A. Trae McMaken's Dwarves of Ice Cloak, Books 1-4

(Author's note: The author of this review loves dwarves. The author of this review wishes he was a dwarf. The author of this review writes his own dwarf based fiction. You will see the words, dwarf, dwarves and dwarven a lot, although I think I only used the word Dwarfdom once. For that you should be thankful. Unless you love dwarves like I love dwarves in which case I'm sorry I didn't up the dwarfness. For those of you bothered by this phonemon, I have the following to say. "DWARF UP AND READ THE REVIEW!!")

I have, in the past, been told that epic fantasy stories can only take place in worlds with high magic. I don't think I've ever believed that, but I've always seen it as a wee bit of a challenge to refute. That is the case no longer. A. Trae McMaken's The Dwarves of Ice Cloak, a four book series, puts that argument to rest. This is fantasy as epic as I've ever seen. It's got dwarves. It's got trolls. (and not the internet kind) it's got a dragon at one point. And no dwarf story is complete with goblins as an enemy, even if the author decides to use the dwarven word for the instead. I'm perfectly good with seeing an ursi get a spear to the chest. I mean, it's less typing for the same effect, right?

Good stuff, that.

But that's not what makes The Dwarves of Ice Cloak epic. Reading McMaken's series is almost like taking a history survey course (IE American History 1877- present or Japanese history since the Meiji Restoration) only it's taught using memoirs of the most important people during the time period. Imagine taking American History by reading four books: One about Washington, one about Lincoln, one about Reagan and one about like, Biden or probably someone later but I don't have anyone later to mention. (Oh, and for the record I have a BA in History and love reading that, too)

This analogy stuff, it's difficult okay. And yeah, it's actually a simile because I used like but whatever.

Listen, this is epic fantasy at its finest. The first book, The Crippled King starts out with one lone, poor, dwarven prospector on his own. During the series (of only four books) we see the rise and fall of a proud dwarven kingdom and a potential resurgence. A lonely mining claim becomes the capital of all Dwarfdom. It fights battles. It increases in size and wealth internally. It becomes someplace worth living and a capital worth having.

And the Ice Cloak dwarves are the dwarfiest dwarves that ever dwarfed. They work hard. They fight hard. They live underground for the most part, but have the inevitable surface dwarves that do the boring stuff like farming and husbandry and also the exciting things like scouting and ursi-slaying. But their miners mine, their crafters craft and dwarf-wifs and maids can craft just as well as the men with none of the factial hair. 

The Dwarven society presented in the books works is amazingly well crafted. I'm guessing that McMaken has done some studying in anthropology in his time. I'm also guessing that there is a huge pile, possibly digital, of notes that McMaken made to be able to keep everything consistent. Ice Cloak is home to a living, breathing group of people whose lives change over time. I got a sense of a grand history while reading these, but it's still undeveloped in most cases. A lot of the time when I started a new book I was wondering how we got here. I had to do a lot of the imagining myself and I like that because it's an excuse to write my own story. I just can't use the words "Ice Cloak." I'd even like to think I could do these concepts justice but we'll see.

As I alluded to above, there is a huge time gap between stories and the characters from one don't really carry over to the next. This kind of threw me when I first picked up Book Two, The Mouth of Fire. None of the dwarves I expected to see were there. It took me a bit to get into Mouth because of that but once I did I was off and running. For Book Three, The Second Gate and Book Four, Bones of Stone I didn't get that effect because I expected it. 

And that's probably another one of the strengths of The Dwarves of Ice Cloak. Although I recommend reading the books in order and all together, this is the kind of series where it wouldn't be at all hard to read the books individually or even pick up one of the later books by itself if you wanted to. There are occasional references that people who have read the prior books will enjoy and can hearken back to but they're not overly long nor are they all that important to understanding the story. They're basically just there as incredibly obvious Easter eggs.

None of the books end on what I would consider to be a true cliffhanger, but all of them end up somewhat unresolved. The reader is left to fill in the rest of the stories themselves and even reading what comes after (in the case of the first three books) doesn't fill in many of the details. I'm reminded, in a way, of the Dragonlance Chronicles, and how they skipped important parts of the story but then, the DC are much closer together in time. The gap between books is literally centuries. They still tie together nicely, but you don't have to know every word that has come before to enjoy the book in your hand right now. 

I'm sad to say that there doesn't seem to be a sequel to Bones of Stone. I feel like there was plenty of room to continue the story and that it hasn't happened. I'll be looking for it though, and I'll be following McMaken. He's got some other stuff out there and most of it appears to be fantasy, I'm sure to pick up another McMaken book sometime soon.

Bottom Line: 5.0 out of 5 Living Steel Mining Picks

The Crippled King
The Mouth of Fire
The Second Gate
Bones of Stone
A. Trae McMaken
Lost Pathway Books, 2022-2023

Monomyth's Grim Tides

I like gaming. Do you like gaming? I'm guessing you probably do, because most geeks are gamers and if you're not a gamer you're probably not going to read my blog. That's unfortunate, I suppose. Everyone should read my epic awesomeness (I mean, the name of the blog _is_ Jimbo's AWESOME Science Fiction and Fantasy Reviews) but some people just don't know how to have a good time. 

Or sumfin'

Today though, it's not about a book or a movie. Today, we're discussing a game. A pretty simple one, actually.  It's a cell phone app and I don't remember when it came to my attention, but I have been playing it a lot lately. There's a reason for that. It's fun. But it goes a little deeper than that, too.

At the most basic level, the reason I like Grim Tides is because it's the kind of app that I really enjoy: I don't have to spend my entire paycheck to succeed. I don't have to play constantly to accomplish anything. I don't have to wait for hours because I ran out of my energy when I do feel like playing. There's no "this will be done in six hours while you're asleep and you can't start your next twelve hour project till lunch time tomorrow when you get a chance to play again." type thing. There is crafting, but it's instantaneous as long as your cellular provider isn't being a buttface. I hate you, Cricket.

Anyway...

There's a lot of nostalgia for me here, because Grim Tides has a similar feel in a lot of ways to old school console Role Playing Games like Wizardry on the original Nintendo Entertainment System. The levels are easier to navigate, not being mazes like they were back in the day, but the random encounter system and linear advancement remind me a lot of the "olden days" as my oldest daughter would call them.

Grim Tides has a bit of open world to it, but not really. As you progress in the game, new areas open up and you can get back to the old places as well. I can't get to most places just yet, because I haven't progressed far enough. That's okay though, because I can see where I have yet to go and, if I'm not sure exactly what it takes to unlock each location, at least I know I'll get there eventually. There are new monsters at each new location and each matches with the environment in that area. Honestly, it's like a series of dungeons in Dungeons & Dragons in that manner. 

With a name like Grim Tides, it shouldn't come as a surprise that you have to obtain and maintain your own ship. I was a bit concerned about how the maintenance aspect would work, but it's pretty easy. It's just a matter of docking your ship (which you do at the end of every dungeon crawl) and paying the gold to do it. I have a couple of crew members now, and they add bonuses to different things. It's a matter of picking the right person to give the right bonus and I've done no research. I've probably got the wrong dudes, but whatever. This is not a super serious kind of thing.

Grim Tides is also a single player game and that's something I've been looking for. There is no player versus player content, so I don't have to try to outspend the other guy. While playing another game, I had a guy lecture me because I was so far behind him in increasing my power. It turned out that he had pumped three hundred dollars into the game. I hadn't spent a penny. I'm still convinced that I'm smarter than him, but I got my ass kicked. Lesson learned. I don't play those kinds of games anymore. I've got bills to pay.

