Giveaway! 'The Games' (Ted Kosmatka)

Thanks to the nice people at Del Rey I have five ARCs of Ted Kosmatka's 'The Games' to give away on the blog. You can read the blurb Here along with my thoughts on the cover art...

You want in? It's another US entrants only competition... (Sorry about that everyone else, I'll see what I can do to even things up a bit in the future) To enter, simply drop me an email (address at the top right hand side of the screen) telling me who you are and your postal address. The subject header needs to be 'The Games'. I'll do everything else.

I'll let this one run until the 18th of March and will announce the winners as soon as possible afterwards.

Good Luck!

‘The Colour Out Of Space’ – H.P. Lovecraft

You are going to be seeing an awful lot of short stories on the blog this year… I hope you don’t mind although there’s not an awful lot I can do about it if you do! Things being as they are at the moment (you know, the whole job hunting thing and so on…) reading time is at a real premium so shorter reads are inevitable. I also thought that focusing on a few short stories, here and there, would be a nice little way to give a little nod to all those anthologies that end up on my shelves and never seem to be picked up. Collections like ‘The Call of Cthulhu’ for instance.

The plan was to run a much larger post that talked about the book as a whole but as I was reading through I couldn’t help but feel that Lovecraft was basically telling the same story over and over again. You boil things down and each story is essentially saying that man isn’t physically or mentally capable of handling the fact that the world is a lot larger than he ever realised. It’s a cruel and uncaring world beyond the limits of what is familiar… I think that’s fair enough to a degree, writing to a formula is pretty much a must if you’ve discovered a way to sell your stories to the pulp magazines. Saying the same thing about each story though… Well, that wouldn’t make for a particularly interesting review really so I thought I’d pick one story out of the book and write about that instead. I will continue to read ‘The Call of Cthulhu’ but probably along those same lines; I think it’s a book that needs to be tackled in bite sized chunks rather than read in one sitting.

Anyway, the story I chose was (of course) ‘The Colour Out Of Space’; purely for the sense of intriguing weirdness that nestles within the title. A Colour from Out Of Space? What’s that all about…? There’s only one way to find out and I found it all too easy to get reading. ‘The Colour Out Of Space’ is a slow-burner but ultimately proves to be worth the initial effort required.

The narrator has been sent to the area west of Arkham to carry out survey work for a new reservoir that is to be built. The stories he hears though makes him glad that the area will soon be underwater and also makes him promise himself that he will never drink that water. There something lurking in the countryside that is not of this world…

I’m not going to lie, Lovecraft almost lost me here before the tale even got going and precisely because the tale takes its own sweet time getting going. What’s odd here is Lovecraft takes very little time in painting a dark and sinister picture of countryside tainted by… something. It’s a great hook that had me wanting to find out more straight away but Lovecraft went wrong (as far as I was concerned) was in telling the reader exactly what was going on and in no small detail. These pages drag and told me more than I wanted to know about scientific experiments on the meteorite etc. The weirdness is dispelled (albeit temporarily) by the cold light of science which lays things bare a little too well. What’s even more odd is that Lovecraft manages to cram all that unwanted detail into about three pages, three incredibly stodgy and dry pages that did their level best to put me off reading any further. Nice work there Mr Lovecraft…

I kept reading though and am glad I did. Lovecraft shows the reader that there is a lot more weirdness to this downed meteorite than at first meets the eye. ‘The Colour Out Of Space’ soon becomes a tale of inexorable doom being visited on a farmer and his family, drawn out with lots of little (and not so little) hints that things are horribly wrong.

For a writer who sought to redefine horror by moving his tales away from the realm of ghosts and witches, Lovecraft seems quite happy to dress ‘The Colour Out Of Space’ in the clothes that made those tales so scary in the first place. We’re talking unexplained lights and trees moving when they shouldn’t; we’re also talking about of the gradual descent into insanity for the family that this is all visited on.
Having said that though, Lovecraft does add his own touch of weirdness as well and the overall affect makes for a deeply unsettling yet compelling read. I couldn’t get enough of it anyway, rooting for the poor family of Nahum Gardner but knowing that their fate was already sealed.

Lovecraft ekes things out gradually and the gradual release of detail proves to be a great way of making the reader want to stay around to get the full picture. And what a picture it proves to be, a family and an entire region blighted by an alien presence that seems to be barely aware of anything else other than itself, except when it’s hungry. That lack of motivation (or acknowledgement of its surroundings) makes the ‘Colour’ somehow seem even worse than your regular vampire, or whatever, that has some dreams of power at least. The ‘Colour’ just exists to, well… exist really. It’s the repercussions for this existence that are horrifying.

Lovecraft leaves us with the knowledge that we are less than a thought to the other life forms of the universe that pass by our planet. The passing of such life forms will always leave a mark though and the repercussions of this will echo long after the ‘Colour’ gets to wherever it was going in the first place.
‘The Colour Out Of Space’ hasn’t left me wanting to avoid drinking the water from my local reservoir but is an unsettling read nonetheless. If it had got into gear a little quicker then maybe I’d be thinking twice about turning the tap on.

