Good day and welcome to this episode of the Books and Authors Fantasy Podcast. I’m your host, podcaster and author of Fun Fantasy Reads, Jamie Davis. This podcast is exactly what the title says it is, a show focused on everything in fantasy books.
This show will cover everything to do with fantasy books. From Epic Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, and everything in between, expect to find the best and brightest authors from all the various corners of the fantasy book world. Plus we’ll add in a few other very special guests as well along the way.
Kicking off things this week, I’ll start with my author update. I’m still plugging away at the first draft of book 4 in the Huntress Clan Saga series. I plan to wrap up the first draft early next week. I can’t wait to share this one with my readers. There are so many great twists and characters I’ve added to this one for you. If you haven’t picked up the first three books in the series, now’s the time to do that. Check out the entire series over on Amazon starting with Huntress Initiate, the first book in the Huntress Clan Saga.
You can check out more information on what I’m up to, including sneak peeks of upcoming covers, special giveaways, and more, by visiting my fan group on Facebook, Jamie’s Fun Fantasy Readers and over at my website and blog, JamieDavisBooks.com. I look forward to hearing from you.
Today on the podcast, I chat with J. R. Frontera. love of science fiction and fantasy originated with her early exposure to the worlds of Star Wars, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, and Dune. Exploring the potential and pitfalls of future or fantastical worlds is a temptation she’s just never been able to resist.
She lives in rural Missouri with her husband, son, and a random assortment of four-legged and feathered friends. She tends to write gritty, character-driven speculative fiction with plenty of action and romance, though she’s also written a light-hearted funny scifi series and sometimes dabbles in children’s books. She has been telling stories in some form or another since she could hold a crayon and draw.
Good day and welcome to this episode of the Books and Authors Fantasy Podcast. I’m your host, podcaster and author of Fun Fantasy Reads, Jamie Davis. This podcast is exactly what the title says it is, a show focused on everything in fantasy books.
This show will cover everything to do with fantasy books. From Epic Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, and everything in between, expect to find the best and brightest authors from all the various corners of the fantasy book world. Plus we’ll add in a few other very special guests as well along the way.
Kicking off things this week, I’ll start with my author update. I’m still hard at work on book 4 in the Huntress Clan Saga series. I plan to wrap up the first draft next week. I can’t wait to share it with my readers. If you haven’t picked up the first three books in the series, now’s the time to do that. Check out the entire series over on Amazon beginning with Huntress Initiate, the first book in the Huntress Clan Saga.
You can check out more information on what I’m up to, including sneak peeks of upcoming covers, special giveaways, and more, by visiting my fan group on Facebook, Jamie’s Fun Fantasy Readers and over at my website and blog, JamieDavisBooks.com. I look forward to hearing from you.
On today’s show I interview Susan Faw. Susan is the Winner of the Dante Rossetti Grand Prize for Best Young Adult Fiction of 2016 (Seer of Souls, Chanticleer Reviews) and multiple other awards, Susan loves to bring new worlds and fantasy adventures to young adults and inspire them to join her on her make-believe journeys.
Always the dreamer, her earliest childhood memories are of a make-believe game she played with her sister, imagining epic adventures inspired by a picture chosen at random from a National Geographic magazine.
Susan is actively crafting stories that sing in your memory. Find Susan on Facebook at www.facebook.com/SusanFaw.
Good day and welcome to this episode of the Books and Authors Fantasy Podcast. I’m your host, podcaster and author of Fun Fantasy Reads, Jamie Davis. This podcast is exactly what the title says it is, a show focused on everything in fantasy books.
This show will cover everything to do with fantasy books. From Epic Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, and everything in between, expect to find the best and brightest authors from all the various corners of the fantasy book world. Plus we’ll add in a few other very special guests as well along the way.
To start off things this week, I’ll begin with my author update. I’m really excited about the release of Huntress Cadet, book 3 in the Huntress Clan Saga. I’m so excited that I’ve already started work on book 4, Huntress Scout. Lots of great twists already in the next book so get caught up on the first three so you’re ready when the next one comes out in May.