Of course, being free to play means that Grim Tides is ad supported. I don't mind it though. You have the chance to view an ad after every dungeon run to get gold, but you don't have to. There are ads at the bottom of the screen, but they're really non-intrusive. Grim Tides is not the kind of game where you're constantly interrupted by annoying ads. And the amount of gold you earn for watching ads goes up as you level too, so it at least stays relevant.

There are a number of classes available, but I only have one character so far. He's a Paladin. I figured some healing and some tanking would be a good mix since you don't get a party: Grim Tides is a solo adventure once you get into the dungeon where most of the action takes place. There are plenty of other classes though. I just haven't had time to work through all of them yet.

Abilities are a huge part of the game. Leveling them requires a lot of gold, but you won't make it if you don't acquire and level them. I really need to experience more than one class to get a good feel for how it works overall, but I like my pally abilities. I've min-maxxed into hacking weapons and the abilities that go with them. This seems to be an effective strategy for now as, from what I can tell, weapons come in tiers and pretty much any weapon of a given tier has the same damage codes. It's the abilities that go with them that change things. And, "whack it as hard as you can as often as you can" has been a tactic that's worked for me for decades now.

The town you base out of is pretty basic, but it's got what it needs to be interesting. It's also small enough to be easily navigable. There's an Inn where you can buy supplies, acquire quests and raise your morale, as well as storing things you have acquired but don't have an immediate use for. That's an important thing, because inventory space is limited. There's a store, an arena where you can fight and win lots of gold, the harbor and a couple of places to do some crafting of magic items and weapons and armor. 

The story aspect is pretty cool, too. There's a prologue at the beginning and a journal feature that lets you re-read the story entries that you've found so far. It's also where you track your quests and get your rewards. And yes, the story is all about chasing down the evil wizard and his henchmen but it works. 

Bottom Line: 4.75 out of 5 Undead Pirates

Grim Tides
Monomyth, 2023?

E.G. Foley's The Lost Heir (The Gryphon Chronicles, Book One)

Okay, so I don't usually mention stuff like this because it's really irrelevant to my (and presumably your) enjoyment of the story, but E.G Foley is actually two people, Eric and Gael Foley. They're a married couple. That's kinda cool. But, with your kind permission, I will now proceed to regale you with my usual nonsense. It makes for fine rea...

*COUGH*

*WHEEZE*

Listen. I tried. That makes some kind of difference, right?

So anyway...

E.G. Foley's The Lost Heir has a title that is a spoiler in and of itself, so I guess it's okay if I mention that our hero, one Jake (don't call him Jacob) Reed is more than just your average orphan. I mean, there may be someone searching for him or something, possibly related to his heritage. Or sumfin'. Listen, Jake is honestly a scamp. He's got some magical power (and his first scene in the book was epic) and he is making his way in the world any way that he can. It's not quite the way the local magistrate would prefer, and that's unfortunate, but Jake is not the type of person to overly concern himself with the opinion of an authority figure. I mean that lovingly. This kid is a little rough around the edges the way I kinda like to read a bit, but that's part of his charm.

Jake also attracts trouble like sugar attracts ants. This kid cannot - under any circumstances - avoid doing the wrong thing at precisely the wrong time. His sense of timing is eerily terrible. That's a trait that keeps things interesting though, and I don't seem to remember being bored at any point during the story, and that's a really rare thing for the first book in a series. The Foleys have a gift for being able to build their world simultaneously with moving the story along. I was expecting some boring exposition and I didn't get any, so kudos to them. 

What I did get was a feeling of time and place that really worked. Being the guy with the history degree, I'm pretty sure that my college professors would have contracted the vapors immediately upon hearing about a story involving magic and water nymphs in Victorian England. That type of thing is just not historically accurate, no matter how much fun it was. I mean, it seriously was. I guess you wouldn't get this if you've never read a thirty plus page paper about the historical inaccuracies contained in the movie The Last Samurai, but trust me, it's a thing.

I've started a new job recently here in the real world, and I was looking for a light read, something I could read straight through without putting too much thought into it and just freaking enjoy. I like my new job but it's been a bit stressful trying to learn all the stuff about the things so that I can get the people to buy them. (Yes, Virginia, there is a Telemarketer Claus, and he reviews books) The Lost Heir was the perfect fit. This is not a heavy, plodding Robert Jordan novel (and for the record, that's a good thing. Jordan never used a word when a chapter would do and I couldn't even get through the first Wheel of Time novel.) nor is it something with the dark, twisted sense of foreboding I got while reading Dragonlance Legends. The Last Heir is entertaining and the stakes are high, but it's kind of like the literary equivalent of a good popcorn flick. Speaking of which, I'd pay to see this, and Jake isn't much older than that Potter kid at the start of his story, And Jake's an orphan, too. Hmmm...

The rest of the cast of characters is also a lot of fun. Jake's best friend is a girl named Dani, and oh wow, do I feel sorry for her. She tries to help Jake out and keep him out of trouble, but I already covered how well that goes. She is loyal to the bone though, and she could hang out with me anytime. She's always there, but she's not afraid to call a bonehead a bonehead. And, while I'm not sure she ever actually uses the word, she lets Jake know what he needs to know. 

Uncle Waldrick, on the other hand, is the piece's antagonist and he desperately deserves a thumb to the eye. I don't like this guy at all. He has no magic of his own, but he has friends and they're just as bad as he is. He has kind of a bit of Cobra Commander to him though. He has grandiose plans, but they never seem to work out. His reach exceeds his grasp, but he never gives up. Jake is the one person in the world who can screw everything up for him. It gets ugly. I hate this guy, but I love to hate him. He's the hero in his own mind though, and has only managed to come into something his brother didn't deserve.

My one complaint about The Lost Heir, and I'd never have noticed this if I hadn't just re-read the Amazon page for the book, is that it claims to be steampunk and I don't really get that feeling from it. There is some mention of trains, and a quick reference to attempts at flying, but it just doesn't have that weird, old time steam tech thing, at least from my point of view. Now, that may change in later books, and The Lost Heir is the first in a series, but for me it's not Steampunk enough to be Steampunk. I guess it's the right time period. Maybe I'm just being that guy. Other than that though, this is a first class story and I'm kind of ticked off at myself for reading that Amazon page of a book I had already loved. But whatever. I'm giving this story a perfect score anyway, because it deserves one.

Bottom Line: 5.0 out of 5 Talking Spiders

The Lost Heir
E.G Foley
Self Published, 2013

The Lost Heir is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.

Rob Howell's A Lake Most Deep

Asskickery, mysteries, intrigue and a new culture? Yes, please! Rob Howell rocked it with A Lake Most Deep. It was my first time reading Howell, but it won't be my last. There's so much packed into this one book. It was almost like a cross between Sherlock Holmes and the battles from Lord of the Rings. I was enthralled from the second I cracked the cover. And, if one of my predictions didn't come to pass (and no, I'm not saying which one) well, it was Howell's book and I suppose he had a better idea of how to write it than I did. Probably. I mean, he's been published and I haven't. So, by definition, he must be better at this than I am, right? 

Anyway...

