If you guys are following my reviews this year, you’ll have seen a pattern where at least one of my reads per month is something older. I have quite a few beat up paperbacks by John Saul and he tended to be a pretty popular, although I’m not seeing his name around as much nowadays. I grabbed Black Lightning off my shelf a few weeks ago and think I made a poor life decision since many many reviewers have stated that it’s no where near his best work. It sounded interesting to me 🤷♀️
Here are my thoughts and why I’m adding Saul’s books to my giveaway pile now
Bookish Quick Facts:
Title: Black Lightning
Author: John Saul
Original Release: Fawcett Books, 1995
Length: 438 pages
Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐✨ ehhh I wouldn’t start Saul with this 🤷♀️
Here’s the synopsis from the back cover:
My Thoughts:
Something about this book just absolutely failed to draw me in. Around page 350 I finally became more interested – just to be disappointed by an abrupt and sort of lame ending that left me with questions as to the future of the characters.
Towards the start a poor description of 90s CPR didn’t help. I don’t know the medical history of resuscitation that well but I’m pretty sure the EMTs would have killed Glen. The idea of the spark of life does make a good plot point. I think it’s one of the more interesting serial killer motivations I’ve read, despite the overall book falling short.
It wasn’t a bad plot though, it just never grabbed me. There wasn’t much police procedural or investigation. We get a lot of running around and gore while the characters figure out what is going on. Twisted family secrets and the cycle of abuse at the core of the plot. I didn’t dislike the characters but it was hard to have an opinion on them one way or another.
Black Lightning is fairly gory and descriptive of said gore, which I’ve learned was Saul’s go-to in his earlier books. Reading animal torture turns me off quicker than anything (not the book’s fault) but it didn’t help me stay immersed as I mostly flipped through the – gosh how long does it take to describe what he’s doing to an animal? *Shivers* no thanks. It all fits right in with Saul’s evil entity plots though.
The rating comes from the fact that I just never felt drawn in, until around page 350 when we start seeing … The things. And the stuff. And the connections. The ending was also incredibly abrupt and unsatisfying despite a decent and fast paced build up to the final scenes.
I think by reading reviews that Saul has written better work but I’ve got over 800 unread books here and based off Black Lightning, I boxed them all up to pass on 🤷♀️ I don’t really love paranormal thrillers or horror and I can’t take much scarier than King (who is terrifying) and early Patterson (pretty gorey stuff). I’m glad I gave Saul’s work a chance though.
Thanks for checking out my book review of Black Lightning by John saul. This is a book that has been on my shelves forever and I’m just rambling on about it with no obligation, but as always, all opinions are my own ♥️
Hi everyone, welcome back to Sunday Brunch! Today in episode 30 something a little different is happening as we delve into the horror community 😱 and show some support for an indie author who’s mythology based novella is coming out in two short days!
Adam Godfrey is an author who believes in doing the right thing and so he gave up a publicity opportunity in favor of not supporting someone doing damage to the indie community. I’ve seen some awesome support come to the affected authors and am thrilled and honored to offer him this platform to chat about his project! (If anyone else is interested, I’m here for you too)!
That said, read on to find out all about Narcissus, horror in general, and a debate on whether or not vampires are actually safe from mirrors 😅
🥞Welcome to the Sunday Brunch Series! As an introduction, can you tell everyone an interesting thing about yourself that isn’t in your author bio?
🎤 When I used to work at United States Joint Forces Command, I provided information technology (IT) support to former Secretary of Defense, General James “Mad Dog” Mattis.
🥞What’s your brunch order today?
🎤 Oh wow . . . you know, Tony Todd, who starred in CANDYMAN, FINAL DESTINATION, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1990), etc. frequently posts about his chicken and waffle meals, which has convinced me that, if I’m ever in the vicinity of a Roscoe’s Chicken and Waffles, there’s going to be an unplanned stop to give it a try. That said, my brunch order today is going to be chicken and waffles. Final answer.
🥞 There is some drama in the horror community right now surrounding the host of a particular podcast, who is receiving harassment claims from female authors? Good on you for not supporting him and backing out of the podcast. Do you have any comments on the situation?
🎤 Yeah, I generally try to steer clear of most Twitter discourse, but due to the nature of the fast-growing numberof claims being made against this individual, as well as my (previously) scheduled appearance on the podcast, I cancelled the interview out of support for those affected by his behavior, and desire to not be associated in any way with what he had going on. I don’t know the individual in question on a personal level, have not personally read the messages exchanged, and am not here to lay judgement on anyone, but life’s taught me that more often than not, where there’s smoke, there’s fire. Enough people had come forth about this individual within a very brief window of time to where I knew he wasn’t someone I wished to align myself with in any way, shape, or form and, although that had been the only podcast I had lined up to promote the release of NARCISSUS, I was more than eager to forego that opportunity in the name of doing what’s right. It’s really infuriating, and there’s no room in this world for such malicious conduct. I will always stand with the victims
🥞 Yeah wow, seems best to avoid that and hopefully those involved get the message that the indie community is a lot stronger than they are. He needs authors, not vice versa, and there’s no time and place anywhere for being a creep🤷♀️
🥞 Is your publication date affected by any of that or are you still on for May 2nd? I’ll list purchase links at the end!
🎤 Oh, not at all. The publisher (Shortwave Publishing) has absolutely no affiliation with that individual, and has also stepped forward to make this known and declare their stance against sexual harassment. They’ve been really wonderful to work with and we’re very excited to release NARCISSUS into the world on May 2!
🥳🥳🥳
🥞 So Narcissus is a horror novella based on the Greek myth! I’ve been seeing a lot of fantasy mythology retellings and adaptations, it’s kind of cool to see it in other genres too. What drew you to that myth?
🎤 I always loved Greek mythology, with the legend of Narcissus standing out as one of the more intriguing ones. Something about the destructive nature of self-infatuation, and how we so often see this in play today by way of narcissistic personality disorder (narcissism) among political figures, celebrities, etc. Narcissists gorge their inflated senses of self-importance on the undue admiration of others, and it’s an affliction that is, in itself, such a horrifying, all-consuming monster that impacts not only the afflicted individual, but also all who are exposed to him/her. What better Greek myth to adapt into a modern horror antagonist?
🥞I got scared while reading, sorry I’m a chicken 🥲 Looking at the book’s tag line on your Twitter that says “If your ability to avoid your own reflection were a matter of life and death, how long would you last?” What would your actual game plan be if you avoid your reflection to stay alive?
