Changes

From TheBookbag
Jump to navigationJump to search
no edit summary
[[Category:Fantasy|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Fantasy]]==Fantasy==__NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mark LinganeA G Slatter|title=Beyond Belief|rating=4.5|genre=Crime|summary=Joshua Richards isn't the most successful PI; clients aren't exactly lining up around the block but he lives in hope that one day his luck will change… and it does. Within a couple The Briar Book of weeks he has a sudden plethora of enquirers; the bad news is that none of them seem to live long enough to pay him. Meanwhile elsewhere, the Engine powering the world (literally) is dying, although the populous is blissfully oblivious. Is there a connection? Joshua Richards doesn't know, but there seems to be a huge part of himself he's not acquainted with either… at least not yet. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0987478605</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Francis Knight|title=Fade To BlackDead
|rating=5
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=In a city hemmed in by mountains that's grown the only way it can - upwards - Rojan' There's job is a part of me that wants to keep this just to find peoplemyself for however long I can. Usually they're runaways or bountiesThis secret magic of my own, easy money and guilt freeall mine, at last. I just like Rojan likes want to enjoy itfor a while. But then Rojan'' Within a remote mountain pass, far away from the world, lies Silverton; a town under the protection of the Briar's niece , a family of witches who protect the town and the wider world from the Darklands. Though she has always wished for magic, Ellie Briar is takenthe first non-witch to be born into her family for generations and as such since she was young, her training as a steward revolved around letters and despite never having met administration rather than spells and potions. When hergrandmother suddenly dies, Ellie's cousin Audra becomes the Briar Witch, the town's leader, Rojan will do anything it and Ellie takes her place beside her. As challenges come her way left, right and centre, Ellie uncovers the rare ability to get communicate with the dead, putting her backat the heart of a maelstrom of chaos. Reeling from one family secret to another, Ellie must decide who to trust and determine what to do as the Briar witches' legacy, everything they have sacrificed to survive, is under threat.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0356501663</amazonuk>1803364548
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Rachel Greenlaw
|title=Compass and Blade
|rating=3.5
|genre=Teens
|summary=''I can hear the song of the sea. The call of the deep, the answering beat in my heart.''
Rosevear, a remote and partially forgotten island, survives on luring ships into the rocks and plundering the wrecks. Mira, like her mother before her, is one of the seven who swim out to survey the ruins – rescuing any survivors and any treasure that lies within. But when the Council Watch lays a trap to end the wrecking, they capture the island's leader and Mira's father. Desperate to save him from death, Mira makes a bargain with a wreck survivor who is as charming as he is secretive and with only coordinates to guide her, she sets off in search of a family secret that lies buried deep in the sea. With only nine days to unearth what might save her father, as her journey takes her from the watched streets of foreign islands to the heart of the smuggler's territory, Mira must be determined to stop at nothing to save the future of her home and the ones she holds most dear.|isbn=0008664730}}{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Melanie RawnT Kingfisher|title=Glass Thorns - Elsewhens (Glass Thorns 2)Thornhedge
|rating=5
|genre=Fantasy
|summary= Only ''You had a little while has passed since we last spent time with Touchstone, the touring theatre company that not only shows the audience the performance, but enables them right to experience, feel and taste it as a 4D hallucinationretake your place. This time they're being taken beyond their comfort zone as they're cornered into escorting  T Kingfisher's latest novella is a princess home from the foreign Continent. Meanwhile Cade Silversun is still getting his 'Elsewhens': the premonitions lovely reimagining of alternative futures a fairytale that come as nightmares is well known and daydreamswell beloved. YesBut whilst there is a princess trapped in a tower, Elsewhenssleeping under an eternal enchantment, those things that warned him about a woman; the same woman that friend and colleague Mieka Windthistle Thornhedge is in love withnot her story. IndeedInstead, Touchstone our protagonist is forced to cope with foreign travelToadling, foreign attitudes who was stolen away by fairies when she was a new-born baby and, for some secreted away to the land of them, the feeling that all isn't as it should befairie where her childhood was spent being taught how to draw magic from her veins and cast spells.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781166625</amazonuk>1803364238