Yeah, Edward Aethelredson (may I never have to type his name again because that surname is a PITA to spell right. I had to check three times to make sure I got it right.) is a great guy. Sort of. I mean, he outlived his lord and has been forsworn, but he's struggling to regain his honor and he risks both life and limb several times to keep his word. This is the kind of character I can get behind. He's rough and tough physically, but able to cope with someone talking poorly of him. He can handle himself in a fight, but is willing to accept coaching from others. He can put away the booze and feel the camaraderie, but is smart enough to keep his head in bad situations and not trust to the point of harming himself. He is, in short, both smart and deadly with a sense of right and wrong and a strong set of morals. I like this guy. We could hang out and watch a game together.

Edward is kind of a mix of traditions as well. He descends strongly from European traditions in most ways: When he first starts out, he's basically a knight on horseback. A free lance to be sure, but still a person that could have ridden onto the page directly from Medieval France or England and no one would have batted an eye. But as the story goes further, you realize that he has a relationship with a blade that is closer to that between a samurai and his katana than anything else. He sees it almost as a part of himself, an extension of his soul and I love it. The cultural background given to justify this is awesome as well. It's a big part of, not just the current story, but the backstory as well. It fits and it adds something to the story. 

He builds a set of companions that shifts from time to time as well. I've been told that there are really only two stories: A man goes on a journey, or a new guy comes to town and that they're essentially the same story, only told from a different point of view. While this is the story of Edward A. and he is definitely a man who has gone on a journey to seek a new life, there are plenty of characters in A Lake Most Deep that provide the opposite feeling: He is referred to many times as an outsider. It works here, too, because he is not only that but much of the plot relies on Edward's working through his misunderstandings to figure things out.

And figuring things out is kind of the point of A Lake Most Deep. It is as much a mystery as a work of fantasy.  Edward finds himself caught in the middle of a dispute, trying to figure out who kidnapped people from an inn, and lurching toward a grand ending involving high level leadership in the City of Achrida. The twists and turns to get there are complicated, but he continuously makes progress. This guy just won't stop.

Of course, no fantasy hero is complete without the occasional dust-up and I'm here to tell you that 'Ol Mr. A can hold his own in a fight. He's actually kind of a Jean Claude Van Damme type except that he uses weapons instead of just his fists and feet. Then again, his enemies use weapons too, and it makes no sense to try to block a sword with your hand. You'll lose an arm that way.  Probably your life too, come to think of it. Seriously don't go punchy, punchy against an enemy that can go stabby, stabby. Bad things happen that way.

And for a book with no truly huge battles, no Helm's Deep analogue, the body count in A Lake Most Deep is really high. Battle size seems to be a tool that Howell uses to up the suspense. As the book goes on, stakes get higher and the fights get bigger. This is a good thing. Edward is an A list combatant, but he's not infallible and things get desperate at times. A little heart pounding action is good. 

Magic is scarce in Achrida. Other than some healing magic, we don't see much of it. There is a book talke about that might be magical in nature, but I'm kind of on the fence about that since we don't really see it directly in the story. I have no problem with this. I'm a Song of Ice and Fire fan, and there wasn't a whole lot of magic in the first couple books of that series. I really love what we've actually seen in the books there, too. Is there more magic in the rest of Howell's series? I don't know. I haven't read it. But that brings up an interesting point. 

A Lake Most Deep is clearly marked as Book One of the Firehalls Saga and I am impatiently waiting for book two which, it should be noted, does not appear as a related work on the Amazon page for ALMD. I checked. I was going to snatch the next one. I guess I'll just have to get over myself for a bit. Hopefully not too long, though. I'm kinda the impatient type.

Bottom Line: 4.75 out of 5 Missing Books

A Lake Most Deep
Rob Howell
New Mythology Press, 2023

A Lake Most Deep is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.

Paramount Pictures Dungeons and Dragons, Honor Among Thieves

I've been playing Dungeons and Dragons on and off since the Eighties (admittedly, mostly off. It's not always easy to find a group.) I've seen the cartoon that was on when I was a kid, and both of the earlier movies. Admittedly, I missed the Dragons of Autumn Twilight movie, but that's because the reviews were terrible. I have no idea how many D&D setting based novels I've read, but it's a bunch. No small amount of them were set in The Forgotten Realms, just like the latest D&D flick, Dungeons and Dragons, Honor Among Thieves. I have to say, I'm in love with this movie.

Seriously, someone took some time and put some care into this movie. Honor Among Thieves actually uses the source material appropriately. I mean, if you don't want to slap the writers of the I, Robot flick then you either haven't read the book, haven't seen the movie, or both. And if you haven't read the book then you probably know as much about Asimov's writing as the guys who wrote the script for I, Robot. Seriously, read the book. It's good.

Honor Among Thieves isn't like that. Honor Among Thieves reads like it was written by a fan, but it's not fan fiction. Here you'll find the Harpers, the Red Wizards of Thay, get visuals of Neverwinter (for all you gamers out there who aren't into the lore yes, this is the Neverwinter of Neverwinter Nights.) We get mentions of Baldur's Gate (yup, that one) and Waterdeep (from the Warriors of Waterdeep cell phone app.) We get multiple character classes that fit with the subject matter for the most part, and we get  abilities that match things you would see in game. There's even a quick dip into the Underdark, which no D&D movie would be complete without. Of course, Honor Among Thieves is its own story and not everything is straight from the rulebooks. 

I can already here some D&D fans out there crying. Someone at Paramount decided not to adhere too closely to the rules as written for D&D and I'm okay with that. If you haven't homeruled something in your life you've never been a dungeon master. Telling the rules to piss off is the second best part of the gig. (The first being creating your own world.) So one or more of the writers didn't follow the rules. Big deal. I don't either and I do DM. Homebrew, house rules and The Rule of Cool have been part of the Dungeons and Dragons game since it debuted in the Seventies. And, while I may not allow a druid to Wild Shape into an Owlbear at my table, I can't deny how awesome it was to see it on screen. I'm a bit bitter because the writers can homebrew magic items better than I can. I'll get over it though. Eventually. Probably. Maybe.

So kudos to the writing team for writing this thing the way it needed to be written and not the way the rules called for. I mean, I never saw anything about a diety following the party down a staircase and healing them every time things got too intense with no limit on spells either, but I allowed it. My players better be glad I did, too. They needed the help. What party of third level characters charges down stairs guarded by hoards of ogres? Goofballs.

But I digress.

Then again, isn't digression my strong suit? I mean, unless this is your first time here you're probably used to it. I go off on more tangents than a trigonometry book. Just don't ask me to calculate one. Interpolation isn't my thing. Or was that square roots? It's been awhile.

Huh? Calculators? TODAY'S KIDS ARE A BUNCH OF WIMPS!!!

Anyway...

While I'm feeling cranky, I'm going to whine. I'm good at that.

OMG, WHERE IS ELMISTER? HAS ANYONE SEEN CADDERLY? WHAT ABOUT DRIZZT?

Okay, I'm over it. 

Yes this is an all new cast of characters, but I like it that way.  There is no mention of any of these people in the existing canon, so Paramount was free to do what they wanted, make them look how they wanted, etc. without spitting in the fans' faces. They used the broad strokes of the setting masterfully and created something new for the fans to enjoy. 

Did I spell Cadderly's name right? It's been a minute since I've read The Cleric Quintet. Seriously though, next time you're bored, find something with the name R.A. Salvatore written on the spine. I mean that.

We do get to see some old friends. If you haven't been spoiled yet, I won't tell you who they are, but I got a real kick out of it. Then again, my buddy David didn't notice them, so if you go and don't see them it's not because I'm full of crap. You just missed it. I had a good time with it though. It took me back to my childhood. 