🎤 Haha! It’s quite alright. My wife doesn’t read horror either (though she’s extremely supportive of my work). She’s very much a horror lightweight.
So, my game plan . . . that’s a tough one. What I found so compelling about the concept of NARCISSUS while writing it was the sheer impossibility of the situation. Reflective surfaces surround us. A glass of water, a doorknob, a window, cell phone screen, a spoon, a freshly-waxed floor. An entity that can access us through our own reflections is a truly inescapable one, so in truth, I have no idea what I would do. And it’s not as if blinding myself would work. I wouldn’t have to see myself for my reflection to gain access to me.
Something funny though. I just sat with Robb Olson on his podcast The ARC Party and he brought up a very good point that I had never considered. Vampires have no reflections. In the world of NARCISSUS, maybe vampirism exists, and if it does, mayyyybe that would be a way to cheat the system. It’s funny, sure, but also pretty dang smart . . . haha!
🥞The cyber security and Department of Defense career sounds interesting, have you based any writing off of your experiences there?
🎤 Not directly (aside from professional publications in the cybersecurity industry), though readers will find a common thread of plausible science and technology running through the center of much of my work. I’m working final edits on a full-length novel now (BODY OF WATER), which contains some of these very elements, and I’m so excited to eventually see this one hit the reading world. It bears a concept never before explored in film or literature.
🥞 Do you have any classic (or non classic) horror favorites or what brought you into writing within the genre?
🎤 When I was young, I was a voracious reader of scary stories, and I’d devour any story anthology I could get my hands on. A couple that stick out in my mind are TALES FOR THE MIDNIGHT HOUR by J.B. Stamper and SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK by Alvin Schwartz. But, truth be told, as much as I do love horror literature, I’ve always watched more horror films/tv than read horror books. Early influences include FRIGHT NIGHT, THE LOST BOYS, TWILIGHT ZONE, TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE, CREEPSHOW, etc. A number of early readers of NARCISSUS have commented on what a cinematic read it is, and this is probably why. When I write, I see it as a movie in my head. For much of my work, if it doesn’t lend itself well to the screen, it just doesn’t work for me.
🥞 I noticed that too with the strong descriptive elements. I can tell and tend to enjoy when books are written with that cinematic feel, it works well with a lot of space opera (and horror)!
🥞What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever read or seen in a movie?
🎤 I’ve honestly never really been spooked out by a book, but as far as films go, the scene in FRIGHT NIGHT where Amy turns into this ravenous vampire and goes after her boyfriend has always been downright terrifying. The opening scene of TWILIGHT ZONE: THE MOVIE where Dan Aykroyd’s character says “You wanna see something REALLY scary?” is one of the most effective horror scenes I’ve seen. Another is the scene from SALEM’S LOT where Danny Glick (having turned into a vampire) is scraping at the window of his friend, floating in the fog just outside and begging to be let in. Yeah, that’s prime material right there.
🥞Have you read any great books recently?
🎤 I’m actually reading Stephen King’s THE STAND for the first time right now, as well as JURASSIC PARK. As a Crichton nut (one of my biggest early influences), it’s absurd that I’m just now getting to that book, but I guess I always thought “well, I’ve already seen the movie”. That was misguided thinking. It’s very different from the movie, and soooo good. I’m a huge fan of DARK MATTER by Blake Crouch, as well as THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE by Neil Gaiman.
A book I recently finished that I really loved was GHOST EATERS by Clay McLeod Chapman. He’s really a brilliant writer that’s rising so fast in the horror community.
🥞 Thank you so much for taking the time to interview! This last is an open forum for you so feel free to talk about anything else you might want to say!
🎤 Thanks so much for the opportunity! NARCISSUS will be available on May 2 in ebook/print format through Shortwave Publishing and other major online retailers, and is already available on audio via Audible and iTunes, narrated by the Audie Award-winning narrator Elisabeth Rodgers. It’s not often that a narrator actually manages to enhance the reading experience, but I feel that’s exactly what she pulled off. Just a phenomenal performance.
Adam Godfrey hails from Chesapeake, Virginia, where he lives with his wife and three daughters. He holds over twenty years of experience working for the United States Department of Defense in information technology and cybersecurity risk management. He holds a master’s degree in cybersecurity, and his professional contributions to the field have been internationally featured across a variety of media platforms.
In fiction, Adam is a novelist and author of short stories. His genre-crossing work ranges from the suspenseful to the horrific, frequently characterized by central threads of plausible science and technology gone awry.
Thank you endlessly to Celadon Books for my early copy of The Angel Maker! I’m coming to love the collection of unique and literary titles I have from them. Regardless of the genre I have come to expect a certain quality of literature and this one does not disappoint.
With the book arriving (unsolicited, but with my thanks) so close to publication date and being in the UK for most of March, I was only able to read it recently. Let’s take a look at this literary suspense & horror novel and then my thoughts!
Bookish Quick facts:
Title: The Angel Maker
Series: N/A
Author: Alex North
Publisher & Release: Celadon Books, Feb 28 2023
Length: 322 pages
Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ for fans of atmosphere, suspense, light horror elements
HEre’s the synopsis via Am*Zon:
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Whisper Man and The Shadows comes a dark, suspenseful new thriller about the mysteries of fate, the unbreakable bond of siblings, and a notorious serial killer who was said to know the future.
Growing up in a beautiful house in the English countryside, Katie Shaw lived a charmed life. At the cusp of graduation, she had big dreams, a devoted boyfriend, and a little brother she protected fiercely. Until the day a violent stranger changed the fate of her family forever.
Years later, still unable to live down the guilt surrounding what happened to her brother, Chris, and now with a child of her own to protect, Katie struggles to separate the real threats from the imagined. Then she gets the phone call: Chris has gone missing and needs his big sister once more.
Meanwhile, Detective Laurence Page is facing a particularly gruesome crime. A distinguished professor of fate and free will has been brutally murdered just hours after firing his staff. All the leads point back to two old cases: the gruesome attack on teenager Christopher Shaw, and the despicable crimes of a notorious serial killer who, legend had it, could see the future.
My thoughts:
As with The Whisper Man, I enjoyed reading The Angel Maker but found it ultimately unsatisfying at the end. The overall pace meanders but maintains a level of dark atmosphere and suspense that kept me engaged through the entire book.
I have to admit that I tuned out slightly during the religious and metaphysical aspect discussions. I have no problem with mystical elements and philosophy, both of which are weaved into the plot in generally small doses. The problem for me is that the ending left a big question mark of what exactly that horror element was. I understand that the point is to have the reader think through the “what if”, but there wasn’t enough for me to grasp the how or the ‘why is this thing making the crazy men create Angels?’
