Adrian Collins's Blog, page 22

REVIEW: A Claiming of Souls by R.A. Sandpiper

A Claiming of Souls is finally here, and it’s absolutely nothing short of suri-eal what R.A. Sandpiper accomplishes in this epic and soul-stirring conclusion to the Amefyre trilogy. Filled with equal parts action and emotion, love and loss, and heart and hurt, this is truly everything you could wish for from a grimdark romantic fantasy.

After the intensely bittersweet ending of A Promise of Blood, I was beyond excited (okay, and quite nervous) to dive into the grand finale to Kol and Suri’s story. In some ways, they are stronger than ever, yet at the same time things have never looked so dire for our precious broken babes; a soul has been taken, a prophecy remains unfulfilled, and a war comes ever closer to destroying all they know and love as threats both human and divine grow more deadly dangerous with each passing second. In other words, the stakes are high, the emotions run even higher, and absolutely zero punches are pulled.

Honestly, it almost feels unreal how far we’ve come with these characters since the start of A Pocket of Lies. I already loved Suri’s well-earned growth over the course of book 2, but I think she really gets her time to shine in A Claiming of Souls. Yes, she is still so realistically flawed and more scarred than ever on both a physical and an emotional level, but I found it beautiful to see how she has gone from being a selfish and stupidly impulsive thief to an absolutely badass reluctant hero who will stop at nothing to protect the people she loves; people who she never, ever could have imagined loving in the first place.

Seriously, I think the unexpected development of all the complex interpersonal relationships that lie at the heart of this story was just as surprising to me as it was to Suri herself, and I loved how both the multi-book slow-burn enemies to lovers romance and the heartfelt found family vibes came to their peak in A Claiming of Souls. I mean, it’s so common for me to lose interest in the relationship(s) over the course of a fantasy romance series, but I loved how Sandpiper avoided that here by continuing to explore new hidden depths to the characters and keeping a believable level of tension without creating unnecessary, melodramatic conflict.

Be it my dark, broody, and fiercely protective marshmallow of a Dark Lord Kol (please don’t tell Suri I was probably swooning even harder over him than she was, I don’t want her to hunt me down), the suave and sarcastic heartthrob Nadrian (a.k.a the true MVP of this story), or my fearsome sapphic ladies Scilla and Viantha (where do I sign up for their spin-off series?!); this entire ragtag crew of broken souls just has my heart, and I loved revelling in all their complicated but heartfelt feelings for each other. Also, this cast of characters is so refreshingly and casually diverse, and I really appreciated the authentic exploration and representation of physical disability, queerness, and mental health struggles.

There’s so much trauma that all these characters have endured and continue to endure, and I found it so powerful to see how they learned to cope, hold onto hope, and find moments of light in the darkness. Especially Suri’s inner conflict due to the loss of her soul in A Claiming of Souls felt like a metaphor for living with depression to me, which made it all the more hard-hitting for me to see how her struggles impacted both herself and the people around her.

All that said, as deeply impressed as I am with how well Sandpiper was able to balance and interweave all the many different aspects of this story, I have to admit that I was personally always much more invested in the inner/interpersonal conflicts rather than the external conflicts. To me, the diabolical, scheming Queen Lera felt a bit like an underdeveloped villain, and all the deep lore/magic dives with Sotoledi and Diophage were fascinating but maybe a bit overly ambitious at times. Moreover, the way that the entire high stakes final act unfolded felt a bit messy and suspiciously convenient to me, with a few sudden unbelievable level-ups in power and some wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff that almost made my last lone brain cell wither and die.

Still, I think A Claiming of Souls overall more than sticks the landing, and I loved how Sandpiper gave more than enough closure to feel utterly satisfied while also leaving some threads dangling for potential spin-offs in this world. I absolutely devoured this trilogy, and I will absolutely be first in line for whatever comes next, be that in this world or something completely new; R.A. Sandpiper is absolutely going to be an author to watch, I’m calling it now.

This story is truly so much more than just another popcorn read of a Fae fantasy romance; it’s a refreshing, bold and deeply layered story of survival, sacrifice, growth, healing, hope, redemption, and love in all its devastating beauty. So whether you normally like your fantasy dark, brutal and action-packed or intimate, sexy and emotional, I think the Amefyre trilogy is an absolute must-read that might just satisfy reading cravings you never even knew you had. 

Thank you to the author for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. A Claiming of Souls is scheduled for release on May 10th, 2025.

Read A Claiming of Souls by R.A. Sandpiper

Read on Amazon

 

The post REVIEW: A Claiming of Souls by R.A. Sandpiper appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: Alien (1979)

How does one review a film that’s so well-known, over 45 years after its release and still add something of value for your readers? It’s a toughie. Especially when the film in question is as seminal and wide-reaching as Alien (dir. Ridley Scott), and one of my own personal favourites. Come with me as I endeavour to add a GdM angle to this gordian knot of a review.