If every single member of the special effects team for Honor Among Thieves doesn't get a raise, the whole world is a fraud and someone needs to hit the reset button. This was one of the most beautiful movies I've ever seen. The magic effects, the scenery, the fight scenes, that one axe thing, it's awesome. 

Also, while I'm busy praising people I don't see on screen, can I show some love to whoever choreographed these fights? (Trick question. My blog. I make the rules.) Of course I can! I'd love to know how they did it and what goes into planning something like that. These guys could put on a clinic and I'd pay to show up. The brawls are just that amazing. Of course, let's not forget about the people doing the stunt work, too. They were awesome.

I should probably mention the cast as well. I mean, they're the ones people pay to go see, right?

Chris Pine was amazeballs as the bard Edgin, but we all expect that, right? I mean Steve Trevor is pretty...

Uhh.. 

Captain Kirk totally sold me...

Yeah, so Pine's a geek icon and I would've been totally disappointed if he hadn't delivered but he totally did and I loved it.  Michelle Rodriguez was just as good as Holga. I'm still trying to decide if she's a warrior or a barbarian but it doesn't matter. Rodriguez owned that role. Seeing Hugh Grant in a movie I actually enjoyed and not some chick flick romcom was a pleasant surprise. Sophia Lillis blew me away as Doric. I have a thing for tieflings though. Justice Smith as Simon was not only fun, he was the guy a lot of D&D players can probably identify with and he pulled it off with aplomb. I can't wait to see this movie again.

Bottom Line: 5.0 out of 5 Homebrewed Magic Items

I usually don't do this, but per Margaret Weis's Facebook page, Gary Gygax, and Dave Arneson, creators of Dungeons and Dragons, are not credited in the movie, nor is Ed Greenwood, creator of the Forgotten Realms D&D Setting. I find this to be troubling. It didn't affect my enjoyment of the movie since I didn't notice it, so I didn't include it in my rating but this is a loser move by Paramount. Hopefully, they can fix this before the movie goes to streaming. Gene Roddenberry gets credited in every Star Trek movie or episode because it needs to happen. The same principle should apply here.

Dungeons and Dragons, Honor Among Thieves
Paramount, 2023

Some Dungeons and Dragons, Honor Among Thieves related merchandise is available for purchase at the links below. If you click my link and buy literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.

Todd Fahnestock's Khyven the Unkillable: Legacy of Shadows (Eldros Legacy Book 1)

I was in the mood for something magicky, something hacky, something slashy, something intriguey, something well...

Something epic fantasy, really. 

And then I wandered across Todd Fahnestock's Khyven the Unkillable: Legacy of Shadows (Eldros Legacy Book 1) and my cravings were fulfilled. 

Seriously folks, this one got my juices flowing for all the right reasons. 

Khyven is a champion of the Night Ring, the fantasy equivalent of an Ancient Roman amphitheater, wherein he has won forty-eight battles. Dude is a fighter's fighter and, unbeknownst to most, has a bit of a mystical ability, even if he won't call it that to see what his opponent is going to do before he does it and where his opponent is vulnerable over and above what a normal human being can do, even one who has won the battles that he has.

Khyven is hard-working, focused and indomitable. He is also absolutely convinced that he knows the one true way to make himself safe in a world full of hostile individuals who would use him for their own gain. I'm not exactly convinced that he's right, but what do I know? I'm just a book reviewer who has a better view of what's going on around him than he does because the author provided me with one. He's probably right. Or not, as the case may be. But he thinks he knows how to get there.

Khyven doesn't really start the series as the kind of man I usually admire. I mean, he's a survivor, and I respect that, but he's not a stand-up guy. Khyven is exactly the guy you would not want to have your back because his main focus is on himself. He lives this out at various parts of the story. Other characters can't always trust him. That makes sense though, from a guy who has been used and abused by every person he has come in contact with. It's not paranioa if they're really all out to get you.

This story really starts when Khyven realizes that the king is using him, and decides to do what the king wants anyway, because it will be good for him if he does what he has been ordered to do. It makes sense. When seeking power (his aforementioned method of protecting himself) it is good to have powerful friends. I get it. When his assignment relies more on his abilities as a spy than as a warrior...

Well...

Good for him, if he can pull it off. It's not an impossible task by any stretch of the imagination. 

And THAT'S when things get interesting.

There's a lot more to Khyven the Unkillable then I thought there would be. Honestly, I was using it as a form of brain bleach to clean out my brain because life has been really interesting lately, and I got a really well written, engaging, action packed work of art that I felt like I had to write about.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, I'm just saying that it was better than I expected and I honestly expected it to be really good.

The world of Eldros is well thought out so far. I haven't read the  newer books in the series (although I plan to) so I can't comment on those, but the magic system (what little we get to see of it) makes sense and produces effects both incredibly huge and instantly noticeable and small enough that only one person would notice it. That works if that one person can spread word of what they have seen though.  There are costs involved with using certain types of weaponry. The power-hungry king may be a bit of a trope, but it's well known because it works. The hero in the wilderness has been a thing since at least the first telling or Robin Hood, but it works. The city itself and the varying loyalties of those within it are true to real life. The wilderness is just outside the city's boundaries, but it is fill with fantastical beasts. Everyone thinks giants never existed, but then we go on a walk through an abandoned castle built by giants...

It builds on itself nicely.  And let's face it, there are as many giants on Krynn as there are dragons.

If you get it, you're laughing right now. If not, go read the Dragonlance Chronicles.

The action in the book is well-paced and easy to follow. It's sword fighting that is informative enough to make the reader understand what's going on, without going the Zelazny route and expecting me to take a fencing class so I can follow it. The consequences are believable too. Some live, some die and others are wounded. It's a fantasy story so magical healing is a thing, but if you read and/or watch fantasy stories that's expected. 

The cast of characters outside of Khyven himself are well drawn and believable. Vamreth, the king, is ruthless and cunning, just as he should be. The Queen in Exile is somewhat different and doesn't read as someone who has spent her life in a royal court because she hasn't. Her followers are who they are for their own reasons. And if one belongs to a fantasy race that might be something entirely new or might be an elf that's good too. A little bit of an enigma keeps the intrigue level high. Especially since she has an ability I haven't seen before but that has major ramifications for her when used...

My only complaint here is that I'm not sure if we'll get to see which member of this cast of characters again. It's a shared universe, Fahnestock is only writing some of the stories, most of which are named after only one character and which may or may not contain the rest of the people from Khyven the Unkillable. I look forward to the other works, both by Fahnestock and the other authors. I'm just wondering how much of this wonderful story is going to be referred to moving forward. It is entirely possible that we could switch locations, people and problems and still be reading the same series. It's got me interested, but I'm usually looking forward to seeing the old crew again and I don't know if I will. 

Yes, my friends, after eight years and more than three hundred posts your faithful reviewer has finally gotten smart enough to know how dumb he is. It's an interesting experience to say the least.

The good news is that I totally plan to read more. I just hope they're all this good.

Bottom Line: 4.75 out of 5 Puffs of Blue Wind

Khyven the Unkillable: Legacy of Shadows (Eldros Legacy Book 1)

Todd Fahnestock

Eldros Legacy LLC, 2022

Khyven the Unkillable: Legacy of Shadows (Eldros Legacy Book 1) is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no extra cost to you.