There’s a whole possible discussion on using your gifts for good vs evil here. What would you do if you could see the future? I can see book clubs having a field day because there’s a lot to unpack on this novel.
I liked the story itself. I read this one fairly quickly once I got into it. One stylistic aspect that was hard for me to keep track of was multiple points of view on top of chronological jumps. I spent a lot of time at first flipping back and forth to recall names and events before deciding to just read and enjoy and see what happens.
The result was good, terrifying, sad, and even sadder once the pieces of the mystery started coming together. There are many characters that show the different ways that family can bond, the lingering effects of trauma, adoption, schizophrenia? and sibling rivalry in two dissimilar but sadly parallel situations.
I did like the characters too, as much as one can while they navigate guilt and unfair burdens in their own ways.
Overall, I come across as cynical but I think North is a great writer. I would recommend this book if you liked his prior novels or if you want to try a more literary suspense novel with a moderately light horror element. I know I’ll keep reading his books for sure.
A quick note on the audio: I was provided with an audio code but was not a huge fan of the narrator in that she didn’t vary the character’s voices. She is clearly spoken and has the right accent but without distinct voices it was hard to keep track of times and characters, so I only spent about two chapters in the audiobook!
Thanks so much for checking out my book review of The Angel Maker by Alex North. I received a free advanced reader’s edition in exchange for an honest review and as always, all opinions are my own♥️
I continue to have no regrets about reading through my endless Stephen King backlog. In October I finished both Wizard and Glass (The Gunslinger #4) and Later, which is his third surprisingly deep horror & crime novel for the Hard Case Crime publisher.
What I like most about King as a person, and an author, is that it’s 2022 and he’s still writing amazing shit like “he kept moving further west like some fucked up braindead pioneer” to describe the main characters uncle, who kept moving to cheaper nursing homes as the family’s finances got worse. It’s equal parts fucked up and hilarious – King is my go to author when I need a break from the politically correct world.
As an aside, I started and now love following King on Twitter. His comments are like a little morale boost in the middle of a crazy world.
Anyway, ok let’s talk about Later
BOOKISH QUICK FACTS:
Title: Later
Series: N/A
Author: Stephen King
Publisher & Release: Hard Case Crime, 2021
Length: 272 pages
Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ for classic King & horror/paranormal fans
A note on the audio: Later is narrated by Seth Numrich, who has narrated many King novels and is absolutely phenomenal. Solely rating Numrich’s narration, an easy 5 stars. 6h32m long for Simon & Shuster Audio
Here’s the synopsis off Am*zon:
SOMETIMES GROWING UP
MEANS FACING YOUR DEMONS
The son of a struggling single mother, Jamie Conklin just wants an ordinary childhood. But Jamie is no ordinary child. Born with an unnatural ability his mom urges him to keep secret, Jamie can see what no one else can see and learn what no one else can learn. But the cost of using this ability is higher than Jamie can imagine – as he discovers when an NYPD detective draws him into the pursuit of a killer who has threatened to strike from beyond the grave.
LATER is Stephen King at his finest, a terrifying and touching story of innocence lost and the trials that test our sense of right and wrong. With echoes of King’s classic novel It, LATER is a powerful, haunting, unforgettable exploration of what it takes to stand up to evil in all the faces it wears.
Later is a short little novel that has an incredible amount packed into it. It’s a coming of age story for Jamie, it’s a touching-at-times story of different ghosts, there’s a crime aspect, and it’s a horror story.
Like I said, this is a horror story
It’s so much more than that though. I love the characters too, from Jamie to his mom to the old professor that the family stays friends with and eventually guides Jamie through his murdery ghost problem. Nothing like an eccentric old man that likes to make fairy tales sound academic and terrible, right?
Oh, right. I was absolutely never bored, and thankfully never that scared either. Some King books are downright horrifying but Later never quite fit that mold even when it was in it’s horror element. I think he meant to keep a slightly lighter tone and focus more on the people than the scares in this one.
Another of my favorite King aspects is that he loves to shout out his prior novels and other authors too. The Ritual of Chud is back. Jamie’s mom runs a literary agency and mentions many, many books & authors including Sue Grafton.
I was so ready to smash that 5 star button until that very last reveal! It wouldn’t be a King book if someone didn’t have a mommy problem, but, it didn’t work for me at all. I’m glad to see others agreeing with this sentiment🤣
I don’t want to ramble forever but I would wholeheartedly recommend this one if you like fast paced stories with a little bit of humanity, horror, action, ghosts, monsters in all their forms, and King’s classically offbeat sense of fucked up humor.
As a note about Stephen King audiobooks – I don’t know if King personally hand picks his narrators or what but I’ve discovered most of my favorite narrators through listening to his books. They are an amazing bunch including Will Patton and Seth Numrich, both of whom bring their stories straight to life and add that little bite that adds something extra to King’s novels!
This Sunday I’m thrilled to present a GrimDarkTober guest post from a book blogger who needs little introduction! One of the many awesome people I met through a Wyrd & Wonder read along, Peat Long’s blog offers up a ton of book reviews, articles, lists, plus many other curiosities. With no further delay, here’s his article!
Roots of Darkness: The Horrifying Origins of Sword & Sorcery
For many, October tis the month of darkness. Gloom, murk, and perhaps a side of iniquity. Book twitter is full of tributes to this spirit, which is obviously difficult as bookish folk have no taste for the macabre and spooky, not least of which is Athena’s Grimdarktober.
Therefore, in my own tribute, I give her and you this post on sword & sorcery.
Some of you might not see the connection here. You might be thinking what does the genre of over-muscled louts seeking a totally not-compensating for anything life of big swords and scantily clad ladies have to do with dark fiction? The answer to that starts with two words.
Weird Tales.
Back in the 1920s, when pulp magazines played a big part in the American literary landscape, there was a magazine named Weird Tales. It was founded specifically to be a home for supernatural stories at a time when there was none, with repeated references to a particular influence: Edgar Allan Poe. A lot of the fiction published in the magazine reflected that influence; ghost stories, gothic stories, horror stories. But some of it was the nascent genre of sword & sorcery. How did that happen? And what influence did that have on the stories?
Some of the how lies in the peculiar mindset of Robert E Howard, whose Conan stories formed the accepted recipe for sword & sorcery. He was a bookworm who absorbed everything, a would-be pugilist with a dislike for the modern world, not to mention an author in search of ways to make a sale. Unconventional settings and violent stories came naturally to him, and were a natural addition to the more conventional horror fo the magazine.
