Book Review: Chrysanthe by Yves Meynard

On July 23, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Living in a world very much like our own, a seemingly ordinary person is wrapped up in a whirlwind journey that takes her across the multiverse, far from the world of her home. On the way, the protagonist discovers there are an infinity of worlds at which there is one true realm at the center, […]

Tagged with:  

Lamentations of a Dipsomaniac’s Ghost: James Maxey’s Greatshadow

On July 2, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  On a tropical island inhabited by castoffs, treasure hunters and malcontents, a dipsomaniac treasure hunter, Stagger, and his supremely capable partner Infidel get into a deadly spot. While Infidel may be mostly invulnerable and superhumanly strong, Stagger unfortunately, is not. When the treasure hunter dies, his ghost does not move onto the next realm, […]

Tagged with:  

The Golden Prince and the Thorn King: Mark Lawrence’s King of Thorns

On June 25, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

When we last left Jorg Ancrath, Prince of a small feudal realm in a post-apocalypse Europe, he had unleashed the power of the Builders to complete an impossible task in humbling one of his father’s rivals.  The author seemingly accomplished the impossible task of getting readers to care about and respect a character who is […]

The Chronicler’s Tale: Jeff Salyards’ Scourge of the Betrayer

On June 4, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

A military unit outside of the boundaries of its Empire, messing around in client kingdoms and bordering polities. A motley group of soldiers and gritty veterans,  more than a bit war-weary. Some of those soldiers are burdened with dark secrets, and a mission and purpose unclear to anyone around them. Standard Sword and sorcery stuff, […]

Gimme that Old School Sword and Sorcery: The Hammer and the Blade by Paul S Kemp

On May 21, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Egil and Nix are thieves.  Good thieves, as a matter of fact.  True, they have side interests and pasts. Nix knows something of magic.  Egil was trained as a priest of the Momentary God. Both of them have pasts and long careers as thieves, years of tomb robbing and other unsavory jobs. Now, the results […]

Tagged with:  

Intrigue in Elizabethan England: Anne Lyle’s Alchemist of Souls

On May 14, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  It’s the early 17th century. Elizabethan England. The scene is London,  a diverse and eclectic metropolis.  Maliverny Catlyn is a skilled but down on his luck swordsman and gentleman who is trying to scrape together a living on the hard streets of London, manage his relationship with his lover Ned, and keep his tortured […]

Tagged with:  

Skill beats Will: Myke Cole’s Shadow Ops: Control Point

On April 30, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  The magic returns (or comes into being) to our technological modern day world is not a new idea in fantasy.  Rachel Pollack’s Unquestionable Fire. The novels of Alyx Dellamonica. The roleplaying games Shadowrun and GURPS: Technomancer hypothesize what would happen if magic erupted into the modern world. Other novels and stories ponder a return […]

Image of a Halfbreed Puca:And Blue Skies from Pain by Stina Leicht

On April 23, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  When last we left Liam Kelly, the slow revelation of who and what he was had left him if not in a happy place, at least a relatively stable place. True, he had lost much in discovering his true heritage, lost his wife, lost friends, lost (or should we say, walked away) from his […]

Tagged with:  

Songs of the Earth by Elspeth Cooper

On April 16, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  Book Review: Songs of the Earth by Elspeth Cooper. Gair has been keeping a secret. Although he a good warrior for the Church, he has a talent for magic that the Church decries as witchcraft. It comes as a terrible song that he cannot stop hearing, and when it manifests too strongly, the magic […]

Tagged with:  

Knight to King’s Knight’s Six: Prince of Thorns by Mark Lawrence

On March 29, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  I am going to start this review off on a note and structure rather different than other book reviews of mine you’ve read of mine at the Functional Nerds and say this right up front: Prince of Thorns, a debut fantasy novel by Mark Lawrence, is a contentious novel with a mostly unsympathetic sociopathic […]

Tagged with:  

Sixguns, Steampunk and Wuxia: Tales of the Far West

On March 22, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Imagine a  fantasy world that’s The Gunslinger meets Storm Riders meets Deadwood meets Afro Samurai meets The Wild Wild West (the series, not so much the movie) meets Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon meets Django meets Brisco County meets House of Flying Daggers and more. This is Far West. Far West started as a kickstarter for […]

Tagged with:  

A Russian Bear of a novel: The Straits of Galahesh by Bradley Beaulieu

On March 15, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Last May, I read The Winds of Khalakovo, and reviewed it here at the Functional Nerds. The Winds of Khalakovo is a secondary fantasy novel borrowing from cultures not usually invoked in fantasy–Tsarist Russia and ancient Persia. Throw in a pair of very different magic systems, very non standard cultural issues of duty and honor, […]