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Nicole Jarvis
|title=A Portrait in Shadow
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=''I want all of Florence to know my name''
{{newreview|author=Aimee Bender|title=Willful Creatures|rating=4.5|genre=Short Stories|summary= In this collection we're shown the reaction of ten men with terminal illness prognosesCast out from Rome, Artemisia Gentileschi arrives in Florence seeking an oasis in which her art can find a large man purchasing a very unusual pet home and the case of a hard-done-by boyfriendwhere her future can thrive rather than stagnate. There are also delights like But as some as she enters Florentine society she faces great opposition from the shop that sells words crafted into what they readpowerful Accademia, a boy with keys instead the self-proclaimed guardians of fingers and the beautifully touching tale of healing magics that through paintings have the pumpkin-headed mother who gives birth power to an ironprotect the city and its citizens from plagues and curses. The all-headed babymale Accademia has hoarded power over art and architecture for centuries and guard it above all else. NoTo them, this isn't your average collection of predictable short stories; these are [[:Category:Aimee Bender|Aimee Bender]] short storiesArtemisia – an ambitious young woman who promises trouble and change – has no place amongst them and their society.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099558858</amazonuk>1803362340
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Thomas D Lee
|title=Perilous Times
|rating=3
|genre= Fantasy
|summary= ''Hate is the path of least resistance''
{{newreview|author=Will Storr|title=The Hunger and Set in the Howling of Killian Lone|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Killian Lone grows up near-distant future, in a home lacking in love and security. For these he relies world on his elderly aunt Dorothythe verge of climate collapse, an accomplished cookBritain is in great peril. Indeed his visits The British Isles desperately needs a hero (or several) to Dorothy revolve around food as he absorbs all she can teach him, slowly inheriting her passion save the day and skill along with her knowledgerescue what little remains. This attachment to food then becomes his career choice, leading to What no-one expected was that one of the unfortunate discovery Knights of a family secret that has remained hidden for a very long time. Why 'unfortunate'? There's a reason for its concealment… a very, very good reasonthe Round Table would answer the call.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1780720807</amazonuk>0356518523
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Luke ScullAmelia Estelle Dellos|title=The Grim CompanyDelilah Recovered|rating=4.5
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=The gods are deadWe meet Dee at a point when her life isn't going as planned but things might, just might, be about to look up. The Magelords murdered them and hurled their bodies from heaven and are also slowly dominating the world below. Dorminia Out of work, about to lose her flat, Dee is already in their iron grasp, policed by the feared Crimson Watch and the terrorising Augmentorsup for an accountant's job. ItBut it's not even safe to think as Mind Hawks monitor and punish with pain and sufferingbe. However there Dee is a resistance, albeit fragmented and comparatively impotent attacked by two men calling themselves witch hunters. She survives the attack but the situation is worsening so they must make a stand or lose everything (and everyone) they lovenot unscathed. Is the evil magic stronger than the heroes' own resourcesWitch hunters? What on earth has that to do with Dee? TheyShe're dying s just an ordinary woman, living an ordinary life. Slivers of memory of things that are not ordinary at all return to find outher and things will never be the same....|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781851328</amazonuk>B0BKYFDLLV
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=James P BlaylockHadeer Elsbai|title=Lord Kelvin's MachineThe Daughters of Izdihar
|rating=4
