Tor is giving away

Touch of Evil by C.T. Adams and Cathy Clamp this week. It's a "paranormal romance". Ugh. I don't like romances.

This one has vampires in it. Werewolves, too. Sounds like Underworld. But without Kate Beckinsale and her guns.

From the synopsis:

Eschewing recent trends, the vampires in this series are not sexy or funny, and this form of vampirism is spread by a parasite in saliva causing those bitten to become part of the herd, or "Thrall," a hive entity led by queens.

Now it's got me thinking of the Borg meets I Am Legend.

To be fair, I'll put asid... [More]

Seems like too many legends (or at least notable people) in the science fiction and fantasy genres have been passing into the next world all too often of late.

This time it's Robert Asprin whose greatest influence, for me, was the Thieves' World series. The only thing left to say is: Thank you, Mr. Asprin, for such a wonderful collection of stories. It held me enthralled many a night when I was a child.

In honor of Mr. Asprin, I'm re-posting my Thieve's World post taken from my old blog. Here you go:

Thieve's World

I read a lot when I was younger. Before college, before my first job back in Californi... [More]

At 88, Corfield still busy writing
Londonder Bill Corfield has worked in the Air Force, been a pilot/journalist for The Free Press and owned his own public relations firm. Now the 88-year-old has turned his attention to writing novels and he has recently published his fourth.

Playing to Type
FORGET LIVING HAPPILY ever after with Mr Big or endless liquid lunches in New York's finest restaurants in your best Manolo Blahniks, Sex and the City's most far-fetched fantasy is the writer who effortlessly produces a stream of polished, instantly publishable prose without so much as a backspace. Carrie Bradshaw, who's about to make... [More]

Thanks to Tobias Buckell for providing me an advanced copy of his upcoming science fiction novel, Sly Mongoose. I hope to have finished reading the novel within a month (yeah, I'm slow) at which time I'll make a follow-up post to include my review.

I'll admit I've never read anything by Buckell (pronounced 'Buck Ell' not 'Buckle'; from the author's web site), but I've seen his other works around town, namely Crystal Rain and Ragamuffin.

As for Sly Mongoose, this excerpt I pilfered from the author's site had me hooked from the start:

Welcome to Chilo, a planet with corrosive ... [More]