two has a little more time to get into Eric Beck's head so we can see what he is all about. It's a little disappointing then that we don't get to see an awful lot. It's all about the plot here and that's fair enough up to a point, it would have been nice to get some more characterisation though. I think the assumption here is that readers will know about the Eternal Champion mythos already and probably know the three heroes from several of the books. All well and good if you do by what if you don't? I'd say that these comics aren't a bad place to jump on board but a little more background is always useful. And as far as Eric Beck goes, I wonder if perhaps a little too much time was spent showing us how he displays the traits of the Champion (and not enough time showing us what else there is to his character)...

It's the power of the story that got me through these rocky patches and has me eager to see how it all pans out in the next volume (roll on October!) Biagini's art contributes, in no small way, to the overall affect; you really get to see his imagination run wild in the scenes outside besieged Tanelorn. What I did notice though was that scenes of quick moving action inevitably resulted in artwork that felt more than a little rushed. This was probably the affect that was aimed for but a little bit more polish here would have made all the difference.

Minor quibbles though when you're faced with a comic book that is this much fun. I would have been around for Volume Three anyway but the cliffhanger ending sealed the deal...

Eight and a Half out of Ten

'Wake of the Bloody Angel' - Alex Bledsoe (Tor)

In fantasy worlds where the focus is usually on warfare, magic or intrigue it makes for refreshing reading to see a 'down on his luck' private eye touting for business and, more often than not, getting into more trouble than he can handle. I like fantasy fiction and I love reading a little Raymond Chandler, every now and then, so I love to see the two collide and what this throws up. This is the big reason why I love Alex Bledsoe's 'Eddie LaCrosse' books.

Glen Cook may well have got there first, with his 'Garrett P.I.' novels, but Bledsoe seems more willing to 'welcome his readers in' rather than adopt Cook's 'take it or leave it' approach. Bledsoe wants you to enjoy his tale so gives it that extra degree of accessibility, it works for me :o)

Without too much more beating around the bush, I've been sat on an advance copy of 'Wake of the Bloody Angel' (not literally, you know what I mean...) for a while now, having reviewed the ARC of 'Burn Me Deadly' far too early and wanting to balance things out a bit. I've been in need of a good read just recently (long story...) and so it felt like just the right time to pick up 'Wake of the Bloody Angel' and give it a read.

Blurb copied and pasted from elsewhere (every second saved and all that...)

Twenty years ago, a barmaid in a harbor town fell for a young sailor who turned pirate to make his fortune. But what truly became of Black Edward Tew remains a mystery—one that has just fallen into the lap of freelance sword jockey Eddie LaCrosse.


For years, Eddie has kept his office above Angelina’s tavern, so when Angelina herself asks him to find out what happened to the dashing pirate who stole her heart, he can hardly say no—even though the trail is two decades old. Some say Black Edward and his ship, The Bloody Angel, went to bottom of the sea, taking with it a king’s fortune in treasure. Others say he rules a wealthy, secret pirate kingdom. And a few believe he still sails under a ghostly flag with a crew of the damned.

To find the truth, and earn his twenty-five gold pieces a day, Eddie must take to sea in the company of a former pirate queen in search of the infamous Black Edward Tew…and his even more legendary treasure.

Summertime commuting in London is one of my least favourite things about living here. If you're wondering why; cram as many people as you can into a greenhouse and then stand in it while the sun is blazing down on your head. Don't step out for at least twenty minutes. That was my train outside London Bridge this morning. Roll on autumn!

'Wake of the Bloody Angel' came at just the right time for me then. It didn't make the commute go any faster but it made it a hell of a lot more bearable.

'Wake' doesn't really do anything new and I'm not sure whether that's a good thing or not (at least not for the long term readers)... On the one hand, there's no hanging around waiting for things to develop. You know what you're getting with an 'Eddie LaCrosse' novel and Bledsoe serves it up to you straight away so you can get reading. Eddie gets working on a case, he finds clues that only make sense after he's made some wrong decisions, a couple of nasty surprises later and Eddie solves the case. That's the previous three books in a nutshell and 'Wake of the Bloody Angel' is no different.

Now that's cool if that's what you're after. It certainly worked for me but only up to a point though... I like a story where things just happen, without having to be laboriously set up first, and that's what you get here with 'Wake'. A lot of room is freed up for the good stuff, all the more exciting as we're talking about a plot set on the high seas here. There are sword fights all over the place, hidden islands, ghosts and sea monsters where you least expect them. Bledsoe strikes a fine balance between moments of all out action (a keen eye for spectacle is on display here) and the moments of inactivity that you can't escape from when you're on a boat in the middle of nowhere. This means that you may not get a fast paced tale but it all feels very smooth in the way that the plot moves forward. It's a lot of fun to read on that score.