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=On a dark and rainy nightDrawing inspiration from Egypt, a weary but determined Langdon St. Ives rides out in hot pursuit ''The Daughters of Izdihar'' explores the villain lives of two women who is holding his wifecould not be more different, Aliceyet find themselves fighting for the rights of women and weavers – those with magical abilities - in a society pitted against them. Nehal, captive. Catching up with his nemesis on born into the roadupper class, wishes to attend the resulting standoff between Weaving Academy to learn to control her abilities and then join the two ends military, but instead she is forced into an arranged marriage with StNico. Ives witnessing Giorgina on the cold-blooded murder of his belovedother hand did not have a privileged upbringing like Nehal and feels great pressure to provide for her family and maintain their reputation, shot in the head at point blank range whilst pinned under secretly attending meetings of the wheels Daughters of Izdihar – a carriagegroup campaigning for women's rights. Giorgina also happens to be in love with Nico. It What follows is a scene that will play out again and again in his mindstory of an unjust society, driving him to the brink of madness filled with hypocrisy and desperation. There appears, howevercruelty, to be a glimmer of hope in the form of from which blossoms a mysterious machine in the possession group of the Royal Academy of Science; a machine that may hold the secret to time itself. Is it possible admirable women fighting for our hero to harness the power of Lord Kelvin’s Machine their rights and rewrite history?overcoming their personal obstacles.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857689843</amazonuk>0356520471
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=James P BlaylockHeather Fawcett|title=HomunculusEmily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries|rating=2.54|genre=FantasyGeneral Fiction|summary=What could possibly be the connection between a mechanical toy crocodile that eats birdsEmily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, a giant emeraldand she has travelled extensively, an oxygenator device for a spaceship and a tiny alien man with researched meticulously, to write her life's work, the power very first encyclopaedia of life faeries. Whilst she is brilliant at research and death? The answer, of coursespeaking to faeries, she is that each item on this unusual list has been placed inside one of four identical boxesnot so good with people. The boxes are hidden in various locations So when she finds herself far, far North in order to prevent the contents from falling into small village of Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the wrong handsvillage matriarch, but evil she is not sure what she has a habit of seeking things out..done, nor how to redeem herself and put her final investigations for her book back on the right track. Enter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, all charm and delight, much to Emily's frustration. But why is he here? What does he want? And what exactly is going on with the faerie folk around Hravsnik?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857689827</amazonuk>0356519120
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Terence BlackerChristopher Golden|title=The TwyningRoad of Bones|rating=3.5|genre=FantasyHorror|summary= Efren is a nobody in The Kolyma Highway… the kingdom of rats till he witnesses the kidnapping 'Road of Bones'… the kingR504. His future changes in Stretching for over a moment as hethousand miles across Siberia, it's sent up to one of the human world to rescue him's most notorious routes. Talking For months of humans, 11 the year old Peter is abandoned by his parents and left to scrape it's a living from Londonspread of sheet ice suspended above the permafrost surrounding it, while its 's streetsspring' sees it turn into a huge blodge of unremitting, apocalyptic-level mud, which dries into rutted, puddly dust. His affinity with animals gives him the name 'DogboyI don' t think google streetview updates it very often. Built because Stalin wanted so much uranium and employment with rat catcher Bob other Siberian minerals, and scientist Dr Ross-Gibbonbecause he wanted to give too many people a lesson, it legendarily cost a life every metre it covers. The DoctorYou can easily find documentaries about it online, but that's ambition a bit rich, for one of our main characters, Felix 'Teig' Teigland, is a film-maker, doing a recce with his cameraman buddy, John Prentiss – who's mostly there to encourage humanity the project to fruition to annihilate claw back some of the rats by dragging them into a warfunds he'd invested in the pair's prior TV projects. Efren and DogboyThey pick up their oh-so-chatty local guide, both insignificant in their own worldsgain the company of a local beauty, must make both man and rodent see sense; easier said than donefetch up at the guide's childhood village. And that's where things start to go awry…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781850704</amazonuk>1803361476