Destiny of the Realms: Fate's Awakening by K.L. Jones

Ya know, it's weird. If you had told me I was going to read a book with a character named "Bane" in it, my immediate reaction would have been to assume that he was the villain. I mean, a bane, at least to me, is a bad thing. It keeps someone from succeeding and maybe even kills them. I'm not usually a fan of banes. I have a tendency to get a bit upset at them. That much having been said, Bane is an awesome protagonist ( no, that's not a typo) and I have a feeling that the name Bane is going to have some importance moving foward in the Destiny of the Realms series. I also think that K.L. Jones picked the right name for the character in his book, Fate's Awakening.

You don't look convinced. Seriously, if you don't believe me go buy the book and read it. What do you mean I need to tell you more about it?

*SIGH*

Why do I have to do all the work around here?

Anyway...

Bane is a hardcore dude. He's a little bit on the young side, but he's the kind of guy that a McCoy of the McCoy/Hatfield feud can get behind. Bane never gives up, and I really, honestly, truthfully mean NOT EVER. I don't know if I could do what this kid does but he does it with aplomb. I wouldn't tangle with Bane. He does lack a certain subtlety at times, but what he lacks in subtlety he makes up for in guts and forcefulness. Don't get me wrong, he has a soft side that comes out at times, and I respect that, but, well...

Let's put it this way.

Did you ever read that internet me about the big, bad bikers and their cute little dogs and the kissy noises and whatever? Yeah. I mean, Fate's Awakening has a Medieval style setting so there aren't any motorcycles but, other than that, totally Bane. 

If and when you buy this one, buckle up and be ready for a rough ride. Jones has a tendency to take a hard right turn every once awhile. As soon as you think you've got it all figured out, everything changes. He does a very good job with his foreshadowing that it makes sense though. I really enjoyed that part of the book, just don't expect things to go the way you expect them to go.

I do find Fate's Awakening to be a bit Kratman-esque for those of you who enjoy his work. Young Bane receives an awful lot of training and there is some exposition about why he's learning what he's learning and why he's learning it. I liked that. I mean, we've all seen the tacky eighties movies with the thirty second training montage and no explanation. It serves a purpose but it doesn't fill the audience in on what's happening. There are some training techniques in here that I'm familiar with and some that I'm not. Having the weird stuff explained my brain malfunction less. (I mean, it's never really worked RIGHT...) Don't get me wrong, things don't devolve into a Weber style infodump, but there are times when you will be not be confused when you otherwise may have been. At least if you're paying attention.

I don't want to make it sound like all of Fate's Awakening is training. There is enough action here to keep anyone satisfied. Everything from duels to mass battles fill the pages. I found myself looking forward to the next fight and never quite being sure how it would go. I will say this much though: Fate's Awakening is not a book for those who are offended by graphic violence. That is a group that very specifically does NOT include me, I grew up on Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street, but those of you who can't take a wee bit of blood and possibly some falling internal organs are probably better off reading Sweet Valley High or something. My sister used to really like those.

The cast of characters outside of Bane is also amazing. Look for names like Toloff, Grim, Yasminia, Alicia, and others. A couple I don't want to give up. This is a book with a pretty decent sized cast and they all seem to have a place to be and a purpose to serve. People come in quickly at times, but you quickly realize why they're there. I like that. 

With so much going on and so many people to get to know, this book cooks with grease. You're not going to find a minute to put it down. I got lucky (sort of) and got two solid hours to read at work because it was so slow and went through the last two hundred plus pages of Fate's Awakening before I got stuck driving all the way across town for voucher rates. (If you missed it, voucher rates SUCK for the driver) Anyway, I went straight through this thing without pausing. I was engrossed.

The author of Fate's Awakening is a Marine and he gets military style comradery. The laughs the men in the book get are not always the most comfortable to some people, but they're FUNNY and it FITS. Jones also gets the warrior lifestyle. Too many military stories read like they were written by Worf when they should have been written by Kurn. I'm not saying Jones is Kurn but he's a hell of lot closer than some of the authors I've read.

Before I go, I will issue one small warning: The fantastic parts of this story don't appear until late and they aren't as pronounced as some may prefer. I thought that the way they were added was not only appropriate but interesting and vital to the story. I have a feeling that things will get more fantastic as the series goes on, but I can't make any promises. Just don't go into this looking for Harry Potter. The level of magic present is probably closer to the Game of Thrones novel than it is to Willow or Eragon. I can appreciate that. 

Bottom Line: 4.75 out of 5 Pells

Destiny of the Realms: Fate's Awakening
K.L. Jones
Self Published, 2022

Destiny of the Realms: Fate's Awakening is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.

Phantoms of Ruthaer: Chronicles of Damage, Inc. by Jason MacDonald and Stormy McDonald

 

Did you love Scooby Doo as a kid? I loved Scooby Doo as a kid. I loved the gang coming into town, finding something they didn’t expect and figuring out what it was. I loved the running, the hiding, the constant threat of danger.  I loved the risks. I loved the danger. But then I grew up a bit and realized that, while the concept of the Scoobster was, and always will be, awesome, the danger needed to be a bit more real and simply removing a mask wasn’t always enough to solve a problem. I wanted MORE danger. I wanted some fighting. I wanted…

Something I thought I was never going to get.

Enter Stormy and Jason MacDonald and their new book Phantoms of Ruthaer. Ok, so PoR isn’t quite as goofy as Scooby was. That’s okay. I’m not as goofy as I was as a nine year old either. I think. Well, probably. Maybe? I mean…

Uhhh…

Look, I’m just the reviewer. This isn’t about me, okay? STOP LAUGHING!!!

Or sumfin’...

All goofiness aside, Phantoms is an intense ride. There is a lot of action here and the one time it really lets up I found myself swept into laughing hysterically, and I mean that literally. Have you ever had that moment when everything around you was terrifying and then something that’s really only a little bit funny happens and you’re laughing so hard that you almost give yourself a concussion? Yeah, that was me. I didn’t know a book could do that to you. I got a similar feeling while watching Saving Private Ryan at the theater. That was sights and sounds and a book is just words and imagination. Well, maybe not JUST but you get what I’m saying…

Yeah, I’m going with “totally immersive experience” because I read that in an interview with a game developer once and, not only is it an accurate description, it sounds cool too. So now you can officially say you read something cool on my blog. Hold on…

You are reading this… Right? Anyway…

There was something in the acknowledgements (I think) about how Phantoms started out as a ghost story set in a fantasy setting. I think I screwed that quote up, but that was the jist of it. The point is that it’s easy to see in retrospect. The fog, the mysterious disappearances, it just makes sense that it started out as a ghost story. The thing is it’s so much more than that. 

Phantoms is a story that just keeps on giving. There is a lot going on. The backstories of the characters are well thought out and actually apply to what is going on in the story. Seriously, one of my pet peeves is when an author goes into a character’s backstory and it has nothing to do with what I’m witnessing happening in the book. That’s not the case here. Everything has relevance to the story we’re reading and helps to move it forward.

The thing that makes Phantoms better than Scooby Doo is that the action sequences are far more intense and the consequences of them are real. This is a story that you can feel in your gut. When the blood starts to fly and things start to do, you’ll say my my,

Or sumfin’.

I’ve reviewed books by McDonald and McDonald before, and they've always given me epic battle scenes. They always hit the mark between too technical (seriously, read <i>The Chronicles of Amber</i> if you’ve never fenced and tell me how easy it is to follow the sword fights) and some of the no-detail stuff I have read in other places. They give you enough details to be able to follow along and make it easy enough to be exciting. That’s what makes it fun to read.