Eight and a Half out of Ten

‘Sadie Walker is Stranded’ – Madeleine Roux (St. Martin’s Griffin/Headline)

As much as I try to be impartial here (and I do) there are certain books that I enjoy all the more because of the subject matter. Yep, I’m talking zombies again… :o) I won’t go into all the reasons why, I’m sure you know them all already, but suffice it to say that someone would have to seriously mess up a zombie novel for me to disappointed by it. Someone like Madeleine Roux? Well maybe that’s not quite fair. I loved the concept behind ‘Allison Hewitt is Trapped’ but it didn’t quite work where it mattered, not for me anyway. You can either read the full review Here or you can carry on here and read a couple of bits like,

‘…with Allison at times worrying more about the wireless connection, on her laptop, than what dangers might lurk in this new world.’

And,

‘…it just didn’t feel that dangerous to me as you know that Allison will be there at the end of the day to blog about it.’

As well as,

‘Allison Hewitt Is Trapped’ benefits greatly from its strong lead character but that ended up being almost the only reason I kept reading.’

Not a zombie book that I’d recommend to you guys then (although I do know others who have really enjoyed it). That being the case then, why did I pick up ‘Sadie Walker is Stranded’?

Well, the bottom line is that I liked the look of the world that Roux was building and I was interested to see how it would stand up without the ‘blogging perspective’ throwing things out of joint. Actually that’s not really the bottom line at all. I like zombie books, that’s all there is to it :o)
Having read ‘Sadie Walker’ though… I’m not sure that I would go back for a third helping. I do like what’s being done with the titles and would have a look at the cover to see what the next one is (‘Amanda Jones is having her large intestine pulled out and eaten by a walking corpse’?) but that’s about it…

Sadie Walker is a survivor in a world where those who don’t survive come back and try to eat those who have made it this far. Seattle is a safe haven for Sadie and her young nephew Shane; well… it is until trouble within the city brings those barricades down and floods the city with the walking dead.
Sadie and Shane manage to get the last boat out of the city but they are about to discover that the danger has spread out onto the open water… It’s not just zombies that they need to worry about either, other survivors have their own ideas about what shape this new world will take.

I really wanted to like ‘Sadie Walker is Stranded’, I really did. There was enough there to see me through to the end of the book but I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone who didn’t enjoy ‘Allison Hewitt is Trapped’. I said it last time and I’ll say it again, there are better zombie books out there.

I think the first hint, that things were most definitely not going the right way, came when Seattle was breached by the zombie hordes. Think about it, an entire city laid bare to the ravening masses of the undead. There has got to be scope there for harrowing scenes of death, panic and humanity at its absolute worst. Hasn’t there? Not if your heroine (you know, the person whose eyes we are seeing this all through) is unconscious for a large chunk of it. If that wasn’t bad enough, Sadie’s escape from Seattle (and what she has to do on the way) is a little bit too easy and makes a bit of a mockery of how urgent it’s supposed to be.
Now, you could say that’s how things can go sometimes; not everyone is going to have a tough time of it are they? I’d say that you’re correct but bailing your heroine out like that robs the story of it’s tension and lets the reader know that you’ll probably be looking out for said heroine over the course of the rest of the book. And that’s what Roux does although, to be fair, if you’re telling a story from a first person perspective then it’s a safe bet that your character is going to make it to the end of the book.
And Sadie was unconscious for what could have been some of the most amazing scenes in the entire book. I’m not sure I can forgive that…

It gets worse though.

Picture a world where the living dead outnumber the living by hundreds of thousands to one. Now picture yourself in that world, what do you do? Do you focus on the survival of you and yours? Or do you make eyes at that attractive looking guy in the group with a view to frantic sex on an island that you already know hides any number of zombies in the forest? You can probably guess what Sadie does…

All I could think was ‘oh, I guess things aren’t that dangerous after all’. They couldn’t be, surely, not if there’s time for a whole bunch of flirting leading up to a whole load of… well, you know. These moments really didn’t gel with the rest of the book and its talk of a zombie menace along with an unseen killer on the island (I liked that sub-plot actually, loads of questions with red herrings mixed in). It got to a point where I wasn’t sure what kind of a story I was reading; what is a tale of survival, after the zombie apocalypse, or was it some kind of weird take on paranormal romance? I don’t know…

‘Sadie Walker is Stranded’ is the point where this zombie fan jumps off the ride and looks for another. It’s not as dangerous as it likes to think it is (Zombies in the water? Well, don’t go in the water then…) and the attempt at introducing romance really doesn’t work at all. If you liked Roux’ first book then there could be something here for you, not for me though…

Five out of Ten

'Berkley UK' Sampler

There’s no getting away from the simple fact that, for someone who loves his genre fiction, my head is well and truly buried in the sand sometimes. I mean, it’s not like I haven’t got other stuff going on but… a whole new publisher in the UK (since late last year) and I completely missed it.

Liz got there first with her post but Berkley UK very kindly sent me a sampler (five current titles and one forthcoming) and I thought it could be fun to quickly nip through them and give you my initial thoughts. From what I can see, Berkley’s list is very top heavy on the Urban Fantasy (American titles that you may have already read) but what list isn’t these days? I’m hoping they make good on their promise to give us a little more sci-fi and fantasy in the near future.

So, here goes…

‘The Pack’ – Jason Starr

When Simon Burns is fired from his job without warning, he takes on the role of stay-at-home dad for his three-year-old son. But his reluctance pushes his already strained marriage to the limit. In the nestled playgrounds of the Upper West Side, Simon harbors a simmering rage at his boss's betrayal.