First, it’s important to think about the context in which Alien was released and how that added to its notoriety. Two years previous, in 1977, Star Wars: A New Hope came out and sci-fi adventures were suddenly viable mainstream entertainment. Despite the ominous promotional material ahead of Alien, it attracted huge crowds when it opened and cinemagoers got more than they bargained for.

Alien takes a slow-burn approach to space horror. Nearly a full hour goes by with just the pottering of a group of hauliers in space responding to a distress signal. There’s tension but it’s low level. You get some iffy vibes from Science Officer Ash (Ian Holm) but nothing you can’t dismiss as him being an insular scientist. The face-hugger attached to Kane (John Hurt) is concerning but it falls off on its own and he wakes up, seemingly fine – problem solved, right? It isn’t until the 55th minute, in the middle of an innocuous, jovial crew dinner that Kane’s choking takes a sinister turn. The others think he might be having a seizure and try to help him… until blood splatters across the inside of his white t-shirt.

Even if you haven’t seen Alien yet, you will have come across some reference to the chestburster scene somewhere in pop culture. It’s been in The Simpsons, Family Guy, Spaceballs and referenced in much more. Heck, it’s even referenced in Toy Story. It’s this scene that terrified audiences in 1979, who’d come along expecting a Star Wars-esque space romp, and made Alien instantly infamous.

The scene itself uses no music to ramp up the tension, you’re left to hear every confused, desperate word the crew utter, every bump and bash as Kane thrashes against the table, and each creak, pop and squelch of the alien emerging from Kane’s body, which is instantly met with silence and the shocked characters look on. It’s an impeccable sequence of shock ‘n’ gore body horror that brings the reality of the crew’s situation crashing down around you in under 2 minutes, pivoting the atmospherics of the film sharply.

The film sticks to its slow-burn pace for a little while longer, and we all have hope that the crew can find and eliminate this invasive species. After all, it’s not that big. No one can account for its prodigious growth rate however, and one by one the crew succumb to the Xenomorph in a series of tense take-downs, full of misdirection and expert filmmaking. Alongside the alien death-machine stalking them from the shadows, the crew have to contend with the moral ambiguity of the company, the ship computer and Ash; all of whom want to capture the specimen and return it to Earth for research. The crew are expendable and swiftly running out of options.

As the film moves towards its finale, the pace and tension ramp up considerably as Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) tries to escape and destroy the alien in the process. But just as you think it’s over, that she’s safe, that she’s won, something moves in the background of the scenery and you are gripped once more by her visceral fear.

There is a lot to appreciate in Alien for fans of grimdark: tension, isolation, fear, desperation, stacked odds and one genuinely badass hero forged in the heat of it all. The Xenomorph is indiscriminate, there is no question of morality here, it simply is, and what it is, is death incarnate.

While some people prefer the more action-packed sequel, Aliens, over the original; I still hold the first film above all for its originality, the expert layering of horror and for introducing so much to cinema and story-telling as a whole. If you’ve never seen it, I recommend it wholeheartedly, even if only as a cultural reference point but I hope you also see the brilliance in it.

 

The post REVIEW: Alien (1979) appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: Sinners (2025)

Sinners (2025) is a horror movie that stars Michael B. Jordan and Hailee Steinfeld with the former playing two separate characters as identical twins. It is, without much in the way of spoilers, a vampire movie. However, much to my surprise, it is a good vampire movie. I expected going into this that it would be basically a rehash of From Dusk Till Dawn carried by the acting of two performers I really enjoy. Instead, I found out Sinners is as if someone made a rehash of From Dusk Till Dawn, but somehow it’s incredibly good on every conceivable level and has something meaningful to say.

The premise is that the aforementioned identical twins Elijah (“Smoke”) and Elias (“Stack”) are a pair of WW1 veterans returning to the Mississipi Delta where they were born. Both of them have been working as gangsters under Al Capone for the past few years and are implied to now be on the run after ripping him off. The pair recruit their young cousin, “Sammie” (Miles Canton), to help set up a juke bar in an old steel mill. Sammie is the son of the local minister and has been heavily warned against associating with the pair. Complicating the issue further is that Stack was involved with a white passing woman named Mary (Steinfeld)and Smoke was lovers with a local wise woman named Annie.

A sense of dread hangs over Sinners long before the arrival of any undead. Stack and Smoke want to just go into business for themselves but there’s hints of the KKK and Jim Crow everywhere. They’re intelligent, capable, and dangerous men but an early story from family friend Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo) is about how one of his companions got himself lynched for the crime of having too much money in his pocket. Mary is a woman of color according to the legal definition but being played by a white actress, Stack knows that even being seen talking to her could get them both killed.

