Please note, The Shattered Realm of Ardor Benn is a direct sequel to The Thousand Deaths of Ardor Benn. If you haven’t read the first book in the Kingdom of Grit series what follows may contain some minor spoilers. Dont say I didn’t warn you. Ardor Benn saved civilisation from imminent destruction, but his efforts brought war to the kingdom. It is believed that the rightful rulers have all been assassinated. However, a young heir might have survived. An ancient organisation known as The Realm is behind the chaos, working from the shadows. Under the anonymity of masks, information is distributed sparingly. Ard’s been hired to infiltrate them, but he’s got competition from an old friend. One who’s set to prove she’s better than the self-proclaimed ‘Ruse Artist Extraordinaire.’ If Ard can’t find the heir, then his world may again approach ruin. Stopping the complete and utter collapse of civilisation is quickly becoming Ard’s speciality. The Thousand Deaths of Ardor Benn was one of my favourite debut novels over the last few years. It features a rascally conman with a flair for the dramatic, a dash of political and religious intrigue and an angry dragon to boot. It’s all good…

Please note, The Saints of Salvation is the final book in The Salvation Sequence. If you haven’t read Salvation and Salvation Lost then what follows is going to contain some minor spoilers. My advice would be to toddle off and read them both first. You can thank me later.  Live in hiding – or die for freedom Humanity welcomed the Olyix and their utopian technology. But mankind was tricked. Now these visitors are extracting a terrible price. For two years, the Olyix have laid siege to Earth, harvesting its people for their god. One by one, cities are falling to their devastating weaponry. And while millions have fled to seek refuge in space, others continue to fight an apparently unwinnable war. As Earth’s defeat draws near, a team attempts to infiltrate the Salvation of Life – the Olyix’s arkship. If it succeeds, those chosen will travel to a hidden enclave thousands of light years away. Once there, they must signal its location to future generations, to bring the battle to the enemy. Maybe allies scattered throughout space and time can join forces. Yet in the far future, humanity are still hunted by their ancient adversary. And as forces battle on…

Bike messenger and wannabe troublemaker Olly Soames is the newest recruit to DedSec’s Resistance movement, but when a stranger is shot dead in front of him, he realizes that danger is closer than he thinks… Sarah Lincoln is an aggressive young politician with questionable methods and big ambitions, and when a string of murders unfolds in her borough, it may be the opportunity she has been looking for to make a name for herself… Ex-MMA fighter turned leg-breaker Ro Hayes is in deep with the vicious Clan Kelley, the most brutal organized crime firm in the city’s underworld, and her survival rests on uncovering a dead man’s secrets… And for Danny, Ro’s estranged brother and former soldier, his new career with private military contractor Albion is leading him down a very dark path, toward choices he may never be able to take back… Four lives are drawn into a murderous conspiracy that threatens to destroy Dedsec and plunge the city of London into chaos. Something very bad is going down in London town… I’ll admit it, I’m a casual gamer at best. I pootle around on my PS4* dipping in and out of titles as the mood takes me. It…

Dragons. Art. Revolution. Gyen Jebi isn’t a fighter or a subversive. They just want to paint. One day they’re jobless and desperate; the next, Jebi finds themself recruited by the Ministry of Armor to paint the mystical sigils that animate the occupying government’s automaton soldiers. But when Jebi discovers the depths of the Razanei government’s horrifying crimes—and the awful source of the magical pigments they use—they find they can no longer stay out of politics. What they can do is steal Arazi, the ministry’s mighty dragon automaton, and find a way to fight… This week’s review is the new fantasy novel Phoenix Extravagant by Yoon Ha Lee. In many respects the novel’s main protagonist, Gyen Jebi, is an innocent. They are so caught up in their desire to create, they are oblivious to the political upheaval going on all around them. Circumstance leads Jebi to find a new job in a government ministry. They meet a strange woman called Dzuge Vei. The intense relationship that develops between them changes them both at a fundamental level. Politics plays an important part in the novel’s narrative. The story chronicles events unfolding in a country under occupation. The Razanei forces are keen to…