Things take a turn when he meets a tight-knit trio of dads at the playground. They are different from other men Simon has met, stronger and more confident, more at ease with the darker side of life- and soon Simon is lured into their mix. But after a guys' night out gets frighteningly out of hand, Simon feels himself sliding into a new nightmarish reality.

Intriguing if only because I’ve worked in a similar office to Simon Burns. Seriously though, this one looks like it could be worth a look as I’m always interested in Urban Fantasy with male leads; doesn’t seem to be enough of that around (as far as I can see)

‘The Iron Duke’ – Meljean Brook

After the Iron Duke freed England from Horde control, he instantly became a national hero. Now Rhys Trahaearn has built a merchant empire on the power - and fear - of his name. And when a dead body is dropped from an airship onto his doorstep, bringing Detective Inspector Mina Wentworth into his dangerous world, he intends to make her his next possession.

But when Mina uncovers the victim's identity, she stumbles upon a conspiracy that threatens the lives of everyone in England. To save them, Mina and Rhys must race across zombie-infested wastelands and treacherous oceans - and Mina discovers the danger is not only to her countrymen as she finds herself tempted to give up everything to the Iron Duke.

Hmmm… Cover art really is the first impression you get of a book and the art here looks like it’s designed to appeal to fans of romance rather than Steampunk. Go take a look and you’ll see what I mean. The preview didn’t really do a lot for me with a female lead who is obviously being set up for some romance, a little too obviously if you know what I mean. There didn’t seem to be a lot else to her…
‘Zombie infested wastelands’ though… I don’t know. Has anyone else read ‘The Iron Duke’? Worth a look?

‘Dust’ – Joan Frances Turner

After she was buried, Jessie awoke and tore through the earth to arise, reborn, as a zombie. Jessie's gang is the Fly-by-Nights. She loves the ancient, skeletal Florian and his memories of time gone by. She's in love with Joe, a maggot-infested corpse. They fight, hunt, dance together as one-something humans can never understand. There are dark places humans have learned to avoid, lest they run into the zombie gangs.

But now, Jessie and the Fly-by-Nights have seen new creatures in the woods-things not human and not zombie. A strange new illness has flamed up out of nowhere, causing the undeads to become more alive and the living to exist on the brink of death. As bits and pieces of the truth fall around Jessie, like the flesh off her bones, she'll have to choose between looking away or staring down the madness-and hanging onto everything she has come to know as life . . .

Not going to say too much about this title as I’m looking to give you guys a full review sooner rather than later. What? It’s a zombie book, what did you expect? ;o) Has anyone else here already read it?

‘Magic to the Bone’ – Devon Monk

Everything has a cost. And every act of magic exacts a price from its user, maybe a two-day migraine, or losing the memory of your first kiss. But some people want to use magic without paying and they Offload the cost onto innocents. When that happens, it falls to a Hound to identify the spell's caster - and Allie Beckstrom is the best there is.

Daughter of a prominent Portland businessman, Allie would rather moonlight as a Hound than accept the family fortune - and the strings that come with it. But when she discovers a little boy dying from a magic Offload that has her father's signature all over it, Allie is thrown into the high stakes world of corporate espionage and black magic ...

I liked the concept but it felt like another cookie cutter urban fantasy where I could just tell what was going to happen to our heroine. I’ll pass on this one I think.

‘Night Life’ – Rob Thurman

Cal Leandros is 19. He eats junk food, he doesn't clean up after himself and fights with his half brother Niko. It's a fairly normal life, but for the fact that Cal and Niko are constantly on the run. Cal's father has been after him for the last four years. And given that he's a monster whose dark lineage is the stuff of nightmares they really don't want him and his entire otherworldly race catching up with them. But Cal is about to learn why they want him, why they've always wanted him - he is the key to unleashing their hell on earth.

This one though… Let me clear a little room on the reading pile and I’d love to give this a shot. The set up is familiar but the character of Cal Leandros really got me thinking that I’d like to get to know him more.

‘Grave Witch’ – Kalayna Price

As a private investigator and consultant for the police, Alex has seen a lot of dark magic. But even though she's on good terms with Death himself, nothing has prepared her for her latest case. Alex is investigating a high-profile murder when she's attacked by the ghost she is raising - which should be impossible. Then, someone makes a serious attempt on her life, thwarted only by Death's intervention. You know you're having a bad day when Death is saving your life . . .

I’m sorry but this one left me feeling nothing whatsoever, certainly no inclination to read the rest of the book. Short and sweet, sometimes that’s all there is to it.

So, a couple of titles that I’d take a look at with the potential for many more to come. Any of those take your fancy? Should I give ‘Grave Witch’ a go? Leave a comment underneath the post and let me know what you think… :o)

'Pax Omega' Cover Art (Or... 'Now this is more like it!')

If you're going to write a book about hardcore steampunk robots then you make damn sure that there is a hardcore steampunk robot on the cover! Like this,

I loved 'Gods of Manhattan' so it's a real no-brainer that 'Pax Omega' will be read and reviewed here just as soon as I can get my hands on a copy (I don't think it's out just yet but I can wait for just a little while longer). Have some blurb in the meantime...