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Daniel O'MalleyAndrew Givler|title=The Rook Soul Fraud (The Checquy FilesDebt Collection Book 1)|rating=54
|genre=Fantasy
|summary= A woman wakes up with amnesia surrounded by dead people wearing gloves. In her pocket she discovers a letter from Myfanwy Thomas, the previous inhabiter of her body. Myfanwy tells a strange story of working for 'the Checquy', a paranormal version of MI5 which Matt has been permeated by a web of betrayal and dangerterrible life. Seriously—it's awful. The problem It is so bad that Myfanwy never discovered Dan the source before her body changed hands (so to speak). The amnesiac has a clear choiceDemon is shocked when Matt turns down his infernal offer: to continue Myfanwy's investigation or to do 10 years of a runnerblissful life in exchange for his soul. It's her decision but Myfanwy's warning is less than encouraging:
::Poor Dan! I know, I know, we shouldn''Remember they want you deadt feel sorry for soul-catching demons. But he really is a terrible salesman.'' Something for her He never hits his targets and, when he fails to get even Matt to bear in mind along with sign on the fataldotted line, unintended consequences of permitting cheap cheese into the UKhe's so desperate that he simply forges Matt's signature.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1908800372</amazonuk>1958204021
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=John R FultzOlivie Blake|title=Seven Kings: Books of the Shaper: Volume 2The Atlas Six|rating=54
|genre=Fantasy
|summary= Runaway slave Tong suicidally avenges his lost love but death seems to elude him. Meanwhile King Vireon is happily married to the beautiful shape-shifting sorceress AluaDark, sharp, although his sister has problems with her husbandand highly inquisitive, King D'zan. A courtesan is carrying his baby; odder still when you realise he's impotent. The Twin Kings of Uruz, scholarly Lyrilan and war-hungry Tyro, canAtlas Six't agree on how to rule so Tyro's wife Talondra puts makes its publishing debut after becoming a real spanner in the works to force a decisionTik-Tok sensation. However bad their lives currently are, evil is spreading through their world like a dark shadow and, to make things worse still, Ianthe the Claw and Gammir the Reborn aren't as dead as everyone supposes them to be. (You'd think the clue would be in Gammir's name wouldn't you?)|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0356500829</amazonuk>1529095239
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Melanie RawnDaniel Abraham|title=Glass Thorns - Touchstone Age of Ash
|rating=4.5
|genre=Fantasy
|summary= Cayden is a hybrid being part elfWe meet Alys under the most northerly of Oldgate's four bridges, fae and human but all wizard. He also she has a day job as knife in her hand and a tregetour or playwright with his own touring company, Touchstonemeeting that she dreads. They're ambitious and planning to get through Meanwhile the trials and into the upper flight. As you would expect from City of Kithamar is at a wizard, this troupe doesn't just act; they also weave magic imbued point in hallucinations the turning of years when the worlds are at their thinnest and encased in glass withiesall things are possible. The problem It is they're short the night between the funeral of a glister, a troupe's wielder Prince and the coronation of withies. Or rather they were until Mieka arriveshis successor. Actually short's For a good world as he's an elf but he also happens to be night the best glister anyone's ever seen, thorns permitting. With one problem solved, another remains. Namely prophetic dreams that have haunted Cade since boyhood and they aren't improving, in fact they're more like nightmaresKithamar is un-ruled.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781166609</amazonuk>0356515427
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Rosanne LicataAnn Sei Lin|title=Blood Bonds: The CaravanRebel Skies|rating=45|genre=Teens|summary=Raj is part ArabKurara has spent her entire life as a servant on the Midori, part Roman. She's independent and strong-willed - too independent and strong-willed to fit well into a society massive dining hall floating in the sky where women belong in soldiers of the home Empire come to drink and only men can bring change make merry between their conquests. However, when a man named Himura arrives to the world. So tell her that she runs away. Disguised as is a boyCrafter like him, she is roaming someone with the streets of Antioch when power to form paper into whatever she encounters Bjornolf, desires – a Danish kingpower sought after all across the Empire. Drawn He asks her to come with him in a way , to leave the life of dreary servitude that is all she canhas known. Well, soon Kurara won't explainhave any say in the matter, Raj stows away on because the caravan he Midori is destroyed by a monstrous paper spirit known as a shikigami, and she is guardingforced to flee out into the world. As She joins Himura aboard the journey continuesOrihime, Raj must decide whether the terrible dangers a sky-ship whose express purpose is to both Bjornolf hunt down shikigami, and herself are worth risking if she reveals her true nature to him...a whole world of adventure awaits her…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1770975667</amazonuk>1406399590