I was watching The Curse of Oak Island: Digging Deeper recently and they interviewed Kevin Burns, the creator of the show and he said something that was both profound and totally unsurprising: Any story is about the people in it, the FAMILY in it. That’s really the feeling you get from the Damage, Inc. crew. There are no blood ties between them, but they’re closer than a lot of blood families are. These are people who have been through the ringer together and they’re ready to go again. They want to go again. It’s the feeling you get at a gaming table with your buddies. Everyone wants to do their part. Everyone expects everyone else to do their parts. But it’s not just that. It’s that you knew everyone else WILL do their part.

And that’s what makes a story like Phantoms work. This is a family and they’re here to take things apart if that’s what they need to do to accomplish their mission. Damage, Inc. is a good name for them. It’s not like they MEAN to damage things, it’s just that sometimes a character’s gotta do what a character’s gotta do. 

Of course it wouldn’t be a good Scooby Doo story if there wasn’t a hidden villain. It’s not really a spoiler to say that there is one here because it’s obvious from the beginning that the team isn’t sure who or what they’re fighting. All they know is that something is killing people and there is fog. Lots and lots of fog that only comes at night. It’s spooky and scary and part of that immersive experience that I wrote about earlier. There’s actually a bit of overlap here, as I wouldn’t be surprised to see Phantoms reviewed on a horror blog.

Being the nice guy that I am, I’m not going to mention the fact that my boy Jasper wasn’t in this book. That would be a low blow, especially as this is an awesome book without him. I’m not in the least bitter or pouty at all. Really, I’m not. I’m totally over it.

Bottom Line 4.95 out of 5 Fog Banks It would be five, but they left Jasper out.

Phantoms of Ruthaer: Chronicles of Damage, Inc.

Jason MacDonald and Stormy McDonald

Parlatheas Press, 2021

Phantoms of Ruthaer: Chronicles of Damage, Inc. is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no cost to you.

Phantoms of Ruthaer: Chronicles of Damage, Inc

Dan Parkinson's The Covenant of the Forge

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 When one accepts free books in exchange for reviews, the expectation is that they will read only those books and review them. I mean, I got it for free, right? And people have a right to expect that I'll hold up my end of the bargain. It makes sense on a purely logical level, right?

The problem being that I'm a human being and human beings aren't necessarily "purely logical." I wish I could be sometimes, but real life doesn't work that way. 

So, having gotten an Amazon gift card for Christmas, I decided to buy some comfort food for my brain. I picked up all three of the books from the Dragonlance Dwarven Nations Trilogy. I started with The Covenant of the Forge by Dan Parkinson because, well, it's the first book in the series. And it's definitely comforting. I was thinking that I had originally read it thirty years ago, but a quick Google search shows that it's only been twenty-seven years since it was published. I guess it was less than that.

Still though, I love this book. 

I'll be honest in stating that part of the reason I picked up these novels is because I'm writing a novel with a dwarf main character that starts in a dwarven town and I've been thinking about these books a lot. I'll also be honest in admitting that a lot of the genesis of my book (and it needs a better title than Dwarf Story, but I'm not so good at titles.) comes from the Dwarven Nations Trilogy. The concept of a dwarven society fascinates me and, if the society I'm creating looks different than this one, at least I won't get sued.  

Parkinson does a really good job of making dwarves people that aren't human (because DUH, they're dwarves) but still have recognizable and understandable motivations. The humans in the book aren't necessarily portrayed in a super positive manner, but that makes sense. Humans, to a dwarf's eyes, are short-lived and therefore in too big a rush for everything and kind of flighty. When viewed from a dwarf's eyes, some positive traits (to humans) don't look so positive. And if you've never been told to "look to the left side of your tools" well, it's a concept we could all benefit from and one that's easy to understand. It's also a concept I'd like to incorporate in my own work, but uhh...

Yeah, not sure how I can manage to mention this one and not get sued. Seriously. I don't have the right kind of file to eliminate the serial numbers on this axiom, but it's so useful and so intelligent..

Yeah, it's dwarven and I'M WRITING ABOUT DWARVES!

AHHHH!!!!

But the thing is that these dwarves are not alien to the point where we can't identify with them. They love. They hate. They marry. They have children. They're people just like you and I only they're different. They're not monolithic though, and that makes sense as well. Handil the Drum is a musician. He plays the Call to Balladine, the opening of the autumn trade festival. He ends up as a major hero. Cale Greeneye reminds many dwarves of an elf. Colin Stonetooth leads the Calnar clan with honor and distinction.. for awhile.

 And I guess that's what interests me more than anything: These are characters I care about. When a child is born at a moment that is precisely perfect and terrible (read the book, you'll get it) you want to cheer for the new father as he runs pell mell to where his wife is giving birth. When your hero, and the guy you figured would end up running things dies heroically it hurts, but you're proud of him for doing the right thing even if it ends badly for him personally. He honestly kind of reminds me of a dude named Sturm Brightblade in the Dragonlance Chronicles and that's saying a lot. If you're not familiar with the Chronicles you need to be. You should read them right after you read the Dwarven Nations Trilogy. Of course, Sturm was human, but no one is perfect I suppose...

The Covenant of the Forge has a little bit of everything. There is some extremely light romance. There is some combat. There is politics and scheming. There are loyal followers and treacherous enemies. There are even treacherous allies. You won't find anything missing from your favorite fantasy works, with the possible exception of horror. The Covenant of the Forge is not Ravenloft, even if Ravenloft  does feature a death knight from Krynn, which is the planet Covenant takes place on.

It doesn't need to be though. And the Dwarven Nations Trilogy takes place before the Cataclysm and Soth's descent into Death Knighthood anyway...

Err.. Nevermind. Nerd moment. Those happen.

The point is that this is a damn fine book and an awesome series. Looking back over twenty-five years after I read Covenant for the first time, I find myself amazed that it starts off as quickly as it does. I guess I didn't think about it at the time, but trilogies, and longer series, often start off pretty slowly. Not so much here. Don't get me wrong. There is a lot of worldbuilding that takes place, but it's so well done that I didn't really notice that it was happening. I just kind of understood things and moved on. There's no navel gazing, and no long winded explanations of things. Parkinson somehow managed to get what needs to be there stuffed in without making it feel like a chore to wade through it. 

I... will... not...

Who am I kidding? Of course I will.

Remember that feeling you got when you were a kid and you saw Star Wars for the first time? Remember how cool it was? Do you know how frustrating it can be to watch the prequels and the sequels because they don't make you feel the same way?

Yeah, I hate it too.

The thing is that I got that feeling reading The Covenant of the Forge again. I love these books for a reason. Read them. You will too.

Bottom Line: 5.0 out of 5 Vibrar Drums

The Covenant of the Forge
Dan Parkinson
Wizards of the Coast, 2012 (current edition)
TSR, 1993 (original edition)

The Covenant of the Forge is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.

 

 

L.S. King's Sword's Edge

 

 I love Sciencie Fiction. I love Fantasy. I've seen Star Wars, with its setting that is primarily SF (Lightsabers, FTL Travel, Aliens, Giant Space Stations, etc) but partially Fantasy (The Force) but L.S. King has done the opposite in Sword's Edge (Sword's Edge Chronicles, Book One).  She's created a setting that is primarily Fantasy (Rangers, Psychic Powers, Nobility, etc.) and partially SF. (Nope, not saying why. Read the book.)  So I guess, in a way, it's reverse Star Wars, except that it takes place on one planet. Then again, that makes it even more reverse Star Wars, right?