In a slightly alternate London in 1983, Susan Arkshaw is looking for her father, a man she has never met. Crime boss Frank Thringley might be able to help her, but Susan doesn’t get time to ask Frank any questions before he is turned to dust by the prick of a silver hatpin in the hands of the outrageously attractive Merlin. Merlin is a young left-handed bookseller (one of the fighting ones), who with the right-handed booksellers (the intellectual ones), are an extended family of magical beings who police the mythic and legendary Old World when it intrudes on the modern world, in addition to running several bookshops. Susan’s search for her father begins with her mother’s possibly misremembered or misspelt surnames, a reading room ticket, and a silver cigarette case engraved with something that might be a coat of arms. Merlin has a quest of his own, to find the Old World entity who used ordinary criminals to kill his mother. As he and his sister, the right-handed bookseller Vivien, tread in the path of a botched or covered-up police investigation from years past, they find this quest strangely overlaps with Susan’s. Who or what was her father? Susan,…

Please note, Dead Man in a Ditch is a direct sequel to the first Fetch Phillips novel, The Last Smile in Sunder City. If you want my advice, if you haven’t already, I would start there. If you don’t what follows may contain some minor spoilers. Consider yourselves suitably warned. The name’s Fetch Phillips — what do you need? Cover a Gnome with a crossbow while he does a dodgy deal? Sure. Find out who killed Lance Niles, the big-shot businessman who just arrived in town? I’ll give it shot. Help an old-lady Elf track down her husband’s murderer? That’s right up my alley. What I don’t do, because it’s impossible, is search for a way to bring the goddamn magic back. Rumors got out about what happened with the Professor, so now people keep asking me to fix the world. But there’s no magic in this story. Just dead friends, twisted miracles, and a secret machine made to deliver a single shot of murder. Earlier this year I read Luke Arnold’s debut novel, The Last Smile in Sunder City. The novel introduced us to Fetch Phillips, a human detective trying to get by in a city full of all…

Please note The Trials of Koli is a direct sequel to The Book of Koli. If you haven’t read book one of The Rampart trilogy the review that follows will likely contain minor spoilers. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Beyond the walls of Koli’s small village lies a fearsome landscape filled with choker trees, vicious beasts and shunned men. As an exile, Koli’s been forced to journey out into this mysterious, hostile world. But he heard a story, once. A story about lost London, and the mysterious tech of the Old Times that may still be there. If Koli can find it, there may still be a way for him to redeem himself – by saving what’s left of humankind. I’m on holiday this week, and the plan was to take a break from the reading and reviewing. It’s not often I get the opportunity to recharge the old mental batteries. All was going to plan until I spotted The Trials of Koli by M R Carey on my leaning tower of books. I couldn’t help but start reading, and once I had done that, I just couldn’t wait to share my thoughts. I read the first book in…

You know the drill. What follows is the review of the second book in a trilogy. If you’ve not read book one in this series, A Little Hatred, then it is likely there may be minor spoilers ahead. Do not tell me later that you haven’t been suitably warned. Conspiracy. Betrayal. Rebellion. Peace is just another kind of battlefield . . . Savine dan Glokta, once Adua’s most powerful investor, finds her judgement, fortune and reputation in tatters. But she still has all her ambitions, and no scruple will be permitted to stand in her way. For heroes like Leo dan Brock and Stour Nightfall, only happy with swords drawn, peace is an ordeal to end as soon as possible. But grievances must be nursed, power seized and allies gathered first, while Rikke must master the power of the Long Eye . . . before it kills her. The Breakers still lurk in the shadows, plotting to free the common man from his shackles, while noblemen bicker for their own advantage. Orso struggles to find a safe path through the maze of knives that is politics, only for his enemies, and his debts, to multiply. The old ways are swept…

The emperor’s reign has lasted for decades, his mastery of bone shard magic powering the animal-like constructs that maintain law and order. But now his rule is failing, and revolution is sweeping across the Empire’s many islands. Lin is the emperor’s daughter and spends her days trapped in a palace of locked doors and dark secrets. When her father refuses to recognise her as heir to the throne, she vows to prove her worth by mastering the forbidden art of bone shard magic. Yet such power carries a great cost, and when the revolution reaches the gates of the palace, Lin must decide how far she is willing to go to claim her birthright – and save her people. In an empire made up of floating islands, adrift on a vast endless sea, an old emperor spends his time honing his magical skill. He picks apart the building blocks of creation while ignoring the suffering of the people he once pledged to protect. The system the Emperor created is failing, and the need for change grows stronger every day. Lin, the Emperor’s daughter, knows that something is fundamentally wrong. She just can’t quite put her finger on exactly what the…

