Germans Get To Dance - Even One Of Our Own

You've probably heard about the Amazon.de mess up where 180 people get A Dance With Dragons [US] [UK] before anyone else. These copies are even more rare since ARC's aren't even being sent out.

Voyager is asking people not to review or spoil anything and I guess that's only fair. I'm just very jealous.

Well, one of our own (or former own), Michael (or ediFanoB), was one of those lucky 180 Germans. How Cool!

Check out his site (Edi's Book Lighthouse) for a great post, including a comparison of Dance's size to Rothfuss' Wise Man's Fear (which is huge btw). Awesome and congrats Edi!

It's News To Me #16 - Michael J. Sullivan's Percepliquis Cover

Yup, two days in a row for It's News To Me. I'm just trying to keep you guessing...or I'm just really inconsistent, you make the call.

The Alloy of Law (Mistborn 4) Excerpt #2: Tor.com has another excerpt from Brandon Sanderson's highly anticipated fourth installment in the Mistborn series...one I have on my shelf and been meaning to read... some... day.

Have you been put on Notice?: Stomping on Yeti has put a certain few individuals On Notice in this always hilarious meme.

Neth Space and MD Lachlan: I guess Ken wasn't a big fan of MD's Wolfsangel, the review was posted to Tordotfantasy and MD wasn't the biggest fan of that. :) I'm still hoping to be a fan of Wolfsangel myself.

Michael J. Sullivan's final installment in the Riyria Revelations has a cover: Of course it's another one done completely by the author himself.

It's almost like some people steel all the talent.


In case you didn't know, those who have been following along with the series (and I guess those who haven't) can buy the final volume in the same matching designs as the first 5 even though this series is being re-released by Orbit. That same blog post also shows you how you can find out when Percepliquis will be available in this format.

And that's the news...at least to me.

It's News To Me #15 - New Hannu Rajaniemi

I have no idea how he does it, but Jussi (from SFFWorld and Westeros I think) always has the latest on the covers.

Here's Hannu Rajaniemi's newest, The Fractal Prince (US edition):

Kekai Kotaki's work

Review - Shadow's Lure by Jon Sprunk

I love assassins! I'll not go into the same discussion from my review of Shadow's Son, but by golly those guys are cool and Jon Sprunk is an assassin master.

Shadow's Lure [US] [UK] is the second volume in the Shadow Saga as I mentioned before, beginning with Shadow's Son. It's full of assassins, magic, and tons of action. Did I mention TONS OF ACTION!

Shadow's Lure takes up the story almost directly after Shadow's Son. Caim, our fearless assassin, is headed north to the dangerous northlands, on a mission not even he yet knows about. Josey has taken over the throne in Othir as empress amidst protests of the True Church. In Shadow's Lure, there is also an added point of view, also in third-person limited, in the witch Sybelle who is the right hand man woman of the new Duke of the North who is attempting to unite the north through subjugation.

While I enjoyed Josey's part in Shadow's Son, I really had a good time with her sections in Shadow's Lure. It was filled with political intrigue and dastardly characters trying to take advantage of her naivete, not least among them, members of the True Church.

Some of the minor problems I had, and the reason for a 4 instead of a 5 star rating, was the fact that (***Minor spoiler warning***) Kit, Caim's invisible Fae partner, is absent from Caim for much of the book. Hence, the fun, witty banter isn't as prevalent as in Shadow's Son. But then again, her parts in the book end up giving us a glimpse of what all this world Jon Sprunk's created has to offer.

I mentioned in my last review that I was really interested, after reading Shadow's Son, to find out more about the Shadow realm. There are lots of hints, but not a lot of solid facts. In Shadow's Lure, we find out much more about this mysterious place, although it is still mostly a mystery.

The magic system in this series is really impressive drawing from this shadow realm and actually using shadows as the magic. There are lots of fantasy books/series that involve shadows, but I'd never seen one that actually uses the shadows for anything from healing to torture and even fighting. What a great concept that's used in a really unique way.

Why Read Shadow's Lure?

Shadow's Lure is sword and sorcery at its best. Fast-paced, filled with action and realistic characters, and of course...assassins! If you like Brent Weeks or Paul Kearney, you'll really enjoy this series.

4 out of 5 Stars (Loved it!)

A copy of this book was provided by the publisher