Paperback, 496 pages Published November 13th 2018 by Orbit ISBN: 0316449717 (ISBN13: 9780316449717)
A nobleman’s daughter with magic in her blood. An empire built on the dreams of enslaved gods. Empire of Sand is Tasha Suri’s captivating, Mughal India-inspired debut fantasy.
The Amrithi are outcasts; nomads descended of desert spirits, they are coveted and persecuted throughout the Empire for the power in their blood. Mehr is the illegitimate daughter of an imperial governor and an exiled Amrithi mother she can barely remember, but whose face and magic she has inherited.
When Mehr’s power comes to the attention of the Emperor’s most feared mystics, she must use every ounce of will, subtlety, and power she possesses to resist their cruel agenda.
Should she fail, the gods themselves may awaken seeking vengeance…
Empire of Sand is a lush, dazzling fantasy novel perfect for readers of City of Brass and The Wrath & the Dawn.
Zen Cho returns with a found family wuxia fantasy that combines the vibrancy of old school martial arts movies with characters drawn from the margins of history.
A bandit walks into a coffeehouse, and it all goes downhill from there. Guet Imm, a young votary of the Order of the Pure Moon, joins up with an eclectic group of thieves (whether they like it or not) in order to protect a sacred object, and finds herself in a far more complicated situation than she could have ever imagined.
My Review
This is one of my signed, numbered first editions from Goldsboro Books in London. It’s rather a beautiful piece of work as an item as well as a story.
This novella took me a short two hours to read.
Guet Imm goes on a journey from naïve anchorite to more a worldly nun. Through joining the bandits and saving them financially, she begins to understand the changing world around her. Tet Sang is forced to face his past and make decisions about his future. Between the pair a relationship of sorts develops, through argument and meditation.
I have a feeling this book story is set into a fantastical version of 19th century Korea. It’s an interesting setting, it feels almost like history but not quite. There’s unexpected magic. It’s a myth until it isn’t. I was enchanted by this novella.
I quite enjoy reading fantasy set in different cultures, because as much as I enjoy traditional European/Euro-American fantasy, it’s important to see things from different angles.
Paperback, 300 pages Published April 1st 2019 by Orenda Books (first published September 2017) ISBN: 1912374315 (ISBN13: 9781912374311)
Jan Nyman, the ace detective of the covert operations unit of the National Central Police, is sent to a sleepy seaside town to investigate a mysterious death. Nyman arrives in the town dominated by a bizarre holiday village—the “hottest beach in Finland.” The suspect: Olivia Koski, who has only recently returned to her old hometown. The mission: find out what happened, by any means necessary. With a nod to Fargo, and dark noir, Palm Beach, Finland is both a page-turning thriller and a black comedy about lust for money, fleeing dreams, and people struggling at turning points in their lives—chasing their fantasies regardless of reason.
My Review
I got this book at the Orenda Roadshow in Southall, Nottinghamshire, in late February. Just before Lockdown started. I met Antti and a few other Orenda authors and got the book signed. I was quite pleased with the trip away even if the place I stayed wasn’t very good. The library at Southwell was, and the bookshop that supplied the books was run by some lovely ladies. Karen, who runs Orenda, and Anne, who runs Random Things blog tours was there, so I actually knew a couple of people, sort of.
The Rosie-Synopsis
Olivia Koski has inherited a rather run down house on the coast. After a couple of failed relationships, she’s had enough, moved home and just wants to renovate her family home.
Jormo Leivo has a dream – Palm Beach, without the irritating heat! But to complete his dream he needs Olivia’s land, and for the boat club to disappear. And Olivia won’t sell. So he decides to scare her away, with the help of failed musician ‘Chico’ and cook Robin.
That’s about the point when it all goes wrong. Because the lads ain’t the sharpest tools in the shed and accidentally kill a burglar when they go to vandalise Olivia’s house (this is not a spoiler, the author tells us right at the beginning that this is the case).
Jan Nyman, undercover police officer, is sent to Palm Beach, Finland, to investigate after the local and regional police fail to find anything. They didn’t bother asking if anyone was threatening Olivia. Jan’s boss is convinced she’s behind it all, and Jan isn’t so sure. Until he meets her.
The dead burglar’s adopted brother comes looking for answers too, flashes cash and threatens a few people.
What follows is a comedy of errors, dark comedy.
The Good
The stupidity of it all! Robin and Chico should have just gone to the police in the first place, said they say something suspicious while out for a walk, couldn’t get a signal to call the police or Olivia so went to investigate/scare off potential criminals and while wrestling with the burglar they accidentally killed him. It would have saved everyone a lot of trouble and they’d probably be considered minor heroes.
