After Audible Frontiers published the entire collection of Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories, I eagerly listened to the first volume, Swords and Deviltry. I enjoyed the stories, but not enough to rush headlong into the rest of the series. Recently, however, I’ve returned to the world of Nehwon, the fictional setting for [...]

The second season of HBO’s True Blood, based on Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse novels. The show’s first season very loosely followed the first novel in the series, Dead Until Dark, while the second season made significant departures from the second novel, Living Dead in Dallas. Hoping to garner some clues about the show’s third season, [...]

John Ottinger over at Grasping for the Wind presents the second edition of the Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Book Review Linkup Meme. I know I’m rather late to the party, since I haven’t been doing much blogging of late, but better late than never.
Below you’ll find lots of great resources for all manner of [...]

The first book I reviewed here on AzureScape was Swords and Deviltry, the first in a seven-book collection of Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories. My review of that anthology was mixed, on the one hand praising the inventiveness of Leiber’s language and world-building, but on the other hand lamenting the rather flat [...]

Changeling
By Yasmine Galenorn; Read by Cassandra Campbell
9 CDs – 11 hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: 2009
Themes: / urban fantasy / paranormal romance / shapeshifting / vampires / fae
I’m ashamed to admit how much time I’ve let go by between reading Witchling, which I reviewed and thoroughly enjoyed, and starting on its sequel, Changeling. Once I [...]

Harry Potter and the Half Blood PrinceBB
Directed by David Yates
Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Alan Rickman, Michael Gambon, et al.
Released: 2009
Due to the round robin of directors tapped for the Harry Potter film series, the quality of the movies thus far has varied wildly, from the solid first and second films to the [...]

The Name of the Wind
By Patrick Rothfuss; read by Nick Podehl
Audible Download – 28 hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Published: 2009
Themes: / epic fantasy / magic school / frame narrative / biography
The Name of the Wind is one of those books I’ve just kept hearing wonderful things about, so when Brilliance Audio finally released an audiobook edition, [...]

I’ve quoted the letters of John Keats here before, and probably will do so again. Keats’s thoughts on literature and the art of creativity, often nestled as if in passing among more prosaic matters in his correspondence, transcend bone-dry literary criticism and illumine the ungraspable spirit of creativity. Furthermore, in my opinion, the Romantic poets [...]

I love my gig as a reviewer. Sure, it doesn’t pay much, but I score the occasional free book, I spend hours reading (mostly) great literature, and I get the satisfaction of sharing my thoughts with others, thereby hopefully directing them toward their own great reading experiences. But am I missing something? Am I merely [...]

Yes, it’s another book about vampires. But wait, don’t shrug it off just yet. Several things set The Strain apart from the glut of vampire novels flooding the market of late. First, it’s co-written by movie director Guillermo del Toro, whose past film successes include the vampire flick Blade II, the comic-book adaptation of Hellboy, and the [...]