Adrian Collins's Blog, page 40

REVIEW: Conan the Barbarian #13 by Jim Zub (W) and Doug Braithwaite (A)

Titan Comics’ Conan the Barbarian enters its second year of publication, and a new story arc begins. Issue #12 concluded with an epic confrontation with a powerful enemy, but this installment shifts gears. Rather than pick up where we saw Conan last, the narrative returns to a younger version of the barbarian. Having first gotten a taste of adventure with his participation in the destruction of Aquilonia’s border outpost of Venarium (shown in the Free Comic Book Day 2023 issue, released prior to the start of the monthly series), the teenaged barbarian has taken up his salvaged sword and horned helmet and headed north into the frozen wastes. Feeling unexpectedly deflated after his first victory in battle, Conan remains eager to test himself and discover his place in the world. Over the course of this first issue in the “Frozen Faith” story arc, Conan encounters several threats to his young life, from dangerous wildlife to threatening Northmen, but he wonders if mere survival is enough to give his life meaning.

With the start of this new arc, writer Jim Zub has taken the Conan the Barbarian narrative in an intriguing new direction. With so much of the comic’s first year occupied by an ongoing high-stakes plotline involving the malignant influence of the mysterious Black Stone and recurring foe Thulsa Doom it feels like a relief to take a step back from all of that and return to basics. Like the original Robert E. Howard stories themselves, other publishers’ comic series have jumped around to different points in Conan’s adventuring career, and it’s reassuring to see that tendency continue in the current Titan Comics incarnation, rather than follow a strictly linear progression.

Zub gives readers an uncommonly intimate look into Conan’s thoughts with this issue. Flashbacks show Conan as a child, untrained but already fierce at a tender age. His father tells him of the Cimmerians’ ancestral god Crom, who lives in the mountains, judging his descendants from afar. Crom famously declines to intervene on his worshippers’ behalf, but he is said to gift every Cimmerian at birth with an iron will. This issue shows Conan as a child, questioning the beliefs his people take for granted and then carrying those doubts into his teenage years. Conan has been tested in battle, but he has emerged unfulfilled, skeptical of religion, and almost nihilistic. This feels like a risky approach to take with a character like Conan; sword & sorcery heroes usually skip the origin story and are commonly depicted fully formed and self-assured. Are readers ready for Conan the Larval Barbarian? I am unsure of what to think at this point, but I am curious to see where Zub takes the character in the next few issues.

“Frozen Faith” marks the return of artist Doug Braithwaite, who previously handled the “Thrice Marked for Death” story arc (Conan the Barbarian issues #5-8). Braithwaite renders this issue’s action scenes and snowy landscapes with aplomb, but I still feel like he etches too many fine lines into Conan’s face, making him appear at least a decade older than he is supposed to be at this point in his life.

Conan the Barbarian #13 offers readers a fresh start. This issue delivers a change of pace for existing readers and serves as a gentle jumping-on point for newcomers curious about Titan Comics’ most successful series to date. While core sword & sorcery enthusiasts find this meditative depiction of Conan slightly jarring, I suspect the added introspection may appeal to grimdark fans hungry for a little existential philosophy in their dark fantasy.

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REVIEW: Lady Macbeth by Ava Reid

Ava Reid dips her quill into Shakespeare’s ink pot, adopting the concept of one of his most famous villains, Lady Macbeth. In Reid’s reimagining of the story, Lady Macbeth, she gives voice to Roscille, the bastard-child of a French Lord, as she is sent off to Scotland to wed Lord Macbeth in a politically arranged marriage. Her presence unsettles the castle, and everyone in it, as Roscille is ‘witch-touched’, with hair as pale as her skin, and a stigma attached to her that claims she can control the minds of men, inciting madness within them through mere eye contact alone. Once married, Roscille discovers that her husband is more than just a man of brute force, as he plays a game of prophecies and secrets that he keeps from his court. Lady Macbeth retains the dark, gothic and atmospheric elements from the source material, but bends the story to accommodate her version of Roscille’s tales and origin story. This feminist twist on a famous male-centered story is a refreshing addition to Ava Reid’s already impressive repertoire of works.

