Floxasm: verb, to make someone look an unknown word up on the internet.
Chullate: verb, to be made to look an unknown word up on the internet,
Now all you need to do is tell someone, "I just floxasmed." or "I bet I can make you chullate."
#chullated #chullating
Monday, 10 October 2016
Sunday, 9 October 2016
Monuments for fantasy fans.
Here's a fine selection of monuments that should bring joy to the heart of any fantasy fan. I've tried to steer away from smaller scale statues toward sizable monuments.
Got any more?
Royal Hunt, Kyzyl, Russia
Sword Monument, Stavanger, Norway
Angel of the North, Gateshead, England
Sword Arch, Baghdad, Iraq
King Decebal monument, Romania
Mother Homeland, Kiev, Ukraine (62m, 102m with plinth)
Lapu Lapu, Manila, Philippines
Chacabuco, Chile
Commemorating the Didgori battle, Georgia
Call of the Motherland. Volgograd, Russia (85m)
Guan Di, Jingzhou, China (53m)
Leonidas, Thermopyles, Greece
Vercingetorix, Alise-Sainte-Reine, France
Yerevan, Armenia
Anonymous, Budapest, Hungary
Genghis Khan, Tsonjin Boldog, Mongolia (40m)
Capall Mor, Kerry, Ireland
Hermansdenkmal, Westphalia, Germany
African Renaissance, Collines des Mamelles, Senegal (49m)
Angel, Cumbernauld, Scotland
Join my 3-emails-a-year mailing list, why don't you? #prizes
Monday, 3 October 2016
Newsletter you say? Wow, that sounds ExCiTiNg!
Yes, it's a staggeringly exciting announcement. A newsletter mailing list! Just what you always wanted to be on.
I'm starting a mailing list. The main claim to fame is the promise of a maximum 3 emails a year. I plan to use it for "my new book is now out" messages.
I will be sending out "free content" including one of the new short stories to be included in the new embiggened Road Brothers. Also I'll be randomly awarding prizes such as signed books to people on the list.
Just go here and give me your email. I won't mistreat it.
Saturday, 1 October 2016
REVIEW: Bloodsong
I won't lie, some small but undeniable part of me came to this book hoping to find fault. It would take a better man than me to watch Anthony Ryan's barnstorming success without a twinge of envy.
Sadly I have to report that this is a very good book and deserves the five stars I've given it.
Ryan writes well, he brings his world and characters to life with good description. It's as a story-teller he shines though, and a good story is always the keystone of a bestseller.
Schools in fantasy books are like crack cocaine to readers. The Wizard of Earthsea, Magician, Harry Potter, The Magicians, Name of the Wind (I think), it goes on, and if not a school per se then an extended training period apprenticed to some master (The Lies of Locke Lamora, The Way of Shadows etc). Blood Song has a battle school as its central focus and we watch our protagonist progress from small boy to large young man through arduous training and a series of very dangerous tests, acquiring a group of firm friends with various talents as he goes.
This is all set in a skillfully executed flashback which our protagonist narrates to a historian on his way to a duel. The tale he tells moves past the school to national and then international conspiracy, politicking, and war. Finally it brings us full circle to the historian and the duel.
It's all good stuff. Don't come looking for great literature or deep themes, do come looking for a great story and a good time.
I don't want to damn the book with faint praise - it deserves 5* and (& this is very high praise from me) it has heart, reminding me in many ways of David Gemmell's work.
The story is very morish, I read this rather fat book in just a couple of weeks, which for me is incredibly fast. Let Vaelin's tale sink its teeth into you and you'll be cheering his victories, growling at his set-backs, and having all the feels in between in appropriate measure.
I begrudgingly affirm that Ryan deserves his success and commend Blood Song to your attention.
Update - we have the second book! My wife stole it and says it's as good as the first.
You can go and 'like' my review on goodreads, if you like.
An index of my reviews.
Friday, 30 September 2016
"Fuck you!" covers...
There are covers that are so bad they're good. There's a sub-culture dedicated to showing you the most comic examples.
Here's one:
It may be a terrible cover but it took some effort. Some skill even. I couldn't draw a horse-thing nearly that well.
Then there are the covers that seem to have been bizarre experiments by people who perhaps haven't read the books. Here are 2 terrible, low-effort US covers for Daniel Polansky's excellent debut, Low Town, and a decent if dull cover for the same book (re-titled) in the UK. Click for detail.
