Author Archive: PaulineMorgan
Foundryside (The Founders Trilogy book 1) by Robert Jackson Bennett (book review).
When the whole genre of fantasy took off, mostly due the success of Tolkien’s ‘Lord Of The Rings’, we were deluged by trilogies of quest novels set in low tech societies which used some kind of magic. Some were excellent but, as time passed, the originality deteriorated. While this kind of fantasy is still popular […]
The Private Life Of Elder Things by Adrian Tchaikovsky, Keris McDonald & Adam Gauntlett
When H.P. Lovecraft write his first story, ‘The Call Of Chthulu’ in 1928, he was unaware of what he was unleashing onto the world of literature. His stories about the Old Ones, the Elder Gods, caught the imagination of horror writers the world over. Three are featured in this volume and their stories are the […]
Girl With Cat (Blue) by Sam Hawksmoor (book review).
In the early days of creating alternative world scenarios, the protagonist entered the other world through some strange happening. Often, it turned out to be a coma. As scientific theories advanced with the idea of string theory somehow postulating branching timelines, parallel universe became more ‘explainable’ though getting there was still a problem. Sometimes, the […]
Brief Cases (The Dresden Files anthology book 2) by Jim Butcher (book review)
Immersion in a world that is the background for a successful series of novels is often the penalty a writer pays. There is a demand for more novels from fans, there are also the requests from editors to contribute to anthology and the danger of coming out of the mindset needed for the next novel. […]
Evocations by James Brogden (book review).
Advice often given to budding writers is to write what you know about. Not an easy task if the heart of the story or novel is fantasy or horror. More important, perhaps, is to use places that are familiar. Done well, the result is convincing. James Brogden’s first novel, ‘The Narrows’, was largely set in […]
Tricks For Free (An InCryptid Novel book 7) by Seanan McGuire (book review).
All creators, whether writers, artists or musicians must have visited places that inspired them to produce the next exciting work in their oeuvre. At times, though, that place is hedged round with copyright and the person risks litigation, especially in the United States, if something bad is set in that place. Imagine, for example, a […]
The Ion Raider (book 2) by Ian Whates (book review).
Second books of either a trilogy or a series are notoriously difficult to write, especially if it is accepted that some readers will not have seen the first book. Somehow information needs to be conveyed about the characters that continue from one book to the other, the setting has to be re-established without boring previous […]
Radix Omnium Malum & Other Incursions by Mike Chinn (book review).
Anyone who has heard of Mike Chinn will probably be familiar with either his steampunk versions of Sherlock Holmes or his ‘Damian Paladin’ stories. Since the works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle are now out of copyright, there have been a number of stories and novels of varying degrees of competence using his character. Mike […]
Witch Creek: A Wildlands Novel (book 2 but book 4 of the ‘Dark Alchemy’ series) by Laura Bickle (book review).
There is something very annoying about cliff-hangers. It is fine at the end of a chapter when to find what happens next is only the turn of a page away or in a TV episode when the next is scheduled for the next week, but having to wait a year to find out what happens […]
Nine Of Stars: A Wildlands Novel (book 1 but book 3 of the ‘Dark Alchemy’ series) by Laura Bickle (book review).
I had always understood that a prequel was something produced after the main action but returning to earlier chapters in the characters’ lives. The ‘Star Wars’ prequel trilogy hit the screens more than ten years after the end of the original trilogy and, however much it is despised, the film ‘Prometheus’ is a prequel to […]