It is important to emphasise that you will not find the duplicitous and conniving Lady Macbeth from the original script here, who bent her husband’s will to her own. Instead, you’ll find a younger rendition of Lady Macbeth, naïve, but still with a sharp eye for survival. Similarly, you’ll find that Macbeth is not as malleable as his namesake from the original but is instead more vigilant about his desire to gain power. As the bastard daughter of a French Lord, Roscille is familiar with her position at court, and how she is expected to live adjacent to a power-hungry man. I particularly enjoyed how Roscille would use this to her advantage, feigning “I am just a woman”, whenever a plan of hers slipped up. She masks herself from the rest of the court, metaphorically and literally in order to survive. For this reason, Roscille is mostly covered by a veil, one that feels both like a barrier of protection against those around her, as well as a cage of her own.

Reid writes eloquently, and with a smooth and fluid grace; her prose fits so perfectly well with the gothic elements of the story. Lady Macbeth felt haunting but had a flippant lightness to it that eased the heaviness of the story. This was mostly reflected in the small romantic elements that flitted throughout the novel. The pacing of the book was initially steady, and easy to indulge in, until the end, when the plot became quite rushed and ultimately created an ending that almost felt too easy. Fantastical elements within the novel do exist, especially the expected appearance of Shakespeare’s three witches and their prophecies, as well as Reid’s addition of Roscille’s madness-inciting stare. Whilst these appropriately slot into the pockets of this story as a whole, there is a particular fantastical element that simply does not. I cannot delve into it properly without potentially spoiling the book, but once you’ve read it, you’ll know exactly what I’m referring to here. It was definitely an aspect of the story that took me by surprise, and not pleasantly, and almost directed the story down a juvenile turn.

I greatly enjoyed this reimagining and hope that Reid continues to indulge in twisting great literary pieces into her own style. I think it suits her well.  For grimdark readers that enjoy a lurid exploration of monarchies, court-life and politics, with a hint of romance, Lady Macbeth would be a great addition to your list. This was the first Ava Reid book I’ve read, and it will most certainly not be the last.

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REVIEW: Conan: City of the Dead by John C. Hocking

Conan: City of the Dead is a deluxe omnibus packaging of two pastiche novels by sword & sorcery veteran John C. Hocking: the fan favorite Conan and the Emerald Lotus and its long-awaited sequel Conan and the Living Plague. Conan and the Emerald Lotus was originally published by Tor Books in 1995 and has been out of print for roughly two decades. While Conan and the Living Plague was penned soon after the release of Emerald Lotus, a chain of unfortunate complications at the publishing end prevented the novel from receiving an official release until now, nearly 30 years after its creation.

Fans of Robert E. Howard’s enduring Conan the Barbarian character have long had a fraught relationship with the pastiche novels written by non-Howard authors. While there were occasional attempts to revive the stories in their original form as published in Weird Tales magazine—perhaps most notably by horror legend Karl Edward Wagner—in the decades following Howard’s death in 1936, the most ubiquitous editions of the stories were those produced under the stewardship of L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter. In addition to reprinting Howard’s work, de Camp and Carter took it upon themselves to complete Howard’s unfinished stories, rewrite stories featuring Howard’s other pulp heroes into Conan adventures, and even write wholly original tales starring the barbarian. As the Conan paperback series shifted to different publishers, other authors including Robert Jordan, Poul Anderson, and Harry Turtledove joined de Camp and Carter in contributing their own novel-length Conan adventures, to the extent that by the Tor Books era (1982-2004) pastiche works by other hands were much more readily available than the Howard stories that inspired them. Publishers Wandering Star and Del Rey upended all this beginning in 2003, collecting and releasing the Howard texts free of the modifications and embellishments of subsequent authors. For many Conan fans, this was their first opportunity to read the unadulterated texts, and it inspired a mini backlash against the pastiche novels, many of which diverged widely from Howard’s tone and characterization of Conan. Twenty years have passed, however, and it seems that Conan fans have begun to reevaluate the role and value of pastiche. While some pastiche novels are widely considered better left forgotten, others have become much sought after. Alongside installments by Karl Edward Wagner and John Maddox Roberts, Hocking’s Conan and the Emerald Lotus has become a lucky find for secondhand bookstore shoppers. The collected Conan: City of the Dead release by Titan Books makes Emerald Lotus and its long-lost sequel available to the general public at last.

