Books shelved under “Fantasy”

As I reflected in my review of The Sleeper and the Spindle, fairytale retellings are all the rage. With The Wrath & the Dawn, we have a new take on One Thousand and One Nights. Unlike the original, the stories within the frame story fall by the wayside, for the most part, as Shahrzad’s relationship with Khalid intensifies. Renée Ahdieh’s reimagining, then, is less about retelling the stories from One Thousand and…

Fairytale retellings are sooooooo in these days, and probably with good reason. Fairytales are, in some ways, cultural bedrock. They are meant to be adapted, retold, reimagined with each new generation and new age. The popularity of such a practice fluctuates, but they are always there, beneath the surface, lurking and awaiting their next moment in the spotlight. Hollywood is incredibly talented at messing up its attempts to retell fairytales (although I have to admit,…

My review of Flannery has been pre-empted because as I write this I’m out of town (a rare occurrence). Rather than try to write that review without referring to the book for the choicest tidbits, I might as well review Anansi Boys, which I read during the combined three hours of flights I had on Tuesday evening. I previously read this book a while ago, but like many of Neil Gaiman’s novels, it was…

As a longtime fan of the Raine Benares series, I was excited when I learned that Lisa Shearin was self-publishing a seventh book. Although All Spell Breaks Loose was a satisfying conclusion to the Saghred saga, there seems like plenty of story left to tell about Raine and this world. Sure enough, Wedding Bells, Magic Spells begins just before Raine’s wedding to Mychael. At the same time, the Isle of Mid is playing host to…

So many feelings, not sure how to put it into words. Mistwood started off like its title: hazy but somewhat enervating in all its potential; as it condensed, the story and plot started narrowing until it almost missed the mark. Even a few days later, I’m not sure whether I think this is a good book or not. I guess the truth is that I liked so many parts of this book, but in other…

For a while I did not like this book. In fact, I was downright worried: was I really going to pan a Terry Pratchett book? Inconceivable! So I let out a sharp breath of relief when everything suddenly clicked and fell into place. Nation is a fun yet sensitive tale, full of Pratchett’s signature wit. I mean, how can you not enjoy exchanges like this?

“The thing about the trousermen is, they are very brave

…

Trigger warnings for discussions of suicide and Faustian bargains with eldritch beings.

Mean Girls is one of my favourite movies of all time. It was the first movie I ever purchased for myself on DVD. (If you are reading this in the future, kids, DVDs were the optical media of choice for storing video, back before Netflix just decided to store everything directly in your brain.) It’s a scathing, fun, moving look at the harmful…

So many friend reviews of this book—and so many opinions! It seems that The Eyre Affair is one of those books that some people love on first sight and others find incredibly tedious, confusing, or just unbelievable. I see elements of both, and so, more often than I would like, I find myself on the fence with these polarizing reads. It’s not a position I see as superior—if anything it smacks of indecision to me.…

One reason I love the Victorian novel? It’s remarkably self-aware. Victorian authors tend to have an appreciation of irony and can wield characters-as-social-commentary like nobody’s business. Victorian England was a time of immense social and technological change, novelists of that era tended to be of a position and background that gave them something to say and the means to say it. While I’m not here to condemn the novels of any other time period, I…

I love it when a book manages to surprise me! I picked this up from the library at a whim, no real expectations, but not overly optimistic from the vague description and some of the reviews I read here on Goodreads. Ash & Bramble gets likened to a Cinderella retelling, but that’s a bit like saying Hansel and Gretel: Witchhunters was a retelling of Hansel and Gretel—in that it is entirely inaccurate. Sarah Prineas…

Look, I know the writing is clunky and the kids read more like twelve-year-olds than the fifteen-year-olds they’re supposed to be. I know the story jerks about in stops and starts. I know Nicholas Flamel is a terrible role model and these kids should not be emulating him.

But. But.

I still really enjoyed The Alchemyst. And this is one of those times I’m glad I tend to wait a day or two before…

Finally caught up on this series, thanks to the magic of ordering stuff online and reading these relatively short novels back to back. The Brimstone Deception starts the day after The Dragon Conspiracy concludes. With such tight timing, it’s no coincidence that emotions and tensions continue to run high. Lisa Shearin advances Mac’s storyline even as she drops some more bombshells about the world of The SPI Files in general.

Already the plot of this…

These book titles remind of the titles of The Big Bang Theory episodes. First The Grendel Affair and then The Dragon Conspiracy. It’s cute, and hopefully Lisa Shearin won’t have to write so many that she starts to run out of ideas like that TV show….

In this sequel, Mac Fraser and Ian Byrne are investigating the theft of magical diamonds with bad mojo. There’s yet another rival dragon in town, this one a…

I am a big fan of Lisa Shearin’s Raine Benares series. I was stoked to hear she had a new series, this time urban fantasy set in our world, coming out. That was … three years ago. This is book one. What happened?

Life happened. The Grendel Affair came out during my last year teaching in England. No problem, I figured—I’ll buy it when I move back in August. Then August came around, and I…

This is an odd book. I'm pretty sure it’s good, but I’m not sure I liked it. It took me far longer to read Black Feathers than I usually take to read any book. Part of that was because I spent more time focused on other things over the past few weeks. Most of it, I think was avoidance. Joseph D’Lacey’s writing is good; don’t get me wrong. But I was never in a hurry…

Wow, reading some of the popular reviews on Goodreads, it seems like Hexed is a love-it-or-hate-it kind of novel. Except, of course, I have to be difficult: I neither loved nor hated this. I can see why people would come down in either camp. Michelle Krys delivers an unlikable protagonist, Indigo, who nevertheless tries to be better in the midst of a harsh world (high school) made all the harsher by a shadowy war where …

Many of the most seminal dystopian novels are chilling for the extent to which they depict a “new normal” of human existence. By this I mean that these novels don’t just portray people oppressed or living under the thumb of a ruling class or technologically-imposed social structure—no, the best dystopian novels create a world in which people are happy, or at least satisfied, with the new status quo. Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World…

In my previous review I talked in broad terms about why I enjoy Supernormal Step, because I just wanted to outline why it’s worth spending your precious time on a new webcomic/graphic novel.

In Volume 2 (Chapters 4–6 of the webcomic), M Lee Lunsford broadens our understanding of Fiona and the main cast, but not before Fiona temporarily leaves them behind in search of solitude. (Hint: That does not work out well for her.)

…

Serial webcomics are hard. Pacing and scheduling are a must, and even we readers can have trouble keeping plotlines straight. I completely understand why some people don't follow a comic regularly but instead binge every few weeks after a chapter has finished.

Supernormal Step is one of my favourite webcomics and one of the few serial webcomics I read regularly. It's about Fiona Dae, a woman pulled into a strange parallel universe where magic exists…

I'm always down for some historical/mythological fiction in a comedic style, so The Table of Less Valued Knights seemed like a good proposition. Marie Phillips delivers an Arthurian quest beset with archetypes, allusions, and anachronisms. Her characters quip like they're in a Christopher Moore novel (albeit slightly less self-aware) and her vision of Knights of Camelot is every bit as decadently absurd as Monty Python's.

There. Have I name-dropped enough comparisons yet? Good. Let's get…