The Call of Cthulhu

and Other Weird Stories

H.P. Lovecraft 1920-36 [1999]

(February 2018)

So that’s what all the fuss is about. Huh.

City of Blades

Robert Jackson Bennett, 2016

(February 2017)

Excellent storytelling; just one more chapter and suddenly it’s 3 A.M. stuff. It's also dedicated to "Sir Terry", which pretty much guarantees that I'm going to look on it favourably.

Half-Resurrection Blues

Daniel José Older, 2015

(January 2017)

Everyone wants coffee except Dr. Tijou, who prefers tea.

I'm struggling to explain why I found this line is so funny, but it provided my first book driven LOL of 2017: a good three or four minutes of guffawing about tea. I am, however, going to give an explanation a bash, because if nothing else it's going to be a good way of working through exactly why I enjoyed this book so much.

Hellblazer

Various creators, 1988-2009

(May 2015)

This was an interesting experience; reading through twenty year’s worth of a single title as essentially a single work. While I was peripherally aware of John Constantine he’s not exactly an A-list character. Spiderman, say, is well enough established in nerd culture that I could probably bluff my way through a conversation about him despite the fact I’ve never read one of the comics, but I (and I suspect most) couldn’t say the same here. The upshot of this is that there’s this massive, historically embedded run of storyline to which I’m coming more-or-less spoiler free.

Vermilion

The Adventures of Lou Merriweather, Psychopomp

Molly Tanzer, 2015

(May 2015)

  

High in the Rocky Mountains of late nineteenth-century Colorado there is a sanatorium. It is run by one Dr. Panacea. That's Dr. Panacea. You can now be confident to the ninety-fifth percentile as to whether this book is something you’ll enjoy as rambunctious fun, or if it will only serve to annoy the everloving shit out of you.

Phantasm Japan

Nick Mamatas and Masumi Washington (eds), 2014

(September 2014)

  

We’ve established that I’m no fan of David Cameron’s, so you can imagine how much it pains me to say that every once in a while he, or at least his speechwriter, is capable of turning quite a nice rhetorical line. One specific instance sticks in my mind from ages ago, when he was baiting Tony Blair at Prime Minister’s Questions and claimed that, “He was the future, once.” And you know, this reminds me very much of Jesus Christ.

Spirits Abroad

Zen Cho, 2014

(September 2014)

  

It’s been a while since I read a book with a manifesto printed inside the front cover. Spirits Abroad is published by a Malaysian imprint that stakes its ground out very explicitly on page one, and it’s so tempting to get all academic and unpack that through the sociolinguistic frames of World Englishes, ELF, the Expanding Circle and so on. For now though we’ll just focus on one point: Fixi Novo’s deliberate and specific repudiation of italicized loanwords, as “italics are a form of apology.”

A Dance with Dragons

George R.R. Martin, 2011

(April 2014)

What to add to the massive multimedia behemoth that is a Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones? Not sure there’s really all that much, though the little that follows will probably have some spoilers, if you care about that sort of thing.

The Book of Apex, Vol. 4

Lynne M. Thomas (ed), 2013

(February 2014)

Now, this is a hefty chunk of goth right here. Demons, tattoos, crows and ravens: all the touchstones get a run out. This is the kind of book you’d meet skulking at the back of certain bars in Camden and be a bit wary about approaching at first, what with the piercings and all, but somehow end up hitting it off with before heading back to their flat for a long night of substance abuse, lyrical angst, and excellent yet terrifying sex.

The Book of the Dead

Jared Shurin (ed), 2013

(October 2013)

Well now. An unsolicited ARC*. This, I don’t mind admitting, is something of a first (OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD). The fact that it’s coming from a publishing house/enterprise/concern I’ve previously been quite enthusiastic about is very nice, but I’m aware that this is the first step down the fraught and slippery path towards Industry Blogger. In an effort to keep my Fandom credentials intact as best as possible, I shall of course try to ensure my comments here are as (un)fair and impartial as they are for everything else. Professional detachment is, somewhat ironically, very much the name of the game (OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD).

The Big Reap

Chris F. Holm, 2013

(August 2013)

Say what you like about the Collector books, they rattle along at a fair old click. I don’t think I’ve read anything so urgently plot-driven since, well, the last one. There are a few holes in said plot, but they flash by so fast that you don’t really get time to dwell on them. It opens with our hero Sam getting an assignment to kill Hitler and it just escalates from there.

Let the Right One In

John Ajvide Lindqvist, 2004 [Ebba Segerberg, 2007]

(May 2013)

Ah, Plot my old friend, how I’ve missed you. 

The Exiled Blade

Jon Courtenay Grimwood, 2013

(April 2013)

So for all that I was patting myself on the back about getting the references (well, a reference) last time out, it took me a worryingly long time to realize that this was pretty much Hamlet with werewolves.

A Pretty Mouth

Molly Tanzer, 2012

(April 2013)

  

Sod’s Law, isn’t it? You wait ages for a Lovecraft/Wodehouse mashup, featuring everyone’s favourite Gentleman’s Gentleman pitting his wits against eldritch forces, and then two come along at once.

The Wrong Goodbye

Chris F. Holm, 2012

(March 2013)

Now this is that pacey and fun urban fantasy I should have read. The sequel to Dead Harvest and it does everything you need it to. Angels, demons, magic, and a lovely pulpy, noir-ey vibe to the whole affair.

Fuck Halloween

Seriously, fuck it. Fuck it right up the arse with a pointy stick.

The Outcast Blade

Jon Courtenay Grimwood, 2012

(August 2012)

Prior Concerns –

1. The first of the Assassini trilogy was Othello With Vampires (and Werewolves). The whole ‘classic story X with supernatural entity Y’ trend was always slightly suspect to begin with, and now looks to be dying a not wholly unwelcome death.

Dead Harvest

Chris F Holm, 2012

(July 2012)

God’s war for real this time. There’s a war a-brewing between heaven and hell, and our hero is the only man/soul/spiritual entity that can stop it. But then there’s always a war brewing between heaven and hell, that’s pretty much the point. C’est la vie/mort/I’ll stop it now.

One ha' penny, two ha' penny

Hot cross buns.

If you have no daughters,

Down to the Bone

Justina Robson, 2011

(January 2012)

Pacey, undemanding, fun. At last. After the weightier, more blatantly intellectual or satirical stuff I’ve been reading recently I figured I deserved something more obviously frivolous. Cyborgs, demons, faeries, and elves. Sit back and go with it.