Conan and the Emerald Lotus finds the titular barbarian coerced into working as an assassin for a twisted wizard hoping to eliminate a rival sorceress and steal her cache of emerald lotus powder, an addictive herbal substance that amplifies magical power while extracting a terrible physical cost from its users. Conan switches allegiances as soon as he manages to extricate himself from his employer’s curse, however. He sets out with the sorceress Lady Zelandra and her colorful retinue—tempestuous knife-throwing young maiden Neesa and a rotund, mute bodyguard named Heng Shih—escorting them into the forbidden deserts of Stygia in search of the source of the emerald lotus and the shadowy manipulator that controls its supply. Conan and the Emerald Lotus deals extensively with the price of power and the extreme lengths to which sorcerers will go to further their mastery of world-warping magic. While Lady Zelandra is a sympathetic character and an ally to Conan, Hocking makes it clear that her lust for power and dependency on the emerald lotus put her on the same grim path as her warped competitors, just not quite as far along.

Conan and the Living Plague is another dark adventure set into motion by evil sorcery. Now serving in a mercenary army, Conan and his comrade-in-arms Shemtare (a character briefly featured in Conan and the Emerald Lotus) are hired to pilfer riches from the vault of Dulcine, a city-state both ravaged by a lethal contagion and besieged by an invading army from without. The resulting adventure is a covert heist, with Conan and a handful of companions of varying levels of competency and trustworthiness venturing into territory in which a single misstep means instant death. Along the way Conan discovers that the epidemic is no natural malady, but instead an intelligent and malignant entity with a yearning for conquest.

Conan: City of the Dead delivers the sort of blood and thunder that sword & sorcery readers expect. Both collected books share relentless pacing, frequent and savage combat, and plentiful horrific elements. Where Conan and the Emerald Lotus features significant moments of cosmic horror—fans of the Cthulhu Mythos will recognize references in the mystical language intoned by the book’s sorcerers— Conan and the Living Plague leans especially hard on the otherworldly terror. The Living Plague is rendered in an intensely creepy and alien manner, and—as Conan is dismayed to learn—it’s not the worst thing lurking beyond the stars.

According to interviews, Hocking wrote Conan and the Emerald Lotus to address some of the flaws common in latter day pastiche and recapture some of the magic of the original Howard, and by that standard Conan: City of the Dead is a tremendous success. While other authors (e.g., Scott Oden) may more faithfully evoke Howard’s prose style, Hocking demonstrates a deep understanding of Conan as a character. He captures Conan’s explosive physicality, emphasizing his pantherish reflexes over sheer strength. And where lesser authors depict Conan as blithely fearless, through both novels Hocking shows Conan as experiencing fear, but not allowing himself to succumb to it. The ability to power through that fear and do what must be done is what separates Conan from his compatriots.

Readers who enjoy Conan: City of the Dead are strongly encouraged to seek out Hocking’s novella “Black Starlight.” Originally serialized in issues of Marvel Comics’ Conan the Barbarian from 2019-2020, the story was collected and re-released in 2023 as part of Titan Books’ ongoing Heroic Legends series of digital shorts. “Black Starlight” begins immediately after the conclusion of Conan and the Emerald Lotus, chronicling a further adventure of Conan with Lady Zelandra, Neesa, and Heng Shih in the wilds of Stygia. Not including “Black Starlight” as part of the Conan: City of the Dead package seems like a missed opportunity on Titan Books’ part but given the fact that they rescued it from falling into obscurity with their ebook release it seems uncharitable to grumble too much.

As a long-time fan of the character, it’s exciting to see Titan Books release both new novels starring Conan (e.g., Conan – Blood of the Serpent) alongside long out-of-print treasures like Conan and the Emerald Lotus. The inclusion of the never-before-seen Conan and the Living Plague sweetens the deal, making Conan: City of the Dead a must-buy even for those lucky readers who already own the original Emerald Lotus paperback. Newcomers to Conan are still advised to start with the original Robert E. Howard tales, but if you’ve devoured those and yearn for more, Conan: City of the Dead is the cream of the pastiche crop.

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REVIEW: Asunder by Kerstin Hall

Well, Kerstin Hall can probably expect some of my therapy bills in her inbox soon, because I think Asunder just broke me in the best way possible. Brimming with arcane horrors, uncanny atmosphere, darkly wondrous magic, divine meddling, broken yet loveable characters, and brutal emotional gut punches, this is truly the fantasy horror adventure of my darkest dreams.

