(moderate spoilers) Most fantasy authors of long standing end up seeing their career boiled down to one thing. In the case of Michael Moorcock, it’s the eternal champion, the endlessly reincarnated warrior that is summoned to stand between Law and Chaos. Many of his characters were some variation on the champion but it is here […]
(moderate to heavy spoilers) I first picked up Gideon the Ninth a few years ago, and was thrown by how far it went from my expectations. Very buzzy book was Tamsyn Muir’s debut, lot of expectations. I picked it up again earlier this year and read it, sometimes struggling with the tale of Gideon and […]
(mild spoilers) By way of introductory remarks, I’d like to say I’m not going to enjoy this review of Samuel R. Delany’s Tales of Nevèrÿon. I wanted to like it. I really did. Delany sounds an interesting man. Sword and Sorcery has given me many good reading experiences. What I’d read of Gorgik, the main […]
(mild spoilers) One of the defining characteristics of Pratchett’s Discworld was that novels would be one thing on the surface, another below, and once you stared at them long enough you’d wonder how you ever thought one could be understood without the other. It’s in this light that I tell you that Pyramids is about […]
(mild spoilers) If I have a flaw as a reader, it is that I am impatient. If there is a great big secret, a true uncertainty, then I must know how it ends. I will read and read until I get to it, assuming I don’t just find spoilers. Robert Holdstock’s Lavondyss, the second book […]
Welcome to the next installment in my Retro Reviews! This time, we’re looking at a man who forged a reputation as one of the giants of early fantasy literature, namely Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany – or as we tend to know him, Lord Dunsany. And the book is his most […]
(total spoilers) For my first review of Wyrd & Wonder, I wanted to do something with a famous forest. The Two Towers delivers on that. However, the forest of Fangorn isn’t the main attraction when it comes to the middle book of Tolkien’s famous trilogy. So what is? Well, first off, nevermind two towers, this […]
(moderate spoilers) There’s three things I’d like you to know about Waylander, David Gemmell’s first novel about his eponymous antihero assassin. The first is that I will always have a soft spot for this book simply because of the sheer gall Gemmell showed in using his co-workers as inspiration for the book, to the point […]
(mild spoilers) When I found out about Kundo Wakes Up, sometime last year, I hit the pre-order button like it said “please collect a free million pounds”. I had utterly fallen in love with Saad Z Hossain’s The Gurkha and the Lord of Tuesday, so finding out about a sequel made my day. I waited […]
The Portrait of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde: So I’m part of a small bookclub focusing on classic books and when this came up I was intrigued. And after a few chapters, I was very intrigued. But after a few more chapters, the novelty of Oscar Wilde being immensely quotable had worn off, not least […]
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