You can check out more information on what I’m up to, including sneak peeks of upcoming covers, special giveaways, and more, by visiting my fan group on Facebook, Jamie’s Fun Fantasy Readers and over at my website and blog, JamieDavisBooks.com. I look forward to hearing from you.
On today’s show I interview Ken Boyter. Ken loves stories and storytelling, especially fantasy. He writes stories to show we can learn more about real life and the nature of humanity through reading fantasy. He really enjoys world building and the ongoing process of creating his magical world of Edra.
As well as writing and storytelling, Ken is also an actor, artist, graphic designer, and medium. He has an English Literature degree from the University of Sussex and co-created and co-hosts The Bottled Imp YouTube channel.
Good day and welcome to this episode of the Books and Authors Fantasy Podcast. I’m your host, podcaster and author of Fun Fantasy Reads, Jamie Davis. This podcast is exactly what the title says it is, a show focused on everything in fantasy books.
This show will cover everything to do with fantasy books. From Epic Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, and everything in between, expect to find the best and brightest authors from all the various corners of the fantasy book world. Plus we’ll add in a few other very special guests as well along the way.
You can check out more information on what I’m up to, including sneak peeks of upcoming covers, special giveaways, and more, by visiting my fan group on Facebook, Jamie’s Fun Fantasy Readers and over at my website and blog, JamieDavisBooks.com. I look forward to hearing from you.
On today’s show I interview Natalya Capello. Natalya lives in a world of oddballs, weather wizards, and big dreams. Really, it’s just Texas. She loves chocolate and spaghetti (but not together!) and writes about fantastical worlds with strong heroines and lots of magic. When she’s not writing she enjoys spending time with her cat and playing video games and tabletop RPGs.
I
read a lot of fantasy. It so happens that I really like all varieties
of fantasy (and almost every genre) but there are some that just make
you sink back with the biggest cup of tea you can find and smile. In
this particular instance, the book was Shattered
Dreams
by Ulff Lehmann, a book that combines epic fantasy with some of the
more fiddly aspects of detailed oriented historical fiction, as well
as a touch of the grimdark to spice things up. This book, I shall
tell you with great delight, is what I imagine a literary chess game
to be. It has strategy, threads woven together, forethought, false
directions, intrigue, and that wonderful fascination that puzzles
invariably provide.
This
plot is definitely one that is not simple. Some epic fantasy stories
will follow a character or a group of characters on a quest. Some
follow more intricate details that move through various characters’
lives and create a world, fully formed, fully fledged, stunning. This
book does that. There are definitely a few things to follow: Danaster
is being invaded by its neighbour, Chanastardh. The Danasterians
would agree that this is a problem. Therefore, some of the people in
Danaster, namely a holy warrior, a slightly-befuddled wizardess, and
a few other people who are smarter than you might think, have decided
that perhaps they should do something about this. Naturally, there
are other forces at work. Ones from the long past. And they’re
bringing other people into play.
The
plot is expertly woven together, with details about the
actually-terribly-important history of the world that I found
fascinating. Often, epic fantasies rarely manage to get the history
involved in a truly realistic manner. Or, they give you an info-dump
at the very beginning disguised as a prologue. This plot involves the
history in careful remarks, chance phrases, and an elf perhaps
screaming too loudly about such matters.
Again,
this is like a chess game, only with death being the result if you
lose a piece.
There
are a few really important characters in this book, but I shall focus
on two: Dragnar and Kildanor.
Dragnar
is a man fleeing his past. His very mysterious past. We first meet
him in the isolated backwaters and he is invariably mysterious and
interesting. This is a potent combination, which usually—in epic
fantasy, as well as other genres—means there is a tragic backstory.
This tragic backstory, though, is actually rather central to the plot
and does more than just develop Dragnar’s character. To be fair, it
does that, too. Dragnar tries to flee, but the past has claws and
does not so easily let go. In facing it, he becomes a key upon which
events turn.
Kildanor,
on the other hand, is fully aware that he is significant. This is not
arrogance, but experience. He is one of an order of holy warriors,
belonging to a religion that current times have done their best to
ban. (It hasn’t worked all that well, as these things go.) Kildanor
has power and he has the influence to wield it. So, he does. All in
the name of his god, Lesganagh, god of Sun and War. But there are
other dangerous forces afoot, some of which haven’t been seen since
one of the last wars and hoped to have been locked away forever.