The movie is so good that I barely noticed we were an hour in before any vampires started showing up in the story. The movie is so good that I actually didn’t need it to involve vampires to want to see the story continue. If it had just been about the looming threat of the Ku Klux Klan and the mafia coming after our heroes, I would have considered it just as good. The thing is, I am a huge vampire fan so it was an extra bonus. At this point, it seems the only things that get me to the theater are vampires and the MCU.

So, if you want to enjoy a good vampire movie then Sinners is a great one to check out. If you want to enjoy a good movie period then this is a great one to check out. The characterization, period recreation, drama, and storytelling is all fantastic. The fact it also has a fantastic blues soundtrack only adds to the enjoyment.

The post REVIEW: Sinners (2025) appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

Project Starship: Innovations in Metallurgy for Science Fiction

Science fiction loves to find ways to stretch the limits of a material’s properties and, as scientists, we can learn from the creativity of these authors to continue to expand our knowledge and applications of these ancient materials. When Dr. John Mauro invited me to contribute my metallurgy expertise as part of Project Starship, I was excited to delve into how we can marry the imaginative and the technical.

My background in metallurgy started with an interest in alloy design, or combining different metals into a single component to form novel properties. My interests further expanded not only into novel properties, but also novel methods of processing these metals to create materials that have only been dreamed of. It requires thinking big in both aspects of metallurgy to even begin to get close to what science fiction has made reality in the pages of a book.

Metallurgy: Ancient Art or Novel Technology

Metals, one of humankind’s oldest materials, defined the ancient ages—think the iron age, the bronze age. It’s hard to imagine what more there is to discover about metals if it has been studied for so long. Yet, there is so much more that we can learn.

Let’s start by defining what a metal is. Metals are crystalline materials that have atoms that are arranged in specific order that gives metals their strength. These atoms can be arranged in different ways to produce very different properties—from lightweight but strong titanium, to strong and corrosion resistant stainless steel. In most applications, we don’t commonly use the pure form of a metal, but rather an alloy. Alloys typically have a primary element and then other elements are added to change the properties of the materials. This is where the magic happens with metals, in my opinion.

Going as far back 500 AD, we saw the discovery of Damascus steel, a carbon steel that was stronger than its standard steel counterpart. It is theorized that this was an accidental discovery, as steel smiths would use coal in the smelting process, introducing small amounts of carbon into the molten metal. Thus, one of the first steel alloys was formed. Another example is the very commonly used stainless steel. By adding just a small percentage of chromium to steel, we are able to take a material that would oxidize if the air is too humid and transform it into a material that can withstand even the most corrosive environments.

This is where we can start getting creative when it comes to the materials starships are made of. In Graham McNeill’s world, his 40k ships are made of many different materials, including ceramite, a high strength steel immune to heat. To get such properties, we would start looking at high melting temperature materials to alloy with steel. Refractory metals, such as molybdenum and tantalum are already alloyed with steel, typically for corrosive resistance, and they become even more prevalent in super alloys. These are typically iron-nickel, nickel, or cobalt based alloys that are designed to withstand even the most extreme environments [1]. Could these be enough to withstand the Warp that McNeill’s starships must endure? While we can’t know for certain, we do know that researchers are constantly on the hunt for metal alloys that can withstand more and more extreme environments.

However, when we start alloying metals together, the new material could be made of new phases, or arrangement of the metal atoms. Not all of these phases come with favorable properties. Iron, the base for steel alloys, has a tendency to become very brittle when it’s alloyed with different metals. Striking the right balance is what gives us materials like carbon steel and stainless steel. Get off balance and the results are disastrous.

Overcoming Compositional Issues through Processing

That leads to the questions of how can we overcome these compositional issues. I’ve discussed alloying, where the mixing of materials occurs at the atomic level, but what about macroscopic ways of combining material. In the inaugural Project Starship article, Graham McNeill brought up the importance of his starships to be able to withstand travel through the Warp. He approached this through a materials selection lens but I invite you to also think about it from a materials construction lens.

Traditional methods of combining metals, like welding, have been used for centuries and are very robust. They are used to connect metal components for all sorts of applications, from stair railings to spaceships. We can’t deny that they are well-studied and well-executed process. However, nothing is perfect. Any sort of join, especially abrupt ones, like a weld, can produce weak spots where materials can fail. For starships, the last thing we’d want is to have a catastrophic failure as enemy fleets are descending upon the ship.