Doc Thunder's last stand against a deadly foe whose true identity will shock you to your core! El Sombra's final battle against the forces of the Ultimate Reich! The Locomotive Man in a showdown with cosmic science on the prairies of the Old West! Jackson Steele defends the 25th Century against the massed armies of the Space Satan! A duel of minds in the mystery palaces of One Million AD! Blazing steam-pulp sci-fi the way you crave it! From the Big Bang to the End Of Time - eleven tales from Pax Britannia's past, present and distant future combine into one starspanning saga set to shake the universe to its foundations or destroy it! 

That's me sold :o) 

Cover Art Fail?

Check out the blurb for Ted Kosmatka's 'The Games'...

Set in an amoral future where genetically engineered monstrosities fight each other to the death in an Olympic event, The Games envisions a harrowing world that may arrive sooner than you think.

Silas Williams is the brilliant geneticist in charge of preparing the U.S. entry into the Olympic Gladiator competition, an internationally sanctioned bloodsport with only one rule: no human DNA is permitted in the design of the entrants. Silas lives and breathes genetics; his designs have led the United States to the gold in every previous event. But the other countries are catching up. Now, desperate for an edge in the upcoming Games, Silas’s boss engages an experimental supercomputer to design the genetic code for a gladiator that cannot be beaten.

The result is a highly specialized killing machine, its genome never before seen on earth. Not even Silas, with all his genius and experience, can understand the horror he had a hand in making. And no one, he fears, can anticipate the consequences of entrusting the act of creation to a computer’s cold logic.

Now Silas races to understand what the computer has wrought, aided by a beautiful xenobiologist, Vidonia João. Yet as the fast-growing gladiator demonstrates preternatural strength, speed, and—most disquietingly—intelligence, Silas and Vidonia find their scientific curiosity giving way to a most unexpected emotion: sheer terror.

Genetically engineered monsters fighting to the death! A killing machine that is far more intelligent than anyone ever could have guessed!!! A book like this literally demands a cover full of monsters fighting to the death for the pleasure of bloodthirsty humans... shouldn't it?

Check out the cover...

A broken fence and a splash of blood. You can colour me slightly disappointed at an opportunity missed here... What do you think? Is understatement good or would you prefer to have seen genetic monstrosities duking it out...?

Giveaway! Signed Copy of 'Arctic Rising' (Tobias Buckell)

Thanks to the folks at Tor, not only do I have one copy of 'Arctic Rising' to give away but it's a signed copy as well. How does that sound...? :o) It's a US only giveaway though...

Do you fancy some of that action? If you do then drop me an email (address at the top right hand side of the screen) telling me who you are and what your postal address is. The subject header needs to be 'Arctic Rising', I'll do everything else.

I'll let this one run until the 11th of March and will aim to announce the winner as soon as possible afterwards.

Good Luck!

Blogging Schedule Interupted By...

Spring cleaning (of all things) and new bookshelves going up. I can see all my books now, it's like I have hundreds of new books all of a sudden :o)

Of course, the upshot of the upheaval is that I haven't read anything at all these last few days; let alone had the time to write reviews for the small pile of books that I have read. I'll be taking a (very) short break to get caught up with myself, there's some stuff scheduled for the weekend and then you should see some reviews around the middle of next week.

I've no idea what normal service is these days but hopefully it should resume soon. Thanks for bearing with me in the meantime! :o)

Comic Book Reading...

A bit of a short and sweet one today because sometimes that’s what comic books are, short and sweet reading. Well, I say ‘short and sweet’… Of the two books on show today, both are short but neither of them are particularly sweet. One of these books was never meant to be sweet but the other? I have no idea…

‘The Goon #38’ – Eric Powell (Dark Horse)

Eric Powell’s ‘The Goon’ has the happy knack of generally being a mixture of laughs, pathos and outright tragedy. Every so often though, Powell takes things down a path even darker than normal (‘Chinatown’ for instance) and lays it on really thick with the tragedy. Those are the times when you end up with something like #38; the sad story of Goon’s Aunt Kizzie (the ‘Iron Maiden) and, by extension, the origins of the Goon himself. You know how Kizzie’s story ends but do you know how it began…? It’s no surprise that Kizzie’s early days were as full of hardship as when we first came to know her; a series of events where happiness is either just out of reach or based on an outright lie. It’s those moments in particular where you really feel for Kizzie, leaving her former life for something that was never there in the first place.
Without giving too much away, things only get worse for Kizzie but she never gives up and I couldn’t help but root for her as a result; a very strong lady in more ways than one and a shining point in the Goon’s life, the only person who ever really wanted him.

“When you died I knew there was one less person in this world that really loved me…”

Issues like this are the reason why Powell is an Eisner award winner and I’ll continue reading ‘The Goon’ as long as it runs. A superb story with the usual high standard of artwork and colouring (Is it really the same Dave Stewart? I’m not sure but I think so)
10/10

‘Uglies: Shay’s Story’ – Scott Westerfeld (Del Rey)

This on the other hand…? Well, all I can really say that there is a lot of dystopian media out there that does it a lot better…
I haven’t read the other books in this series but the premise is simple and easy to pick up, a little too simple in fact. The whole ‘beauty is only skin deep, it’s who you are that matters’ thing has surely been done to death already and there’s no effort made to be subtle with the message at all. It’s almost insulting to think that stuff like this is being written because someone really believes that teenagers are only after something simple. And another thing, if one group of teens are known as ‘Uglies’, have the artist make them ugly or at the very least different. The manga style employed by Steven Cummings doesn’t really offer a lot of distinction between the two groups… (Although I know you could well argue that’s the whole point, there does need to be a line though)
Very disappointing. 4/10

The 'Jobhunting is a pain...' Competition Winner's Post!

