Steven Brust’s JHEGAALA is yet another in the vaunted Vlad Taltos series, following 2006’s DZUR. Taltos is an assassin, currently on the run from the Jhereg, who seek to eliminate him for past activity. With some time on his hands, and a reason to leave his immediate area, Taltos finds out a bit about his long-dead mother, and travels to his homeland to see if he can reinstate contact with family remnants.
Taltos travels with Loiosh and Rocza, two reptilian familiars who are wont to ride on his shoulders. He communicates telepathically with Loiosh, and quite a bit of the fun of these books is the snarky interaction back and forth between the reptile and the human assassin.
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Maybe it’s because so many do it poorly, but poetry sits with me as well as ipecac syrup. Some people with no writing talent and a surplus of wide-lined notebook paper scribble a few lines in the ABAB format about their cat Marbles and think they’ve created art. I should know — my mother-in-law is one of them, and she falls for those poetry “contests” where you “win” the right to be published, yet have to pay for copies of the supposed books.
Which brings us to THE UNICORN MAN, Vox Anon’s rather thick paperback collection of dark poetry. He knew my stance on poetry, but wanted to send the book for review anyway. On the outside of the envelope was scrawled this message: “I hope you love it or hate it.”
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In case you didn’t hear, Max Allan Collins revisits his hitman character of Quarry in the new THE FIRST QUARRY, from Hard Case Crime. We’ve got an extra copy we’re just dying to give away to someone who deserves it.
Is that you? Prove it! Just e-mail me your justification, along with your name and mailing address. We’ll announce the winner on Friday, Oct. 3, based upon the best answer. Or you can just be a wuss and buy it at Amazon.
A sampling of some of the bizarro search terms with (thankfully) low numbers that brought people to BOOKGASM over the last 30ish days:
• “naked man on ladder”
• ”penis slowly –enlargement”
• “reason for wallenburg apache crash”
• ”sexy nazi girls in pulp magazine illustration”
• “how to draw scarface”
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She’s back, pimpin’ out notable new releases to place on your radar!
NATION by Terry Pratchett — The sea has taken everything. Mau is the only one left after a giant wave sweeps his island village away. But when much is taken, something is returned, and somewhere in the jungle, Daphne — a girl from the other side of the globe — is the sole survivor of a ship destroyed by the same wave. Together, the two confront the aftermath of catastrophe. Drawn by the smoke of Mau and Daphne’s sheltering fire, other refugees slowly arrive: children without parents, mothers without babies, husbands without wives — all of them hungry and all of them frightened. As Mau and Daphne struggle to keep the small band safe and fed, they defy ancestral spirits, challenge death himself and uncover a long-hidden secret that literally turns the world upside-down.
INKDEATH by Cornelia Funke — The Adderhead — his immortality bound in a book by Meggie’s father, Mo — has ordered his henchmen to plunder the villages. The peasants’ only defense is a band of outlaws led by the Bluejay — Mo’s fictitious double, whose identity he has reluctantly adopted. But the Book of Immortality is unraveling, and the Adderhead again fears the White Women of Death. To bring the renegade Bluejay back to repair the book, the Adderhead kidnaps all the children in the kingdom, dooming them to slavery in his silver mines unless Mo surrends. First Dustfinger, now Mo: Can anyone save this cursed story?
HOT MAHOGANY by Stewart Woods — One night at Elaine’s, Stone Barrington — back in Manhattan after chasing down bad guys in the Caribbean — meets Barton Cabot, older brother of his sometime ally, CIA boss Lance Cabot. Barton’s career in Army intelligence is even more top-secret than his brother’s, but he’s suffering from amnesia following a random act of violence. Amnesia is a dangerous thing in a man whose memory is chockfull of state secrets, so Lance hires Stone to watch Barton’s back. As Stone discovers, Barton is a spy with a rather unusual hobby: building and restoring antique furniture. The genteel world of antiques and coin dealers at first seems a far cry from Stone’s usual underworld of mobsters, murderers and spies. But Barton also is a man with a past, and one event in particular — in the jungles of Vietnam more than 30 years earlier — is coming back to haunt his present in ways he’d never expected.
THE HOUSE OF THE STAG by Kage Baker — Before the Riders came to their remote valley, the Yendri led a tranquil pastoral life. When the Riders conquered and enslaved them, only a few escaped to the forests. Rebellion wasn’t the Yendri way; they hid or passively resisted, taking consolation in the prophecies of their spiritual leader. Only one possessed the necessary rage to fight back: Gard the foundling, half-demon, who began a one-man guerrilla war against the Riders. His struggle ended in the loss of the family he loved, and condemnation from his own people. Exiled, he was taken as a slave by powerful mages ruling an underground kingdom, but earned his freedom. This is the story of his rise to power, his vengeance, as a lord and commander of demon armies.
Buy them at Amazon.