These are all questions that metallurgists are asking themselves in the wake of emerging technology. Additive manufacturing, or 3D printing, opened up the door to a whole new way of processing materials in general, but also metals specifically. 3D printing allows us to create components layer by layer, with layers as small as 0.1 micrometers thick. To put that in perspective, that is about the thickness of human hair. We can create complex shapes that come out from the printer nearly ready to go. I am already imagining how just this aspect of the technology would be game-changing for starship design. No longer bound by the limitations of subtractive machining, starships could include any number of complex designs that have already been imagined by authors but could now become reality.

Beyond the shaping capabilities of 3D printing, there’s another aspect that is of interest for starship design—small scale changes in chemistry over a longer length scale. This gradient like change in composition opens up a wide array of possibilities for joining materials over longer length scales with the specific goal of avoiding some of the issues that crop up with welding and other traditional joining methods. That is not to say that this method is without flaws. Part of the research in this field is all about planning pathways to jump between materials without encountering those undesirable phases discussed earlier [2]. Ongoing research is working towards using fundamental scientific principles to better understand these pathways and enable continued innovation in this field.

3D printing also allows us to combine materials with different properties to create components that have different properties at different locations. For example, we could have a material that is particularly corrosion resistant in a location that’s continuously exposed to extreme environments and another part that has a low coefficient of thermal expansion in a location that cycles through large temperature changes.

Looking to the Future

So where does this leave us? While it may seem like some of these starship designs are lightyears off, in reality, the innovation toward novel materials is well underway. Metallurgy is an ancient art but also a novel science. This field of functionally graded materials is still new, but research is ever evolving. I imagine that with time it would reach the capabilities to be able to spatially tailor exact properties for specific locations within the 3D printed part. Combining this processing technology with that of alloy development opens the door for the innovative materials and designs that are assumed to be the stuff of dreams in science fiction.

This article was first published in Grimdark Magazine Issue #42

References

[1] Jr., William D. C., David Rethwisch. Materials Science and Engineering: An Introduction, 10th Edition. Wiley, 2018.

[2] Bobbio, L. D., Bocklund, B., Simsek, E., Ott, R. T., Kramer, M. J., Liu, Z. K., & Beese, A. M. (2022). Design of an additively manufactured functionally graded material of 316 stainless steel and Ti-6Al-4V with Ni-20Cr, Cr, and V intermediate compositions. Additive Manufacturing, 51, 102649. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.ADDMA.2022.102649

 

 

The post Project Starship: Innovations in Metallurgy for Science Fiction appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: The Exile by Ryan Cahill

After introducing Dayne, and the region of Valtara, in Of Darkness and Light, Ryan Cahill offers us insight into his years spent away from his homeland in The Exile. This novella, while set largely before the events in Of Blood and Fire, is best read between books two and three.

The Exile begins on the night Dayne’s life is irrevocably changed, the night his parents and their nascent rebellion against the Lorian empire are betrayed. Assassins are sent to kidnap Dayne’s younger siblings, and through chance, he spots them just in time to intervene. The night quickly descends into a chaotic, bloody scramble to escape before his entire family, and all their warriors, are killed. His father is head of House Ateres elite fighting force, the Andurii, and his mother is a renowned wyvern rider; both unwilling to lay down and let the empire roll over them.

Tragedy after tragedy befalls the Ateres family and Dayne and parents are captured, taken by sea to watch as Dragonguard mercilessly burns an entire city of innocents before them. Dayne escapes and is cast into exile, vowing to hunt down every person who played a key part in his parents’ death and the decimation of his home.

Dayne is able to wield the Spark, and uses this to his advantage in his brutal quest for revenge. Along the way, he meets Belina, a Hand Assassin trying to get out from the organisation that has kept her beholden to them for her entire life. She offers Dayne a path to find the Dragonguard who gave the order to burn Valtaran souls. This takes both characters to some dark and unsettling places, both figuratively and literally.

You may be wondering, is this an optional companion novella, or required reading? Personally, I’m inclined towards the latter. You don’t need the additional context, backstory and information that The Exile offers in order to move forward and read Of War and Ruin – but there will be some moments you might not fully appreciate, characters you won’t immediately know or interactions you won’t understand if you haven’t read The Exile.

The Exile fleshes out Dayne’s backstory, but also provides a lot of deeper context for Belina, Valtaran history, Lorian depravity and how Dayne became part of Aeson’s trusted network. The story spans over a decade but never feels rushed in this shorter form. It keeps Cahill’s signature blend of gritty violent scenes, dark flashes of humour and heartbreaking agonies. It will make you mad, sad and hopeful, just as a good grimdark tale should.