Please note, A Burning Sea is book three in The Wanderer Chronicles. It is highly likely that the following review will contain minor spoilers if you have not read books one and two. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Erlan Aurvandil has turned his back on the past and his native Northern lands, taking a perilous journey to the greatest city in the world, Constantinople. But as his voyage ends, Erlan is brutally betrayed, captured and enslaved by a powerful Byzantine general. Meanwhile, Lilla Sviggarsdottir, Queen of Svealand, has lost her husband and with him, her father’s kingdom. Her life in danger, Lilla escapes to find Erlan, the one man who can save her, following his trail to the very gates of Constantinople. But corruption infests the city, and a dark tide is rising against the Emperor from within his own court. As the shadows darken and whispers of war begin to strengthen, Erlan’s fate becomes intertwined with that of the city. Are they both doomed to fall, or can freedom be won in the blood of battle? The first two books of The Wanderer Chronicles, A Mighty Dawn and A Sacred Storm are two of my favourite historical fiction…

Everyone knows the story of Joan of Arc, a peasant girl who put Charles VII on the throne and spearheaded France’s victory over Britain before being burned by the English as a heretic and witch. But things are not always as they appear. Jeanne d’Arc was only five when three angels and saints first came to her. Shrouded by a halo of heavenly light, she believed their claim to be holy. The Archangel Michael and Saint Margaret told her she was the foretold Warrior Maid of Lorraine, fated to free France and put a king upon his throne. Saint Catherine made her promise to obey their commands and embrace her destiny; the three saints would guide her every step. Jeanne bound herself to these creatures without knowing what she’d done. As she got older, Jeanne grew to mistrust and fear the voices, and they didn’t hesitate to punish her cruelly for disobedience. She quickly learned that their cherished prophecy was more important than the girl expected to make it come true. Jeanne is only a shepherd’s daughter, not the Warrior Maid of the prophecy, but she is stubborn and rebellious, and finds ways to avoid doing – and being –…

In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet up once a week to investigate unsolved killings. But when a local property developer shows up dead, ‘The Thursday Murder Club’ find themselves in the middle of their first live case.  The four friends, Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron, might be pushing eighty but they still have a few tricks up their sleeves. Can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer, before it’s too late?  There is a wonderfully eccentric little sub-set of the crime genre that – in a phrase I’ve coined myself – can best be described as British Comfortable. You know the sort of thing – Lovejoy, Hamish MacBeth, Hetty Wainthrop, and Father Brown. The list goes on and on. In British Comfortable, murders happen, but usually only to people who are entirely deserving of a gruesome fate. The latest entry into this cosy group is The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman*. The author has a keen eye when it comes to exposing all those little quirks that come together to create a truly memorable character; or, in this case, four memorable characters. The main quartet of The Thursday Murder Club are an absolute joy. Elizabeth…

For ex-Navy SEAL Jon Hayes, the super-powered ‘costumes’ are just part of ordinary life in New York City, until the day his pregnant wife Melanie is senselessly killed in a clash between Captain Light and The Jade Shade. But as Hayes struggles to come to terms with his loss, and questions for the first time who the costumes are and where they come from, the once sharp lines of his reality begin to blur… If Hayes wants to uncover the shocking truth about the figures behind the costumes, and get justice for his fallen family, he’ll have to step out of the background, and stop being a bystander. In Bystander 27 by Rik Hoskin, superheroes and supervillains are a fact of life. They are famous, or infamous, depending on what side they are on. We get to follow a single man, Jon Hayes, as his entire existence is changed at a fundamental level by a seemingly random, horrific event that involves the biggest hero in New York. Those of you who have read or watched The Boys are going to see, at least initially, similarities between Hayes and Wee Hughie’s origin story, but don’t worry that doesn’t last for long….