Imagine there was a supernatural chiller that Hammer Films never made. A grand epic produced at the studio’s peak, which played like a cross between the Dracula and Frankenstein films and Dr Terror’s House of Horrors… Four passengers meet on a train journey through Eastern Europe during the First World War, and face a mystery that must be solved if they are to survive. As the Arkangel races through war-torn country side, t...
According to the Mayan calendar we only have until 21st December 2012 until the world ends. With that in mind, and the fact that John Cusack hasn’t arrived with a limousine to whisk us off to safety just yet, I suggest we spend the time together reading some great new books. I could have easily included many, many more novels on this list but these are the baker’s dozen that I am currently very excited about. I have included...
I do hope everyone is having a relaxing festive season, I know I am. Some new reviews on the way next week but until then how about a public service announcement from the dark forces behind the rather splendid Anarchy Books. I’ve added in a link to the original reviews for the titles I’ve read. Hopefully that will help you make an informed decision. Personally I’d take em all! Press Release – Anarchy Books – F...
All the reviews for 2011 are done and dusted but I thought I would share the following press release that dropped into my inbox this morning. A review will follow in early 2012. Vivisepulture edited by Andy Remic & Wayne Simmons Welcome to our anthology, a collection of weird and bizarre tales of twisted imagination by Neal Asher, Tony Ballantyne, Eric Brown, Richard Ford, Ian Graham, Lee Harris, Colin Harvey, Vincent Holland-Keen, ...
2011 has been another great year for books. First off a few stats – I have managed to read eighty-two novels which works out at over six and a half books a month. After a swift and very rough calculation that works out at approximately 6,150000 words. Some were bad, some were good and some were even great. I thought it would be nice to round off this festive season with a little bit of review. Firstly, my books of the month Januar...
Daniel Cole wants the world to end. Returned home from the Great War, his parents and brother in their graves, Daniel walks a ghost world. When players in a theatre show lure Daniel and his friends, fellow soldiers, into a surreal otherworld they find themselves trapped on an apocalyptic path. A pirate ship, helmed by Death, waits to ferry some of them to the end of the world. Already broken by war, these men are now the world’s...
Jake Reese is an ordinary guy with an ordinary job, trying to block out the memory of his violent past by planning for the future with his new wife, Diane. But the past has a habit of refusing to stay buried… When two men attack Jake in a car park and cut off his ring finger, he tries to dismiss it as an unlucky case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But when events take a more sinister turn and Diane goes missing, Ja...
1494 Barcelona As Torquemada lights the fires of religious fervor throughout the cities of Spain, accused heretics are not the only victims. Thousands of books and manuscripts are lost as the Black Friars attempt to purge Europe of the ancient secrets of the gods and the bold new ideas that are ushering the Renaissance. Nadira lives a dreary life as servant to a wealthy spice merchant until a dying scholar is brought to the merchant&#...
How can one plucky orphan girl save the world from ultimate destruction? Born into captivity as a product of the Royal Breeding House, lonely orphan Purity Drake suddenly finds herself on the run with a foreign vagrant after accidentally killing one of her guards. Her mysterious rescuer claims to have escaped from terrible forces who mean to enslave the Kingdom of Jackals as they conquered his own nation. Purity doubts the story, unt...
The Ant-headed God ‘The Great Maurr’ has ascended to rule the Earth and enslave the population. These are the chronicles of the last few survivors. Only three cities remain: Moscow, London and Hong Kong. All crumbling, dying versions of their former glory. The Great Maurr’s own City of Hell dominates most of North America. Its diabolical influence has turned ordinary citizens into torturers, debased slaves, lunatics and zealo...
My favourite thing in the world – books. My second favourite – movies. If only there was some way to combine the two? Oh joy! According to this press release there is. TOP SOUTH AFRICAN PRODUCER WINS COVETED FILM RIGHTS IN INTERNATIONAL ‘BID FEST’ TO MULTIPLE AWARD-WINNING AND BESTELLING NOVEL “ZOO CITY” by SOUTH AFRICAN AUTHOR LAUREN BEUKES “Beukes’ energetic noir phantasmagoria, the winn...
Son of a knight and aspirant to the Round Table, Alymere yearns to take his place in the world, and for a quest to prove his worth. He comes across the foul Devil’s Bible – said to have been written in one night by an insane hermit – which leads and drives him, by turns, to seek the unholy Black Chalice. On his quest he will face, and overcome dire obstacles and cunning enemies, becoming a knight of renown; but the ult...
In 1348, England is stricken by the Black Death. The worst pandemic in human history has reached the kingdom of the warlike Edward III, a monarch who in battle against human adversaries cannot imagine defeat. Two thirds of his subjects now perish. Woods become wild again, farmland goes to rack and ruin, villages, towns and castles are left empty, inhabited only by ghosts. Little wonder that fear of the supernatural reaches an all-...