There are some surprises throughout the book but these are all found on the way and are incidental to the case itself. No big deal here but it does highlight the fact that the case doesn't spring any big surprises, not the kind that Bledsoe was looking to spring anyway. The resolution here feels mechanical and a little too smooth; everything slots together far too easily, early on, and you can see what's coming...

No big deal though surely? Like I said, 'Wake of the Bloody Angel' is a lot of fun to read and took my mind off some lowpoints of the day. My mind keeps coming back to the whole thing about 'formula' though. I've already said that this isn't necessarily a bad thing here but the point is that when you're writing to a formula things get a bit... well, formulaic. I'm starting to get a feel for what is supposed to happen where with Eddie LaCrosse and it felt like just a little bit of the fun had gone. I was reading for the pulp swashbuckling heroics (loads of these) but I found I wasn't reading to be surprised anymore. And I want to be surprised... Maybe that's the price we pay for books that are more accessible.

While I had a lot of fun with 'Wake of the Bloody Angel' it felt like things were starting to get a little too familiar in lots of little ways. No big deal if you're after a fun read, maybe a bit more of a deal if you're with the series for the long term and want to see things develop. This isn't going to stop me being around for the next book, I just hope that Bledsoe has a few surprises for me...

Eight and a Quarter out of Ten

New series by 'Double Dead' and 'Blackbirds' writer to debut in 2013

From the press release...

Don't look up. Don't send your prayers skyward. Because the gods aren't in the sky. They're here. All of them.

 

After publishing Chuck Wendig’s debut novel Double Dead, in 2011 Abaddon Books is proud to announce that it is set to publish a brand new title from the inimitable author of Blackbirds.

 

Gods and Monsters: Unclean Spirits, the first title in a brand new shared world series, will debut in summer 2013 with Wendig’s characteristically sharp, take-no-prisoners style sure to win him even more fans.

 

Exiled to Earth, the gods now walk amongst us, bringing with them their children and their servants and their monsters. Their power is a mere fraction of what it once was, but even a mote of divine magic is awesome - in the truest sense of the word.

 

Cason Cole knows this firsthand. He's been serving the gods for the better part of a decade, their leash fastened tight around his neck. But when his most recent divine master gets killed - a thing Cason didn't even know could happen - he finds himself once more a free man. All he's got left is a burning need for vengeance against the very gods who forced him to kneel, but he'll soon discover that getting revenge against the gods is no easy feat. He'll have to put his life, love, sanity and soul on the line. Will he pay the cost? How priceless is his wrath?

I am all over this new series when it comes out. Chuck Wendig has done right by me with the books of his that I've read ('Double Dead', 'Blackbirds', started reading 'Mockingbird' last night...) so I'm looking forward to more of the same. Don't let me down Chuck... ;o)

P.S. Because Joey Hi-Fi's covers are consistently awesome, here's the cover art for 'Mockingbird'...

 Told you it was awesome :o)

'Pandemonium Stocking Stuffer 2011' - Edited by Anne C. Perry (Jurassic)

So I've finally installed the Kindle app on my phone and can read books off it! It's like the twenty first century has finally allowed me to be a part of things (having a smart phone still feels like I'm in an episode of 'Star Trek' though). I always catch up with technology later than everyone else...

This doesn't mean that I'll be accepting ebooks for review, not at all, as I've got plenty enough to be reading as it is. What it does mean though is that if I see some free reading that catches my eye then it will be on my Kindle app before you know it. Free reading like the 'Pandemonium Stocking Stuffer 2011' for instance.

Christmas 2011 has been and gone but Kindle books sit on Amazon forever and sometimes they get given away for free, presumably to drum up a bit more interest in other books that aren't free. Whatever the reason, I'd missed out on other 'Jurassic' books so decided to take the opportunity to have a little look while I didn't have to pay for it. It's a good little read and I'd recommend you give it a shot if you have a Kindle.

The 'Stocking Stuffer' isn't a huge read at all (the clue is in the name people!) weighing in at something like forty pages on my phone. It's incredibly easy to get into though, so easy in fact that it can feel a little longer than it actually is. All three authors on display here appear very adept at using the little space they have to give you enough background scenery to balance out the actual plot. Archie Black's 'Villainy Fair' doesn't quite hit the spot here but, to be fair, I don't think it's meant to (being entirely based around the content of a particular conversation, the background doesn't matter at all here).