Especially when you've been woken up at ten to six in the morning by a little one who just wants to practice all her words... That's all I'm saying for now, purely because I'm too tired to say much more!

On a more positive note, how about some winners for last weeks competitions? Do you want to know who those winners were? You do? OK then...

Phil Darling, Stowmarket, UK
Paul Gibbons, London, UK
Edward Crutchington, St Neots, UK

Emma Engel, Oregon, USA

Nice work guys! Your books should be on their way very soon. Better luck next time everyone else...

What can you expect to see here for the rest of the week? Well, there's a review coming up for a zombie book that I ended up really not being that keen on at all. The rest of it will involve a whole load of short story reviews and at least one comic review too. It's all good (well, apart from the zombie book...) so check back and see what's what... :o)

Blog Tour - 'Arctic Rising' (Tobias Buckell)

I don't normally go in for these things but when I was asked if I'd like to be part of Tobias' blog tour I had to say yes, having enjoyed the books of his that I've read in the last few years. The reading pile is teetering once again but I'm planning on reading 'Arctic Rising' sooner rather than later.
Here's what Tobias has to say for himself today...

So I have a new book out after a roughly three year gap. And it's been a weird three years. Most people might remember me from the far future space opera steampunk type mashup books I did with dreadlocked Caribbean cyborgs putting the smack down on colonialist masters. So now Tobias is doing a near future novel? Something he calls an eco-thriller? What gives?

I think in Silicon Valley it's called the art of the 'pivot.'

I really fell head over heels for the cyberpunk writers back in the mid 90s thanks to a chance discovery. It was Bruce Sterling's Islands in The Net that hit me upside the head. The first third of it was set in a near future Grenada. I grew up in Grenada. It was the first moment where I thought that maybe I could fuse my Caribbean background and experiences with my favorite genre, SF, and make a career of it.

I loved writing those first few big action books, but I've secretly always wanted to do a tech-oriented, near future piece. I've always wanted to play with what's just over the horizon, like the master authors I wanted to follow in the footsteps of while in high school.

Arctic Rising was a chance to head in a new direction and explore a near future that may be around the corner. Explore some interesting social technologies and hacks. Through the eyes of someone we don't normally see in SF adventures. Welcome to the ice-free Arctic.

I am an awful blog tour host, having no idea what the schedule is or where Tobias will appear next! I'm guessing that you should be able to get the information here... ;o)

Dear Del Rey...

Just wanted to say hi and thanks for sending me an advance copy of ‘Caine’s Law’. I read ‘Caine Black Knife’ way back at the end of 2008 and enjoyed the hell out of it so I’m really looking forward to what should hopefully be more of the same.

I still have a copy of ‘Heroes Die’ that I need to read but I was saving it until I could get hold of a copy of ‘Blade of Tyshalle’. You know, read the whole lot at once kind of thing? But here’s the thing… I can’t for the life of me find a copy of ‘Blade of Tyshalle’ that isn’t an ebook and doesn’t cost upwards of silly money for a physical copy. What’s up with that?

I know you’ll probably turn round and say that the ebook is there for anyone who wants it and that’s fine. What about those people who don’t have a Kindle or a Nook or whatever else? People like, erm… me for example. People like me who might enjoy ‘Caine’s Law’ and ‘Caine Black Knife’ and then want to go back and read the rest in order? Except… Oh, they can’t. It’s a shame really…

I guess I’m wondering why you’re releasing the most recent ‘Caine’ book (and I’d imagine any future books as well) as a hard copy but you don’t seem too keen on going back a couple of books and plugging in that gap? Even an omnibus edition, collecting the first two books, would work for me and quite possibly a whole bunch of others.

The ‘Caine’ series is one of those series that has critical acclaim thrown at it on a regular basis. Is there any chance that you could make the whole series accessible to everyone who wants to read it? If not then the only way I’ll ever read ‘Blade of Tyshalle’ is if I spend eighty nine pounds on a Kindle first…

Cheers,

Graeme

(Edited To Add) P.S. In a move that I never saw coming, my Mum rung me five minutes after the post went up to let me know that she had found a copy of 'Blade of Tyshalle' really cheap online and would get it for me. I'm sitting pretty now but don't think that lets you off the hook Del Rey. What about all those other people that don't have an ebook reader and can't afford a second hand copy...?

A Short Interlude (Courtesy of Calvin & Hobbes)...

I didn't realise it but I've been getting all burnt out and jaded with my reading just recently, not being able to get into anything and so on. My clever wife totally realised though and, having banned me from the reading pile for an evening, sat me down with a big pile of 'Calvin & Hobbes' books instead of my normal fare.

Talk about revisiting old friends that I haven't seen in ages :o) I haven't laughed so much in a long time and I put the books down promising myself that I wouldn't leave it so long until I hung out with those two again. Now I'm totally ready to dive back into the pile :o)
Here's one of my favourite 'Calvin & Hobbes' cartoons (you might need to click on it to make it bigger), have you got a favourite?