Read The Exile by Ryan Cahill

Read on Amazon

The post REVIEW: The Exile by Ryan Cahill appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: Dance With Me by Livia J. Elliot

In Dance With Me, Livia J. Elliot spins a deceptively enchanting and intimately vulnerable coming-of-age fantasy tale that explores emotional trauma, identity, depression, trust, and love in all its devastating beauty. It’s tragic yet hopeful, challenging yet comforting, but most of all, it’s an allegorical masterpiece that danced with my emotions in ways I could never have prepared for.

Previously a 47K-word interactive short story on the Unearthed Stories app, Dance With Me has been expanded into a full-length novella with extended scenes and beautiful artworks. We are pulled into the mind of Lyra, a perfect ceramic-made ballerina who lives the perfect life dancing for the pleasure of her elven owners, until the day she falls. She stands up, goes on dancing like nothing happened, but soon she finds herself spiralling into an emotional journey more dizzying than a thousand pirouettes could ever be as she is forced to confront the fact that it’s not just her ceramic that has fractured, but her entire identity and worldview.

Now, whereas Elliot’s debut novella, The Genesis of Change, engaged and stimulated me on an intellectual level, Dance With Me offered an altogether more impactful experience that just spoke to the most vulnerable parts of my soul. Right from the very first page, you can feel that this story is deeply personal, and the gentle yet brutally honest way that Elliot depicts Lyra’s inner conflict was equally powerful and confronting to read.

In many ways, Lyra’s journey is a lesson in empathy, as much for herself as for the reader. It’s so easy to judge her for her naivety or to get frustrated with her refusal to accept the reality/ break free of her situation, but anyone who has ever suffered (or been close to someone suffering) from the same mental health issues will immediately recognize just how authentic and painfully realistic her struggles are. The self-sabotage, the toxic thought patterns, the short term relief of engaging in unhealthy coping mechanisms, the downplaying of the severity of your situation in comparison to others, and especially the way that staying in the safety of your comfort zone could very well end up being the thing that kills you in the end; how a story that doesn’t feature any human characters managed to be so relatable and made me feel so seen is totally beyond me, but I love it all the more for it.

Elliot just knows perfectly when to be overt in the messaging and when to hold back to make room for personal interpretation, which is exactly what makes her storytelling so clever and effective to me. Especially the inclusion of the experimental strike-through text which conveyed the way that depression completely overtook Lyra’s actions and thoughts by overriding her deep fears and intense desperation really stood out to me; it showcases exactly how so many people are suffering in silence, hiding behind the smiles and lying to themselves most of all.

But as dark and heavy as all that sounds, Dance With Me is ultimately a beautiful story of resilience, hope, and healing, and it’s infused with a fairytale-esque air of whimsy and wonder that had me fully entranced the entire way through. Elliot’s lyrical and delicate prose made both the most gut-wrenching and heartwarming scenes (DORIAN!!) just hit so hard, and I really appreciated how Lyra’s personality bled into her unreliable narration of the story. Did all of the French terms and references to ballet moves make total sense to me? No, but they did create a level of immersion that only the most skilled authors are able to achieve with their storytelling.

And even though some aspects of the revelatory and romantic ending felt maybe a bit rushed to me, I truly loved how it tied all the previous events/interactions into a cohesive whole and showed just how much unexpected impact the various eccentric characters we met along the way had made on Lyra with their wise words. To me, it is a beautiful depiction of the fact that the decision to break free and start your healing journey has to come from within, but it’s not a journey you have to embark on alone and it’s more than okay if you need some outside intervention to start stepping into your power. 

Ultimately, there is no denying that Elliot pulled her vision for this novella off with effortless grace, and I think her bravery in sharing this raw and vulnerable story is beyond commendable. Dance With Me is a story with a pulse, and my heart was beating right along with it. This is simply character-driven and introspective storytelling at its very best, and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Thank you to the author for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Dance With Me will be available on Kickstarter on May 6th, and release for the general public on July 2nd. 

The post REVIEW: Dance With Me by Livia J. Elliot appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: Dragon Rider by Taran Matharu

As someone who really likes dragons, Dragon Rider by Taran Matharu has been on my reading list since it was first released in 2024. Dragon Rider is the debut adult novel from Taran Matharu and other reviews had called it ‘bloody, glorious, and irresistibly compelling’ and ‘dazzlingly epic’, which made me go from ‘Oh, look a dragon book!’ to ‘Oh, I would probably really like that book for more than the dragon’. Dragon Rider is also the first book of The Soulbond Saga and the second novel, The Tainted Khan, is out in April of 2025 so this could potentially become the start of great new fantasy series for me.

