While winter is for reading and trying to stay warm in the Great White North when the Ice Giants and the White Dragons roam the wastelands of Minnesota, summer is for getting out there and enjoying the all too brief warm weather. As the Pandemic still threatens us, and heat waves, wildfires and worse make travel problematic, once again, I turn to the worlds within books as escapes for my adventures "out of season". Pity I can’t take a camera inside of a book, though. But, then, there is a power for a book to conjure an image in my mind that is allied to one you might have, but it is not exactly the same. Your Minas Tirith is not mine own. And that's awesome.
So here, find a list of six of the books I am looking forward to getting to before Summer turns to Fall, and green shifts to hues of red, gold, and orange before a clattering change to brown.
On my 2020 list I read four out of the six books . And so on to 2021!
The Justice in Revenge, Ryan Van LoanI highly enjoyed Van Loan’s debut novel, The Sin in the Steel, which provided a genderflipped Sherlock Holmes as a teenaged girl in an intriguing fantasy world. The Justice in Revenge continues Buc’s story, and I am very interested in seeing where she heads next.
In the Deep, Kelly JenningsI have highly enjoying Jennings’ shorter space opera work in short story anthologies. Here, she makes her second jump into novels, with a story of fractured alliances, complex and flawed protagonists, political power plays and science fiction adventure. I’m ready to follow the crew of the Susan Calvin into their story.
The Fallen, Ada HoffmannI was highly impressed by Ada Hoffmann’s debut novel, The Outside, combining Space Opera with Cosmic Horror, but with additional filips and aspects (AI Angels!) I most definitely not see coming. This second novel continues to look at what happens to the planet of Jai after the extradimensional incursion of the first novel. Yasira and Tiv have to try and save the planet...while Angels and worse continue to hunt them.
Hold Fast Through the Fire, K B WagersWith Wagers’ Indranian War series now done, Wagers focus is on their other space opera verse, the story of the Neo-G, the 25th century Space Coast Guard. I enjoyed A Pale Light in the Black, and am definitely on board for more adventures of the crew of Zuma’s Ghost, especially Jenks, the 21st century Earth culture enthusiast who provides such an easy entry for us into the world four centuries hence.
When the Goddess Wakes, Howard Andrew JonesSticking the landing on a trilogy is a hard thing. In When the Goddess Wakes, Howard Andrew Jones sets to end the trilogy (For the Killing of Kings, Upon the Flight of the Queen) of his high heroic epic fantasy that has reminded me, in numerous ways, of one of my heart series, Roger Zelazny’s Amber Chronicles. The Altenerai protectors of the realm are in desperate straits, and if the titular Goddess does wake and get loose, can they protect not only their realm, but every realm in every world from her insatiable wrath? I sure look forward to finding out.
The Jasmine Throne, Tasha SuriI really enjoyed Suri’s Empire of Sand, which was a Silk Road fantasy with Empire, family ties, blood magic, captured gods and more. The Jasmine Throne starts a new verse for Suri, featuring a pair of ambitious characters, an exiled priestess and a princess, whose ambitions promise to tap into that Empire and fantastical magical goodness that she showed in her first duology.
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POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I’m just this guy, you know? @princejvstin
