Let’s start this off honestly. I only picked up this book because I’m trying to be less of a snob. Both about this type of fantasy (urban pop romance, I would call it) and about authors who are as prolific as Ms. Day (the first three books of this series were published in the same year). Eve of Darkness did nothing to dispel my disdain for this type of novel because Eve of Darkness is terrible on many, many levels. Basically all of them that […]
CBR Review #2: Alanna: The First Adventure
The book cover I’m using is the original cover for the first edition of this book, from back in 1982 (I think). To me, this is the only cover that I even acknowledge. It’s the first one I saw, and the best one. It’s so evocative of the story, whereas the newer ones are just blah. I review this book over on my blog. Sorry, my site is slow. I need my husband to upgrade the hosting to a *faster* site, but he’s cheap. […]
Ms. Marvel; the Delight of the Origin Story
You must have heard about Ms. Marvel – it’s the most important comic of 2014; it even says so on the cover! What’s so important about it? The new Ms. Marvel, Kamala, is a muslim. I cannot believe that it’s 2015 and stories with non-white, non-Christian people is still such a big thing. It is a step in the right direction though, that is; it’s another story. So this review will focus on the actual story. Which is an origin story. I love a good […]
Slick As Sh*t
There is a very deliberate sort of chaos in Perdido Street Station. Everything about it is designed to force square pegs into the rounder, well-worn holes of our expectations for fantasy and horror. Its pages are occupied by fantastical races, but their separation from humanity is stark and marked. There are no beautiful elves or noble dwarves found in New Crobuzon, but there are frog-like vodyanoi and beetle-headed khepri and culturally alien bird-folk and inconveniently spiny cactus people and…and…and… There is a very deliberate […]