In a foolishly desperate act in her late teens, Karys Eska bargained her soul away to a terrifying eldritch being, which granted her the abilities of a Deathspeaker; she can communicate with the newly departed through touch, and uses her gifts to investigate suspicious deaths around the city. However, her latest job suddenly goes horribly wrong, leaving her with a dying stranger accidentally attached to her shadow. Haunted and hunted by horrors both internal and external, they will have to learn to trust each other and travel their faded empire to find a way to rip their bond apart, before they are both torn asunder by their looming demise.

Holy smokes, does Hall know how to open a story with an irresistible hook! Her visually and emotionally evocative prose immediately sucked me straight into this dark miasma of a story, and I was instantly obsessed with all the wondrously weird intricacies of this disturbingly haunting yet beautifully mesmerising world.

There’s almost a bit of a technologically advanced aesthetic to this fantasy world, yet it somehow never loses its darkly whimsical air of wonder and magic. Cosmic horrors, semi-sentient beastly transport systems, meddling heralds, arcane artefacts, abominable constructs, and deathspeaker magic; Asunder is truly exploding with wild imagination, and the all-consuming eerie atmosphere just immediately grabbed me by the throat and didn’t let me go until the very end.

From the moment I met my fearsome woman Karys Eska, I was honestly a lost cause. With her sharp snarkiness and well-earned ‘fuck around and find out’ attitude, she reminded me of all the best parts of some of my all-time favourite characters like Mia Corvere (Nevernight), Gideon (Gideon the Ninth), and Eska (Along the Razor’s Edge), except with a less foul mouth. Life has tried to beat her down without remorse and her walls are up high, but she is still an absolute force to be reckoned with and has a heart of gold hiding behind the tough mask.

I absolutely loved exploring this dark world in all its beauty and terror through her eyes, and her strong voice and compelling emotional journey kept me rooted throughout this increasingly wild quest. Despite its addictively smooth pacing and  riveting ‘ticking clock’ element, Asunder almost has a bit of an episodic feel to its storytelling. Yet each little ‘side quest’, if you will, only helped organically expand the vibrant world, deepen the lore, heighten the stakes, build out the characters’ backstories and strengthen the gripping emotional core of this narrative (for better or worse, my poor heart).

You see, while this is absolutely Karys’ story first and foremost, I loved how each member of the motley crew that she (unintentionally and sort of begrudgingly?) picked up along the way absolutely gets their time to shine as well. Through the vivacious scholar Winola, we get such a fascinating look into the dizzyingly complex yet darkly wondrous ‘workings’ magic system, while Karys’ childhood friend Haeki blasted open the more mythological aspects of this world through her status as Favoured of one of the capricious heralds. Plus, we get treated to some delicious sapphic tension, so I am always here for that.

However, Karys’ complicated yet amusing dynamic with her mysterious yet cheery shadow companion Ferain (who is a GEM and has now become my new standard for any future shadow daddies, just saying) was absolutely the heart of this story for me, and I never knew I needed the ‘only one head’ trope until Kerstin Hall introduced me to it here; don’t get me wrong, the sloooow-burn romance is just about the most minor and least important aspect of Asunder, yet I was truly gobbling up every single scrap of the simmering tension and playful banter. The way that he slowly and gently breaks through Karys’ carefully built walls was so touching to see, and I loved how Hall wove in themes of (childhood) trauma, grief, trust, redemption and healing through their tentatively developing bond.

I honestly can’t remember the last time I was this deeply engrossed in a story, and I am not kidding when I say that Asunder quite literally tore my soul asunder and left me physically, mentally and emotionally unwell by the end. This story truly just kept zigging whenever I expected it to zag, and I deeply admire Hall for not pulling any punches, especially with that brutally bittersweet cliffhanger of an ending; I needed book 2 yesterday already!

If my unapologetic gushing hadn’t given it away yet, Asunder has instantly become my favourite book I have read this year so far, and if it has any flaws, I sure as hell didn’t notice any of them. If you like the sound of an emotionally-driven fantasy horror that beautifully blends its darkness with a tender heart, then I can’t recommend Asunder highly enough; it’s disturbing yet beautiful, traumatic yet entertaining, epic yet intimate, and it will absolutely leave an irreversible mark on you, whether you like it or not.

Thank you to Tordotcom for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Asunder is scheduled for release on August 20th, 2024.