A great deal of the how also lies with the very nature of Weird Tales. Its writers formed a close-knit community, writing to each other often, and few of them wrote as often as old Mr Nightmare Fuel himself, HP Lovecraft. His influence was felt in many ways – one proto S&S tale was inspired by him asking the author why not a story told from the werewolf’s perspective, another story got published after he prodded the editor – but the biggest was that of his stories.
At which point you start to see some other S&S staples enter the canon. Weird snakemen. Sinister sorcerers and their eerie cults. Indifferent, terrifying gods. Alien monsters and forgotten communities of malevolent people. In some respects, these are things the early S&S authors would have looked at anyway as these did reflect the fears of the time, but these are very much the sort of thing Lovecraft loved. As such, they very much part of what Howard, and other early S&S writers influenced by Lovecraft such as Clark Ashton Smith and Fritz Leiber, used.
Which means that, amid the tales of conquest and feud, of picaresque adventure in exotic locales, you get a distinct vein of sword & sorcery stories that are almost pure horror. Situations where mighty sinews, honed skill, and indomitable wills only allow our heroes to survive where all others have died. The worlds might be more historic than Lovecraft’s contemporary gothic stylings, the heroes more alive and sane at the end, but the similarity is marked.
And the result is some very dark fantasy fiction, perfect for your October reading! Want some examples? Here’s a few to look up…
Worms of the Earth by Robert E Howard – Howard’s most horrifying tale probably belongs to the character Bran Mak Morn, whose attempt to get revenge against the Romans involves making common cause with those he’d rather have nothing to do with. Very creepy.
The Howling Tower by Fritz Leiber – This adventure of Fahfrd and the Grey Mouser can be found in Swords Against Death, a collection which features a great many horror-esque stories. In this case, what seems a simple case of finding treasure in a tower goes rather unpleasantly wrong.
The Black God’s Kiss by CL Moore – This one can be found in just about any Jirel of Joiry collection, many of which are named after this story. The long and the short of it is some bastard takes Jirel’s castle and makes some presumptions about her sexual interest in him, so she elects to go to hell to find a weapon to right all of this. Hell is, unsurprisingly, somewhat unsettling.
The Testament of Athammaus by Clark Ashton Smith – This short can be found in the Hyperborea collection. It is the tale of a city’s downfall and an execution that won’t go right, told with mordant humour and gruesome horror, and a very nasty villain.
The Unspoken Name by AK Larkwood – From the old to the new. Larkwood’s riff on The Tombs of Atuan also includes plenty of that horror S&S feeling as the former priestess Csorwe navigates many, many terrifying challenges in her bid to prove her worth to her saviour.
The Border Keeper by Kerstin Hall – Another recent piece of weirded out adventure that seems to be in the spiritual lineage. It is more high flying and epic than most of the names here, but the adventures of Vasethe through the nine-hundred and ninety-nine spirit realms contains a good dose of uncanny wonder.
So there you go. Even the hardiest of heroes have horrifying moments, and all because it’s baked into the genre right at its very inception – hopefully you look up some of these stories and enjoy the dark side of sword & sorcery this Grimdarktober
Ever notice that I tend to get about three or four books into a series and then quit? The fact is that in between ARCs I never had time to read these giant, door stopping books, and once they got above 8-900 pages I was just about out of luck …
Well, this book was one of these clonkers. It took me two weeks to get through it even listening on partial audio (28 hours total 😭) so it’s kind of easy to see where a reader with deadlines gets to these longer books and comes to a screeching halt.
Or maybe that’s just me. Anyway, the great Mark Lawrence wrote (see GoodReads) that you are either a Roland (and hate Wizard & Glass because no progress is made) or an Oy (you love everything about the journey despite it being a giant flashback).
For once I am glad that I’m taking the time to be an Oy, and this is a more than appropriate kickoff to GrimDarkTober.
Bookish Quick Facts:
Title: Wizard & Glass
Series: The Dark Tower #4
Author: Stephen King
Publisher & Release: Grant, 1997
Length: 704 original hardcover (my PB around 930 pages)
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐✨ I’m team “enjoy the journey”
Here’s the synopsis:
Roland the Gunslinger, Eddie, Susannah, and Jake survive Blaine the Mono’s final crash, only to find themselves stranded in an alternate version of Topeka, Kansas, that has been ravaged by the superflu virus. While following the deserted I-70 toward a distant glass palace, Roland recounts his tragic story about a seaside town called Hambry, where he fell in love with a girl named Susan Delgado, and where he and his old tet-mates Alain and Cuthbert battled the forces of John Farson, the harrier who—with a little help from a seeing sphere called Maerlyn’s Grapefruit—ignited Mid-World’s final war
So this book started out where The Wastelands left off, in an epic riddling contest between Eddie and Blaine the Mono. Was I belly laughing at the dead baby jokes?
Um…. Maybe? I had a cathartic laughing experience at the baby and the SuperFlu one, I have such tied up feelings about pandemics and it’s not usually who I am but I think I just needed to laugh at something particularly horrible. Some inner turmoil definitely released there, so thank you Mr King.
Anyway, Eddie is probably turning into one of my favorite book characters of all time, even if our main characters essentially drop off the page once Roland starts his story.
It’s creepy, dark, witchy, mystical, had me absolutely cringing at some especially gory parts, and was everything I’ve come to expect from King at this point. I wanted Roland and Cuthbert and Alain to succeed. It was painful to watch youth and inexperience war against the more hardened players as they uncovered the true goings on in Hambry.
Not going to lie, I’m all for Roland and Susan too. I was actually pretty broken up about how that all ended. P.S. none of this is spoilery, it’s all alluded to in prior books.
Character wise – really quick – yes I liked the boys and their personalities. It was nice to finally “meet” them. Rhea the witch is probably the creepiest witch I’ve read in a LONG time, and more than once I had to put it down and go think non-gorey thoughts for a bit. Sheemie was the real hero in the pages for sure.
One thing that struck me was the level of anticipatory grief that I was having for certain character deaths that actually never occured. They have to happen at some point but not all happened here and for that I was glad, because it was hard enough to read what was already there.
I do wish that King hadn’t essentially gone all Wizard of Oz at the end. It was just weird, and felt a lot weirder than the whole Charlie the Train thing he had going on before. I won’t hold the ending against the rest of the book but it did put a weird taste in my mouth after such a disturbingly wonderful journey.