The
characters in this book read like wildly interesting and realistic
people. They have quirks and fears. They joke with their friends. And
they both shape and are shaped by the world around them. These are
really well done characters, ones I enjoyed reading almost as much as
I enjoyed the situations in which they found themselves.
There
was a bit where things caught fire and people were complaining by
means of axe-strike. That was definitely my favourite bit.
My
critique for this book has very little to do with the book and more
with my inability to read a map. It took me a few chapters to figure
out who was fighting whom and which side everyone was on. However, it
was all made completely clear once I looked again at the map so
helpfully provided at the front of the book. Otherwise, I really have
no major critiques. Just the knowledge that I am directionally
challenged and geographically incompetent. C’est la vie.
Overall, I would say that I have not read a book of this depth and detail and thought for a while. Sometimes I read to melt my brain and clear the synapses. But most of the time, I like to think and to be invited to think. This book definitely did that and I am glad for it. I could probably read this book over and over and still enjoy unravelling it. I would therefore say that this book was excellent.
In
some stories within the fantasy genre—including all the grimdark,
horror, epic, adventure, and otherwise—there are beings that are as
old as the world. Usually these beings are gods, or monsters. In
Brent Kelley’s work, Chuggie
and the Desecration of Stagwater,
the main character is one of these beings. And he manifests as a
drunk, more-than-slightly sarcastic person with a chain and anchor
protruding from his ribs. Chuggie is the manifestation of Drought and
he is, unknowingly, about to enter into a series of events that is
going to change the lives of a good number of people and also cause a
whole lot of trouble.
There
is a lot going on in this book, which is actually quite nice. There
are so many different elements that all exist separately and yet come
together to make the whole. For people like me who enjoy a well-woven
story just as much as puzzles, this is a really good combination. The
way that Chuggie interacts with the world seems to be a haphazard and
drunken staggering from plot point to plot point. The characters
around Chuggie have their own intent, their own mechanisms, their own
motivations, and yet everything that Chuggie does expands upon and
renders moot all that these characters do. Basically, this world has
no idea what hit it. The way that this is explored is really well
done on the author’s part. It is a difficult feat to manage to make
everything come together under the attentions of a character who
seems completely blown about by chance. And also quite impressive.
For
as much as Chuggie seems to be a drunken wanderer who has no real
intent beyond living his life and enjoying it, he is actually a very
complicated and interesting character. It is sometimes hard to relate
to these incomprehensibly old and powerful beings in stories, simply
because their experience is so far beyond our own. With Chuggie,
however, he seems to be a perfectly ordinary guy. Well, except for
the super old bit. And the embodiment of Drought bit. But everything
else is just a result of Chuggie trying to eke out a decent life and
encountering rather dangerous and unfortunate situations along the
way. The really entertaining part, though, is the way that all of the
other characters seem to underestimate him. He may act like an
ordinary guy, but he really isn’t. And honestly, it’s more than a
bit amusing to see the other people floundering when they realise
their mistake.
There
are so many pieces of this book that I enjoyed that it’s really
hard to pick a favourite part. Is it the bit where we’re introduced
to Chuggie and he’s stuck in a tree? Or the bit where he
impulsively runs off to go fetch a goat-faced purse to save his
trapped love? Or the part where the other characters finally realise
what idiots they’ve been? I don’t know. So I shall instead say
that my favourite part was the fact that everyone is going around
riding goats like horses and pretending that it’s completely
normal. Every time I read that, I had to fight from laughing out loud
and scaring my cat. Even in dire circumstances.
I
think out of everything, I had a hard time with the ending. This book
does such a spectacular set-up and building of the
dark-possibly-horrific world that we find ourselves in. There is so
much going on that comes together so nicely. The bits that push this
book into the horror category are really well described and quite
vivid. So when everything ends so abruptly, it felt a little strange.
Okay, yes, the ending does make perfect sense. And, yes, there is a
book two that will (hopefully) answer all the remaining questions.
