Tag Archives: Fantasy

QUICK REVIEW: The Case of the Somewhat Mythic Sword – Garth Nix

A short but satisfying homage to the classic Conan Doyle tales, Garth Nix’s occult detective story The Case of the Somewhat Mythic Sword features Sir Magnus Holmes, the somewhat less famous cousin of the legendary literary sleuth. Responding in Sherlock’s stead to a case more suited to his esoteric talents, Sir Magnus – accompanied by Almost Doctor Susan Shrike – investigates the appearance of a medieval knight in the cellar of a London pub. Although Holmes quickly deduces what’s happening, it turns into a case which tests his willpower and Shrike’s wits, and reveals the darkness lurking beneath the dapper detective’s civilised veneer.

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The Library of the Unwritten – A.J. Hackwith

A book about the power of storytelling and the nature of stories both told and untold, A.J. Hackwith’s fantasy novel The Library of the Unwritten reveals a wonderful world of demons, angels, librarians, heroes and villains. Every story left untold resides in the Unwritten Wing of Hell’s library (it’s a tenant, more than an actual part of Hell), protected and guarded against by the head librarian, Claire, and her assistant Brevity. Venturing to Earth in search of a runaway hero before he can do too much damage to his author, Claire and Brevity – along with jittery demon Leto – find themselves unwitting players in a plot which threatens the library’s impartiality and risks inciting a new war between angels and demons.

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The Spider Dance by Nick Setchfield – via the British Fantasy Society

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything for the British Fantasy Society, but I’m delighted to say that my latest book review is now live – for The Spider Dance by Nick Setchfield, a tremendously enjoyable occult thriller from Titan Books. You can read that review by clicking on this link, but I want to take a moment to add a few more informal thoughts about this book here, to accompany the link. Of course, if you would rather skip straight to the review then feel free to head over to the BFS website – I don’t mind, honest!

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The Death and Life of Schneider Wrack – Nate Crowley

A dark and ferociously imaginative story of revolutionary zombies, interlinked worlds and psychically-possessed marine life, Nate Crowley’s The Death and Life of Schneider Wrack is part science fiction, part horror, part black comedy and entirely bonkers. Schneider Wrack wakes to a scene of absolute terror, finding he’s not only dead – with no idea why – but a zombie, one of thousands enslaved upon the gargantuan ocean trawler Navuto. With only vague memories of his life beforehand – as a quiet, hapless librarian – and a burning sense of injustice, he stumbles his way towards becoming the figurehead for a bizarre uprising against the Navuto’s brutish overseers, setting himself upon a path he couldn’t possibly have foreseen.

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Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir – via Grimdark Magazine

It’s with great pleasure that I can tell you I’ve had my first review published by the excellent Grimdark Magazine, for Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir. If you haven’t come across Grimdark Magazine before, and in case the name hasn’t given the game away, it’s a website and (quarterly) digital magazine specialising in science fiction and fantasy of the darkest dark. You should check it out, it’s awesome! Go on – here’s the link. I’ve reviewed a story from the magazine before, but I’m delighted to be now writing reviews for the site, although don’t worry – it’s in addition to Track of Words, not instead!

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Angel Mage – Garth Nix

Set in a world of angels, monsters and musketeers, Garth Nix’s standalone fantasy novel Angel Mage cleverly transposes the essence of The Three Musketeers into a beautiful tale of magic, adventure and friendship. Over a century after fleeing her homeland of Ystara in the wake of a great tragedy, the powerful mage Liliath wakes in Sarance and begins the next stage of her grand plan. She seeks out four individuals – a musketeer, a scholar, a clerk and a doctor – who find their paths converging and who feel an unexplained connection between themselves. While Liliath spins her web for them, the four companions are swept up in events of great import and placed in danger they can’t begin to comprehend.

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The Imaginary Corpse – Tyler Hayes

Tyler Hayes’ debut novel The Imaginary Corpse is a rare book which genuinely deserves the label of unique, a wildly imaginative story that’s as much about acceptance, honesty and overcoming trauma as it is about a stuffed-toy dinosaur investigating crimes in a technicolour imaginary world. Detective Tippy (a yellow triceratops) lives in the Stillreal, the place where abandoned Ideas too real to fade away can live and thrive, solving crimes and helping his Friends. When a newly-birthed nightmare – The Man in the Coat – starts murdering other Friends (for real, not just temporarily), Tippy has to work through his own deep-rooted issues and find a way to solve – and survive – the deadliest mystery he’s ever faced.

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We Are the Dead – Mike Shackle

An intense, enthralling rollercoaster of a debut novel, We Are the Dead starts Mike Shackle’s The Last War series off with a bang and never lets up, a captivating book packed full of drama, violence and emotion in an East Asian-influenced fantasy world. The Shulka have always protected Jia against its enemies, but even their vaunted skill at arms isn’t enough when the Egril launch a blistering, magic-fuelled surprise assault. The Jian people soon find themselves enslaved by cruel new overlords in cities suffering under enemy occupation, but while some try to make the best of their new lives, others resist and strike back against the Egril.

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The Ruthless – Peter Newman

Book two in Peter Newman’s The Deathless series, The Ruthless takes place sixteen years after the events of the first book, as Lady Pari Tanzanite is finally reborn and Lord Vasin Sapphire is almost ready to make his play for power. In the years that Pari has been away, the demons of the Wild have grown bolder while the cracks have widened between the Deathless houses. In the castle of Lord Rochant Sapphire, young Satyendra searches for a way to avoid sacrificing himself for Rochant’s rebirth, while deep in the Wild the semi-feral Sa-at watches the human Gatherers and dreams of belonging.

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AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Peter McLean Talks Priest of Lies

Welcome to this Track of Words Author Interview, my ongoing series of quick interviews with science fiction and fantasy authors talking about their new releases. These are short and sweet interviews, with the idea being that each author will answer (more or less) the same questions – by the end of each interview I hope you will have a good idea of what the new book is about, what inspired it and why you might want to read or listen to it.

In this instalment I spoke to Peter McLean about his new novel Priest of Lies, which is available now from Jo Fletcher Books in the UK and Ace Books in North America. I’m a big fan of Peter’s writing, and his current series is one of the best I’ve read in a long time!

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