Quick note on what I heard from Frank Muller when I was listening – he’s a great narrator and added a LOT to the story, made my skin crawl reading Rhea’s parts!
Long story short: I’m an Oy. I appreciated the journey and am excited to keep reading forward. When will I have time for the next book, even longer at 931 pages? I hope next month!
Thank you so much to Wednesday Books for the free early read of Wake the Bones in exchange for an honest review! All opinions are my own.
Honestly I liked this one quite a bit but struggled with it’s age group appropriateness, so it was hard for me to rate. I would push it on the 18-25 age group and keep it off the YA imprint.
With walking bones, rising evil, death, abuse, and a terribly disillusioned drowned ghost among other eldritch things, this is definitely one to have on board for spooky season. It’s much more lyrical than a typical horror novel though and encompasses magical realism and literary fiction too.
Bookish Quick Facts:
Title: Wake the Bones
Series: N/A
Author: Elizabeth Kilcoyne
Publisher & Release: Wednesday Books, July 12, 2022
Length: 320 pages
Rate & Recommend: *scratches head* I just don’t think it’s a YA, 16+ if I were really stretching it
Here’s the synopsis:
The sleepy little farm that Laurel Early grew up on has awakened. The woods are shifting, the soil is dead under her hands, and her bone pile just stood up and walked away.
After dropping out of college, all she wanted was to resume her life as a tobacco hand and taxidermist and try not to think about the boy she can’t help but love. Instead, a devil from her past has returned to court her, as he did her late mother years earlier. Now, Laurel must unravel her mother’s terrifying legacy and tap into her own innate magic before her future and the fate of everyone she loves is doomed.
Elizabeth Kilcoyne’s Wake the Bones is a dark, atmospheric debut about the complicated feelings that arise when the place you call home becomes hostile.
Ok here are my quick thoughts on the age thing: it’s marketed as YA (13-18) but I really truly strongly feel it should target an 18-20something age group. The characters are 18+, one was in college and dropped out, and all were struggling with loyalty to home, their future, and generational bonds vs their own fate. Is their home down on the holler or where does fate lead them? Many of the conflicts and issues were not ones that 13-17 yr olds are going to face, although some will, plus the language includes at least one f*co per chapter, s*x scene at the penultimate moment AGAIN (please, YA authors, stop doing this – we assume a second couple shacked up that night too) … I just have a hard time with this on the YA imprint.
That said: let’s talk about this contemporary fantasy / horror / literary fiction
It takes place mostly on Kentucky farmland, where Laurel’s family tobacco farm has sat for generations. The atmosphere it set from the start with a hunt for bones and trip to the graveyard, where we learn that Laurel has a penchant for death. From there, things slowly start getting spookier and spookier. It never gets to the splattering stage but there are dead animals, blood trails, dreams of the dead, her mother’s drowned ghost, lots of blood, someone is hanged, and the devil is downright creepy .. among other things.
The spooky parts are interspersed with a number of important themes to the New Adult (18- ?) age group, like generational chains. Laurel’s family has been rooted on Kentucky for generations, and she tried leaving, failed, and came home to the farm and friends that needs her. Another character is abused by his father, and wants to leave, but also struggles with loyalty to his friends and the area. One doesn’t want to leave at all and is happy as is, and, the fourth has no idea what he wants.
So we see these scary parts mixed with chapters about love and mixed feelings. Two male characters (Isaac and Garrett) have feelings for each other and that is a constant storyline, plus Laurel and Ricky feel fated towards each other but recognize fear and obligation as obstacles.
All this taking place in a muggy, hot summer, in the middle of a pretty severe haunting. Each character, even a fifth that is brought in as a guide to Laurel, has different parental and generational issues that has shaped their experience growing up in this small town.
Can they all be friends like they were before, what needs to change, what will their futures hold? Will they even be alive to find out?
Coming home and self acceptance are huge themes. I loved how the magic worked, as Laurel’s mother was tied to the land and so is she. Land based magic is my favorite but I’ve never seen it in a contemporary fantasy before so that was interesting
I wish I could share quotes … I normally am not a fan of purple prose but Kilcoyne manages to write about death, life, and survival in such a way that I had SO many quote tabs on the pages.
OH, yeah, survival is a HUGE theme too. Everyone has to survive their upbringing, life situation, and all the self destruction of those around them while taking hold of their own futures.
The real question is … Does everyone survive? Heh heh I actually did like what the author did at the end, but no spoilers
For me, 🌟🌟🌟🌟, but I’m 33 and would hold this one til my kid was at least 17. I will not rate it for YA
Welcome to the special Halloween edition of the Sunday Brunch Series!! I was so excited to see Halloween falling on a Sunday this year. After an absolutely incredible month of GrimDarkTober interviews, it is coming to an end with an amazing feature… Presenting my first traditionally published author – dark fantasy & horror writer A.J. Vrana!!
I “met” A.J. on bookstagram after participating in a tour for her first book, The Hollow Gods, and at this point am honored to say I consider her a booksta friend!
Happy Halloween everyone, here she is!
🎃Welcome and thank you so much for coming onto the Halloween edition of the SBAIS! Tell everyone a little about yourself and your literary life?
🎤Hello! I feel like my online bio is more eloquent than I am, but here it goes: My name is A. J. Vrana, and I’m the author of The Chaos Cycle Duology, which is comprised of The Hollow Gods and The Echoed Realm. They’re folklore-infused, contemporary dark fantasy with horror undertones and a romantic subplot. I also penned the short supernatural horror story, These Silent Walls, which is published in Three Crows Magazine. Outside of my literary life, I’m also a PhD candidate researching the supernatural in literature and its relationship to violence, and I have two magical rescue cats, Moonstone and Peanut Butter.
🎃That’s a fascinating topic for research! Especially in book one, the interest in violence, legends, and sociological/group aspects was evident. How did that research translate into or influence The Chaos Cycle?
🎤I actually think that it might be the other way around: my fiction influences my academic writing more than my academic writing influences my fiction. That said, they are mutually reinforcing, and I think that ultimately, they might just be part of the same project.
To be a little more specific, my research focuses on Japan and former-Yugoslavia, with my personal background being with the latter. I was always interested in the supernatural, and through my research, I’ve found that it functions as an excellent metaphor for trauma, violence, and all the horrible things that we maybe can’t do justice to through plain, clinical expression. Further to that, the relationship between truth and fact is something that I have always been intrigued by. I research a lot of folklore, and folklore has always been a way of approaching and understanding the world. It’s a system of knowledge, and it can be very useful! There is truth to it even when it is just a story, because often, those stories are produced from generations of lived experience.