The 'Stocking Filler's' introduction sets out the main theme, tying three very different stories together, as being how speculative fiction can still be about looking back instead of just looking forward all the time. There's new ground waiting to be trodden but 'there's still plenty of fun to be had in our old stomping grounds.' If the 'Stocking Filler' is anything to go by then this is definitely the case as there's a lot of fun to be had here.

Things kick off with Osgood Vance's 'The Season' and I've got to admit that I wasn't too sure about seeing another dig at the tired old 'stable boy with a destiny' trope. Not that it doesn't deserve the odd poke but it's such an easy target that I'd much rather see people take aim at something else. I shouldn't have worried though. Vance gave me enough action to keep things exciting whilst taking a look at just how the mechanics, and administration, of destiny might work (and what this might mean if you're not very good at your job...) I wasn't planning on chuckling but couldn't help myself with this tale of what looked like medieval pest controllers (seriously, check out the 'Dark Lords' here).

After that, we get Den Patrick's 'The Shock of the New'. I liked the play on words here as the reader gets a look at the introduction of new weaponry into an alternate First World War along with at least one other shock along the way. This isn't so much a story as it is a 'moment in a story' and I'd quite happily read the rest if this was ever expanded upon. Patrick builds up the tension and then lets it all go with the help of one Mr Tesla, 'explosive' isn't the word for it and I also enjoyed the understated banter between Harry and Valente.

We end with the aforementioned 'Villainy Fair' and again, I wasn't looking forward to this tale of 'fantasyland seen through the eyes of a minority'. I mean, it's not like we haven't seen this done before... I should have paid a little more attention to that introduction. This kind of thing has been done before but that didn't make 'Villainy Fair' any the less fun to read. Archie Black's Demon Queens come across as so put upon, and hacked off with the whole thing (and wouldn't you be?), that you can't help but feel for them and laugh when they get really bitchy about their male counterparts. It's all so down to earth, in a good way, and that's the bait that Black uses so effectively to hook her readers.

'The Stocking Stuffer 2011' would have made for a great Christmas present (last year) and it still makes for a thoroughly entertaining read in the middle of (what is currently passing for) summer. I didn't even notice the commute while I was reading (and that's pretty high praise given how much I hate commuting). Pick it up now, if I hadn't picked it up already then I would.

Eight and a Half out of Ten

Gaie Sebold to pen sequel to her debut novel, Babylon Steel

From the press release...

Solaris is delighted to announce that author Gaie Sebold is to follow up her fantastically well-received debut, Babylon Steel.


With a bold frankness that eschews fantasy’s usual reluctance to deal with sex and gender politics, Sebold has conceived one of the most stunning and well-realised female characters in the genre – ex-mercenary turned brothel owner Babylon Steel.

And Babylon is set to return in Dangerous Gifts, which will be published in February 2013.

Babylon Steel runs the best brothel in Scalentine, city of portals. She’s escaped her past and it’s all going pretty well. Apart, that is, from the racial conflict and economic misery boiling up in Scalentine.


Her lover, Chief Bitternut of the City Militia, is trying to keep the lid on, while hunting a killer whose real target is a lot closer than he knows. Just as things are getting really tense, Babylon is forced to take another job. Bodyguard to Enthemmerlee Entaire: symbol of hope or object of disgust for most of her country’s population, and a prime target for assassination, along with anyone who happens to be in the way. Such as her bodyguard.

Unintentionally dragging a very annoyed government employee along in her wake, Babylon struggles to turn Enthemmerlee’s squabbling household guard from liability into security, dodge the rigid Moral Statutes of Incandress, and keep both herself and her client alive. She soon realises that the situation is far worse than she thought, her past hasn’t quite let go of her yet, and she will be driven to a choice that will have far-reaching consequences…


I never got round to reading 'Babylon Steel' (although I think it might still be on the shelves somewhere...), has anyone here read it and what did you think? Would you pick up 'Dangerous Gifts'...?

The 'Wow, where did the last couple of months go...?' Competition Winner's Post!

Three more weeks in this contract and then I'm going to be looking for work again. This time round though I'm a bit more cool about it (I think). All the stuff that I was worried about, last time, didn't happen and I must know dozens of recruitment consultants by name after all the emails that I sent out. Most of all though, I'll be taking a little holiday before throwing myself into all of that :o) After the past few weeks, I'm really looking forward to that...