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Celia FriedmanB09Q3P283Y|title=Legacy Of Kings (Magister 3)Shadebringer|author=Grayson W Hooper
|rating=4
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=Three years Clyde Robbins signs up for the US Army during the Vietnam War. He's not really that invested in the fight against Communism, nor is he particularly interested in a long time to wait between parts of a trilogy, especially one as good as Celia Friedmancareer in the military. If he's Magister Trilogy. Ihonest - which Clyde usually is, with himself at least - he hasn'm not someone blessed with great patiencet got many choices and this one, which has made the wait interminableat least, but finally I get to find gets him out what happened to Kamala and of the other Magisters rut he's in. He's good in training and to see how Salvator Aurelius is coping quickly put onto a non commissioned officer training course. He's chuffed with being the first Penitent Kinghimself.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841495360</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Patricia BriggsJennifer Saint|title=Aralorn: Masques and WolfbsaneElektra
|rating=4
|genre=FantasyLiterary Fiction|summary=Here is what seems quite a rum [[:Category:Patricia Briggs|Patricia Briggs]] compendium – her first attempt at a fantasy novel, published and read 'Elektra' by roughly six men and an orc back Jennifer Saint tells the story of three women who live in the early 1990sheavily male dominated world of Ancient Greece. Cassandra, Clytemnestra, and what would appear the fourth book Elektra are all bit players in the same series, dusted off after they both got a rewrite in 2010, and together at last for story of the curious completistTrojan War. And if the rewriting ironed out a few creases it Yet Jennifer Saint shows just how much there was needed done – for us that often the first book is still full of minor problems – a man immune to, or invisible to, magic unless when it's needed for silent women have the plot, a host of exposition all throughout, most compelling stories and much that marks it down as a debut effort. It doesn't mean it's not worth reading howeverthe most extreme furies.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0356501647</amazonuk>1472273915
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jim ButcherDean Koontz|title=Cold DaysQuicksilver|rating=2.5|genre=FantasyThrillers|summary=Happy birthday Harry Dresden! And what a birthday as life becomes a little hectic for the Winter Court KnightMeet Quinn Quicksilver. He returns 's not had the chance to life in time get to fight be a mercurial character yet, for he's lived in the Winter Palacea nun-run orphanage since he was a three-day old foundling, have and now is starting a career on a near death experience at the hands needless magazine's staff. But when this book starts he IS now ''subject to sudden or unpredictable changes of darkmood or mind'', for something – call it unearthly intuition, minicall it mind-peoplecontrol, then is nearly killed again (by call it a friend this time) and his island supernatural urge – has demanded of Demonreach is about him that he go to explode taking a chunk derelict diner, find a gold coin worth a fortune, cash the value of it out of his bank and prepare for going on the USA with itlam. He therefore has 24 hours And all this is just in time for two of those typical Men in Black types to save some world. Oh, turn up and you know those headaches suggest he's been having? HIs head of interest to them. Helped to escape, he finds his flight is on the verge interrupted by other instances of exploding too. Indeedhim acting without being in control, it's the sort discovery that he is not unique in having some kind of birthday that it's hardly worth reanimating forburgeoning power – and a whole lot more besides.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0356500896</amazonuk>1542019885
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jesse BullingtonTasha Suri|title=The Folly of the WorldJasmine Throne
|rating=4
