Book Review: The Green Man’s Heir by Juliet McKenna
The story of Daniel Mackmain, son of a Dryad, inspired by Juliet McKenna’s 2012 story “The Roots of Aston Quercus”, is told in her new novel, The Green Man’s Heir. The Green Man’s Heir combines a strong sense of place with a confident use of rural fantasy to create a strong character and excellent worldbuilding.
Book Review: Born to the Blade by Mike Underwood, Cassandra Khaw, Marie Brennan and Malka Older
Imagine a place where diverse and very different polities come to meet, to trade, to conduct diplomacy, to intrigue. Amidst large and scheming powers in a world on the edge of conflict and war, this is a shining beacon, all alone in the night. Imagine a group of ambassadors who come to meet at this place. They have agendas, factions, goals, hopes, fears that they bring with them from across known space. And what they do will not only change their lives, but the destinies of worlds far beyond theirs. No, this is not Babylon 5*. For this place is a trio of islands in the sky; the diplomats and ambassadors are skilled with swords and blade-based magic. Welcome to the world of Serial Box’s latest serial, Born to the Blade.
Book Review: The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang
In a secondary fantasy world inspired by early 20th Century China, a young woman’s determination and drive to succeed and excel at any cost runs into the horrors of war, conflict and ancient, suppressed forces in R. F. Kuang’s excellent debut novel, The Poppy War.
Book Review: Age of Assassins and Blood of Assassins by RJ Barker
RJ Barker’s Wounded Kingdoms Trilogy in its first two volumes, Age of Assassins and Blood of Assassins, combines a straightforward western fantasy world with deeper and more intriguing worldbuilding with a flawed and unusual protagonist to good effect. The two novels, together with the forthcoming third, tell a story of an apprentice assassin who slowly emerges into a figure that helps shape the destiny of an entire kingdom.
Book Review: Bookburners Season 3
With the publication of an omnibus edition, the Bookburners, one of the serial stories from Serial Box, comes to officially cap its third season and prepare the ground for the fourth. Bookburners is hardly the only serial from Serial Box, as the release of this third omnibus joyfully coincides with the release of omnibus editions of Tremontaine Season 3, and ReMade Season 2.
Book Review: Jade City by Fonda Lee
In an alternate world where a small island carries both a magical material and the scions who can wield it, the aftermath of a world war that consumed and wrapped up even the island is a tricky and dangerous time. The city of Janloon on the island of Kekon is a fraught place, with the clans that helped liberate the island kingdom from foreign occupation now the temporal behind-the-scenes powers that rule Janloon and the island of Kekon itself. After years of quiet small scale conflict, however, a change in leadership of the No Peak clan provides their stronger rival, the Mountain Clan, with a chance to push and push their advantage, to do to the No Peak what they have done to several of their smaller rivals already—to conquer it.