‘Blackbirds’ – Chuck Wendig (Angry Robot)

It’s early days yet but my theory is that, beneath that mild mannered exterior, Chuck Wendig could very well be a superhero writer using his powers to rescue readers from a reading fate worse than… [insert your least favourite book here]. It’s true, my zombie reads were starting to shamble down a very tedious and ‘samey’ path but, just in the nick of time, Wendig suddenly appeared on the scene with ‘Double Dead’, a zombie tale with a difference. You can either read my review Here or just have a quick look at how I rounded things off…

‘I didn’t realise that my faith in zombie novels was starting to wane but ‘Double Dead’ restored it anyway. There’s something here for both zombie and vampire fans (apart from ‘Twilight’ fans, obviously) and it’s all drenched in blood and entrails.’

I resolved to keep an eye open for anything else of Wendig’s and it turned out that I really didn’t have all that long to wait. Angry Robot will be releasing Chuck Wendig’s ‘Blackbirds’ around May time but I was lucky enough not to have to wait that long for a look at the book. And what did I think…? ‘Blackbirds’ is a totally different book to ‘Double Dead’ but the end result was that it blew my mind in exactly the same way.

All it takes is one touch and Miriam Black knows exactly when and how you will die… and there’s nothing that she can do to stop it happening. She’s tried over and over again but that just makes the death that she has seen all the more likely to happen. All Miriam can do then is keep on moving, and touch as few people as possible, but something is about to happen that will change everything.
Miriam shakes the hand of truck driver Louis Darling and sees that he will die in thirty days, gruesomely murdered while he calls her name. Miriam can’t save Louis but if she wants to stay alive then she’s going to have to try anyway.

I don’t normally do this in a review but I just wanted to take a quick paragraph to basically gush over the cover art a little as it’s gorgeous. If I was in the habit of doing ‘favourite cover art of the year’ posts then this would be an early contender, it might even take the prize right now. I don’t just love the way that it’s made out of blackbirds, I also love the way that closer examination reveals moments from the book as well as the amount of death that has filled Miriam up. Its artwork that you just can’t take your eye off. My advance copy doesn’t give the artist’s name but Angry Robot have more than got their money’s worth here.

But back to the book itself, a book that I had real trouble putting down… There are hints of a sequel here and I for one and all excited just about the possibility that this may be the case.

I’m hard pressed to remember any other book that I’ve read where death haunts the pages in the way it does here. Death is quite literally everywhere; whether it’s in the bleak landscape Miriam walks through, the hearts (and ultimate fates) of the people she meets and Miriam herself. ‘Blackbirds’ is a short read, clocking in at two hundred and eighty seven pages, but it’s a book where the subject matter makes the book feel that little bit heavier in your hands.

It’s a depressing read then, of course it is. How can it not be with the main character forced to live people’s deaths whenever she touches them? It’s clear then that Wendig has a struggle on his hands if he is going to hook the reader in past all of that so they can get to the story proper. The good news is that it turned out not to be a struggle at all. Wendig hooked me and I reckon you’ll be hooked too.

For me, Wendig’s masterstroke was not to sensationalise Miriam’s ability and send ‘Blackbirds’ down the trail of other more generic urban fantasies. Everything is very downbeat and matter of fact, so matter of fact that it is all very readable and flows as smoothly as your passage from this world to whatever comes next.
Wendig also makes it clear that he has a very healthy respect for death and what it means to die as well. Again, no sensationalism here. Everyone dies eventually and the way it happens isn’t fair; the way you check out is the way you check out. Wendig appeals to the slightly nasty part of us that we don’t want to admit to but know is there. Who amongst us doesn’t secretly want to know how it all ends for us? And who amongst us doesn’t want to know how others die so that we can hope for something a little easier for ourselves? Wendig can’t give us the answer to the first question but he gives us plenty of answers to the second.

Caught up in the middle of this is Miriam (a strangely endearing mix of viciousness and vulnerability), a young woman who is trying to deal with this unwanted ability in the only way she knows how; making sure that she stays away from as many people as she can. At the same time though, Miriam can’t help but seem to attract trouble and this is what drives the plot down some dark and unexpected roads. For a book that’s about fate (and how you can’t fight it) everything ties together very neatly in the end but, as Wendig no doubt intended, not quite in the way that you’d expect. There’s a real contrast here, one that I think will be explored in further books. I hope so anyway.
I think that’s where ‘Blackbirds’ fell down, slightly, for me. While the main plot wraps itself up nicely there are other strands that are clearly being set up for resolution at a later date and this offers a contrasting effect that makes the book feel ‘unfinished’ in a strange way.

This is a relatively small price to pay though when you’ve got Wendig throwing you into any number of violent and chilling encounters with what is becoming his typical abrasive attitude. The guy has only written two books and already I can’t get enough. If you’re after some urban fantasy that is by no means typical then ‘Blackbirds’ is probably already on your wish list. For everyone else, give it a go anyway and have your mind blown. Wendig takes you on a journey, down the forgotten highways of America, that you won’t soon forget.

Nine and a Half out of Ten

Zombie Quote of the Day!

I was in two minds about continuing with Madeleine Roux' 'Sadie Hewitt is Stranded' (and I'll tell you why when I review the book next week) until I came across this quote...

"I don't know, Andrea. Name me one thing worse than aquazombies. Go on, name one."
She thought for a moment, her head quirked to the side.
"Zombies with wings?"
"Jesus. That is worse."