In Dragon Rider we follow Jai, the third son of a conquered emperor. Jai has been forced into slavery. He has spent most of this life in servitude to the former emperor who conquered his people and watches from the edges of their society as the Sabine people continue to spread their empire over the continent and kill or enslave the people in their way. The unconquerable and harsh mountain Dansk land to the north broker a marriage between their princess Erica to the Sabine emperor’s son and with Princess Erica becomes her dowry: dragons. The betrothal goes horribly wrong, and the bloody coup gives Jai a chance to escape. He flees with a Dansk servant, Frida, stealing a dragon egg as he goes. For Jai this is the first chance in years he may have to return to his homeland and try to seek his revenge. But first he must do something that no one other than Dansk royalty has ever done before; bond with a dragon.

For me Dragon Rider has ticked a lot of the boxes of traditional epic fantasy. Dragons, an improbable quest, an unlikely hero – Matharu has used a lot of fantasy tropes here, and he has used them well. Let’s be honest, we all like fantasy books for a reason, so Dragon Rider is probably going to be an enjoyable read for most fantasy fans. I really liked the pacing of the novel. It is a chunky tome, but it flows well. Chapters are quite short, and I felt like I could move through the story at a rapid pace but still have good pause points. The main character of Dragon Rider, Jai, is still quite young and this does lead to a somewhat naïve perspective (not entirely, Jai is still a slave and witnesses a whole lot of cruelty first hand) but I don’t think that makes the book feel juvenile, instead it sets the reader up to watch Jai grow over the course of the series.

In terms of what hardcore grimdark fans would enjoy, Dragon Rider might not be the first book I’d suggest. There are some really violent bits, but it is very clear who the bad guys are and who we are meant to be rooting for. There is not a whole lot of moral ambiguity at work. Dragon Rider has an underdog and some big baddies and we are rooting whole heartedly for the underdog here. Matharu isn’t shy about the depictions of battles or torture, but I wouldn’t describe Dragon Rider as a dark fantasy. It’s firmly in the epic fantasy category for me.

I also really enjoyed the magic at work in Dragon Rider. Dragons and their bonded riders is not a new concept in fantasy (I was reminded a little of the 1990s film Dragonheart and Anne McCaffrey’s Chronicles of Pern series whilst reading) but Matharu’s novel feels like a fresh take on the idea. The times where Jai is learning more about the soul binding process and how to use the dragon bond were some of my favourite parts of the novel and I look forward to learning more as the series continues.

Dragon Rider is a solidly good, epic fantasy novel and I think it would bring a lot of enjoyment to fans of traditional fantasy. I had a good time reading it and I am excited to continue with Matharu’s series. Thank you both to Taran Matharu and the team at Harper Voyager who sent Grimdark Magazine a review copy of Dragon Rider.

Read Dragon Rider by Taran Matharu

Read on Amazon

The post REVIEW: Dragon Rider by Taran Matharu appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman

An interesting mix of Arthurian tales, modern language, gallows humor, and grit, Lev Grossman’s The Bright Sword is a book with a ton of banter, quests, and heart.

To be honest, I didn’t expect much going into this book. I knew it was about King Arthur and the Round Table, and with that comes certain expectations of epic fantasy where the good guys are good, the bad guys are bad, and all the characters talk about is how great friends they are and use phrases like “it’s my duty to protect the realm” ad nauseam. Even the title alone of The Bright Sword implies a certain run-of-the-mill epic fantasy.

But that’s not what this book is.

We start with Collum, a young man with no connections and no money, getting into a duel against a mysterious knight on his road to Camelot. Our main character gets told to fuck his mother three or four times within the first five pages, and ends up having to do one of the more brutal executions I’ve read. From there, The Bright Sword continues to be a breath of fresh air while maintaining that familiarity of King Arthur’s world.

“When you were inside them adventures happened slowly, but the aftermath of a failed adventure was even slower.”

The first subversion of expectations established, Grossman doesn’t let up. Instead of focusing on Arthur, Lancelot, Galahad, and all the other more famous ones, he focuses on the lesser known knights. Sir Bedivere, Sir Dagonet the Fool, Sir Palomides, Sir Dinadin, and Nimue. Each one is one I’d only roughly heard of before, and The Bright Sword brings these characters so much life and detail that it’s impossible to pick a favorite.

In the vein of continuing to bring new life to King Arther, we spend most of our time with these lesser-known characters because all the “important things” have already happened. Our main character Collum is too late: everything has already happened. Lancelot and Mordred have completed their betrayals. The Round Table is in ruins. King Arthur is dead.

From there, we get to know all the “left-over” knights rather intimately by having chapters from their POVs dropped in semi-randomly. Now, before I say anything else, Lev Grossman is a master writer and I’ve added the rest of his books to my TBR. I’ll go a step further and say that the wit, prose, action, and character work on display in The Bright Sword is the closest I’ve ever read to Joe Abercrombie’s First Law. With that out of the way, I have to say, I kind-of hated the way that we get these knights’ chapters. The approach follows a rough pattern of two Collum/”main” chapters, then a chapter or two featuring “the tale of Sir (insert knight of your choosing).” With Grossman’s talent, it provides an interesting routine where it’s nearly impossible to put down for thirty pages and then nearly impossible to continue after fifty.

