Accused of practising pagan magicks, a young boy flees for his life… In fear for her life, a woman suffering from a mysterious illness is forced to break out of the mine where she has been enslaved… An innocent warrior is exiled by the holy man of this mountain tribe and told to make his own way in the world…  In the Empire of the Saviours, The People are forced to live in fortified towns. Their walls are guarded by an army of Heroes, whose task is to keep marauding pagans out as much as it is to keep the People inside. Several times a year, living Saints visit the towns to exact the Saviours’ tithe from all those coming of age – a tithe often paid in blood. When a young boy, Jillan, unleashes pagan magicks in an accident, his whole town turns against him. He goes on the run, but what hope can there be when the Saviours and the entire Empire decide he mud be caught? Last year I read Necromancer’s Gambit by A J Dalton and, although I had some issues with the editing, overall I enjoyed the dark fantasy that the author created. You can’t ever go…

Day of Demons is a collection of powerful stories featuring the conflict of demons and humans over the course of a day. Read how one women’s inner-self awakens to unexpected and frightening consequences, or how a charismatic half-breed thief is forced to strike a deal with a pen-stealing imp. Read about a mother as she struggles to cope with a deadly, satanic bargain, and a sword-wielding anti-hero as he returns out of exile to face his demonic fate. Nine stories, nine demons, nine authors. From fantasy, to horror, to contemporary fiction, this anthology will fright, delight and grip you with tales of daring-do, danger and of course — demons. Last year Anachron Press launched with the rather marvellous anthology, City of Hell. This week sees the launch of the second collection from this fledgling publisher. The Deal by Karen Davies – A fantastical tale that follows a young adventurer who learns the hard way that coming to an agreement with even the lowliest of demons can cause you no end of grief. A nice balance of action, humour and re-interpretation of classic genre tropes gets things off to a great start. The ending is left wide open and I’d love…

When Tudor explorers returned from the New World, they brought back a name out of half-forgotten Viking legend: skraylings. Red-sailed ships followed in the explorers’ wake, bringing Native American goods – and a skrayling ambassador – to London. But what do these seemingly magical beings really want in Elizabeth I’s capital? Mal Catlyn, a down-at-heel swordsman, is seconded to the ambassador’s bodyguard, but assassination attempts are the least of his problems. What he learns about the skraylings and their unholy powers could cost England her new ally – and Mal Catlyn his soul. Maliverny ‘Mal’ Catyln is a suitably heroic sort and he certainly typifies what you would expect from an Elizabethan dashing blade.  Driven to protect Queen and country, he throws himself into his role and won’t let anything stop him. Mal has a  roguish charm and his mix of easy manner and strong resolve make him a perfect protagonist. Though Mal is an interesting lead, there were a couple of other characters that I was more taken with. Coby is a teenage girl who is forced to live her life pretending to be a boy, calling herself Jacob, in order to survive on her own. She is intelligent, inquisitive…

Please note A Clash of Kings is the second novel in an on-going series and may therefore contain potential spoilers for anyone who has not read book one of the series, A Game of Thrones. Proceed at your own peril.  The price of glory From the ancient citadel of Dragonstone to the forbidding shores of Winterfell, chaos reigns as pretenders to the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms prepare to stake their claims. As a prophecy of doom cuts across the sky – a comet the colour of blood and flame – five factions struggle for control of a divided land. Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, the price of glory is measured in blood. Almost a year ago I finally got around to reading the first novel in the saga A Song of Ice and Fire. I had actively avoided A Game of Thrones for a long time because, if I’m being honest, I was a little intimidated by the hugeness of it all. By the time I started reading there were already four novels available and the fifth was on the horizon. After completing, and enjoying, the first book I had significantly revised my…

Rough music: (- n) a loud cacophony created with tin pans, drums, etc,; the cacophonous ringing of bells, hooting, blowing bull’s horns, the banging of frying pans, saucepans, kettles, or other kitchen or barn implements with the intention of creating long-lasting embarrassment. Sometimes, the sounds we hear in the dark have resonances that we cannot foresee… This story has a wonderfully simple premise and can check this content experience that beautiful premise. A man, called Cornish, is woken every night by a noise that only he can hear. Over a series of successive nights, the noise gets louder and louder and when he discovers the source he is forced to confront the truth behind the lies in his life. I liked the sense of ambiguity and uncertainty that flows through the narrative of this story. Is Cornish merely projecting his internal turmoil, are all the events he witnesses occurring just in his head or is something more sinister going on? As the plot unfolds the reader is given the opportunity to interpret the events that occur and draw their own conclusions from Cornish’s reactions. I read Rough Music a couple of times over the course of a few days and…

Meet Sam Thornton. He collects souls.  Sam’s job is to collect the souls of the damned, and ensure they are dispatched to the appropriate destination. But when he’s sent to collect the soul of a young woman he believes to be innocent of the horrific crime that’s doomed her to Hell, he says something no Collector has ever said before.  “No.” I have a confession to make – My name is Pablo and I’m an addict, I’m hooked on Angry Robot books. There I’ve said it, feels good to finally get it out there into the open. Things got so bad that I’ve actively avoided Angry Robot publications for the last couple of months. Ever since I pronounced them my publisher of 2011 in December, I realised that I had to go ‘cold turkey’ for a while. There was a serious danger of me reading nothing but Angry Robot books all the time and getting stuck on one publisher doesn’t work terribly well if you are a book reviewer. Up until very recently I’ve done quite well. There has been the odd wobble (I’m looking at you Empire State), but with the exception of that one lapse my life has been…