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=It is On the 1420snight of her sacred burning, Princess Malini defies her brother and a lot of what we now think of as The Netherlands refuses to step on to the pyre. She is underwater. Crossing immediately sent to be imprisoned on the deluge is a most unlikely trio – Hirana: an ancient temple that was once filled with a posh man seeking something with the help community of the others, including a girl people who has survived his sometimes-fatal test, and a manic fellow fresh got powers from saving himself upon the gallows, who might or might not have been down to hell in mysterious deathless waters. But now the interim. What that quest temple isnothing more than an overgrown, and how it will lead to nightmaresdecaying ruin. One day, deaths galore and Malini witnesses a lot of other interesting parts girl kill someone with magic. Instead of reporting her for such a gruesome crime, Malini claims that the story, is girl saved her from an attacker and begs for you the girl to discover, in this absorbing cross-genre piecebecome her own personal maidservant.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0356500888</amazonuk>0356515648
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Graeme K TalboysGenevieve Gornichec|title=Stealing Into Winter: being the first adventure from the chronicles of Jeniche of Antar |rating=4|genre=Fantasy|summary=Streetwise young thief Jeniche wakes up to find her prison cell's walls collapsing around her. This is no natural disaster but an invasion by the Occassans, mercilessly brandishing 'moskets', weapons that fire death rendering the native Makamban cudgels futile. Whilst scouring the streets and avoiding the marauding army, Jeniche visits old haunts, checking on her friends and wondering what to do next. This last part is solved for her: a band of Tunduri monks and nuns, including their young God-King himself, want a guide to take them home to Tundur, the land of winter beyond the desert. The journey may be hazardous but nothingWitch's safe anymore, and so, accompanied by the muscular, slow-witted stable owner, Trag and mysterious swordsman Alltud, their journey begins.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178099625X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Chris Wooding|title=The Iron JackalHeart
|rating=4
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=For once I don't feel like devoting my first paragraph to A modern and approachable reimagining of the Norse myths that centres around a teasing plot summarywitch named Angrboda. And while I'm here to judge She hides in a forest at the book and not edge of the covernine worlds, even the British paperback blurb agrees, and gives remembering nothing away in its woolliness. I am duty bound to say this is the third book to feature Darian Frey and the rest of her past life but that fact that she was survived burnt at the crew stake three times because of his flying craft the ''Ketty Jay'Odin's wrath. If pressed I will say it starts with him indulging Her attempts to live in a further instance of thieverypeace, making a mistakehowever, and then finding just how much is in the science fantasy universe that can possibly get between him and what might repair the damage.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780620853</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Kate Griffin|title=Stray Souls|rating=5|genre=Fantasy|summary=Sharon Li has a normal job in a London coffee shop but doesn't feel normal. She's beginning to realise she's a shaman, especially are quickly thwarted when she is so at Loki shows up with her literal heart—the one with the city, that was cut from her chest before she vanishes. In order was tied to meet others who'll understand, she starts Magicals Anonymous, a self-help group for the mystically confused coming stake—and refuses to terms with their giftsleave her alone. The meetings come with various beveragesAfter an initial period of mistrust, biscuits, a Facebook page and a very good turnout. However all is not herbal tea and crunchy-creams as someone or something seems Angrboda begins to be stealing the spirits that make Londonfall for Loki's soul charms, and another something walks the streets tearing people limb from limb. The city is dying and gradually Sharon realises that Magicals Anonymous are more than just two start an unusual family made of up a social group. As odd as it sounds to look at themhalf-dead daughter, the Midnight Mayor wants them to save the capital.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356500640</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Holly Black|title=Red Glove (Curse Workers 2)|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=Cassel lives in a world where magic is frowned upon. Practice is banned and everyone wears gloves to prevent being worked. Cassel himself is a transformation worker - the rarest type. And he is the most powerful transformation worker in living memory. This makes him extremely valuable to the crime families who use curses to support and maintain their empires. It also makes him extremely dangerous as far as the authorities are concerned. And son that's why Cassel tries to keep his status to himselfa wolf, since he discovered it in the [[The White Cat (Curse Workers, Book 1) by Holly Black|first book]] in this ''Curse Workers'' sequence.