Category: Fantasy
A Murder of Crows — DeAnna Knippling
The Raven Tower — Ann Leckie
No idea how i came across this, but it sounded rather good so i added it to my wish list and when it got put on sale for only 99p, i didn’t need asking twice. 
And for 99p i definitely got an incredible bargain.
I’ve no idea why this is listed in science fiction on Amazon, i’d definitely put it squarely in the grimdark fantasy section. I suppose i may be getting my genres completely misconstrued, but i don’t think i am.
Anyway, if you’re looking for a good bit of grimdark fantasy then this should be right up your alley. Who are the good and the bad in this and are they even aware that they are and why? The baddies, although doing what they do for completely nefarious reasons, are actually doing the good thing; while the goodies, thinking they’re being all altruistic and everything, turn out to be on the baddies’ side. And it’s all wound into a very well written story.
My only little winge is that Eolo’s gender thing is rather ambiguous and confusing and i think this could have been better defined. At the end of the book i’m still not sure what gender Eolo actually is: cis, trans or otherwise. Another character also mentions an aunt that had a gender thing going on, but again, no real information as to what. I just completely failed to see what purpose having a main character — and another character who wasn’t part of the story whatsoever — with ambiguous genders served: other then being a poor attempt by the writer to include someone with these issues in order to get some woke cred. Wouldn’t it be nice if we’re going to have characters with gender issues, dysphoria, trans, non-binary, etc., that they were made relevant to the story and explored further with a view to educating the ignorant masses on these issues while also helping and supporting those who have to deal with these issues in real life? A great example of a writer that did such a thing would be Jason Segel, working with Eve Lindley, in the series Dispatches from Elsewhere: definitely a must watch before you read another book if you haven’t watched it already.
Other than my little winge this is a great book with great characters, well written and it really plays with the idea of gods and how gods get, keep and use their power over people. We can see in our own world how a certain god has been allowed to overwhelm other gods and how this has ultimately turned the whole world into a shit hole of ecological disaster with a global plague while in a mass extinction event. This is what happens when you worship a god whose clergy tells you that you don’t have to care about this world because said god has got something better for you when you die — just keep breeding like flies and fucking the planet up, Armageddon will soon be upon us and the pious shall have their rapture.
Ann’s Page
#fantasy #grimdark #annleckie
Feyland — Anthea Sharp
The First Adventure
The Dark Realm
The Bright Court
The Twilight Kingdom
How to Babysit a Changeling
Trinket
Spark
Brea’s Tale
Royal
The Bug in the Dark Court
Marny
Real Challenge
Anthea’s Page
#fantasy #fairytale #antheasharp
Marny — Anthea Sharp
The Book of Swords — Anthology
The Best Man Wins — K. J. Parker
Her Father’s Sword — Robin Hobb
The Hidden Girl — Ken Liu
The Sword of Destiny — Matthew Hughes
“I am a Handsome Man,” said Apollo Crow — Kate Elliott
The Triumph of Virtue — Walter Jon Williams
The Mocking Tower — Daniel Abraham
Hrunting — C. J. Cherryh
A Long, Cold Trail — Garth Nix
When I was a Highway Man — Ellen Kushner
The Smoke of Gold is Glory — Scott Lynch
The Colgrid Conundrum — Rich Larson
The King’s Evil — Elizabeth Bear
Waterfalling — Lavie Tidhar
The Sword Tyraste — Cecelia Holland
The Sons of the Dragon — George R. R. Martin
#fantasy #kjparker #robinhobb #kenliu #matthewhughes #kateelliott #walterjonwilliams #danielabraham #cjcherryh #garthnix #ellenkushner #scottlynch #richlarson #elizabethbear #lavietidhar #ceceliaholland #georgerrmartin
Good Neighbours — DeAnna Knippling
I really enjoyed this. A nice captivating little short to fill an hour or so.
In East Smithville the fog is always coming and with it, the Fairies who whisk people away, not to be seen again for years. This is the story of one such person returning — for a while at least.
I admit to being thoroughly disappointed that it ended, i really wanted it to keep going: away with the Fairies.
Well worth a read of your time and it would be really good if DeAnna came back to East Smithville some time and wrote a few more short stories about people returning.
DeAnna’s Page
#fantasy #fairytale #deannaknippling
Alice — Julia Crane
Another tale from the anthology Once Upon A Curse.
I’ve quite enjoyed the previous tales from this anthology, and was quite looking forward to one that was “Alice and Wonderland” inspired. Oh my, how utterly disappointed i was.
To begin, you’ll realise when you get to the apparent end of this tale that this is simply the beginning of one of Julia’s books and you’re supposed to be so impressed with this that you go running off to Amazon to buy it. Julia, and/or the editor of the anthology, should — in the very least — have had the decency to warn the reader of this fact at the beginning of the tale.
It wouldn’t be so bad if this were any good and one was left wanting to go and buy the full story, but it’s an utterly childish love story and one soon finds oneself just wishing it over and done with. So yes, there’s a part of me that’s very pleased that this is just an excerpt and i was therefore relieved of having to wade through the whole tedious story.
Furthermore, it doesn’t have anything to do with “Alice and Wonderland” other than the protagonist is called Alice and her adoptive mother is referred to as the Red Queen. It’s an insult to your readers to take a half finished story you had lying around and rename the characters and try and pass it off as a “Alice and Wonderland” tale.
I’m putting this in “The Deleted” even though i can’t delete this as it’s part of an anthology that so far i’ve been enjoying. But seriously, all “Alice and Wonderland” fans, just avoid this tale if you come across it.
Julia’s Page
#fantasy #aliceinwonderland #juliacrane #whataloadofcrap
The Clockwork Alice — DeAnna Knippling
I really enjoyed All the Retros at the New Cotton Club, so i was really happy to discover that Deanna’s also wrote some “Alice and Wonderland” stuff.
Instead of the fun clockwork story about Alice and all things Wonderland that i was expecting, i found a story heavily biased towards the real life of Alice Liddell and her relationship with Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll): this story is set several years after Charles’ death.
I’m not going to get into my views about Dodgson here, this is about DeAnna’s views, and she does a fairly good job of brushing over things (sweeping them under the carpet) and tidy things up in making a story out of Alice’s and Charles’ final years. Although, to be honest, i think that DeAnna just makes things worse: i’m left with the opinion that this story could be a nice little dose of Streisand effect for a lot of its readers.
And for those of you feeling the effects of Streisand, you can begin at Wikipedia. 
All that aside, it’s a fairly good read, and a must for all Alice and Wonderland fans: just expect it to be more about Alice reminiscing, through thoughts and dreams of Wonderland, than a pure Wonderland adventure. Sadly, there’s a few typos that detract on occasion, and that are so obvious they should have been easily fixed before publishing.
Final words, other than those few annoying typos, DeAnna’s a very good writer. The Queen of Stilled Hearts is in “The Pile” and i’m looking forward to giving that a read soon.