“He’ll keep killing and killing till only one knight survives, and King Galahad will wear a crown of bone and sit on a throne of blood.”

Pacing aside, so much of The Bright Sword just works. Grossman’s writing style is superb, his talent undeniable. The dialogue, the action, the prose, all of it is tip-top stuff. He’s a master. I flipped open a copy of the book while writing this review and every passage I read left me wanting to read more, even though I just read the book last week.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that one of the core themes in The Bright Sword is the closing of the age of magic & the rise of Christianity. It’s like the British version of the last days of the Wild West. Fairies and the old world are being left behind in favor of fervent Christianity, and every character has an opinion on it. Some hate God, some love Him, and a lot have mixed opinions, but every one of them offers their two cents. If you go into the novel, be prepared.

“My God may be harder to love, but that’s because He is not like man. He is greater.”

While I adore the writing style, I did have another nagging issue outside the pacing: the ending. No offense to Grossman, but the ending of The Bright Sword left a bad taste in my mouth. It’s executed as perfectly as it can be, and still, I just hated the concept. Credit where credit’s due, the actual last line is perfection.

Quibbles aside, The Bright Sword is a damn fine book. It’s something that I just can’t imagine anyone ever saying anything less than “this is a great tale,” but it’s also something I can’t imagine someone saying “it’s my favorite book.”

If you’re looking for the familiar word of King Arthur with a fresh voice, relentless talent, and a deft touch, The Bright Sword is here to light your world.

Read The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman

Read on Amazon

The post REVIEW: The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: Dark Crescent by Lyndsey Croal

Last year, Scottish author Lyndsey Croal gave us the exceptional collection Limelight and Other Stories, a Black Mirror-style set of sci-fi shorts which despite the name was deathly dark, with the odd emotional punch to the gullet. One quick genre side-step later and she’s back with Dark Crescent (Luna Press, out June 3), another enjoyably grim set of tales which reflect her pleasingly obsessive love of Scottish folklore and all its magnificently weird denizens. It’s a consistently haunting ride more chilling than a liquid nitrogen tank but also frequently and bleakly beautiful; a lyrical ode to nature, the seasons, and the sea in all their inevitable and uncompromising glory.

Across the 22 shorts and one novella in Dark Crescent, structured across the four seasons, Croal presents and often reinterprets a host of spirits and creatures from Scottish folklore and Celtic myth. Some you’ll likely have heard of—mermaids, kelpies, selkies, and will-o’-the-wisps—and others with pleasingly unpronounceable Celtic names are, under Croal’s playful interpretations of them, as chilling as they are imaginative. Want to hazard a guess at what the nuckalavee, the frittering, or the boabhan sith are? Good luck. The land of the Celts has always had a dark and delightful imagination and the hybridisation of this with Croal’s midnight-black brain is a pleasure to read. An added bonus is Croal’s explainer at the backend, where she notes each of the folklore entities the stories are based on.

Many of the stories in Dark Crescent are more sinister than a creak in a fog-filled cemetery, filled with characters set on a path of doom we can only watch as they careen towards. Croal’s interpretation of the will-o’-the-wisp, a ghostly countryside light, is particularly grim, as a girl discovers that making friends with it comes at a terrible cost. But the most disturbing for me was the story “The Fiddler and the Muse”, in which a musician rents a room to practice in and finds himself trapped creating the perfect song as the seasons change; for the villain in this story Croal combines two creepy myths to terrifying effect.

But amongst the deep chills in Dark Crescent, Croal has sown messages of, if not outright hope, then the beauty and inescapability of nature and giving in to its form of death. A recurring character is the Cailleach, the Scottish goddess of winter who inevitability gives way to the spring. We also see a human version of the Orkney sea goddess the Sea Mither in the quietly beautiful post-apocalyptic story “The Loneliness of Water” (surely a nod to the del Toro Oscar winner?) which is one of several stories to shows Croal’s eco-side, reminiscent of her spec fic stablemate author Lorraine Wilson. The sea, strong in Celtic myth, is ever present.

Not all the characters are hapless victims too; some stoically face their inevitable fate, as in the woman awaiting something menacing in the sky in the poignant eponymous opener “Dark Crescent”. Some welcome transformation and rebirth, as in the surreal and evocative tale “A Change in the Rain”, where a community hides from the rain, the touch of which makes you translucent, but a daughter dreams of being united with her rain-changed father. And some defiantly face their fate, as in the outcast grandmother in “To Gut a Fish, First Gather its Bones” who strikes out alone to defeat the sea monster who’s killed her family. Many of these are women—as Croal knows, feminism in Celtic myth has strong roots.