So yes, the setting does a lot for the story. Sword's Edge is a book that works based on the world where it's at as much as it does on its characters. (More on that in a minute.) The politics of the world move the story, as does the science fiction aspect of it, which we really don't get all that good a glimpse of at first. We're kept guessing for quite awhile as to certain aspects and I like that about it. We get hints here and hints there, but nothing concrete for quite awhile. And, getting back to the politics, they're complicate, convoluted and corrupt. There are only two political figures in the entire work that read as not evil and treacherous but that's necessary to the plot and makes a lot of sense given the internal logic of the book. 

Our main character is a girl named Tamissa, Tam for short. Tam is a young girl who has been raised in seclusion by her father. She is a member of the Ranger clan, which is responsible for both police and military duties in the Lairdom, but was brought up believing that she had no family. She belongs to the Clan but knows nothing of it. In short, King seems to have used a technique very similar to one used by a certain Mrs. Rowling: Her character is accepted as a member of the society she is in, so we can see her functioning within it, but she views it the way an outsider would. Another apt comparison would probably be Data. Everyone seems to know how to fit in, but her.

This leads Tam to be a bit naive about some things, even for a girl in her early teens. This can cause a bit of consternation among those of us who were born into a more egalitarian age. Tam knows nothing of romantic love and less of sex. She has no real concept of marriage. She can't even recognize her society's version of a wedding ring for what it is. She has no idea why women fear men, since she had no fear of her father and no interactions with any other man. But the thing is, she is actually an extremely intelligent young lady. She learns quickly, but has had no context. 

That's not to say that Valdor didn't teach his daughter anything: She can read. She can write. She can grow a garden, hunt and cook the proceeds from both endeavors. She knows uses of spices and herbs both medicinal and nutritional. She can make a poultice to cure a wound and identify plants that are harmful.  There's got to be something else, too. I feel like I'm missing something...

Oh yeah. Tam can fight. Tam will kick your scrawny (or fat, well proportioned, heavily muscled, etc) ass barehanded and won't feel bad about it. In the Rangers, they call it matching and it's basically like Mixed Martial Arts (watch the backfist bro, trust me) except less formalized. She also seems to know quite a bit about swordplay and archery to go with a working knowledge of tracking. In short, she's every bit as tough as any man in the book, but it gets more complicated from there.

King has done her research well. Sword's Edge features a type of reality that everyone else misses: Tam suffers the mental consequences of succeeding in battle. Here in the real world, Planet Earth, circa the last probably hundred and ten years at least, the leading cause of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder among combat veterans is that they were forced to kill. Having studied history (and I got one of them fancy pieces of paper what has my name and the words "Bachelor of Arts in History" written on it) I can attest that everything I've read agrees to that fact, but most authors and play/screenwriters ignore that fact. It makes me a little batty sometimes watching a hero make his first kill and walk away like nothing happened. The act of killing effects people. Kudos to king for looking the real world in the eye and not backing down. Other authors would do well to follow her example.

That's not to call Sword's Edge overly maudlin. The plot moves quickly. Points of view bounce around at times and we see things when we need to. The fight scenes actually gave me a burst of adrenaline at points. There is no navel gazing. There's no time for it. Tam is hard-core and even when she is relaxing it seems that there's always a prankster around to keep it interesting. Somehow, she makes it through the novel without developing a love interest even though I had two separate dudes picked out at her at different points in the novel.

The only weird part of Sword's Edge was that it didn't end when I thought it would. I was reading it on an app called FB Reader. Page numbers appear in the lower right corner of the screen and often don't match up with Kindle or print page numbers. When I got to what I thought was the end is still had fiftiesh (I think) pages left. What followed was both fun and interesting and ended up with me being very frustrated with my dispatcher at work (Seriously, if the whole day sucks and I'm not making anything don't interrupt me just when the weird stuff starts. It makes me cranky.) but in some ways it felt like it was more set up for the rest of the series than it was part of the story I was reading. Then again, it must have been a good ending because I've already snagged a copy of the omnibus edition containing not only Sword's Edge but also the sequels Children of the Enaisi and Laws and Prophecies. Maybe if you're lucky, I'll let you know what I think about those too.

Bottom Line: 4.75 out of 5 Bells and Stars

Sword's Edge 
L.S.King
2014, Self Published

Sword's Edge and the Sword's Edge Chronicles Omnibus are available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and then buy literally anything from Amazon I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.

Sarah K.L. Wilson's Dragon School: Episodes 1-5

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So, I've kind of got a confession to make. I've got like a huge backlog of stuff that people sent me to review and I errr...

Read something else.

But it was, like, really good, so I thought I'd force all of my fans (LAWL) to read my thoughts on it because awesome. Or sumfin'.

And I know some people don't like young adult fiction, but I truly feel sad for those people and think they should broaden their horizons. Sure, the teenage years were rough for some of us (and believe me, I was a geek with acne, I would know) but that shouldn't ruin your enjoyment of a perfectly good story. Especially one that's awesome dipped in awesome sauce on a stick.

So what is this gem that I'm up past my bedtime to share with all of you? (Seriously, I get up for work at 5 AM and it's 11 PM here.)

It's Dragon School: Episodes 1-5 by Sarah K.L. Wilson.  It's the story of a young girl with something to prove. It's the story of overcoming a common birth and a disability to achieve her goals. I'm not sure if it's a story of incredible courage, or a case of having more guts than brains, but she's definitely no coward. It's action packed, non-stop and I already downloaded the second omnibus. I stopped reading it to let you all know about this series though, because you need to read it.

When I first downloaded Dragon School, I thought it was going to be a massive omnibus. It is massively entertaining, but it's not all that long. I can see why she packages them five episodes at a time because the five of them were about the length of an average novel at three hundred ninety-one pages on Kindle. (Yes, I know all of the cool kids do word count but I'm a geek. Not just that, I'm a LAZY geek. I'm not counting all of those words.) The next one is slightly longer at four hundred and one. The five episodes serving is just about right.

I swore I wasn't going to rant about not getting anything done on my day off because I had my nose buried in Dragon School all day so I won't. After all, it's not like I really need clean clothes or groceries. I'll be just fine without them. I did take time out to make my last steak tonight and I think I've got some Ramen around here somewhere...

Good authors are evil. Wilson is practically Skeletor mixed with Darth Vader.

Or sumfin'

Our heroine is one Amel Leafbrought. She is a commoner in a fuedal society. She has a problem with her leg and can't walk without a crutch or at a normal pace. (I'm not sure what the exact nature of the leg problem is, other than that it hurts and it won't hold weight. As a gout sufferer I can relate.) She passes some tests and wins the right to choose a dragon. (that's not a spoiler, it's in the first chapter.) The she picks one, gets inducted into Dragon School and chaos ensues.

I'm not really the superstitious type, but you'd almost think there was some malevolent force out there intentionally waiting for her to join Dragon School before allowing the world to blow up. Like, oh, I dunno...

An author or something?

They tend to do that, I suppose.

At any rate, Amel is the kind of girl who doesn't have a bit of backup in her. Seriously, this is the girl you want to go to war with. She's smart, tought and indomitable. I like this girl. I teach my daughters to be “Strong, Proud, Smart, Tough, and Brave.” Amel is all of the above. I like this girl. I respect this girl. Hell, I admire this girl. I'd really like to see my oldest read this (it might be a little tough for my nine year old) but good luck with that. She's into romance and not the good stuff. Poor kid.

