Tag Archives: fantasy

Pages Breathing Fire: 10 Books About Dragons

Dragons, dragons, dragons – so many writers have written about them in one form or another. Here’s ten books featuring dragons for fellow lovers of the form. Continue reading

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A Frame of Mother of Pearl

On her twenty-fifth birthday, two days after her true love’s disappearance, Hattie had her scalp tattooed with the twelve celestial houses. They marked off her head in long pie-shaped wedges, Scorpio over her left ear and Taurus over the right. When she stood still, no matter the location, she chose to stand in alignment with the sky, so the spidery black demarcations reflected the patterns of the stars Continue reading

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Urban Fantasy #1: Laurell K. Hamilton

You can argue about where it all started (or even what it is) but I’d rather take the tack of looking at the authors that shaped the genre. Let’s begin, accordingly, with Laurell K. Hamilton, who started so much with her heroine, Anita Blake. Necromancer and private investigator, Blake kicks ass and takes names, at least early on in the series, which begins with Guilty Pleasures. (did Hamilton know the direction she’d go in from the first? The title seems to hint in that direction.) In the early books, Anita is tough as nails and prone to smartassery. She’s got two love interests: Richard the werewolf and Jean-Claude the vampire and, unlike a lot of romances, you don’t know what will end up happening. It’s great stuff. Continue reading

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Bigfoot

“Whoop! I’m Bigfoot! I’ve wrassled woolly mammoths left over from the ice age and tamed them until they gave down sixteen hundred gallons of mammoth milk! I’ve hollowed out giant redwood stumps with my teeth to use as a cradle for my daughter, and spit out the splinters to make a rocking chair! I’ve walked over mountains taller than a man could think and I’ve swum seas deeper than sorrow! Whoop! Whoop! I can out-drink, out-boast and out- love any person in this bar, and I’ve got the scars to prove it!” Continue reading

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Five Fantasy Books You’ve Never Heard Of

Tired of the usual stuff? Here’s five fantasy classics that you may have missed. Continue reading

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WIP: Dr. Fantastik Part V (Final)

…when she opened the door to the kitchen, everything was moonlight and steel, the rims of the great soup pots shining like rounded scimitars, the rack of cleavers and knives varying from the length of his forearm to the smallest paring blade possible, the tiles of the floor like moonstones underfoot, sending up a muted dazzle that mirrored the steel’s. Continue reading

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WIP: Doctor Fantastik Part IV

Ellie wouldn’t have liked bland, indeed. Her menu featured quirks of taste and savor and spices that sometimes felt like blows, but ones that left you tingling with satisfaction. He knew that without her, what had come to the table was only a shadow of what it could have been, but she had designed the recipes, and they were as individual as signatures. As he ate, he had put together the strands, as though he were talking to her in his mind, drawing her out, finding out how she felt about fighting, or politics, or love. Continue reading

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WIP: Doctor Fantastik

“This craze for exorcisms is a harmful fad,” Dr. Fantastik said to the man at his left. His tone was severe in a way that seemed at odds with the addressed man’s mien, for the lefthand man was wholely engaged in his newspaper, turning over the yellow sheets with an attention utterly untouched by Dr. Fantastik’s presence. Continue reading

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