Book #43 of 2021: Snuff by Terry Pratchett (Discworld #39) Another fine comic adventure, but not quite up to author Terry Pratchett’s best work, which makes it all the more regrettable that this is where we leave the stalwart Commander Sam Vimes of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch. The writer finished just one or two further …
Tag Archives: fantasy
Book Review: The Mirror of Her Dreams by Stephen R. Donaldson
Book #41 of 2021: The Mirror of Her Dreams by Stephen R. Donaldson (Mordant’s Need #1) As with many of author Stephen R. Donaldson’s works, I have some complicated feelings towards the Mordant’s Need duology, and especially this first volume. In terms of worldbuilding and atmosphere, the story is top-notch. The mirror-based magical system is …
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Book Review: Over the Woodward Wall by A. Deborah Baker
Book #36 of 2021: Over the Woodward Wall by A. Deborah Baker (The Up-and-Under #1) This is a cute children’s fantasy adventure, sort of like a cross between The Phantom Tollbooth and L. Frank Baum’s classic Oz series. It’s also a bit metatextual, as “A. Deborah Baker” is a pen name for the real author …
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Book Review: The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones
Book #35 of 2021: The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones It’s always neat to see a fantasy story built on Welsh mythology, but the plot to this one is a slower and pretty generic quest narrative, and I haven’t quite found the protagonists interesting enough to justify spending so much of the novel with just …
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Book Review: The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis
Book #33 of 2021: The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia #7) What a depressing and offensive conclusion to a generally solid children’s fantasy heptalogy. Author C. S. Lewis has always had his share of mid-twentieth-century hangups, but they are seldom so blatantly awful as here, where traditional feminine interests like …
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Book Review: When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain by Nghi Vo
Book #30 of 2021: When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain by Nghi Vo (The Singing Hills Cycle #2) Not quite as powerfully moving as the previous novella, but still well above much of the fantasy genre. In this story, returning protagonist Cleric Chih is waylaid on their travels by a pack of hungry tigresses, …
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Book Review: The Courts of Chaos by Roger Zelazny
Book #29 of 2021: The Courts of Chaos by Roger Zelazny (The Chronicles of Amber #5) These Amber sequels have never really lived up to the promise of their series debut, and since this fifth book brings the initial story arc to a close, I think it’s a good moment to cut my losses and …
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Book Review: Labyrinth Lost by Zoraida Córdova
Book #26 of 2021: Labyrinth Lost by Zoraida Córdova (Brooklyn Brujas #1) A fun #ownvoices fantasy built on indigenous Latinx mythology, rather like Percy Jackson in aiming for the younger side of the YA market. The plot is a classic careful-what-you-wish-for scenario, in which a teenager frightened by her family’s magic tries to lose her …
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Book Review: Eternal Life by Dara Horn
Book #25 of 2021: Eternal Life by Dara Horn I love a good story about angsty immortals, but it’s possible I read this one too soon after last year’s The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, which explores a similar thematic territory far more movingly. In this 2018 novel, the protagonist is a woman who doesn’t …
Book Review: Maresi by Maria Turtschaninoff
Book #22 of 2021: Maresi by Maria Turtschaninoff (The Red Abbey Chronicles #1) Interesting fantasy worldbuilding, but the characters can seem a bit simplistic at times and the plot doesn’t really kick in until midway through, when a raiding ship attacks the island refuge where the heroine lives as an abbey novice. It gets pretty …
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