TL;DR Review: Suicide Squad done right. Grim, gritty, sarcastic, and charmingly irreverent. Entertaining from start to finish. Synopsis: ‘Seven powerful mages want to make the world a better place. We’re going to kill them first.’ Picture a wizard. Go ahead, close your eyes. There he is, see? Skinny old guy with a long straggly beard. No […]
Fantasy
Review: We Are the Origin (Wrath of the Gods #1) by C. M. Lockhart
Synopsis She was a shadow. Forced into a life of serving the queendom before she was old enough to deny them, Brandi was a cultivator of death and the queen’s own blade, reserved only for the disloyal and the blasphemous. Crafted by the queendom and forged in blood, she was nothing more than a tool. […]
Review: Dragons of Kings (Upon Dragon’s Breath #2) by Ava Richardson
Synopsis The battle for Torvald begins. As the young heir of a noble house fallen into decay, Bower has reluctantly shouldered the mantle he was born with—that of Torvald’s rightful king. It is his destiny to throw off the shackles of King Enric and lead his people to freedom, or so he’s been told. With […]
Review: Shattered Spirits: The Fall of Ishcairn by Cal Black
Synopsis Legends say a dead god is buried under the stone city of Ishcairn, protecting its inhabitants by dashing enemy fleets into the jagged coast of Craeburn. Adjunct professor Corrie Ecksley doesn’t believe any of that, but she knows from her work excavating nearby burial sites that the ancient Craeburn people believed it enough to […]
Series Review: The Adam Binder Novels (White Trash Warlock, Trailer Park Trickster, and Deadbeat Druid) by David R. Slayton
Series Synopsis: Not all magicians go to schools of magic. Adam Binder has the Sight. It’s a power that runs in his bloodline: the ability to see beyond this world and into another, a realm of magic populated by elves, gnomes, and spirits of every kind. But for much of Adam’s life, that power has […]
Review: Dragons of Wild (Upon Dragon’s Breath #1) by Ava Richardson
Synopsis The once peaceful kingdom of Torvald has been ravaged by evil magic, forcing Riders to forget their dragons and their noble beasts to flee to the wilds. Now, anyone who dares to speak of dragons is deemed insane and put to death. Into this dark and twisted land, Saffron was born sixteen years ago. […]
Review: Dawn of the Darkest Day (Soultappers Saga #1) by K.C. Woodruff
Dawn of the Darkest Day is a fun book full of flawed romance and rich worldbuilding, giving the Soultappers Saga a fantastic beginning and room for growth.
Review: The Hallows by H.L. Tinsley
Drugs, nuns and secrets – no, not your average weekend night out but the return of the Princess of Grimdark. Synopsis The Hallow serum was once sacred to the Auld Bloods. Used to gain access to their lost ancestral powers, now it is regulated and administered by the powerful Providence Company. Evolved from the echelons […]
Molten Flux (Flux Catastrophe #1) by Jonathan Weiss
Synopsis As the freshest conscript aboard the walking fortress of Revance, Ryza forges a name for himself in battle. The enemy are the smelters, bandits that trade in reanimated corpses. But for Ryza, the bloodshed represents a path of redemption for an upbringing he’s just escaped.His prowess with a rifle draws the interest of the […]
Review: When Shadows Grow Tall by Maressa Voss
Synopsis When truth becomes a weapon, who shall wield it? In the Grasp, a realm on the threshold of enlightenment, the dactyli guard the fading embers of their ancient brotherhood, dedicated to the pursuit of absolute truth. Lovelace and Gunnar are rangers, two of the orders’ last who find themselves on the precipice of a […]
Australian & New Zealand Author Showcase No 21 – Aman Bedi
An idea squeezed into my head in 2023, after seeing so many of the book community gathering at conventions across the US and UK. And once my FOMO subsided, I got to thinking about who might be gathered together if we had similar conventions closer to home. Pending the master planning required to arrange a […]
Review: Light Bringer (Red Rising Series #6) by Pierce Brown
Synopsis Darrow returns as Pierce Brown’s New York Times bestselling Red Rising series continues in the thrilling sequel to Dark Age. “The measure of a man is not the fear he sows in his enemies. It is the hope he gives his friends.”—Virginia au Augustus The Reaper is a legend, more myth than man: the […]