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0575096764</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Brent Weeks|title=The Blinding Knife (Lightbringer 2)|rating=4.5|genre=Fantasy|summary=Gavin Guile thought he had five years left to complete his seven great purposes. But now it seems he has less than one. He might be the Prism - the most powerful light drafter in the Seven Satrapies, capable of drafting huge amounts of light without risk of losing his mind to the colours - but heand another son that's lost blue. He can't see it or draft it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1841499072</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Stefan Bachmann|title=The Peculiar|rating=4.5|genre=Fantasy|summary=''Don't get yourself noticed and you won't get yourself hanged.'' Such is life for peculiars like Bartholomew Kettle and his sister Hettie. Their mother is human but their - absent - father is a Sidhe, a high fairy. Fairies are contemptuous of the half-breed peculiars and humans distrust and suspect them. Hapless peculiar children are often hanged by humans. And, even more worryingly, bodies of peculiars have been turning up recently, quite dead, covered in ancient faerie script and as empty of bone and organ as they are of lifesnake.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0062195182</amazonuk>1789097061
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jay KristoffHannah Whitten|title=StormdancerFor the Wolf
|rating=5
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=Warrior Masaru has raised his In Red's family, the first daughterbecomes queen, Yukiko, alone since his wife left. Yukiko is now 16; and the second daughter becomes a feat more due latterly to her own strength and resourcefulness than his caresacrifice. For since his wifeTo Red's departuremisfortune, Masaru has gone she is the second daughter. Sent alone into the woods with nothing but the cape on her back, Red knows what to piecesexpect: within the woods is a wolf, addicted to gambling and he is the one who will decide the narcotic effects fate of lotus smoketheir kingdom. The days when he was the legendary Black Fox are behind him which If she is not a shame as worthy sacrifice, the monsters he keeps contained to the Shogun (not a man known for calm reasoning or lack of ferocity) has a mission for them. Masaruwoods will be released, Yukiko and an entourage must hunt and capture the legendary stormtigerfabled kings he keeps hostage will never be returned—or so the stories go. But they're extinct aren't they? Well, no, they aren't as Yukiko discovers when Red enters the hunt goes terribly wrong and she's left alone with just a storm tiger for company. She fights woods, expecting nothing more than to find a way homebe killed within the hour, learning as she goes finds that the full extent to which the Shogun has worked against the good of the nation in general and her family in particularlegends are lies. And the stormtiger? LetThe wolf is not a monster—he's just say he's had his wings clipped and he's not happy about ita man.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0230759017</amazonuk>0356516369
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=G Willow WilsonJohn Gwynne|title=Alif the UnseenThe Shadow Of The Gods
|rating=5
|genre=Fantasy
|summary=Alif lives under an alias and he has a good reason for that: he's a hakinista The Shadow Of The Gods is the first installment of the Bloodsworn Saga, set in an Arabian oil producing country that, to put it mildly, doesn't encourage free speech. He sells IT know-how and wizardy to any covert organisation that works against the government, their agenda unimportant as long as era of the aim is Vikings in the downfall shadow of Ragnarok, when the Gods have battled and their oppression. But bones lie scattered for all that's about to change as Alif falls in love and, as it's the wrong girl at the wrong time, is spurnedsee. His response to this romantic let down This story is to create a computer programme that will identify her internet activity by her individual typing pattern. Unfortunately what works for him also works against him. It's captured by the notoriously dangerous government censor 'The Hand' who also wants Alif ultimate in High Fantasy, and his hidden network of colleagues. Now Alif runs John Gwynne certainly does justice to preserve his life the genre, with mythical creatures, archaic language and those who have trusted him, his only possession an ancient manuscript from his former lovebattles galore. Just This is a thick book, albeit one with an intricate plot and fascinating characters that's accompanied by myths are woven together to create a wonderfully realistic and old wives' tales rendering it irrelevant a logical gritty world. However, sometimes the most desperate of times requires more than logic and, sometimes, a mere book of stories may be more than it seemsin which our heroes must do battle.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857895664</amazonuk>0356514218