I also think a LOT of my own experiences are in the novels, but they’re all written in through metaphor and allegory. I really struggle with explicit #ownvoices stories because it feels like there is no barrier between the reader and the writer. It’s too vulnerable. However, using the supernatural to talk about communal violence is a productive way to explore themes in my own life. I’ve never been kidnapped by spirits or anything, but I do think there is a relationship between Miya’s existential ruminations, Kai’s alienation from society, and my diasporic experience. Also, having grown up being adjacent to civil war, there is something about the way Black Hollow functions that echoes that experience of mine as well. Violence against the outsider is such a common theme, but I wanted to give it the kind of intimacy that can really unsettle. And what could be more intimate and unsettling than having a folkloric creature invade your dreams and become the reason your whole community turns against you?
🎃I was sometimes a little confused during book one, and then book two was just incredible and I loved how you brought the legend to life via the history. What do you think was the biggest growth factor for you as an author between the two books?
🎤There was about a five-year gap between the writing of the first draft of each book, so I definitely grew as a person and as an author, though I don’t think that’s what impacted the clarity of the story so much as it impacted the way I delivered my themes. When I wrote the first book, I was in a phase in my life where I was grappling with a lot of intellectual ambiguity, and so ambiguity became a huge theme that permeated the story. I actually intended the first book to be rather hazy, because one of the central points is that there are no simple truths and that we can’t always get clear cut answers to our bigger questions. Was the town’s violence the result of groupthink and repressed generational guilt, or was it due to the influence of a malevolent entity? The story doesn’t give you an answer; both possibilities are true and inseparable from one another. Likewise, the way we weave social narratives is diffuse and confusing; you can’t always locate the logical progression that led to a belief system or social truth. The fabric of real-world narratives is often incoherent and full of contradictions, and I wanted to capture some of that incoherence in the structure and narrative style of the book. That said, I was also far less confident when I wrote The Hollow Gods; I shied away from being direct about my themes, and when you are a new writer trying to get traditionally published, it can be difficult to feel assured in your approach. I also had no idea how to outline! To a large extent, I was flying by the seat of my pants, and I had to do a lot of editing and rewriting as a result.
However, The Echoed Realm was a very different process. It took me much longer to write the first draft, but it was such a strong first draft that the editorial process only took several months (THG’s editorial process took years, hence the five year gap!). I went into The Echoed Realm with a much firmer idea of what I wanted to do, and so I think the book is much more confident and direct about some of its themes. I feel like it also reflects my personality better; there is, I think, an intensity to The Echoed Realm that wasn’t present in The Hollow Gods, and that has a lot to do with me feeling like I have laid the groundwork to really be myself as a writer. This also reflects the characters’ growth between books; they are not the same people they were in The Hollow Gods. They’re not experiencing their world for the first time! I also did lean into commercial fiction a lot more for the second book, whereas the first book veers a bit towards the obscure. All that said, I think the success of The Echoed Realm largely hinges on the work The Hollow Gods did to establish a strong foundation. The first book does a lot of heavy lifting with world building, lore, and characterization so that the second book can really showcase what the duology had been building up to all along.
🎃What do you think is the most important part of capturing a consistent atmosphere?
🎤This might sound weird, but I think the most important thing is to actually decide on what kind of atmosphere you want and to pay very close attention to word choice and language. Atmosphere (for me anyway) is a matter of focus. It’s kind of like maintaining a character’s voice throughout the book; you need be consistent not just with imagery and descriptions, but with the specific word choices that make up each image, because word choice can help evoke a particular tone or emotion. Atmosphere suffers when writers reach for the easiest or most obvious word. Readers don’t consciously pick up on word choice, but it does impact them because we all make subconscious associations without even realizing it. So, if I say, “Thunder rolled through the grey sky,” it sounds quite plain compared to, “The sky churned with a menacing rumble.” Both sentences are almost the same length, but the second one uses a stronger verb (one that evokes sickness or unease) and transforms something commonplace (thunder) into something with character (a menacing rumble). Ultimately, these are the things that make up atmosphere.
🎃What makes a good morally gray character?
🎤I think this is a really interesting question, because in reality, we are all morally grey. No one has a rigid or unchanging moral compass; we are all reacting to our circumstances and trying to navigate the world in all its complexity. The world is morally grey at best (or completely bankrupt at worst), and so we are all inevitably morally grey. But, to answer your question, I think that good morally grey characters are the ones that invite us to reflect on the moral ambiguity in ourselves. Their reactions, attitudes, and choices have to make sense for their character regardless of our moral expectations, and even if we recognize that their actions are morally questionable, we an approach those reactions with a degree of compassion.
So, for example, it’s not that Kai lacks a conscience or acts out of wanton malice. He is simply responding to his circumstances in the only ways to know how to, and that is all informed by his personal history and his position as a socially marginalized person. But I think most people who read the books don’t judge him to be a bad person, so that particular confluence of indictable behaviour and compassion help us produce a more nuanced understanding of ourselves and others. Morally grey characters may do something that is morally reprehensible, but in context, that behaviour might seem reasonable, and that forces us to reckon with the expectations we have for moral behaviour. I also think this is why Mason is the character I personally find the most frustrating. He’s someone who fancies himself to be morally upright, but he behaves in ways that are subtly quite selfish, and ultimately, it’s his confrontation with Kai and Miya that brings all that to the fore.
🎃Is it hard to write your characters into those tough, destructive, near deadly scenes that Grimdark requires? Are you a true lady of chaos or does it take an emotional toll?
🎤Full disclosure: when I first wrote The Echoed Realm, Kai lost an arm. My editor made me change it, though, and in hindsight, I’m happy he got to keep it. I think when I’m writing it, I’m not really impacted by these tough scenes, but sometimes I’ll come away, like, “Wow, that was kind of intense.” I wouldn’t say it takes an emotional toll, though. On the contrary, I think it can be quite cathartic and invigorating to write out a very intense scene in which all the characters’ emotions are running at eleven and a half. In some instances, the whole book is culminating to that moment, so it’s exciting to finally let shit hit the fan, you know? I guess that makes me a true lady of chaos…
🎃Seeing as it’s halloween! If you’ve ever worn a Halloween costume, what was your favorite? Bonus points if you have a picture!
🎤Oh gosh, I don’t remember the last time I dressed up—I’m so lazy! As a kid, though, my two favourite costumes were a witch and a ninja. I don’t have any photos from that era, but I have this monstrosity
🎃How do you feel about brunch? Do you have a favorite brunch food?