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REVIEW: Dragons of Eternity by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman

Dragonlance: Dragons of Eternity is the third and final volume of the Dragonlance Destinies series that may well be the final instalment of the Dragonlance saga as we know it. It is by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, two authors who have been synonomous with the Dragonlance line but also, on a personal note, my childhood.

I had mixed feelings about the previous two volumes but a generally positive reception. The Dragonlance Destinies series is not a particularly epic fantasy series but more like a smaller homage to all the past stories told in the setting. Dragons of Eternity is a warm hug to longtime fans and best experienced by those who grew up with the books in their childhood.

Dragons of Eternity begins with the premise that the Queen of Darkness has successfully altered time and managed to conquer Krynn. This seems to result in a lot less changed timeline than you might expect with every single person from the original Chronicles trilogy now around as well as the War of the Lance still occurring. You’d think with the fact that with the erasure of the Cataclysm that the changes would be more extreme. However, that’s not the point of altering the timeline. The point is to bring back the cast all for one last hurrah.

We get to see Tanis, Flint Fireforge, Caramon Majere, Kitiara, Lord Toede, and many others. The Dragonlance Destinies series feels remarkably low stakes versus the epic fantasy series that inspired it. Basically, our heroes are trapped in the alternate War of the Lance and spend in Solace, dodging aroound the incompetent soldiers under Kitiara while confusing their allies that don’t know they’re in a time travel story.

Dragons of Eternity’s previous protagonist, Destina, has a somewhat reduced role this time around. As the holder of the Graygem and the person who broke time in the first place, you might think she’d play a more significant role in the resolution of events but she takes a backseat to Raistlin Majere. Given Raistlin is unquestionably the best character of Dragonlance, I’m not going to complain about this choice but it is noticeable.

If I had a complaint about Dragons of Eternity, I would say that I didn’t much care for its handling of Kitiara. As one of my favorite female characters in fiction, I was hoping we’d get a deeper handling of her like the Dragons of a Highlord Skies. Here, she seems more obsessed with Tanis Half-Elven than she did in the books. I was hoping she might also get her own redemption arc like Raistlin, Dalamar, and other villains did.

Without getting into spoilers, there was a lot of speculation about whether or not Dragons of Eternity would retcon away the events of Dragons of a Summer Flame. Given the fact that book had a lot of controversy abouts its changes to the setting, this idea met with perhaps more approval than is typical for such possible changes. Whether or not it did happen is something I won’t spoil but the issue of Chaos’ release as well as the destruction of the setting is addressed in an interesting as well as clever way.

In conclusion, this is a solid and entertaining novel that is probably my favorite of the three but it’s something that feels closer to cozy fantasy rather than epic fantasy. There’s no real sense of menace despite the fact that time travel is being used to have the Queen of Darkness take over the universe. Usually, this is used to go really darker like X-men’s Days of Future Past or Terminator. Here, it feels barely relevant. Still, if you’re a Dragonlance fan then I recommend you pick up Dragons of Eternity.

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REVIEW: Hellblade II: Senua’s Saga

Hellblade II: Senua’s Saga, was on our most anticipated games list for this year for a reason. The first game followed the 8th Century Pict warrior Senua as she battled against her demons, and monsters in a dark fantasy version of Orkney. The story was grimdark perfection as Senua fought to save her lover’s soul in Helheim – Hellblade II had a lot to live up to but I’m pleased to say this is another masterpiece in storytelling.

Hellblade II continues Senua’s journey, these time across Viking era Iceland. Taking on slavers, Senua travels across the land as a more confident warrior following the previous game’s events although the voices in her head still whisper of doubt and fear as she takes on fantastical creatures in this grimdark world. The game is not for everyone – it is dark and bloody but has a kindness that threads itself through the cruel world that I find makes the great grimdark works stand out. Senua meets humans doing horrific things but there is always a reason for their actions, as bad as they may be and the story beats are perfectly paced to ensure you get each perspective at the right time to give you pause to think about each character and their actions. Like in its predecessor, Hellblade II is full of powerful, unique boss events that have Senua taking on great beasts. This time, her aim is to calm and defeat giants from Norse Myth. Each giant had their own backstory and a reason for unleashing their pain upon the world and they each had a dark beauty that only grew as the game went on. The story is tightly focused and one of the best I have played but it does come at a cost. It is an incredibly linear game but it allows the writers to ensure it is perfectly paced. This is in great contrast to games such as Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth where players could become bored and lost by the grand scope of the world before them. Hellblade II has a beautiful, realistic fantasy world that pulls you along at its chosen path but still allows you moments to reflect and enjoy the beauty around you.