My reading feels like it's on a bit of an upward curve as well; I actually managed to polish two books off (over the weekend) without putting them down to start something else - that's a huge deal for me at the moment and I'm looking forward to getting at least a couple more read this week :o)
What can you expect to see, on the blog, this week? Well, you know that 'Dr Who' book I was telling you about yesterday? Yep, that will be reviewed and so will the novelisation of 'Dawn of the Dead' (I'm still trying to get my thoughts together on that one, it was a good read but...) The other plan is to get 'Wake of the Bloody Angel' finished and reviewed by the end of the week, we'll see how that goes...

Sorry, what did you say? Winners from last week's competitions...? Of course! Thanks to everyone who entered by the way, talk about having hundreds of emails to go through :o) There could only be two winners though and they were...

Milo Milton-Jefferies, North Devon, England

('Holiday Reading' Competition)

Seb Jones, Wiltshire, England

Nice work there guys, your books will be on their way very soon :o)

That's about it for me today, see you tomorrow... ;o)

What I'm reading right now...

Due to a whole load of other things going on right now (work, ongoing legal stuff and generally feeling like something a dog just threw up...) I'm really bad at finishing books right now. I mean, I get there in the end but it's really 'stop and start' at the moment (which is even more odd as the books I'm picking up have all been very good). Here are a few of the books that I'm 'stopping and starting' on...

The main culprit :o) Every time I pick up 'The King's Blood' I think to myself, 'this is better than 'The Dragon's Path' and that was excellent'. Then I realise that another week has gone by and I've only read a chapter or two...

I totally forgot that this was on the shelves until the other day, curse you 'random shelving of books...!' The 'Eddie LaCrosse' books are a much easier going version of Glen Cook's 'Garrett P.I.' series but with a hidden edge that will cut you by surprise. I'm enjoying 'Wake of the Bloody Angel' as much as I've enjoyed Bledsoe's others.

Because 'readers block' is a great excuse to re-visit some childhood favourites and see how they measure up :o)

 Everyone else has been raving about this title (and I do mean everyone, I don't think I've heard a single bad word about 'Sharps'...) so I figured it was way past time I gave K.J. Parker another go. It's looking good so far.

 Because if there's anything that can cure 'reader's block', for me, then it's David Gemmell... surely?

 Same deal here, loads of short stories that I can dip in and out of as the mood takes me. What's also intriguing here is that one of the stories is written by John Brunner (the guy who wrote 'Stand on Zanzibar'). Definitely want to check that one out...

That's what I'm reading, how about you?

Cover Art! 'Tomorrow the Killing' (Daniel Polansky)

Another hooded figure on a fantasy cover but it is raining though so that's alright, isn't it...? If you're the king of the criminal underworld then you really don't want to come down with a cold...
I like this cover with its street that you really don't want to be caught walking down. Not just because it's raining either, you don't want to come across the Warden while he's about his business. Check out the blurb...

Once he was a hero of the Great War, and then a member of the dreaded Black House. Now he is the criminal linchpin of Low Town.

His name is Warden.

He thought he had left the war behind him, but a summons from up above brings the past sharply, uncomfortably, back into focus. General Montgomery's daughter is missing somewhere in Low Town, searching for clues about her brother's murder. The General wants her found, before the stinking streets can lay claim to her, too.

I loved 'The Straight Razor Cure'/'Low Town' and am really looking forward to reading 'Tomorrow the Killing' a little closer to its release date in October (sooner if I can get away with it!)

'Wrath of Iron' - Chris Wraight (Black Library)

Ah, 'Space Marine Battles' series; we meet again... Here is a series that has given me many highs but just as many lows (have a click on the 'Black Library' link on the side and you'll see what I mean). The key theme here is that a battle should be part of the overall plot, it shouldn't be the whole plot. What more is there to tell other than that there's a battle, one side wins and the other side loses? Given that the Black Library are all about trying to dispel 'tie-in fiction' myths they've set themselves quite a task here, especially given that the Space Marines haven't lost a battle yet in this series...
What they're after then are good writers who can rise to the fundamental challenges of this series; it's a good job then that they have Chris Wraight on board.