But it felt a little like everything just stopped. It was a little
like being yanked out of the story by a string of strangely spelt
words (this didn’t happen, but for a linguist, this is the best
parallel I’ve got).
Overall, though, and even disregarding the ending, I would say that this book is very well written, well thought out, and well done. The characters were interesting (if a touch grotesque in parts, which is to be expected), the plot was entertaining and the whole goat situation… Anyways, I would say that this book was very good.
Good day and welcome to this episode of the Books and Authors Fantasy Podcast. I’m your host, podcaster and author of Fun Fantasy Reads, Jamie Davis. This podcast is exactly what the title says it is, a show focused on everything in fantasy books.
This show will cover everything to do with fantasy books. From Epic Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, and everything in between, expect to find the best and brightest authors from all the various corners of the fantasy book world. Plus we’ll add in a few other very special guests as well along the way.
To start off things this week, I’ll begin with my author update. Huntress Cadet, book 3 in the Huntress Clan Saga releases this week. I love how the third book in this series came together. I urge you to check it out and the whole trilogy of urban fantasy books with a VR gaming twist.
I also have wrapped up writing book 8 in the Extreme Medical Services series. It’s going to be titled The Paramedic’s Amazon. I hope you all will enjoy it. If you haven’t already delved into this series, check out Book 1, Extreme Medical Services, available wherever you purchase ebooks.
You can check out more information on what I’m up to, including sneak peeks of upcoming covers, special giveaways, and more, by visiting my fan group on Facebook, Jamie’s Fun Fantasy Readers and over at my website and blog, JamieDavisBooks.com. I look forward to hearing from you.
On today’s show I interview A.M. Rycroft. A.M. was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pa (USA) and has been writing fantasy and horror since they were a kid. A.M.’s books have received a couple of reader awards, including Best Sword & Sorcery Novel for The Joy Thief (currently being revised for a second edition) at the 2017 Virtual Fantasy Con.
Good day and welcome to this episode of the Books and Authors Fantasy Podcast. I’m your host, podcaster and author of Fun Fantasy Reads, Jamie Davis. This podcast is exactly what the title says it is, a show focused on everything in fantasy books.
This show will cover everything to do with fantasy books. From Epic Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery, and everything in between, expect to find the best and brightest authors from all the various corners of the fantasy book world. Plus we’ll add in a few other very special guests as well along the way.
To start off things this week, I’ll begin with my author update. I’m prepping things to get ready for the release of Huntress Cadet, book 3 in the Huntress Clan Saga next week on Tuesday February 25. Check out my reader group on Facebook for a sneak peek at the new cover design before anyone else. If you haven’t already started this awesome series, you can check it out with book one, Huntress Initiate, the first book in the Huntress Clan Saga, available from Amazon.
I also have just about wrapped up writing book 8 in the Extreme Medical Services series. It’s going to be titled The Paramedic’s Amazon. I hope you all will enjoy it. If you haven’t already delved into this series, check out Book 1, Extreme Medical Services, available wherever you purchase ebooks.
You can check out more information on what I’m up to, including sneak peeks of upcoming covers, special giveaways, and more, by visiting my fan group on Facebook, Jamie’s Fun Fantasy Readers and over at my website and blog, JamieDavisBooks.com. I look forward to hearing from you.
On today’s show I interview Sebastien de Castell. Sebastien had just finished a degree in Archaeology when he started work on his first dig. Four hours later he realized how much he actually hated archaeology and left to pursue a very focused career as a musician, ombudsman, interaction designer, fight choreographer, teacher, project manager, actor, and product strategist. His only defence against the charge of unbridled dilettantism is that he genuinely likes doing these things and that, in one way or another, each of these fields plays a role in his writing.
Sebastien’s acclaimed swashbuckling fantasy series, The Greatcoats, was shortlisted for both the 2014 Goodreads Choice Award for Best Fantasy. the Gemmell Morningstar Award for Best Debut, the Prix Imaginales for Best Foreign Work, and the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. His YA fantasy series, Spellslinger, was nominated for the Carnegie Medal and is published in more than a dozen languages.
Sebastien lives in Vancouver, Canada with his lovely wife and two belligerent cats. You can reach him at www.decastell.com.