Hellblade II has simple but hard-hitting battle mechanics. It is not difficult to face the various foes in this Viking-inspired land but each hit can be felt as they land and the game is quite forgiving with any missteps from players which gives you a chance to fight back when you have made a mistake. Senua does feel less vulnerable compared to the first game but this is to be expected following everything that she has been through. She is more confident and this can be seen in the way she gathers people to follow her and becomes more of a leader as she tackles the giants and aims to stop slavery in her land.

For me, Hellblade II is the epitome of grimdark storytelling. The world is dark and brutal. The fights are bloody and ferocious. The characters all have their own demons to face and make tough decisions that mean you may struggle to be certain about who is good and bad. Though some gamers may wish for a more open world, the tightness and pacing of the story means that you can just enjoy the ride. Playing the game, I found myself salivating at the thought of a film following Senua’s dark adventures (Robert Eggers would be the perfect director – just watch The Norseman or the upcoming Nosferatu). Grimdark gamers, this one is for you.

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REVIEW: Times Never Change by John R. Fultz

The Emperor of Yhorom is dead. Its five-thousand-year Empire on the edge of ruin. Now ungoverned, the Masters of Yhorom feud amongst each other for power. Their war may destroy the civilized world. Their sorcery threatens all life. Brutality reigns over all in Times Never Change by John R. Fultz. The second book of The Scaleborn series plunges to the far depths of human depravity and clings to hope.

As a sorcerer, Emperor Pai Sing had pledged the Thousand Year Bond. By swearing this oath, which brings immunity to disease and delays aging, only sorcery could have ended the Emperor’s life. Someone had betrayed the Emperor to his death. The Empire in disarray, the Masters of Yhorom are more fractured. One among them is the killer. Huto Sing, brother to the late Emperor, breaks three hundred and fifty-two years of isolation to bring his brother’s killer to justice. He sets for Yhorom, the city of Masters. A city where no good men exist. As someone who refuses to use sorcery, Huto’s quest is suicide. His vow forswearing magic spells doom. His refusal may seal the fate for many.

John R. Fultz throws his readers down a pit of cruelty in Times Never Change. His first book in the series Immaculate Scoundrels is a barbarian-esque fantasy adventure with plenty of bloodshed but only scratches the surface of Yhorom’s corrupt politics. It follows several scaleborn characters, humans with patches of scales on their skin. The time of scaleborn slavery ended but their rights remain as little more than technicality. While the first book is bleak, Times Never Change is far darker in comparison. The time jumps in the second book shows the world before scaleborn people were freed. While both stories have flashy battles and fights, Times Never Change delves into the more intimate side of horror. Fighting is futile against a world of hate.

Times Never Change is told from the perspective of several new characters. Huto Sing spent more than three hundred years living as a hermit, renouncing the crown and refusing sorcery. He seeks justice for his brother’s death at the risk of losing everything he stands for. His struggle to uphold his ideal identity imposes harm on his companions. A new pivotal character introduced is Umi. She is from Mossback Hollow, a scaleborn village hidden from the rest of humanity. When her village is attacked and burnt down by soldiers, she is forced to wander this cruel world. Her interactions with humans reveal the most about humanity’s disposition towards scaleborn. Her journey exposes readers to the worst of this world.

The time jumps in Times Never Change is mostly subtle and restricted to Umi’s story. Her character steals the show. Her resolve to help other scaleborns is pinned against her naivety. She takes readers on a turbulent journey of some successes and many soul crushing failures. While the time jumps are necessary to progress the story, a couple parts of Umi’s tale feel rushed.

John R. Fultz showcases the range of his writing ability in Times Never Change. While faithful to its sword and sorcery spirit, the second book of The Scaleborn series swaps some barbarian-esque elements with full scale brutality.

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REVIEW: Haunt Sweet Home by Sarah Pinsker

“Haunt Sweet Home,” the titular show at the center of Sarah Pinsker’s new novel, offers a twist on the familiar genre of home renovation. Each new D.I.Y. uncovers not just hardwood under the carpet or termites in the awnings but, inevitably, a ghost in the attic (or library, or orchard, or, or, or). Even if the rest of the book had been a disappointment, I’d have to give Pinsker due credit for a banger of a reality TV pitch. Luckily, though, Haunt Sweet Home is terrific. 