Wraight has already delivered the goods with his Warhammer fiction (see my reviews of 'Sword of Justice' and 'Sword of Vengeance') but what is more telling is that he has also delivered with his 'Space Marine Battles' novel 'Battle of the Fang'. Wraight has risen to the challenge once already, can he do it again? That was the question I had with 'Wrath of Iron' and I'm really pleased to say that Wraight hit the target again. 'Wrath of Iron' isn't perfect but you can't complain with what's on offer here.
Blurb copied and pasted because you would not believe the kind of things that were jumping out of the woodwork and biting me on the rear yesterday...

After months spent in the service of the Chaos god Slaanesh, the ruling classes of the Contqual sub-sector have finally brought true damnation upon their people - innumerable hordes of foul and lascivious daemons swarm from a tear in the fabric of reality to embrace their mortal pawns and drive them on to ever more depraved acts of worship. It falls to the merciless Space Marines of the Iron Hands Chapter to cleanse these worlds of the warp's unholy taint, and it is upon the surface of Shardenus that the fate of a billion lost souls will be decided.

Since I first came across Chris Wraight, his work has done more than enough to make me pick up and finish whatever he writes. It's that simple.
It was no surprise then that I finished 'Wrath of Iron', in a relatively short space of time, but there was plenty to make the experience worthwhile. Wraight not only has high standards but has no trouble in meeting them.

He doesn't make the job easy for himself though... The Iron Hands Space Marines are warriors bent on glorifying their Primarch by replacing their flesh with steel, purging any trace of what little was left of their humanity. All they want to do is fight, not a lot to write about surely?

In a way there isn't, all the Iron Hands are there to do is fight and win, but there are interesting little snippets that hint at a wider (more tragic) picture. I'm talking about the words of the Iron Hands Primarch, that open the book, and the struggle of Sergeant Naim Morvox to accept his destiny as an Iron Hand. I say 'struggle' though... It's not much of a struggle to be honest given the conditioning that he has already received. Bit of a damp squib then? Possibly, there's no doubt how that strand of the book will end... These little hints give the reader a bit more perspective then but they don't do a lot to advance the plot.

It's a good job then that there's a lot more to 'Wrath of Iron' than just the Iron Hands. Wraight takes in everyone, with even a passing involvement in the conflict to give us a war that is truly all encompassing. The fighting itself is as brutal as you would expect with no punches pulled (albeit still a little too linear for my tastes, I’m going to have to accept that this is how the series will be on the whole). You can't pull any punches when describing just what it takes to lay siege to an entire Hive city… It’s a whole load of glorious (yet somehow futile) spectacles, I’m talking Titans going up against daemons, combining to show us warfare on a wide scale and personal scale all at the same time.

This is where Wraight really delivers the goods, as far as I was concerned, showing us what it's like to be a civilian caught in the middle and unable to tell which side is which. Even characters like Khadi, who know which side to fight for, are tested to the absolute limit when they see what waits for them within the Hive. Wraight gets it; you can't do half measures if you want to show just what war is like, you have to give it everything.

Contrasting this is the story of Lord General Nethata. Space Marines can seem very simplistic characters, just there to keep fighting, and the only way you can get across just how different they are is to see what it's like to be a human fighting alongside them. By having Nethata struggle to make sense of the Iron Hands command, Wraight makes it clear just how apart from humanity these warriors really are. This is made especially clear when the reader gets an idea of why the Iron Hands are prepared to sacrifice their comrades in the guard. The Space Marines have a perspective on this millennia old struggle that the rest of the Imperium will never have.

‘Wrath of Iron’ is a simplistic tale at heart, no doubt about it, but it’s covered in a lot of other stuff that will have you forgiving the linear nature of the plot. Wraight shows us just how futile war can be but, at the same time, also shows us why the fight here must never stop until it is won. I’m hoping for Wraight to make a return to the world of Warhammer but, if he keeps writing books like this, I’ll keep reading his stuff anyway.

Nine out of Ten

They don't do covers like this anymore (and that's got to be a good thing)...

I found this, a couple of days ago, and it won't be read for a little while yet. Doesn't mean we can't all have a little chuckle at the cover though, does it? I was going to write something about the cover but I really don't need to. It says everything it needs to say all by itself :o) I can imagine the conversation...

Artist: "So we've got this science fiction tale with some politics thrown in. What sort of thing do you want for the cover? Are we talking the revolution of the masses? Do you want a picture of the Fireclown delivering his oratory?"

Publisher: "Dude, just have a smoke of this and go with whatever feels right. We'll put it on the cover."

It did get me thinking though. Bloggers, and the lovely people who comment, do love to have a good moan about the generic covers we get these days; hooded warriors/assassins and the like. The next time you do that, have a look at this cover again. That's the alternative.