True to its name, Dark Crescent is a resplendently pitch-black love letter to Scottish folklore and all the bizarre creatures within it that paints a lyrical canvas of the beauty of nature and rebirth even as it chills your bones till they shatter. Another unmissable Croal collection.

The post REVIEW: Dark Crescent by Lyndsey Croal appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.

REVIEW: A Promise of Blood by R. A. Sandpiper

Ooooh damn, A Promise of Blood doesn’t just deliver on all the great potential that A Pocket of Lies promised, but it completely takes the Amefyre series to the next level. It gets bigger, darker, riskier, sexier, and even more cruelly twisted, and it’s bleeding with the most exquisite tension, inner turmoil and emotional gut punches that just hurt oh so good.

Now, if there’s one thing we learned from book 1, it’s that Suri seriously can’t catch a break. After all the brutal trials and tribulations that she somehow managed to survive, she has now ended up in the legendary City of the Damned; the city under the rule of none other than our deliciously dark Fae Lord Kol, who believes her to be the key player in the prophecy that forespells his people’s salvation. In other words, hello deadly high stakes, hello forced proximity, hello complicated feelings, and hello forbidden desires… let’s goooo, I am so here for the drama! 

You know, I really liked these characters in A Pocket of Lies, but I absolutely fell in love with them in A Promise of Blood. I mean, it’s not like this sequel is any less action-packed than its predecessor, but I personally feel like it was way less hectic and overwhelming. To me, Sandpiper really hit the sweet spot between the action and the emotion, and the amount of organic character-/relationship development really increased the emotional stakes to levels that were honestly dangerous for my emotional wellbeing.

Suri is honestly just my type of spunky, angry gal, and I really loved that we got to see so much more emotional vulnerability from her while still maintaining her total badass status. And Kol… my dear, dark, broody, and absolutely tortured Kol; he is truly down bad for Suri (even if she is still deep in denial country), and oh baby do I like the (filthy) mouth on this man. I was honestly eating up their deliciously risqué will-they-won’t they dynamic and couldn’t stop grinning over all their knife-sharp, teasing banter. Also, the little teases of spice… fuuuuck me, they are HOT together!

But what’s especially impressive to me is how the increased focus on the achingly slow-burn (multi-book) enemies-to-lovers romance somehow never even came close to killing the grimdark tone or overshadowing all the other intriguing aspects of this story. I loved getting to know the side characters better as we spent time in Kol’s inner court, and the tentative and unexpected found family vibes had me all in my feels. And you know, Scilla may or may not have become my favourite character in A Promise of Blood, which is a true testament to Sandpiper’s skill as a storyteller considering how much I loathed this woman in book 1. These characters are all so flawed, so messy, so complex, and so deeply relatable in the most painful ways, and I loved that they are constantly and continually faced with the heavy consequences of their actions and mistakes.

Moreover, the world also organically expands in both breadth and depth as we travel to new places and more of the history/lore/magic gets unveiled, which really added a nice extra level of immersion for me. I especially loved the moments in the Fae Glen, with all its deceptive beauty, wicked trickery, and arousing seduction, as well as the shocking unravelling of Kol’s personal backstory (the diary entries in the epigraphs are starting to make so much sense now!). The way that Sandpiper cleverly played around with familiar tropes and kept subverting my expectations was just so fun, and I really loved seeing how intricately everything is tied together; the revelations are just SO GOOD!

That said, I do have to admit that there were a few plot beats that felt either a bit contrived, predictable or purely forced in there for the sake of drama, and both Kol and Suri suffer from some severe cases of martyr complex, which made me want to strangle them more times than I can count (even if the chaos also kinda gave me life). Also, similarly to in book 1, the final act of A Promise of Blood felt maybe a bit messy to me, but the last scenes were absolute fire and all the implications got me equal parts excited and absolutely scared shitless for the finale.

Ultimately, my few little nitpicks didn’t stop me from devouring this book like nobody’s business, and I think A Promise of Blood is just a sequel done absolutely right. The Amefyre series is quickly shaping up to be the dark fantasy romance of my darkest dreams (or should I say nightmares?), and I can’t recommend it highly enough to anyone who has been looking for something to fill that Throne of Glass or The Cruel Prince void, but which just goes a little harder in all the best ways.

Read A Promise of Blood by R. A. Sandpiper

Read on Amazon

The post REVIEW: A Promise of Blood by R. A. Sandpiper appeared first on Grimdark Magazine.