Thirty-something Mara is an aimless loser (I say this with compassion; like recognizes like): drifting through life, perpetually on the fringes of her more talented and well-socialized family.  An offer from her cousin Jeremy, the charismatic host of “Haunt Sweet Home,” lands Mara a summer gig as part of the show’s “night crew.” No mere gofers, the night crew is responsible for encouraging the show’s credulous subjects to believe just that little bit harder in things that go bump in the night. If that means making the bumps themselves, so be it. 

Seasoned readers of horror are probably rushing to fill in the blanks: the house that turns out to have a tragic past, for real, the scares that are laughably fake––or are they? Did you make that noise? No, I thought that was you, and so on. Here, Haunt Sweet Home hits all its marks, sort of. But don’t go into this novel hoping to be sickened or scared silly. Haunt Sweet Home is not a horror novel. 

Rather, Sarah Pinsker is more interested in exploring a different kind of haunting. Call it haunting as a kind of persistence: an exploration of what it means to linger, unchanged and unchanging, while the world moves around you. 

By this metric, whether or not the assorted ghosts in the assorted attics of “Haunt Sweet Home” are real is almost beside the point. Instead, Haunt Sweet Home reimagines the haunted house narrative with Mara as both haunting and haunted, moving through the early parts of the book like a ghost in her own life. Mara’s voice is restrained and awkward, attentive to physical details but always second-guessing her own presence on the page. This style of narration could easily turn claustrophobic or ramp up into a hysterical Gothic, but Pinsker keeps Mara frank, nearly guileless. Her keen, wry sense of observation allows the slim novel to linger in the details of Mara’s summer on set in a way that feels confident, leisurely, unhurried. 

In the end, though, haunted house stories almost always come down to a question of dispossession: who will leave? Who will fight to stay? In answering this question, Haunt Sweet Home’s symbolic haunting finally comes head to head with a real ghost. Unfortunately, this was also a moment where the narrative faltered for me. As soon as the supernatural, which has been drifting suggestively below the surface, is brought into sharp focus, the novel begins to feel rushed and exposition-heavy, as though anxious that its reader not leave with questions unanswered. Haunt Sweet Home’s theory of ghosts is suggestive and complex, and I don’t blame Pinsker for wanting her reader to understand the nuances. It’s a minor misstep in an otherwise beautifully executed narrative. But I wish that Haunt Sweet Home, so wonderfully seeped in its protagonist’s uncertainty, had been willing to trust its readers with some uncertainty of our own.

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REVIEW: House of the Dragon Season 2 Episode 6

House of the Dragon 2×06 “Smallfolk” is the sixth episode of the second season of HBO’s award-winning series that I mostly think of as an apology for the last few Game of Thrones seasons. House of the Dragon follows the adventures of the Targaryen Royal Family several generations before the rise of Daenerys Stormborn. Who got robbed, let me tell you. The Dance of the Dragons officially began with the murder of Lucerys Targaryen in 1×10 of House of the Dragon but has been slow to start in the 2nd season. There’s so far only been a couple of actual battles with one dragon fight (spectacular as its been).

Generally, House of the Dragon has not reached the stellar heights that Game of Thrones reached. House of the Dragon’s characters are generally flatter, less nuanced, and possessed of less variety. Game of Thrones drew from all seven kingdoms, Essos, and Beyond the Wall when making its characters. House of the Dragon is primarily focused on the Targaryens, Velaryons, and the Hightowers. This isn’t a a bad thing as it’s much easier to keep track of characters in the show, but the rich lore of George R.R. Martin is less on display. Worse, many of the characters feel quite similar.

Despite this, I think “Smallfolk” is a big improvement over the previous episode that I thought was House of the Dragon’s worst one so far. This one feels far more like the show is moving toward the finale with only two more episodes left this season. All the pieces like they’re in place now. We’ve assembled a bunch of armies, we’ve started looking for some new dragons, and everything is ready to come to a head.

The Lannisters are prepared to invade Harrenhal and take it back for the Greens but are unwilling to give as long as Daemon has Caraxes but they don’t have Vhagar’s support. Daemon is making moves to get the Riverlands army he needed to go after King’s Landing. Aemond is consolidating his position as the Lord Paramount of Westeros by dismissing his mother as well as pushing Larys’ ambitions down. There’s also Rhaenyra’s quest to find new dragon riders that have some candidates with Corys’ likely bastard and maybe Rhaena in the Vale with a sheep stealing wild dragon.