A hooded guy may be generic but at least it's vaguely relevant to what's in the book. Moan too much and we could be looking at a descent back into cover art anarchy. Just saying... ;o)

'Surprise!' Cover Art - 'Eyes Like Leaves' (Charles De Lint)

Well, it was a surprise for me... :o)

One of the things I love about running the blog are the random, unsolicited, books that arrive in the post. It is a double-edged sword (with some books not interesting me at all, quite the opposite in fact) but every now and then a potential gem arrives in the post. Such as 'Eyes Like Leaves' for example, kindly sent by Tachyon Press when all I'd asked for was a copy of 'The Sword And Sorcery Anthology'.
Check out was is, quite frankly, a glorious cover...

Summer magic is waning in the Green Isles, and the evil Icelord is encasing the lands in a permanent frost while coastal towns are pillaged by snake ships. Mounting one last defense against the onslaught, a mysterious old wizard instructs his inexperienced apprentice in the art of shape-changing. Mercilessly pursued by the Icelord's army, this newfound mage gathers allies—a seemingly ordinary young woman and her protective adoptive family—and they flee north in a desperate race to awaken the Summerlord. Time is running short for the Summerborn, especially when a treacherous family betrayal is discovered.

Doubly a surprise then as, until now, I thought that De Lint only wrote (very good) urban fantasy. I'm about halfway through four other books at the moment but I'm really excited about 'Eyes Like Leaves'. Anyone else read it?

'Breakfast in the Ruins' - Michael Moorcock (New English Library)

These days, if I see a Moorcock book (that I don't already have) it gets snapped up quicker than... Well, think of something really quick... It gets snapped up quicker than that :o) Until Gollancz get round to republishing Moorcock's back catalogue (it's going to happen) the only way to find these books is by chance in second hand bookshops. I actually found a copy of 'The Winds of Limbo', in the book market outside the BFI, today but that's another story.
I would have picked up 'Breakfast in the Ruins' anyway but I was particularly interested seeing as I still need to read a lot more outside of the 'Eternal Champion' series, especially the alternate history books that 'Breakfast in the Ruins' seems to fall into.

A chance meeting leads Karl Glogauer into the maelstrom of time and space; cast in various roles but always a witness to man's inhumanity. What will be left of him on his return? And how is the mysterious stranger that guides him...?

'Breakfast in the Ruins' is an unsettling read, only a hundred and seventy four pages long but packing content that could fill a book twice the size (and stays in your head for a long time afterwards, some of the imagery is disturbing to say the least). It's pitched on three levels and this approach failed to be as effective as I think it was meant to be. It's like there are three 'mini-books' vying for attention and the strongest one overshadows the other two.

The 'winner' in this respect is the part of the book that shows Glogauer's journeys into various alternate earths. Moorcock really lays bare man's ability to oppress his fellow, casting Glogauer in a number of roles to maximmise that impact. If Glogauer isn't the victim (or witness) then he is the perpetrator of acts that are all the more brutal for the fact that not all of these histories are alternate (I'm talking Auschwitz, Kenya and Vietnam here). We're not just capable of doing this stuff, it actually happens. The alternate stuff is no less forceful, especially Glogauer's potential end.

All this force and energy drowns out the rest of the book though. I got to the end and realised that something really important had happened, in the relationship between Glogauer and the mysterious stranger, but I'd missed it because of how strong the alternate history bits were. It's clear what the outcome is but I'm going to have to go back and re-read the book just to see how we got there. I missed that pivotal moment but it's still interesting to see the balance of power shift backwards and forwards over the course of the book.

The 'third bit' is almost deliberately understated. Here, Moorcock invites us to measure our potential inhumanity against a series of moral dilemmas. It's understated and that seems to really invite you to think about what's being asked here (and there is plenty to ponder although some questions are a bit too obvious); that understatement is also an unhappy side affect of the main strand though...

Finishing 'Breakfast in the Ruins', I couldn't help but wonder what might have been had the book been a little more balanced and equal attention paid to the three threads. Like I said though, it's a powerful and unsettling read that has taken up residence in my head for the next week or two... Worth a look if you can find a copy.

Eight and a Half out of Ten

Which cover would you go for? 'Shadow's Master' (Jon Sprunk)

Because sometimes I get sent two copies of the same book and it's only fair if both of them get a little coverage here :o) I've only read the first book of Jon Sprunk's trilogy (really need to catch up there!) but even so...