But Jan and Olivia wouldn’t have met, and it wouldn’t have been a very long book, so it’s probably best that they didn’t. I liked the way their relationship developed and the realisations they make. All the characters, except Leivo, develop in some way, making sense of their bizarre situation and realising how they got to that point. Leivo still dreams of his ‘Palm Beach, Finland’ at the end. Giant flamingos everywhere, it’d be hideous.
There were comic moments sprinkled liberally throughout, moments when reality and people’s beliefs about themselves clashed mostly. The descriptions of events were funny, and some of the major events and turning points were situationally hilarious. But it’s a dark humour – Robin and Chico trying to start a small fire and blowing up a shed while getting scorched faces comes to mind. Even the initial killing is humorous in certain lights.
I really enjoyed the plot, the way it all sorted out in the end, and the character development.
It’s the first day of Ramadan in heat-soaked Bangalore. A young man begins to dress: makeup, a sari, and expensive pearl earrings. Before the mirror he is transformed into Bhuvana. She is a hijra, a transgender woman seeking love in the bazaars of the city. What Bhuvana wants, she nearly gets: a passing man is attracted to this elusive young woman-but someone points out that Bhuvana is no woman. For that, the interloper’s throat is cut. A case for Inspector Borei Gowda, going to seed, and at odds with those around him including his wife, his colleagues, even the informers he must deal with. More corpses and Urmila, Gowda’s ex-flame, are added to this spicy concoction of a mystery novel.
Paperback Published April 30th 2020 by Zaffre (first published June 13th 2019) ISBN: 1785764500 (ISBN13: 9781785764509)
In the sleepy village of Babel’s End, trouble is brewing.
Bilal Hasham is having a mid-life crisis. His mother has just died, and he finds peace lying in a grave he’s dug in the garden. His elderly Auntie Rukhsana has come to live with him, and forged an unlikely friendship with village busybody, Shelley Hawking. His wife Mariam is distant and distracted, and his stepson Haaris is spending more time with his real father.
Bilal’s mother’s dying wish was to build a mosque in Babel’s End, but when Shelley gets wind of this scheme, she unleashes the forces of hell. Will Bilal’s mosque project bring his family and his beloved village together again, or drive them apart?
Warm, wise and laugh-out-loud funny, This Green and Pleasant Land is a life-affirming look at love, faith and the meaning of home.
Walthamstow, 1902: Archie and his police sergeant pal Frank Tyrell investigate the disappearance of teenager Lilian and the discovery of a corpse in the River Lea – Eleanor ‘Nell’ Redfern.
Did her father’s ambitious plans to marry her to a rail magnate cause her to run away to her watery doom? And what about Lilian Steggles, a star swimmer with her eye on the 1908 Olympics – what prompted her to disappear from home and where is she now?
Archie uses his artistic skills to identify Nell and thence to track down her story and that of the other victims of a dastardly scheme to exploit young girls for the benefit of lascivious older men.
Humanity will be extinguished in less than seven days.
Wing Commander Jude Styles is a Starfighter Pilot trying to get pregnant before the world ends. Her wingman, Hamid Ashkami, just wants to block the spam
messages he is receiving from someone claiming to be his dead ex-husband.
Instead, they are locked in a media tour, shown off as the heroes that stopped the alien invasion by destroying the massive mothership known as the “Dead Moon”, persuading the masses that all will be fine if they keep calm and carry on.
Trapped telling the same lies, driven over the edge by post-traumatic stress and the constant flow of alcohol, it is only a matter of time before Jude and Hamid break down – and the fragments of the Dead Moon have already begun to fall from the sky.
Yes, I’m first on the tour. Thanks for that Kelly. And thanks to the author for a copy of this book.
As I mentioned in my post about my future plans, I’m going to have a break from blog tours to make my way through my personal TBR pile. I thought I’d start with a sci fi series of four novellas and a novel by Martha Wells, the Murderbot Diaries.
PUBLICATION DATE: 17 SEPTEMBER 2020 | PAPERBACK ORIGINAL | £8.99 | ORENDA BOOKS
One of Norway’s most distinguished voices, Agnes Ravatn’s first novel to be published in the UK was The Bird Tribunal. It won an English PEN Translation Award, was shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Award and the Petrona Award, and was adapted for a BBC Book at Bedtime. She returns now with a dark, powerful and deeply disturbing psychological thriller about family, secrets and dangerous curiosity…
University professor Nina is at a turning point. Her work seems increasingly irrelevant, her doctor husband is never home, relations with her adult daughter Ingeborg are strained, and their beautiful house is scheduled for demolition.
When Ingeborg decides to move into another house they own, things take a very dark turn. The young woman who rents it disappears, leaving behind her son, the day after Nina and Ingeborg pay her a visit.
With few clues, the police enquiry soon grinds to a halt, but Nina has an inexplicable sense of guilt. Unable to rest, she begins her own investigation, but as she pulls on the threads of the case, it seems her discoveries may have very grave consequences for her and her family.
Everything Is Better With Dragons 