}}
{{newreview|author=Benedict Jacka|title=Taken: An Alex Verus Novel|rating=4.5|genre=Fantasy|summary=Alex Verus, future-diviner and erstwhile Camden magic shop owner has dusted himself off after the rigours of [[Cursed: An Alex Verus Novel by Benedict Jacka|Cursed]] and is good to go once more. He continues training Luna as his apprentice but all is not completely well. Alex has been asked to investigate the disappearance of apprentices by Council representative, Talisid. Now, Alex's involvement with the Council (and indeed Talisid) hasn't always been good for Alex's health in the past, but his commissioning may be a sign of his enhanced reputation and this time there's a note of self-interest: Luna may be the next to vanish. Alex receives a tip-off that Fountain's Reach (a stately home with a mysterious past) has something to do with it and, as luck would have it, it's also the venue for the next apprentice tournament which Luna has entered. The investigation begins and hopefully they'll survive to see it through to the end.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356500268</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Catherine Fisher|title=The Obsidian Mirror|rating=4.5|genre=Teens|summary=Jake's father disappeared while working on a secret project with his best friend, the celebrated explorer and recluse Oberon Venn. Jake is sure that Venn is a murderer and sets out to prove it, dragging his teacher, Mr Wharton, into the investigation. But the truth is perhaps even more frightening: David Wilde isn't dead, he's lost in time. Venn and his sidekick Piers are intent on re-entering the past to find him, using a device called the Chronoptika. But it's dangerous and they aren't the only ones hell bent on using the time machine. There's Sarah, who can turn herself invisible, and who's being pursued by a murderous Replicant and his wolf. And there's the scarred man with his acolyte and his strange weapon. And there are the Shee, who keep their own counsel, but have their own ambitions, and who enchant the forest on Venn's estate... |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340970081</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Janet Evanovich|title=Wicked Business|rating=4|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=Following Move on from [[Wicked Appetite by Janet Evanovich|Wicked Appetite]], pastry chef Lizzy and paranormal bounty hunter Diesel continue to seek the seven powerful stones linked to the seven deadly sins. They're looking for the stone associated with lust and it becomes a bit of a treasure hunt as, accompanied by Gloria (the slightly wizardy un-witch) and Carl (the ill-mannered monkey) they have to work their way through a string of clues. However, they aren't the only ones looking; for wherever goodies seek power, the baddies lurk also. The baddies in question are again the deliciously dark (on many levels) Gerwulf (Wulf) Grimoir and his medieval minion Hatchet. Wulf may be Diesel's cousin but there's not a lot of family love in any room they both occupy so let the race to the stone commence. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>075538492X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Gillian Philip|title=Wolfsbane (Rebel Angels)|rating=5|genre=Teens|summary=After the terrible events at the end of the [[Rebel Angels: Bloodstone by Gillian Philip|second bookNewest For Sharing Reviews]] in Gillian Philip's ''Rebel Angels'' sequence, we move on a decade or so. Finn is back in the mortal world. But Rory and Jed have stayed with Seth, now the captain of the MacGregor clann's dun. Faerie queen Kate NicNiven continues to plot against Seth and to wrest Rory, the Bloodstone and prophesied saviour, from him. She is as determined as ever to destroy the veil separating the mortal and faerie worlds. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905537352</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Nikki Gemmell|title=The Bride Stripped Bare|rating=3|genre=Fantasy|summary=A young woman, newly married. Discovering her husband is not all he seems. That he has secrets. That she has needs, wants, desires. That she will need to take things into her own hands if she is ever to be satisfied in her new role as wife.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007163541</amazonuk>}}

Navigation menu