Have some blurb first,

A land of death and shadow where only the strongest survive. Yet that is where Caim must go to follow the mystery at the heart of his life. Armed only with his knives and his companions, he plunges into a world of eternal night where the sun is never seen and almost every hand is turned against him.

Only Kit, spectral vision and often unreliable accomplice, will stand by Caim in his darkest hour. But how much can he rely on her, when he can't even fulfil her greatest wish? Kit is in love with her companion, and he may not even know it. And even a Fae's tolerance will only last for so long...


Caim has buried his father's sword and found some measure of peace, but deep in the north an unfathomable power lays waiting. To succeed on this mission, Caim will have to more than just survive. He must face the Shadow's Master.

And here are those covers,

The UK Cover

The US Cover

This is a really close one to call for me, both look pretty darn good. In the end, it's the slight 'grainyness' (it's a word... well, it is now) of the UK cover that swung it for me. Makes things seem a little more 'rough' around the edges which is a little more in keeping with the tone of what I've read so far. That and the fact that Kit looks a little more 'Fae' in the UK cover rather than a lady in real need of some sun...

That's what I think anyway, what about you? Comments in the usual place please :o)

'The Goon: The Deformed of Body and the Devious of Mind' - Eric Powell (Dark Horse Books)

Now this is more like it... :o) I've just spent the last week doing work that is slowly but surely killing my very soul. At home, I'm dealing with a neighbour who wants to sue us (long story, not to be told here) and some nasty food poisoning that did some very nasty things to me last night... It's all ok though! It's that one time of year where I get to escape real life horribleness and hang in Lonely Street with two of my favourite comic book characters. It's time for the Goon once again :o)

I've been following the Goon almost as long as the blog has been running (quite a while then) and a couple of years ago I reached the point where I'd caught up on all the story and I was left to wait for new stuff to appear. It always feels like an interminable wait but it's worth it every single time. This time was no different.

After a short break, following the conclusion of the 'Labrazio' storyline, Powell has returned with a series of 'one off' issues that don't seem to contribute to a larger arc (although a few familiar faces return, hinting at possibilities for the future) but make for good reading all by themselves.

I've already reviewed issue 34 here so am going to cheat a little bit here and give you a link to the Review. The rest of the book though...

Long term readers of 'The Goon', and this blog, will already know that the Goon hates vampires almost as much as he hates zombies. Given how much we all hate the 'Twilight' vampires it's great fun then to watch him throw down some serious hurt on some sparkly looking types out for a game of baseball in Lonely Street. These scenes give us my second favourite quote in the book, "Sparkly vampires? You've got be ****ing ****ing me!"

What I really love about Powell though is how he can go from childish humour to dark horror and tragedy, all in a couple of pages. The horror comes out on the next page, swiftly followed by the pathos of issue 34 (see that link) and then straight back into the burlesque stylings of the 'Roxi Dlite' episode. The humour here is unashamedly burlesque, that's all I'm saying (other than that I laughed lots and couldn't help but feel a little sorry for Franky afterwards).

The highlight of the book for me was the 'Union' episode where Powell leaves out the humour entirely and gives us a dark tale of real tragedy and revenge. Ghosts coming back from the grave, union busters and a demonic gorilla all combined to make for a real riveting read; the fire in the factory bought a real tear to my eye as I saw the people trying to get out.

Running the 'Union' story a close second was 'The Goon's on Vacation', a tale of vacation interupted by a wiener stealing hobo and Fishy Pete's amorous mother; the kind of thing that could only happen to the Goon and the kind of thing that you just can't help but follow (just to see if the ending is as weird as the rest of it). I had a lot of fun reading this, not least because 'The Goon's on Vacation' gives us my favourite quote from the book... "Why does every BBQ I have end with a dead hippie being molested?" Why indeed.

There's a little more to come as Powell signs the volume off with 'An Irish Wake', the tale of a fastidious goblin and a promise made long ago. It's a short tale (maybe a little too short) but well worth it just for the panel where the corpse flies off the table and out of the window :o) A real slapstick laugh out loud funny moment!

I found myself missing the absence of a plot arc (which really did things for the preceding ten volumes) but what's on offer in 'The Deformed of Body and the Devious of Mind' more than made up for that in the meantime. 'The Goon' is as wild and dark as ever (all beautifully drawn by Powell as well) and I'm looking forward to more already.

Nine and a Half out of Ten

Fancy seeing 'The Amazing Spiderman' at the IMAX?

