Eww - there's some Geology in my Fiction.
Coming soon - an anthology of Earth Science short fiction containing my short story Permafrost, which originally appeared in Issues in Earth Science.
The anthology will be released on May 13th but is available for pre-order now.
Find it HERE.
Hannah-9 is a symbiote: a child of Heaven and Hell, bred in the bowels of the Last City. Implanted into an ancient, nuclear-powered war machine—a God-engine—she stalks the wastes with Rachel-3, her sister-in-arms.
Their mandate is absolute: to wage war against the Adversary, to purify the Earth, and to endure—until the radiation consumes them.
This is her story.
My Thoughts:
I came across this novella through the Self Published Indie Novella Competition (SFINCs) which is a sister contest to SPFBO (fantasy novels) and SPSFC (SciFi novels). Several reviewers were marking it down because they didn’t like that it included religious themes and some of the contestants were calling them out on their bias. So, always curious to see what the cause of all the drama was, I decided to read the novella and judge for myself.
Well I’m so glad I did for I would never have discovered this amazing author otherwise. This book is superb. Powerful and evocative prose mixes in with amazing worldbuilding and the two tragic characters at its core. My heart bled for Hannah and her sister Rachel, the world they had been born into and the tortures they had to endure. The spiritual aspect was their way of coping with their unfortunate lives, and certainly wasn’t overegged. It was in fact a powerful part of the worldbuilding and highlighted Hannah and Rachel’s inner vulnerability.
This a powerful novella that touches on some dark and disturbing themes. It challenges as well as entertains. It’s an excellent and beautiful bit of writing and I think a book that with time will recognise its own significance. The shorter length only adds to this impact.
You really need to read this book. It’s something quite special and I haven’t read anything this good or thought provoking in a long time.
I’d give it 6 stars if I could.
Some lies are best left buried…
Science and magic are forbidden in Brandshold, where the Seven Gods' scripture dictates daily life. When spirit-magic erupts, disrupting an alchemical experiment, fear rolls across the realm and awakens the veil dragons buried deep beneath a forest, their existence struck from memory by the Gods.
Laoch, a veteran of the crusades, and Sura, an elf disowned by her tribe, stand as warriors of spirit and bone against the oncoming tide, while a queen shackled by the demands of the Gods’ Overseer, seeks to cut through his web of deceit and find the truth about her people’s past and the threat of the awakened dragons.
Drawn into a brutal world of soul-magic, forbidden alchemy, and divine weapons, together they uncover a terrible truth: the realm is held together by lies ‒ and they hide a far greater threat to their future. For the dragons are creatures that were built for the hunt, and their creators are hungry.
My Thoughts:
What a ride! And what an opening to what looks like an amazing new fantasy series.
I’ve already reviewed a few of Nick’s books on this blog – in fact I’ve become something of a fan - but this is the first of his fantasy that I’ve read. Suffice to say it lived up to my expectations.
The worldbuilding is superb, the characters compelling and as the action picks up pace I found myself being swept along in a thrilling chase. This was a thoroughly enjoyable book. But not without its moments of passion and sorrow. I became so involved with these characters that I felt their love, their tears, their terror as if I was right there with them.
I particularly loved the mechanical dragons. What an excellent extra dimension.
I thoroughly recommend this book and I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the series.
A solid 5 stars from me!
The Book:
Are you so sure you’re the painter, and not the painting?
Micah has a hangover, a looming deadline, and a very opinionated rat following him around the orbital station. No one else can see it—which is definitely not ideal.
Outside, the wealthy are fleeing Earth on seed ships. Inside, Micah’s team has days to perfect their gene-editing tech, or be left behind. On top of that, Micah’s unsure if reality is taking an extended vacation, or if his brain has finally short-circuited.
Equal parts absurdly funny, sharp-edged, and human, Transition explores the events that started The Narrator Cycle. Long before Nicholas, Dorothy, and Charon, there was Micah, a dying earth, a talkative rat, and a question—is reality such a fixed thing?
My Thoughts
Don’t worry if you haven’t yet read the Narrator Cycle. This book, which works as a prequel to those events works perfectly well on its own but I can guarantee after reading this one you will want to read the rest of them! You won’t be disappointed. They are all equally as good.
This is a relatively short read in itself but packs in so much. There are some interesting ideas at play here but for me it’s Micah who really makes it. He’s a compelling character and I loved spending time inside his head. It’s not often a character stays with you long after finishing the last page, but Micah is one of those people.
There’s a wonderfully surreal feeling to this book, not just the mutant talking rat, but I’ll leave it to you to find out what I’m talking about.
All in all an excellent book which I thoroughly recommend.