Check out my interview with Sebastien now and follow him on his Facebook Author Page.
One
of the most looming things in the lives of all living is death. Many
see death as a darkness that will inevitably come and destroy them.
Poetry, plays, novels, treatises, art and more have all been created
about the matter. Rarely, though, have I seen a piece of dark
supernatural thriller examine the matter of death and darkness in the
way that Alan Baxter’s Devouring
Dark
managed to do. Of course, rarely do I see contemporary novels of any
sort reference Shakespeare and the craziness of a London pub in the
same chapter.
Devouring
Dark
follows Matt McCloud, a man who has darkness inside him doing its
very best to eat him alive. He can assuage this effect by touching
others and spreading the darkness on to them; it eats them and he can
live. Matt has been using this particular talent of his by hunting
down criminals of various sorts and acting as a supernatural
vigilante. Unfortunately for him, he is seen. This leads to his
entanglement with a criminal enterprise of the darkest sorts. Matt
must fight both the darkness within and without if he is going to
survive this particular situation. Only his wits, his friends, and a
mysterious woman with a similar darkness are able to help him. Will
the darkness, and thusly, death win?
If
the story itself doesn’t grab you—though it is definitely one of
the more creative stories I have read in a bit—then the writing
itself will. This piece is an intriguing conglomeration of musings on
the various forms that darkness can take, be it through a character’s
thoughts, the casual mention of Hamlet by a man dying, even the
situations themselves. However, this is no piece of pure philosophy;
this is a thriller mixed with elements of noir, with the according
danger to the character’s world, the desperate race to save things,
the need to solve a crime or defeat that crime, and all the according
pieces that are so enthralling to us lovers of mysterious happenings.
The sequence of events is never too much to follow, nor are the
various character interactions unlikely or unbelievable. Everything
flows together quite nicely and I was kept intrigued until the very
end.
As
for the characters, they were extremely well done. The depth of each
primary character, including the villainous or slightly-questionable
ones, was incredibly well managed. Matt, despite his dangerous and
illegal hobby of going after and killing criminal elements, was
likeable and sympathetic. Victor was dislikable and sympathetic in
much the same way, because of the way his empire functioned and the
perhaps normal business of running a pub. Amy Cavendish was, though,
my favourite of the array of characters because she was eminently
more normal than all the others; she may have had a similar dangerous
and illegal hobby as Matt, but seemed so much more cheerful about the
matter.
Be
forewarned, though, this book is definitely on the darker side of the
supernatural/thriller realm. A lot of the struggles that the
characters, protagonist or antagonist, face are definitely ones that
force an examination of the darker side of things. There are even a
few situations where people die in quite gruesome ways. Many
reviewers have said that this book combines horror elements as well
as the elements one would expect in supernatural thriller fiction.
Now, I may be a bit dark in my own judgements, but I would say that
this book did not quite fall into the horror category for me.
(However, I did some research and discovered that many of the books I
considered gothic, dark, or even just a bit intense are considered
horror. Frankenstein,
Dracula, many
of the Edgar Allan Poe pieces [these I did generally classify as
horror, but not all] are in the horror genre. Which means that I
could be completely wrong in my genre identification.) I would not
necessarily call this piece gory or spectacularly violent; it does
not revel in or describe exclusively, violence or violent situations.
But it is definitely dark, requiring a person to examine their own
relationship with the darkness residing within, as well as their
perception of death. For me, though, there was missing that extra
edge of psychological manipulation that I expected from a horror
piece.
This
darkness does not, though, diminish my opinion of this book in any
way. I would say that overwhelmingly, the writing was excellently
done. Never once was I dragged from the story due to an unlikely
situation or misspelt words. The story itself pulled me through,
desperate to find out what the characters were going to do in order
to extricate themselves from the pretty terrible situations in which
they found themselves. The characters were interesting and
sympathetic. And the ending… well, let’s just say that it made
perfect sense and was both interesting and satisfying in a slightly
death-y sort of way.
Anyways, I would have to say that Devouring Dark most definitely made it onto my list of best books for the 2020 reading year. I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in a bit of supernatural thriller or a delving into the human psyche. Settle in, though, because it is a wild ride.