Now I'm reading the book in the hope that I'll see winged zombies before the end. I know, I probably won't but a chap can hope... :o)

While we're here, can anyone think of anything zombie related that's worse than zombies with wings...?

The 'It's Rothfuss!' Slightly Later Than Normal Competition Winner's Post!

Thanks to everyone who left a comment on yesterday's post; I'd like to say that I am already deep into 'The Wise Man's Fear' but page seven isn't exactly 'deep into', is it...? ;o) I'll get there as and when (what with all the other, shorter, books I've got on the go right now), next up after that will be 'Dust of Dreams' and then 'The White Luck Warrior'. If I'm very lucky I might have finished them all by the end of the year...

Anyway, enough of that for now as I have a few competition winners to announce... finally. Sorry about that, this week has been a busy one already. Thanks to everyone who entered the competitions and better luck next time to those who didn't win this time. Those lucky winners were...

Euan Au, London, UK

James Collins, West Midlands, UK

Charles Fraker, North Chesterfield, USA
Jeff Raymond, Millbury, USA
Sabrina Osborn, Washington, USA
Shaun Duke, Florida, USA  32608
Pat Forsythe, Texas, USA

Well done everyone, your books are on their way even as we speak! Better luck next time everyone else, fancy entering one of the two competitions that are still open? (Scroll down a bit for them).

See you all tomorrow, I've got some reading to do :o)

Cover Art! 'Black Wings of Cthulhu' (Edited by S.T. Joshi)

Because it reminds me of all the brass rubbing I used to see going on when I was taken around various ruined castles as a child...

I should point out though that none of the brass rubbings that I saw were of an Elder God, just saying :o)
Here's the blurb if you're interested...

Taking their inspiration from works by Lovecraft himself, prominent writers such as Caitlin R. Kiernan, Brian Stableford, Ramsey Campbell, Michael Shea, Darrell Schweitzer, Donald R. Burleson, and David J. Schow delve deep into the psyche, expanding on concepts H.P. Lovecraft created and taking them in new directions.

The result is stories that are wholly original, some even featuring Lovecraft himself as a character. Black Wings editor S.T. Joshi is the recognized authority on all things Lovecraftian, and is famous for his restorations of Lovecraft's original works. He has assembled a star-studded line-up in a book that is essential for every horror library.

I still need to finish reading the originals (I know...) but 'Black Wings' is a definite read for sometime after that.

The 'Chunky Book Challenge'!

Because I'm feeling a little pleased with myself at finally managing to get through a book that's over five hundred pages long, it's been a while... :o)
I feel like I could do it all over again but reading what book...? Well, that's where the 'Chunky Book Challenge' comes in and that's where you come in as well. Tell me what you think I should read next! Here are the contenders...

Officially the fattest book on the reading pile as of right now :o)

A book that has beaten me at least three times already (usually around about the hundred and fifty page mark). I think this time could be different though...

Another series that I stalled on due to the sheer size (and weight) of the latest installment...

Which one should I pick up first then? I think I know which one will win... but will it? We'll see.

Leave a comment below the post saying which book you think I should read; the one with the most votes at the end of today will be the book that I start reading tomorrow. I'm not setting myself a time limit or anything here (because that never ends well), just going to go with the flow and see how it goes.

So there we have it, comments please! :o)

‘A Dance with Dragons’ – George R.R. Martin (Bantam/Voyager)

Last year saw some pretty big fantasy and sci-fi releases and none more so than a certain book called ‘A Dance with Dragons’. How could it not have been the book that every self-respecting fantasy fan had to get their hands on? Especially after the wait that had to be endured while GRRM actually polished the book off… Didn’t that divide the fans…? ;o)  ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ was either an astonishing series that had the misfortune to seriously stall or a series that was slowly getting worse and obviously required some major effort from GRRM to turn around. Which camp did you fall into? Personally I was somewhere in the middle; I wasn’t too keen on ‘A Feast for Crows’ but it had been so long since I read the series that I couldn’t for the life of me remember all the issues I had with it in the first place (ok, apart from Brienne’s travelogue and the fact that nothing really seemed to happen). It wasn’t like I didn’t have enough other stuff going to worry about the lateness of a book…

This was probably the reason why I didn’t immediately jump on the book, and start reading, as soon as my copy arrived. It had been a while after all and, like so many other thick hardbacks, ‘A Dance With Dragons’ does not make for practical reading material on the tube! That excuse went though when my job came to an end and I had a little more time on my hands. It was several months late but the time had finally come to crack open ‘A Dance with Dragons’ and get reading.
You’ve doubtless already seen comments here about my experiences with the book but I’ll sum them up one more time by saying that ‘A Dance with Dragons’ had many moments of sheer brilliance but was ultimately a very frustrating read…

The fate of the Seven Kingdoms hangs on a knife edge while petty lords and knights scheme for more ways to grab a little extra power. Queen Cersei must put herself through the ultimate shame if she is to briefly win free from her prison before her trial begins in earnest. A Prince of Dorne must believe in his very blood if the heist to end all heists is to be in any way successful. An exiled lordling journeys into the untmost north to learn about the uncanny power that he holds and an exiled Queen fights to hold onto her territories as well as fighting to remain true to her own ideals.
All the while such scheming is going on, winter is coming and the Others grow stronger in the cold places of the north. It seems that only Jon Snow will do anything to halt the tide and there are men (that he calls brothers) who will do anything to stop him.