🎤I adore brunch, and it’s one thing Canada sucks at. When my partner took me to his hometown in the US, I nearly died eating biscuits and gravy every day. That said, I do love just a basic brunch of fried eggs, sausage, hash browns, and toast. If I can get a single banana pancake on the side, then we’re golden.
🎃Ama – I am just dying for any tidbit that hints at Ama’s story. I think I missed who she was in the original story. Can you tell us anything extra about her??
🎤I actually have a whole book planned for Ama! Her backstory is still definitely a mystery. All you really know is that she’s been with Gavran for a long time and that he more or less raised her. She’s obviously very dedicated to anything Gavran cares about, and she is strongly attached to Miya both because of Gavran but also because she genuinely cares for her. Regarding the first book, **spoiler here** Ama is the wolf that Miya originally sees as a child, and this encounter becomes the thing Miya latches on to and hopes for throughout her youth and into had adulthood. Of course, the next time she encounters a wolf, it’s not Ama, but Kai.
What I can tell you is that Ama’s becoming a wolf is not quite the same as Kai’s, though there are similarities too. Neither of them are werewolves in the contemporary sense; their condition follows the wonky rules of folklore rather than what we get in genres like urban fantasy. In Kai’s case, it’s “spiritually inherited” from Sendoa, though his parents were also like him. Kai’s history is also a bit of a shadowy thing, so there is a lot about his past left unexplored by the end of the duology. Ama, however, was not actually born a wolf as Kai was, and if you go to my website, click on Vignettes, and then on “The Weaver,” you’ll find some short stories exploring bits of Ama’s past ;).
{{Done!! Can’t wait for that book!!}}
Now that The Chaos Cycle duology is completed, can you give us any hints as to what’s coming next? A WIP?
🎤I am currently working on a supernatural horror novel! I can’t say much about the project right now, but it does feature a small Appalachian town in rural Pennsylvania, an unreliable narrator, creepy, supernatural melodies, and murder. It’s been slow going, but I’m just about 40-50% through the first draft. I also have been fleshing out the world of The Chaos Cycle on my Patreon and plan on writing a standalone that takes place after the duology. It will focus on Miya, Kai, Ama, and Crowbar, and it will not be related to the major plot of the duology, though I do plan on exploring Kai’s history quite extensively in that book!
🎃Here is the round of easy rapid fire bookish questions – do you have a favorite book or series that you always recommend? Favorite literary character? Strange and wonderful bookish habits?
🎤Uhh, here goes:
The Winternight Trilogy by Catherine Arden!
I am blanking so hard on this. Let’s say Dorian Grey.
I’m pretty boring, but I need to read in complete silence, or I get very crabby.
Thank you so much for taking the time to interview!! A.J. wanted to tell you guys that the special hardcover editions of The Chaos Cycle duology just released, so definitely check those out!!
Here is an Instagram post with all the info, plus you can find her website at
As always, a huge thank you to Storytellers On Tour and Lee Conley for having me this time around! Last year I featured the debut novel in The Dead Sagas, A Ritual of Bone, you can find that review here! Now comes the sequel, a even more grim dark-er read called A Ritual of Flesh. Definitely check out the tour schedule and giveaway below because I am 100% fully recommending these books to any dark fantasy and horror fans!
It is also of note that the author is going to be coming onto my GrimDarkTober interview lineup so definitely keep an eye open for that!
Bookish Quick Facts:
Title: A Ritual of Flesh
Series: The Dead Sagas #2
Author: Lee C. Conley
Publisher & Release: Self, 10/10/20
Length: 476
Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ fully!
Here is the synopsis:
As evil ravages the north and the dead walk, all eyes fall to Arn… The apprentice journeys south, home to the College, unaware of the dark events that transpired in the High Passes after his departure. His leg in ruins, and haunted by watching shadows, the College council in Arn awaits him, but he does not travel south alone.
Arnulf and his warriors must travel to Arn also, with tidings for the king of the risen dead and the terrible curse which has destroyed all that he knew. Arnulf seeks vengeance upon the College, but must choose wisely if he is to save his son.
Meanwhile in the west, Bjorn and his strange Wildman companion report back to High Lord Archeon at Oldstones with grim news of cannibal Stonemen encroaching from the Barrens, but is embroiled in news of war and invasion as Archeon requests his service once more.
In the capital sickness awaits them all, Nym has fled to the city and must now continue her struggle for survival on the plague ridden streets of Arn, keeping all who she cares for safe from the halls of Old Night.
The many threads of this Saga converge on the city of Arn, but amid plague, invasion and terror, a greater darkness is looming. Dark forces are seeking to unleash evil upon Arnar, honour and renown is all, and sword, axe and shield is all that stands between the living and the grasping hands of the dead
Holy crap, so I thought that book one was immersive, desperate, dark, and a true grabber from page one .. and then I read this installment. Conley blew it out of the water in terms of maturity, atmosphere, and bringing the storylines together in a cohesive, interesting, and seamless way.
Imagine if you will, the stinking bloody dead victims of a plague piling up in the gutters, no food to be had, and the gates of the towns all sealed. A man is crawling through the corpses, risking the plague himself, trying to find some coin – but even if he found something to steal, he couldn’t buy food. The surviving townsfolk just look on, too numb to bother.
That, friends, is an actual scene (but not a quote) from the novel. I can’t tell you the immersive, seeping atmosphere of dread throughout this book without just describing the scene where I feel they *almost* hit rock bottom.
Each surviving character experiences significant loss and witnesses family as well as other loved ones die, so I know Conley is setting the end up for something even more desperate and epic.
I loved how the characters still managed to find something to fight for, even if all they have left is their family legacy and claim to their homeland.
One thing I have to mention too is the utter chaos of some scenes … Certain parts are just absolutely crazy but still remain within world possibility.
My favorite thing is that this is such a welcome break from the newer fantasy I have been reading: I honestly don’t care about romance and character development and all that crap, just entertain me with something amazing and immersive and intelligent and well written, and this is IT.
Long story short: if you like chaos, dark fantasy, fantasy horror, fighting and honor set in a world reminiscent of Skyrim (I hold by that comparison in terms of my visualization of the world): you need these books!
Happy September! I am feeling the fall vibes, pumpkin spice, wearing of long sleeves, and books that contain corpses and nightmares …. Hey!
Today I am endlessly grateful to self published author Nicolas Lietzau (pronounced Lee-tsow) for the stunning hardcover of his novel Dreams of the Dying. The naked cover mirrors the dust jacket and makes the book an excellent Halloween/shelf decoration as well as a memorable read, so definitely put this on your radar to read while he’s working on book two!
