The Drowning Cityby Amanda Downum384pp (Paperback)My Rating: 5.5/10Amazon Rating: 5/5LibraryThing Rating: N/AGoodreads Rating: 3/5 The Drowning City is Amanda Downum’s debut novel and was just released on August 25. It is the first book in The Necromancer Chronicles series, and the next two books are scheduled to be published approximately a year apart (The Bone Palace in 2010 and Kingdoms of Dust in 2011). Ever since I saw the cover quote from one of my favorite authors, Elizabeth Bear, I’ve […]

The Book Smugglers has been celebrating YA Appreciation Month with a whole bunch of reviews and giveaways of YA books as well as interviews/guest posts with some authors who write YA. They posted an open invitation to other bloggers to post reviews or articles about YA books on August 15 and I decided to participate. It was tough to pick a book to review but I ended up settling on the sequel to a very good book I read earlier […]

Best Served Coldby Joe Abercrombie512pp (Hardcover)My Rating: 8/10Amazon Rating: 4.5/5LibraryThing Rating: 3.94/5Goodreads Rating: 4.23/5 Best Served Cold is a stand alone novel by Joe Abercrombie set in the same world as his First Law trilogy with a different set of main characters. It takes place sometime after the end of the series, although I’m not sure exactly how much time has passed other than it must have been at least a couple of years. Although I enjoyed the First Law […]

The Orphan’s Tales: In the Night Gardenby Catherynne M. Valente496pp (Trade Paperback)My Rating: 9/10Amazon Rating: 5/5LibraryThing Rating: 4.51/5Goodreads Rating: 4.36/5 In the Night Garden comprises the first half of Catherynne M. Valente’s The Orphan’s Tales duology. The second volume, In the Cities of Coin and Spice, was released in 2007. Often compared to The Arabian Nights for its style of stories within a story, In the Night Garden was nominated for the 2007 World Fantasy Awards and won the 2006 […]

Archangelby Sharon Shinn400pp (Paperback)My Rating: 8.5/10Amazon Rating: 4.5/5LibraryThing Rating: 4.21/5Goodreads Rating: 4.10/5 Archangel is a novel in Sharon Shinn’s Samaria series, featuring a world in which angels and humans live together in harmony. The Samaria series is not published in chronological order, but on her website Shinn recommends reading the books in the following order (by release date): Archangel, Jovah’s Angel, The Allelluia Files, Angelica, and Angel-Seeker. There is also a novella in the To Weave a Web of Magic […]

Dreamdark: Blackbringerby Laini Taylor448pp (Paperback)My Rating: 8/10Amazon Rating: 5/5LibraryThing Rating: 4.32/5Goodreads Rating: 4.51/5 Blackbringer is the first book in the Dreamdark series by Laini Taylor and just came out in paperback this month. The second book in this YA fantasy series, Silksinger, will be released in September 2009. Long ago, the djinn captured all the devils, sealed them in bottles, and threw them into the water. Their magic kept any creature from being able to release the devils back into […]