The thing that will probably be remembered most about “Smallfolk” will be the same-sex kiss between Rhaenyra and Mysaria. As controversies go, it should be nothing, but it is something that has apparently affected House of the Dragon’s ratings in multiple countries. This is an addition to the series that wasn’t in Fire and Blood, but something added by the show runners. Personally, I’m intrigued by the possible complication to their relationship but also skeptical that it will amount to much in the long run.

Another twist that has been controversial is the fact that they seem to have given the book plotline of Nettles the Commoner Dragonrider to Rhaena, Daemon Targaryen’s daughter. This bothers me because I’m a huge fan of the book story and think it’s terrible to lose a lot of its nuance. Nettles was a challenge to the idea of the Valyrian dragonriders and the exceptionalism that it implied about the House of the Dragon. Now, Rhaena is just another member of the Targaryen family claiming a dragon.

In conclusion, “Smallfolk” is a good episode that does a lot of finally fixing the issues of pacing we’ve been facing. However, some fans are impatient to get back to the battles and dragon fighting. I don’t think this is necessary, though. House of the Dragon is better when it deals with the politics and intrigue of the characters rather than empty spectacle.

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REVIEW: A Mask of Flies by Matthew Lyons

A Mask of Flies is the latest horror novel from author Matthew Lyons, and it is as terrifying as it is gripping. The book has its brakes ripped out at the very beginning, sending readers on a torrent of twists and turns as Lyons brilliantly sets the stage for a tale that is both deeply sinister and emotional. A Mask of Flies ponders on themes of death and loss, and how grief keeps coming back to haunt us no matter where we hide or how far we run from it.

The tale begins with the frantic escape of young Anne Heller and her terror-stricken mother from a mysterious and menacing pursuer, which ends up in a fatal car crash that kills her mother and wounds her. Twenty years later, it seems that Anne’s life hasn’t changed much. We follow an adult Anne as she narrowly escapes from a botched bank heist, stringing along a fatally-wounded Jessup – the heist mastermind – and Dutch, a policeman whom she’d recklessly taken hostage.

As if being fugitives weren’t enough, Anne’s rude reunion with her mother’s strange past is disrupted when Jessup vanishes, only to reappear dead. The horror escalates when the supposedly buried Jessup comes back from the dead, not as himself but as a hungry, mask-wearing, shape-shifting thing. As I mentioned, the action in this book is relentless and is constantly filled with shootouts, gory fight scenes, and crazy people. Alongside the existential dread that oozes from the prose, the supernatural elements left this supernatural fan thoroughly satisfied.

A Mask of Flies is a slow burn at first, but the action scenes that follow are relentless, plunging the characters into a pool of torment. Fans of It and Evil Dead will revel in Lyons’ gory prose and epic adventure.

Lyons’ character development stands out for its straightforward yet profound. A Mask of Flies presents characters barely clinging to hope, only to be mercilessly struck down when they seem most vulnerable. From the very beginning, we learn of Anne’s traumatic childhood—confused, scared, and alone—which sets her up for a fairly lonely adulthood where she trusts few and loves even fewer. However, she soon learns that she doesn’t have to face life alone, nor does she need to be scared alone. I loved how Lyons’ characters grow on one another despite their dark circumstances, making it easy to root for them. Even the novel’s minor characters left a lasting impression on me, and I felt that they each added to the ambitious narrative.

However, while I did find the fight scenes and visceral gore were thoroughly satisfying, the transition from crime to cult felt just a little sudden. The cult-horror elements were undeniably fascinating (and as a fan of cult-horror, I relished these parts), but an earlier introduction to the cult would have woven the threads more tightly together. Despite this, A Mask of Flies presents a gritty blend of crime and cult themes that injected a dark, unpredictable twist which kept the story brutally engaging.

Overall, A Mask of Flies is an epic journey not for the faint-hearted, truly living up to its blurb—”the past has teeth”—quite literally. This novel keeps you on edge from the first page, with unabated tension and bone-crunching twists. I can’t wait to see what spine-chilling work Lyons’ will put out next! Thank you to Tor Nightfire for sending over a review copy.

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