Bookish Quick Facts:
Title: Dreams of the Dying
Series: Enderal #1
Author: Nicolas Lietzau
Publisher & Release: Self, December 2020
Length: 826 pages (hardcover)
Rate & Recommend: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 yes to those with any interest in fantasy, horror elements, mental health rep
Here is the book blurb from GoodReads:
If your mind is the enemy, where do you run?
Years after a harrowing war experience, ex-mercenary Jespar Dal’Varek has taken to drifting. It’s a lonely existence, but, barring the occasional bout of melancholia, he has found the closest thing to peace a man like him deserves. Life is “all right.”
Or so he believes. Hoping to turn the page, Jespar accepts a mysterious invitation into the beautiful but dangerous archipelago of Kilay-and everything changes.
Plagued by explosive social tensions and terrorism, the tropical empire is edging ever closer to civil war. Kilay’s merchant king is the only person able to prevent this catastrophe, but he has fallen into a preternatural coma-and it’s Jespar’s task to figure out what or who caused it. As the investigation takes him across the archipelago and into the king’s nightmares, unexpected events not only tie Jespar’s own life to the mystery but also unearth inner demons he believed to be long exorcised.
Battling old trauma while fighting for his life, his sanity, and the fate of Kilay, the line between dream and reality blurs until only one question remains: If your mind is the enemy, where do you run?
Described as “Inception in a Polynesian fantasy setting,” Dreams of the Dying is a slow-burning, haunting blend of fantasy, mystery, and psychological horror, that explores mental illness, morality, and the dark corners of our minds.
This is a pretty difficult book to unpack! I know a lot of my followers have played Skyrim – if you played the Enderal mod you may be familiar with the author of this book, or at least his writing! (I admit that I entirely stopped gaming around 2016, it wasn’t compatible with travel nursing, but knowledge of the Enderal story is not required to enjoy the book!)
The Worldbuilding: I thought the best part about the hardcover was all of the extras in the appendix. This is a clearly lovingly crafted world that had an insane amount of planning involved, both on a macro and micro level. There is plenty of world building in the book including local foods, customs and culture, architecture, a religious synopsis, weather, and the feel of the populace…
Then the book is over and the appendix is there! The micro world-building is just .. it’s just something that only an indie author can do and it’s perfect. Pages on and drawings of animals, even their named skeletons, local fashions, drawings, more about the Gods and Goddesses, and just an incredible breakdown of the language that was created for the Makehu people.
Take this example of how the language and lingual barriers feed overall immersion – it integrates into the story and creates comic relief at times!
‘kaia ‘ō kā teteie e māu kū.’ Do you know it?”
“‘Look out for … the emotional fish?’”
Kawu snorted. “Not quite.
I just love how much local culture and lore was included without being burdensome to the story. I was going to share another quote about the tension/feel of the city but it contains a typo … The sentiment is there though. (Mostly the editing is extremely well done).
The only issue I had with the world is – the heck is up with the seasons? The 6th moon of dry season only has 5 days … but the rainy season month has 33 days?
Also as far as immersion .. Lietzau probably wrote one of the most creative languages I’ve ever seen in a low fantasy, including such slang gems as “by the excretions of the sacred donkey.” Yet with nothing else modern about the world, he throws in modern slang. I got used to it … (yes yes even though it’s a Bavarian cultural thing) … but it threw off an otherwise near perfect immersion. I’m sure the Makehu swear too 😂
The Characters: ah gosh this book was so perfectly tailored to people who are struggling through their 30s. Jespar has PTSD, anxiety, and guilt, and the representation is just so real that reading his journey through it was a bit jarring at times. Lysia is a physician that runs a slum clinic even though her debts are piling up, and Kawu is an innocent, selfless little thing that had way too much trauma thrown at him at once. Neither of them were particularly good people but they seemed real and I think anyone with struggling mental health will be able to relate to someone in the novel.
The point of view is mostly Jespar’s, but there is another that is referred to as “The Man”. This POV brings out a whole spectrum of one’s own personal hell, confronting past demons, and learning a thing or two about what exactly it means to be a monster.
Between the monster, the swamp, and the court of corpses, the analogies are spot on.
Alright the book is heavy content wise: briefly there is anxiety, crippling guilt, parental death, fairly graphic suicide description involving a knife, a drowning attempt, a not too scary corpse, other corpses, kind of descriptive (maybe R rated) m/f and m/m intercourse, smoking and alcohol use, and some really cute fluffy animals.
Tae ite nū’iwilo, tae hūnā ‘o. ‘You won’t find out if you give up.’ Because that is what it comes down to with melancholia and despair: just as other people lie when they tell you things always get better, your mind lies when it tells you that it doesn’t. The only way to know is to stay and find out … as hard as it might be.”
That quote hit me HARD, and it felt like something extremely personal that the author left in the text. When he recapped it in the afterword and talked about his own mental health struggles; I am just glad to see people speaking openly of this. My mental health is total trash as a critical care nurse right now and I’ll openly admit that I had to clam up on this review for a bit.
The Magic: alright let’s perk this back up. The magic system ranges from dream-walking to necromancy, healing, mind control, and seems to work as a mental and physical drain. There are quite a few abilities and it’s pretty interesting overall. Y’all know me, throw in necromancy and I’m there. There’s a lot of cause and effect related to the magic, and a professorial lecture in the appendix if you are still curious!
Closing thoughts : it’s a long book but nothing is extra, and the plot keeps moving forward without much drag at all. This is a more intellectual breed of fantasy that I would push towards fans of Gene Wolfe or NK Jemisin rather than those expecting pure escapism.
To break the book down into a one sentence synopsis:
A comatose magnate, insurgent terrorists, furious commoners.
With a side theme of mental health, and….
If you fight injustice with injustice, no matter how deserved it may feel, you’ll always end up as just another turn of the wheel.”
I do strongly encourage everyone with an even casual interest in fantasy to check this one out. It won’t be for everyone with some of the strong themes but I definitely think it’s worth consideration!
Again thank you so much to the author for my review copy, all opinions are my own 🖤
Now that no one is still reading, a quick bookish note and SBAIS update: I am endlessly grateful to ALL of the Indie authors that have been reaching out to me with their novels this year! There are thousands of reviewers out there and it’s an honor! Everyone stay tuned this Sunday because I’ve got Heartmender series author V Romas Burton on and I can’t wait to share that with you all!
OneReadingNurse.com 