Sunday, June 07, 2009

Books in the Mail (W/E 06/06/09)

The first week of June brings three books...

Eyes Like Leaves by Charles de Lint (Subterranean Press Hardcover 10/15/2009) – Subterranean is continuing it’s impressive series of de Lint reprints and long-lost stories with this big fantasy novel.

Magic is already fading in the Green Isles, but it's still a time when myths walk the world and the children of the ancient gods are engaged in one final confrontation. But when legendary creatures wage war, it s the ordinary people who suffer the consequences--unless they, themselves, can find a way to bring an end to the hostilities. The trouble is, not all of them are able to pick a side.

Eyes Like Leaves was written in the days of Moonheart and Charles de Lint's other high fantasy novels. The tale slept like a long-forgotten lover until he recently chose to revisit (and polish) this never-before-published gem.


First Rider's Call (Green Rider #2) by Kristen Britain (DAW Trade Paperback 06/09/2009) – I read the first book, Green Rider, in this series years ago, and I think I read this one two in hardcover release. For whatever reason, DAW is reissuing the book in Trade Paperback after having made it available in Hardcover and Mass Market Paperback. .

Once a simple student, Karigan G'ladheon finds herself in a world of deadly danger and complex magic, compelled by forces she cannot understand, when she becomes a Green Rider—one of the magical messengers of the king. Forced to accept a fate she never would have chosen, she attempts to return to her life as the daughter of a wealthy merchant, but the magic in her blood is too strong. Pursued by the ghost of the legendary First Rider, she rejoins the Green Riders to confront an ancient evil.

Winter Duty (Vampire Earth #8) by E.E.Knight (Roc Hardcover 07/07/2009) – I’ve been following this series from the beginning but I’m just short of being caught needing only the previous book Fall With Honor to be completely caught up before jumping into this one. I like the post-apocalyptic milieu quite a bit and Knight is a solid and entertaining writer. I reviewed The Way of the Wolf (#1), Choice of the Cat (#2), Tale of the Thunderbolt (#3), Valentine's Rising (#4), and interviewed Mr. Knight in the past for SFFWorld. Here’s the synopsis for this volume:

Major David Valentine and his fugitive battalion are the remnants of an expeditionary force shattered in its long retreat from disaster in the Appalachians. Between a raging blizzard, bands of headhunters, and the need to recover wounded soldiers lost during the retreat, Valentine is in for the toughest winter of his life.

And Valentine is losing allies fast. Some of the clans in the region have declared themselves in favor of the Kurians, throwing Kentucky into civil war. But the Kurian overlords have determined that the region isn't worth the effort of another conquest. Their order: extermination.


Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson (Tor Hardcover 06/09/2009) – This is the final version of the ARC I received back in March. Here's part of my review

Consistent, engaging and well crafted – these are just three ways one can describe Brandon Sanderson and his second stand-alone fantasy novel, Warbreaker. Sanderson tells the story of a land ruled by a faceless God King and focuses on the woman (Siri) who is sent to be his wife. That core of the plot feeds several subplots – Vivenna, the sister of the God King’s wife (Siri) trying to save her; a brewing war between nations; the machinations of the Gods who live amongst men and just who and what the God King really is.
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Warbreaker is another top-notch novel from Brandon Sanderson – a novel that will likely be one of the top fantasy novels of the year.

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