For centuries it has been locked away  Lost beneath the sea  Warded from earth, air, water, fire, spirits, thought and sight. But now magic is rising to the world once more. Gavin has given up on the adults in his life, and they’ve given up on him. His father appears to hate him, his mother is scared of him, his teachers think maybe he should be in a different school. What he has is a gift – one he neither wants nor understands. At fifteen, his closest friend and confidante is the mysterious Miss Grey, although he has given up trying to talk to people about her as it only seems to upset them. Turned out of school, and not included in his parents’ holiday plans he catches a train to what may be his last haven; his aunt Gwen in Cornwall. However, she is not there to meet him. Instead the weather is turning bad, and unnerving things are stirring. Gavin is at that difficult age between childhood and being an adult. He is filled with uncertainty and he doesn’t seem to fit in anywhere. When the reader is first introduced to him you aren’t given a great deal of…

Last year I had the good fortune to read The Kill Crew and then Meat by Joseph D’Lacey. Each were superb examples of the horror genre, both are darkly bleak but utterly compelling. D’Lacey’s latest publication is Snake Eyes, a single volume split into two separate novellas. This is a slight departure for the author as the first story moves into the realms of science fiction while the second has a more fantastical tone. A Man of Will and Experience – Robert Johnson dreams of spiders, thousands of them. When he wakes, the true nightmare begins: a tube has been attached to his head – to everyone’s – but he’s the only one aware of it. His cosy suburban life unravels into paranoid hallucination as Johnson fights to free himself from the control of unseen forces. I don’t want to delve to deeply into the plot, I believe that part of the enjoyment of this particular story is making discoveries yourself, but what I will say is be prepared to explore a landscape that shifts on more than one occasion. Be ready for an experience that feels akin to reading without the aid of a safety net. The story veers off…

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 only hope in the greatest battle of all. Earlier this year, I had the opportunity to read the short story Nowhere Hall by Cate Gardner. I enjoyed it a great deal, and when the chance to read more of her work arose I jumped at it. Like an expertly crafted piece of classical music, Theatre of Curious Acts has many layers to explore, and it works very effectively on multiple levels. It can be read as a straightforward horror story, and there is certainly enough startling imagery to please the most hardened horror fan, but there is also a psychological element in play that is just as effective. Are the events unfolding all in Daniel’s head? Are Daniel and his comrades alive or already…

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’s stable, beaten by mercenaries who are on the hunt for The Hermetica of Elysium. To Nadira, words are her life: she lives them as her masters scrivener and dreams them in her mother’s poetry. She is pursued as passionately as the fabled manuscript for her rare skill as a reader of Ancient Greek, Latin, Arabic and Hebrew that maker her valuable to men who pursue the book to exploit its magic. Kidnapped by Baron Montrose, an adventurous nobleman, she is forced to read from the Hermetica. It is soon revealed to her that ideas and words are more powerful that steel or fire for within its pages are the words that incite the Dominicans to religious fervor, give the Templars their power and reveal the…

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 ultimate threat is to his very soul. It’s typical isn’t it? It turns out that stories about knights are like buses. You wait for one to arrive and then two appear at the same time. No sooner had I finished King Death by Paul Finch, I then noticed that the next book on my TBR pile was The Black Chalice by Steven Savile. (Possibly not the best planning in the world on my part but we’ll gloss over that shall we?). The Black Chalice is the first in a series from Abaddon Books called Malory’s Knights of Albion. The premise of this series is outlined in the novel’s introduction and describes the set-up perfectly. Found in a church vestry…

The Viking, King Authun leads his men on a raid against an Anglo-Saxon village. Men and women are killed indiscriminately but Authun demands that no child be touched. He is acting on prophecy. A prophecy that tells him that the Saxons have stolen a child from the Gods. If Authun, in turn, takes the child and raises him as an heir, the child will lead his people to glory. But Authun discovers not one child, but twin baby boys. Ensuring that his faithful warriors, witnesses to what has happened, die during the raid Authun takes the children and their mother home, back to the witches who live on the troll wall. And he places his destiny in their hands. And so begins a stunning multi-volume fantasy epic that will take a werewolf from his beginnings as the heir to a brutal Viking king, down through the ages. It is a journey that will see him hunt for his lost love through centuries and lives, and see the endless battle between the wolf, Odin and Loki – the eternal trickster – spill over into countless bloody conflicts from our history, and over into our lives.  I’ll start with a small confession….

Wuruyaaria: city of werewolves, whose raiders range over the dying northlands, capturing human beings for slaves or meat. Wuruyaaria: where a lone immortal maker wages a secret war against the Strange Gods of the Coranians. Wuruyaaria: a democracy where some are more equal than others, and a faction of outcast werewolves is determined to change the balance of power in a long, bloody election year. Their plans are laid; the challenges known; the risks accepted. But all schemes will shatter in the clash between two threats few had foreseen and none had fully understood: a monster from the north on a mission to poison the world and a stranger from the south named Morlock Ambrosius When I first saw the cover for The Wolf Age by James Enge I knew that I wanted it to be included in Werewolf Appreciation Month. Broody looking hooded figure with a magic sword fighting off hordes of evil looking werewolves. It looked like it would be an absolutely perfect fit. I couldn’t help but love this book could I? I immediately rushed off to Amazon and purchased an imported copy, I’m not sure but I don’t think the book has been officially released in…