Rumballs on the eve of War: Michele Lang’s Lady Lazarus

On February 8, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

The scene is Budapest, Hungary  in the late 1930’s. Hitler’s saber rattling over in Germany  is becoming more and more bellicose, and there is the scent of war in the air. The quasi-fascistic pre war Hungary is not the most pleasant of places, especially for a Jew like Magda.  The fact that she is not […]

Tagged with:  

Transcending Part of Speech: Kafkaesque, edited by James Patrick Kelly and John Kessel

On January 23, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  Kafkaesque Adjective Marked by a senseless, disorienting, often menacing complexity e.g. Kafkaesque bureaucracies. Marked by surreal distortion and often a sense of impending danger. In the manner of something written by Franz Kafka. There are precious few writers whose names have transcended their status as a proper noun. Dickens has become an adjective to […]

Tagged with:  

Flying Unfriendly Skies: The Black Lung Captain, by Chris Wooding

On January 16, 2012, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  Captain Darian Frey has had some more reversals of fortune. Despite the encounter at Retribution Falls, keeping his beloved aerium fueled airship The Ketty Jay is serious business. His navigator is still weird and possibly inhuman, his daemonologist is still haunted by something he won’t talk about, his outrider fighter pilots are still a […]

Tagged with:  

The World as MMORPG: The Restoration Game by Ken Macleod

On December 19, 2011, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Lucy Stone works as a game designer in Edinburgh. Digital Damage is making a Massively multiplayer online role playing game based on dark ages Britain. With Zombies and other odd things.  Slaving away at this game, Lucy gets a call from her mother, a fellow émigré from a troubled region in the Caucaus.  Her mother […]

Tagged with:  

A twisty maze of passages all alike: Mirror Maze by Michaele Jordan

On December 14, 2011, in Book Review, News, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Jacob Aldridge, scion of a respectable, well off family in 1882 London, has had the shadow of tragedy hanging over him. His beloved fiancée, Rhoda Carothers, has suddenly died, and he seems more than usually affected by the tragedy.  A chance meeting with Livia Aram is shocking to both, for Livia very much resembles the […]

Tagged with:  

Steampunk, Zombies and Alternate History: Boneshaker, by Cherie Priest

On December 7, 2011, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Its late 19th Century Seattle.  The gold rush of the Klondike a couple of decades earlier  meant that the city was large and growing when inventor Leviticus Blue’s magnum opus due too greedily and too deep, releasing a gas that turns those who breathe it too deeply into the walking dead.  Those bitten or injured […]

Tagged with:  

Sing, Muse! Moses Siregar III’s The Black God’s War

On November 14, 2011, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

Sing, Muse!: Moses Siregar III‘s The Black God’s War Two very different realms have struggled against each other for years. The Rezzians, worshipers of ten deities, have engaged in a holy war against their godless neighbors, the Pawleons. With the birth of a royal son who is also a prophesied holy leader with divine powers, […]

Tagged with:  

Fae and Fallen in the Time of Troubles: Stina Leicht’s Of Blood and Honey

On October 10, 2011, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

  A savage pant—almost a laugh—puffed foul breath that blew hair from Sanders’s forehead. Sanders raised a fist, but the beast caught his arm with ease and slammed it on the concrete floor. Liam felt bones give way with a sickening snap and was pinned between satisfaction and revulsion. Sanders howled. A talon plunged into […]

Tagged with:  

The Problem of Free Will: Prospero Regained and the Prospero’s Daughter Trilogy by L. Jagi Lamplighter

On September 21, 2011, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

      “Ah!” Malagigi’s eyes flickered over the three staffs of power we carried—the staffs that were our Prospero Family legacy: Gregor’s Staff of Darkness, Erasmus’s Staff of Decay , and my flute, The Staff of Winds—before coming to rest upon Durandel riding in its sheath at Erasmus’s side.  Softly, he murmured. “Maybe, with […]

Tagged with:  

The return of the Hierophant of the New Weird: The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities, edited by Ann and Jeff Vandermeer

On August 15, 2011, in Book Review, Paul Weimer, by Paul Weimer

hierophant noun. 1. (Historical Terms) (in ancient Greece) an official high priest of religious mysteries, esp those of Eleusis 2. a person who interprets and explains esoteric mysteries Back when I wrote a review of Finch, I called Jeff Vandermeer the “Hierophant of the New Weird”.  I used that unusual word on purpose, then, and I use […]

Looking for something?

Use the form below to search the site:

Still not finding what you're looking for? Drop a comment on a post or contact us so we can take care of it!

Visit our friends!

A few highly recommended friends...