Have
you ever seen a Rube Goldberg machine, where ordinary objects are
taken and put together in such a way that a single act of motion is
perpetuated throughout a sequence? They’re fun, fascinating, and
are really hard to watch just once. Jeffery L. Kohanek’s book,
Wizardoms:
Eye of Obscurance,
is like a Rube Goldberg machine. And it is really wonderful.
This
book follows a few main characters as they explore the wizardoms of
Kohanek’s world. One is Rhoa, an acrobat turned thief who is
seeking out a particular artefact in order to seek revenge. She then
meets Jace, a thief turned… thief who is seeking that same artefact
for a rather large amount of money. Enter Rawk, a dwarf exiled from
his people who has never seen nor interacted with the outside world.
Then, there is Salvon, a storyteller who appears to hold mysteries
from a time long forgotten. These characters meet and must join up in
order to perform a particular act that will set a chain of events in
motion that will forever change the world. For how can a normal
person, in a world ruled by wizards, defeat a person whose power
rivals a god?
There
are a lot of different elements that go into this story. First off is
the worldbuilding. It is familiar enough that the reader has a grasp
of what is going on: instead of kingdoms, the world is broken into
wizardoms, but there are magical and non-magical people, and the
world works much as one would expect of a fantasy novel. That
expectation and familiarity, though are enhanced so as to make things
much more interesting and detailed and unique. The world comes alive
under Kohanek’s guidance and I, for one, really like the result.
It’s like watching a modern movie as compared to the old movie
(except the modern movie has just a good a story); things are more
fleshed out and vibrant than before. And it works spectacularly well
with this particular set of characters.
None
of these characters—except one, who is more the exception than
anything—is from the upper echelons of society. These people are
trying to make their own way and affect change without the benefits
that power and position and wealth can bring. This means that their
struggles are much more relatable than fantastical. With the
worldbuilding being so vibrant, a bit of relatable reality is just
what this story needs. As for the fleshing out of the characters,
well, that was done quite well also.
Throughout
the story, the reader learns more and more about the characters
through their interactions with their surroundings and compatriots,
as well as through strategic sequences of flashback and storytelling.
These sequences serve to make the characters feel like actual people
who have developed and grown over the course of their lives, as well
as that of the story. In short, they’re great to read. Rawk, the
dwarf with alopecia, is my favourite. He seems to be on such
uncertain footing, having been thrown into a world that makes
absolutely no sense to him. And yet he still manages to forge
connections and find his way. That and stonecrafting is just really
cool. Rhoa is also one of my favourites, but that could be simply for
her snark.
As
for the actual writing, Kohanek’s prose is not reminiscent of any
great 18th
or 19th
century literature, nor is it distinctive for being unique in a
strange way that some modern pieces try to attain. The writing is
smooth, even, easy to access and basically falls away as you read.
The writing is not important; the story is. This is an impressive
thing to accomplish, given that I am often very aware of the actual
writing. (Being a linguist and a writer, I am perhaps too aware of
words sometimes, which can make it difficult to be truly engrossed in
a story.) Even the flashback sequences and the storytelling sequences
by Salvon were integrated seamlessly into the story and did not feel
awkward or out-of-place as can often happen. In short, I was drawn
into this story from the beginning and enjoyed it thoroughly. Did it
take me to new heights as some classic literature does? No. But that
really doesn’t matter.
This
is usually the point in the review where I talk about my critiques
for the work. For this piece… I don’t really have any. This story
was well thought out, entertaining, it drew me in and I was never
bored or uninterested. The characters were varied and none of them
dislikeable to the point where they ruined the story (Jace’s jokes,
though, were a bit on the “oh, piffle” side of things, but that’s
besides the point). Frankly, this book was exactly what I would hope
for from a fantasy of this sort. So I don’t really have any
critiques.
Overall, Wiazardoms: Eye of Obscurance was a highly entertaining read. I enjoyed myself from start to finish and I am curious to see where the next book will take me. This is one I would recommend to anyone looking for a fun fantasy adventure with a healthy dose of snarky, strong characters thrown in. I think I can safely say this made my best books read in 2020 list.