So the nice lady, at the BFI, asked me if I'd like to give away two tickets to see 'The Amazing Spiderman' at the London IMAX... I said 'yes', of course, and here we are :o)

Two tickets then, here's what you need to do. Have a click Here and see what date appeals to you. Then drop me an email (address at the top of the screen) telling me who you are and what date you'd like to go to the pictures. The subject header needs to be 'Amazing Spiderman'. Seeing as I'm giving away two tickets, tell me if you want both of them (taking a friend?) or just the one. The only other condition is that you must be able to get to London, and use the tickets, on the day. If you can't then don't enter basically ;o)

'The Amazing Spiderman' is showing right now, and I want to turn this thing around quite quickly, so get your emails in as soon as possible. Shall we say by the end of tomorrow? Yes, lets :o)

Good Luck!

Couldn't Finish It... 'Turbulence' - Samit Basu (Titan Books)

A great way to start a new month, on the blog, then... Most times I'll finish whatever book is in front of me no matter whether I like it or not (just like I used to do with my dinner as a child) but things haven't been great just recently and this has been reflected in my total lack of reading patience. More likely than not it isn't the books fault at all but if it's not working for me then down it goes. Such was the case with Samit Basu's 'Turbulence'...

Aman Sen is smart, young, ambitious and going nowhere. He thinks this is because he doesn’t have the right connections—but then he gets off a plane from London to Delhi and discovers that he has turned into a communications demigod. Indeed, everyone on Aman’s flight now has extraordinary abilities corresponding to their innermost desires.

Vir, an Indian Air Force pilot, can now fly. Uzma, a British- Pakistani aspiring Bollywood actress, now possesses infinite charisma. And then there’s Jai, an indestructible one-man army with a good old-fashioned goal — to rule the world!

Aman wants to ensure that their new powers aren't wasted on costumed crime-fighting, celebrity 
endorsements, or reality television. He wants to heal the planet but with each step he takes, he finds helping some means harming others. Will it all end, as 80 years of superhero fiction suggest, in a meaningless, explosive slugfest? 

I can only comment on the hundred, or so, pages that I read but 'Turbulence' comes across as a verbose read with a lot of detail that doesn't seem to have much to do with the plot (although I'll admit that I could be wrong here, not having finished the book and all...) Normally I can deal with that but what made me put the book down was that it felt like 'Turbulence' was a book all about discussing superheroes rather than letting people actually be superheroes. I think there's definitely a lot of discussion to be had here but it's not a book that I want to be reading right now... so I'm not :o)

This has been an odd post for me to write then... The blurb looks great and I can see a lot of potential but it just didn't work for me. It might work for you though, let me know if you read 'Turbulence' and what you thought. Did I put the book down too soon?

Apparently Titan are giving away ten free copies of 'Turbulence' over on Twitter (if your interest has been piqued by the blurb here). All you need to do is tweet the link to this post to @Titanbooks (#Turbulence) along with a description of the most original superhero you can think of. Samit will pick ten favourites and they all get a book...

'Holiday Reading' Giveaway!

Because it's the first day of July and if you read this blog then you're probably wondering what to read while you're on holiday. You are... aren't you? I am but that's another story.

So then, with the help of Orbit books I'm going to help you with your holiday reading by giving away two books to one lucky reader. One lucky UK reader that is, this one is only open to people living in the UK I'm afraid... The books in question are,

I've been going on about this one just lately, all because I loved it to pieces. Check out my review over Here.

'The Killing Moon' is on my 'must read very soon' pile. Here's the blurb...

In the ancient city-state of Gujaareh, peace is the only law. Upon its rooftops and amongst the shadows of its cobbled streets wait the Gatherers - the keepers of this peace. Priests of the dream-goddess, their duty is to harvest the magic of the sleeping mind and use it to heal, soothe . . . and kill those judged corrupt.
But when a conspiracy blooms within Gujaareh's great temple, Ehiru - the most famous of the city's Gatherers - must question everything he knows. Someone, or something, is murdering dreamers in the goddess' name, stalking its prey both in Gujaareh's alleys and the realm of dreams. Ehiru must now protect the woman he was sent to kill - or watch the city be devoured by war and forbidden magic.

Two good books then :o) If you want a shot at winning, simply drop me an email (address at the top of the page) telling me who you are and what your postal address is. If you want to make me really jealous by telling me where you're off to, on holiday, then I can handle it ;o) The subject header needs to be 'Holiday Reading'.


I'm letting this one run until the 8th of July and will announce the winner as soon as possible afterwards.

Good Luck!