I have had a couple of days to ponder ‘Dance’ since I finished the last page and wondered, ‘what went wrong there?’ I think the bottom line and root cause lies in GRRM’s very own words on ‘Dance’ in his introduction…

‘…this volume does not follow that one in the traditional sense, so much as run in tandem with it.’

Not a lot happened at all in ‘Feast’, it was very much the ‘Crossroads of Twilight’ of ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ with people being moved into position for events to come. As ‘Dance’ runs in tandem with ‘Feast’ it was inevitable that this would be the same case here…
There are a lot of people saying that they would like to do something but that they are scared of the power of the Lannisters. There are scattered moments where things actually start to happen but don’t get your hopes up too much as these moments inevitably become cliff hangers that won’t be resolved until the next book and, as such, feel like a real anti-climax (apart from the last ‘Jon Snow’ chapter that is, that was a real cliff hanger moment that I can’t wait to see resolved).
There also seems to be a lot of eating and feasts and this wouldn’t be too bad if we weren’t subjected to a dish by dish account of what each course entailed. If that’s your thing then all well and good but I really don’t care what was served at the table. It got to the point where I didn’t feel sorry at all for King Stannis’ snowbound army (all either eating their horses or each other) as their meals were over very quickly, I just felt grateful.

I also wondered whether some chapters should have appeared in ‘Feast’ instead of ‘Dance’. Was it just me or was Sam’s story told the wrong way round just so we could get Jon Snow’s perspective in ‘Dance’…?

 ‘A Dance with Dragons’ was a stodgy read then, as stodgy as the dubious looking stew the small folk eat in Kings Landing. So why did I keep reading?
Well, I’ll be the first to admit that when I get to a certain point in a series then I’m there for the duration; especially when it’s a series that I’ve enjoyed like ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’. I’m here until the bitter end.
It’s not just that though. ‘A Dance with Dragons’ was an unnecessarily slow old read but there were moments where it felt like GRRM not only got his groove back but was on fire with his storytelling and plot. It’s this that will have me picking up the next book in the hope of more of the same.

Tyrion’s chapters show that GRRM definitely hasn’t lost his touch in terms of writing characters that you really want to root for. Tyrion’s tongue is as acidic as ever but GRRM takes care to balance these moments out with the inner turmoil Tyrion goes through not only as a kinslayer but as a man who has just found out that a large chunk of his life was based on a lie. It’s been far too long since we saw Tyrion last (not that I’m blaming GRRM, a writers perogative and all that…) and he makes a more than welcome return here.

I may be amongst the minority here but I really enjoyed Dany’s chapters (and other chapters set in and around Meereen) as well; chapters that showed us that GRRM’s ability to write gripping intrigue and subterfuge haven’t died away. I got the sense that anything could happen in the lands around Slaver’s Bay and while the main events plodded along perhaps a little too predictably there were still enough surprises on the periphery to keep things interesting. The ‘big heist’ chapter in particular was stunning, really powerful and intense stuff.

The world building, away from Westeros, has some real potential as well with the landscape defined by its history instead of the lineage of its inhabitants. This approach makes for reading that you can really lose yourself in and I did on more than one occasion. I know GRRM has enough on his plate for now but if he ever found the time to write more about ancient Valyria then I for one would be very grateful.
I also enjoyed the air of horror in the shadows as magic slowly makes its presence felt in the world again. Whether it was Bran’s meeting with Lord Brynden, the Others picking off the survivors of the battle at the Wall or the practicalities of dealing with three very large and hungry dragons, it is clear that GRRM’s world is still a dangerous place and one that is only likely to become more so.

‘A Dance with Dragons’ is a bloated affair and I’d say that GRRM needs to grasp the reins a little more firmly if the rest of the series is to live up to early promise. There are moments though where GRRM seems to do just that and that’s what has me excited for the future. A very frustrating read then but one with potential at the same time.

Seven and a Half out of Ten

Giveaway! 'Fated' (Benedict Jacka)

Orbit have a happy knack for getting hold of urban fantasies and then publishing the hell out of them. A lot of these books all look like the same story with a handy name change for the lead character (sorry but they do...) but every now and then you get what looks like the possibility of a real gem. Like Benedict Jacka's 'Fated' for example. Check out the blurb...

Camden, North London. A tangled, mangled junction of train lines, roads and the canal. Where minor celebrities hang out with minor criminals, where tourists and moody teenagers mingle, and where you can get your ears pierced and your shoulder tattooed while eating sushi washed down with a can of super strength beer. In the heart of Camden, where rail meets road meets leyline, you might find the Arcana Emporium, run by one Alex Verus. He won't sell you a wand or mix you a potion, but if you know what you're looking for, he might just be able to help. That's if he's not too busy avoiding his apprentice, foiling the Dark, outwitting the Light, and investigating a highly toxic Relic that has just turned up at the British Museum.

I just need to finish off Chuck Wendig's 'Black Birds' and then I'll be into 'Fated' :o) Thanks to Orbit, I have three copies of 'Fated' to give away to three lucky readers here (open to UK readers only though, sorry about that...)


If you want in all you need to do is drop me an email (address at the top right hand side of the screen) telling me who you are and what your postal address is. The subject header needs to be 'Fated'. That's all you need to do, I'll do everything else :o)

I'll let this one run until the 26th of February and will aim to announce the winner as soon as possible afterwards.

Good Luck!