But then there are the fuck you covers.
Del Rey blessed SPFBO winner Michael McClung with this beauty.
How long did it take someone on Paint (the free graphics tool, not huffing it) to come up with that? But let's be fair here ... this was an ebook cover back in 2003 and back in those days nobody knew if ebooks were really going to be a thing...
HOWEVER....
What excuse do Night Shade Books have for this nonsense?
This is an omnibus of the first two parts of Courtney Schafer's excellent Shattered Sigil trilogy.
I'm offended on her behalf by this lazy shit...
They even got the name of the first book wrong (Whitefire, one word). I could do better than this in ten minutes with Paint. And I'm no good at this stuff. My readers did much better than this making deliberately bad covers.
Anyway. Don't be put off by the cover. They're great reads and the third book, The Labyrinth of Flame is also fine work, available everywhere. Get it here. (If you want books 1 & 2 and you're outside North America you can get them from the author).
Join my 3-emails-a-year mailing list.
Here's one:
It may be a terrible cover but it took some effort. Some skill even. I couldn't draw a horse-thing nearly that well.
Then there are the covers that seem to have been bizarre experiments by people who perhaps haven't read the books. Here are 2 terrible, low-effort US covers for Daniel Polansky's excellent debut, Low Town, and a decent if dull cover for the same book (re-titled) in the UK. Click for detail.
But then there are the fuck you covers.
Del Rey blessed SPFBO winner Michael McClung with this beauty.
How long did it take someone on Paint (the free graphics tool, not huffing it) to come up with that? But let's be fair here ... this was an ebook cover back in 2003 and back in those days nobody knew if ebooks were really going to be a thing...
HOWEVER....
What excuse do Night Shade Books have for this nonsense?
This is an omnibus of the first two parts of Courtney Schafer's excellent Shattered Sigil trilogy.
I'm offended on her behalf by this lazy shit...
They even got the name of the first book wrong (Whitefire, one word). I could do better than this in ten minutes with Paint. And I'm no good at this stuff. My readers did much better than this making deliberately bad covers.
Anyway. Don't be put off by the cover. They're great reads and the third book, The Labyrinth of Flame is also fine work, available everywhere. Get it here. (If you want books 1 & 2 and you're outside North America you can get them from the author).
Join my 3-emails-a-year mailing list.
Wednesday, 28 September 2016
We LOVE to HATE
Yeah, yeah, shock horror, water is wet.
But browsing Goodreads I found quite an impressive numerical example.
Pat Rothfuss has written two of the most successful works of Epic Fantasy of all time. They have shockingly high average ratings on Goodreads. 4.55 and 4.57 respectively. It should be noted that average ratings decline sharply over a book's first few thousand ratings and tend to bottom out around 20,000, so you will find plenty of books with 50 ratings and a 4.5 average. Rather few with 500 ratings and a 4.5 average, and almost none (outside YA fiction) with 5,000+ ratings and an average of better than 4.5. And Rothfuss's books have 370,000 & 240,000 ratings respectively.
These are hugely lauded and commercial books. One in one hundred of the ratings given to these books are 1*.
And yet, if you look at the most liked reviews:
The clear message here is that if you want attention for your review, hate something. We are, as a species, more interested in seeing someone insult and belittle something than in praising or lauding it. We are more motivated to 'like' negative reviews. We are more moved to seek out and support opinions about things we did not like than about things we did like.
Water is wet.
Don't drown.
Join my 3-emails-a-year mailing list.
But browsing Goodreads I found quite an impressive numerical example.
Pat Rothfuss has written two of the most successful works of Epic Fantasy of all time. They have shockingly high average ratings on Goodreads. 4.55 and 4.57 respectively. It should be noted that average ratings decline sharply over a book's first few thousand ratings and tend to bottom out around 20,000, so you will find plenty of books with 50 ratings and a 4.5 average. Rather few with 500 ratings and a 4.5 average, and almost none (outside YA fiction) with 5,000+ ratings and an average of better than 4.5. And Rothfuss's books have 370,000 & 240,000 ratings respectively.
These are hugely lauded and commercial books. One in one hundred of the ratings given to these books are 1*.
And yet, if you look at the most liked reviews:
Water is wet.
Don't drown.
Join my 3-emails-a-year mailing list.
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