Oh, and I've never seen a character quite so loyal to her friends. Amel is a girl that would go through a fire to save someone she cared about with gasoline drawers on and not worry about what would happen until after they were safe. What a girl.

I really like the dragons in Dragon School. For an old school Dungeons and Dragons they take a bit of getting used to (Chomatic Dragons that are good guys are weird for some of us) but once you wrap your brain around the fact that you're in a different universe they're awesome. Seriously, one of my least favorite things about both the J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series and  Harry Turtledove's  Darkness series is that they get dragons wrong. Dragons are meant to be huge and fearsome, yes, but also of at least human intelligence.

Wilson gets it right.

Her dragons are smart and lively as well as flat out deadly. They may have a bit of a temper at times, but they are predators with lots of natural weapons, so that seems only natural. They're also good friends and allies – or at least some of them are. Others I haven't seen so much about and there are hints of tension within the ranks of the dragons, most of which are wild.

I'm hoping that'll show up in future volumes. I'm kind of guessing that it will, actually.

The political scheming is intense. For a commoner girl, Amel sure does get caught up in a whole bunch of stuff above her station. I don't want to get too spoilery, but trust me she gets to know some seriously important people. I'm wondering if she doesn't end up with some kind of minor title herself at some point. I guess I'll just have to keep reading. For some reason, that doesn't seem like a bad thing to me.

Listen, there are a lot of other characters I'd like to talk about but honestly, it's almost midnight now. I need to be up soon and I totally want to get through a few chapters of  Episode Six now. Hie thee off to Amazon for Dragon School: Episodes 1-5 while I hie me off to sleep. And seriously, get the omnibus editions. The individual episodes are pretty short and you won't have to go through the frustration of interrupting your reading for multiple downloads.

Bottom Line
: 5.0 out of 5 Sets of Leathers
Dragon School: Episodes 1-5 (Dragon School Omnibus Book 1)
Sarah K.L. Wilson
Self Published, 2019

Dragon School: Episodes 1-5 (Dragon School Omnibus Book 1) is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and they buy literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.

RIP Gary Gygax

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Today marks the twelfth anniversary of the death of one of gaming's greats. Gary Gygax was the impetus for the creation of Dungeons and Dragons but he was more than that. An entire generation of geeks grew up on D&D. It's more than that though, too. Three (maybe four) generations of geeks have grown up with Role Playing Games in general, be it tabletop roleplaying games like yes, Dungeons and Dragons, but also GURPS, Heroes Unlimited, Shadowrun, Pathfinder, the Star Wars RPG (yes, George Lucas invented Star Wars but without D&D there's no RPG to go with it.) or the early platform RPGs like the  Final Fantasy franchise, Wizardry and the Phantasy Star franchise, and MMORPGs like  World of Warcraft, Everquest, City of Heroes, or Elder Scrolls Online. That all started with Dungeons and Dragons.  Every bit of it comes from a game that started in someone's basement.

It's more than just Role Playing Games though, too. The D&D legacy has helped build geek culture in ways that go far beyond gaming. The Lord of the Rings novels were published long before Dungeons and Dragons ever hit the shelves, but without the growth in the fantasy genre promoted in large part by D&D in the form of its players and fans. Willow, Dark Crystal and even The Princess Bride all owe a large debt to Gary Gygax and his game whether they realize it or not.

And, can you say card games? The original audience for Magic the Gathering was, yup you guessed it, RPG players. Yu-Gi-OH and Pokemon both descended in large part for MTG and are part of Gygax's legacy as well. Of course, when MTG first came out and a flurry of card games followed there was a D&D based one named Spellfire. It didn't catch on because it wasn't as cool as Magic (and I've played both) but it was there nonetheless.

Speaking of card games...

All of the fantasy card games have one thing in common: Art. Seriously. I've already reviewed Beholder. The fact remains that some of the best fantasy art over the last forty-plus(!) years was either created for Dungeons and Dragons or descends from it. I love fantasy art. When I was married and had a bigger budget I went to the local Ren-Faire and came home with new art every single year. I bought it at art fairs. I went to a local place that features local artists... and left disappointed. There wasn't any fantasy art. But pretty much any fantasy art (with the possible exception of Cthulu related stuff) descends from D&D art somehow.

Let's not forget comics. Not only have there been like elebenty bajillion different D&D titles but the parodies are excellent. Seriously, if you haven't checked out webcomics like Darths and Droids (I cast Summon Bigger Fish because I'm a Cheddar Monk) or Rusty and Company (I haven't reviewed Rusty and Company? Why haven't I reviewed Rusty and Company? This is a travesty. THIS WILL NOT STAND!!!!)

And guys.. The novels. Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms, Dark Sun, Ravenloft, Eberron, the other ones that I'm blanking on...

They're all based on Dungeons and Dragons settings. Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman are two of my favorite authors of all time. Their first book was Dragons of Autumn Twilight. R.A. Salvatore is another one of my favorite authors. He got his start writing in the Forgotten Realms. (And can we get a decent Drizzt Do'Urden movie PLEASE?!??!??!?!?!?!?!?) He was the editor of the Everquest line of novels as well and I already noted that EQ was a descendant of D&D and therefore Gygax.  (Does anyone know where I can get my hands on the old Spelljammer novels?)

There are, in my estimation, only three true giants in the field of Fantasy Fiction. The first is Tolkien who wrote Lord of the Rings and really created the modern fantasy genre. Before him, we had several ancient mythologies for fantasy stories and not much else. Since Tolkien, we've seen an explosion of Fantasy. Without Tolkein I don't think D&D would have taken off the way it did in the 1970s.  I certainly don't think it would still be here.

 Most recently, we have J.K Rowling. Harry Potter is something that has taken over the world. Of course, J.K. Rowling also pushed the Young Adult Genre to new heights and pretty much singlehandedly added the Young Adult sections to both the bookstore and the library and so she's a giant in other fields than JUST fantasy, but it all starts with a magic casting boy named Harry Potter. In a way though, probably the most impressive thing about Mrs. Rowling (whom I loves and respects) is that she is maybe the only fantasy author since 1977 who didn't draw on Dungeons and Dragons fandom at the beginning of her career. Most of the Harry Potter fans that have been there since the beginning were not old enough to have played D&D before they started reading HP. (Yes, I played D&D before I read Harry Potter. I was also in my late twenties when I read Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone. Oh, and there were four books out by then.) Geek culture is exploding in the United States right now, and a lot of the reason for that is a British woman who can write like a champion.

The last, but definitely not least, is  Gary Gygax. I've covered a lot of the reasons above. Yes, a lot of what he did was derived from Tolkien. The fact remains that he invented the modern Roleplaying Game. Gygax did every bit as much as for RPGs as Tolkien did for fantasy in general and J.K. Rowling did for the Young Adult genre. And do you know what else he did?

That's my daughter Riley at our gaming table.

Gygax and his game have brought people together and created friendships on a huge scale. A love of Dungeons and Dragons has created friendships and brought families together. When my then-wife was pregnant with my oldest daughter, I declared that I would one day play D&D with my kid. My ex thought I was crazy because “She won't be interested. She's a girl!” I just shook my head. One of the happiest days of my life was the first time my kid showed up at my gaming table and I got to present her with her first dice. I was a proud papa that day. There are millions of stories like mine. And we owe that to Gygax as well.

So rest in peace, Mr. Gygax. We miss you. I know you're somewhere banging out some natural 20s and steamrolling mobs. I'll see you when I get there.

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