Tag Archives: Still Life with Fantasy

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Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #4

Along with all the delicious fantasy, today we shall enjoy watermelon, nectarines, saturn peaches, and a bit o’ tea with honey:

Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #4

Yeah, that’s a red onion in there. I’m just making sure you’re paying attention.

A bit about the fantasy: Neil Gaiman + Charles Vess = Yum. Enough said. In the back on the right, we see The Tough Guide to Fantasyland by Diana Wynne Jones. If you read a lot of fantasy, you’ll find this really amusing. I was reading it in Starbucks and laughing out loud, drawing glares from staid, sober types who always glare at me when I laugh out loud. (I might be the only person who laughs in my neighborhood. I really need to move out.) The Tough Guide deals with all the clichés of fantasy, and let me tell you, they’re still getting used even though this book came out a few years ago. My favorite is how everyone eats stew. Even though it takes hours to make stew from scratch, especially over a camp fire, all these heroes are eating stew on their journeys instead of slicing off a steak from a slain animal and cooking that in a few minutes. Seriously, have you ever tried to make stew from scratch, without using pre-made broth or stock? Try it and then check out how long it takes them to do it in a novel. That’s magic.

The featured book here is The Light-Years Beneath My Feet by Alan Dean Foster. This is also a few years old, but what I really want to do is express my fanboy ecstasy for Mr. Foster’s body of work rather than draw attention to any particular book. He’s written over thirty-five books for Random House alone. He’s written more with other publishers. Check out the list here. That’s a long, prolific career, friends. He’s written science fiction and fantasy; he’s written series and standalones. And no matter what you pick up, you’ll get a good read, guaranteed. He’s not a #1 bestseller (I don’t think?), he doesn’t win fancy-schmancy awards, he just gives you an entertaining read, every time, and he’s been doing it since 1972. I first got hooked on him with The Man Who Used the Universe. I’ve read it so many times that my copy is falling apart. After that I read The I Inside, and I liked that even more. (Those links are to Powells, and you’ll probably have to find those books at used bookstores because they’re out of print now.)

There are only a few authors who write books that I read multiple times. I revisit Card’s Ender’s Game quite a bit; McCaffrey’s Dragonsinger series; Herbert’s Dune; Stephenson’s Snow Crash; Tolkien, of course; and then there are these little books by Mr. Foster that I just dig for some reason. The first book of his Damned trilogy, A Call to Arms, keeps me coming back. I really enjoyed Drowning World and Life Form, too. And Mudge, the otter from his Spellsinger series, started me laughing out loud in public early on and drawing glares from stuffy old people. If you’ve never given Mr. Foster a look, he’s worth a try. He’s bound to have written something you’d enjoy with fifty or so books to his name. He’s basically the guy who got me hooked on science fiction when I was young; his Spellsinger books were also the first fantasy I ever read. In many ways, he’s the reason I’m a writer now. Mr. Foster, I salute you—and thank you for all the great stories.

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Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #3, Steampunk Edition

Ah, goggles & dirigibles—is there anything more divine? Yes! Goggles and dirigibles and FRUIT! Behold the latest composition in my ongoing series:

Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #3
Friends, this is simply delicious. Cherie Priest’s Boneshaker, Gail Carriger’s Changeless, and a delectable chorus of pears, grapes, and melons await your admiration!
Boneshaker doesn’t simply have cool gadgets & goggles: it has zombies! Mmm, braaaaaains. (That is why the melons were absolutely necessary.) It’s also printed with brown ink and set in a rather tasteful font. Thus far I’m enjoying it quite a bit. Changeless, aside from its great humor and attention to fashion, features werewolves and vampires and mummies, and if you’re interested in picking it up, I’d start with Soulless first, which will get you hooked on a fantastic series. Carriger’s third book is supposed to come out in September—I can’t wait—and if I’m lucky, I’ll get to interview up here on the Grove. 
Speaking of interviews, you can look forward to two this summer: Nicole Peeler on June 29, and Kelly Meding on July 27. Those are actually release dates for their second books, and if you’d like to be introduced to them ahead of time, Nicole’s first book is called Tempest Rising and Kelly’s is called Three Days to Dead.
Still plugging away at my third: 47K now on Hammered.
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Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #2

Behold my new masterpiece:

Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #2
“You put the lime with the coconut and read it all up.” That’s how the song goes, right?
Unlike my first Still Life, I didn’t get these books for free. I paid U.S. dollars for them because these two particular authors aren’t with my publisher. That being said, they’re also quite worth it, because they’re the leading writers in the urban fantasy genre and their books are always entertaining. 
Let’s pause a moment to judge these books by their covers. On the one hand you have a Brooding Trench Coat Man holding a staff like he’s claiming this land in the name of Some Majesty, May He/She Reign Forever.  On the other you have an Impressively Inked Woman holding a book, giving you this look over her shoulder that suggests if you ask her nicely, she might read it to you. Or…you can read about her reading that book to someone else in the book. There are layers of books here. I’m sold! Briggs wins, hands down!
Here’s what I like about the photo: It looks like Brooding Trench Coat Man is glaring at the reflected, mirror-imaged name of Patricia Briggs invading the territory he has claimed with his phallic symbol.
If you’re not familiar with either of these authors, I highly recommend filling this awful void in your life. You’re truly missing out on some great characters. You can start with Jim Butcher’s Storm Front here and Patricia Briggs’ Moon Called here.

I’ll get reviews of these up when I’m finished with them. I’m chugging through Silver Borne right now. The Impressively Inked Woman hasn’t read that book to me yet, but there’s still a hundred pages to go, so there’s hope.

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Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit

My editor is THE COOLEST editor ever! Behold Exhibit A:

Still Life with Fantasy and Fruit #1

All of this was sent to me by my editor, except for the fruit. Here’s what you’re looking at, left to right, front row: Robert Redick’s The Red Wolf Conspiracy; a Braeburn apple; Daryl Gregory’s Pandemonium; another apple; Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett’s Have Mercy; and then moving to the back row, an Advanced Reader Edition of Peter V. Brett’s The Warded Man; a NEW! AWESOME! copy of Mr. Brett’s latest novel, The Desert Spear, two weeks before it’s available in stores (Whoops! I just drooled on the keyboard in nerd ecstasy!); bananas, because this shit is bananas; Richard K. Morgan’s The Steel Remains; and a final apple.

And now we pause for a celebratory squee. Squeeeee!!!

I had no idea how cool it would be to get free books until I got them. I mean, when I was a younger nerd with more hair, I’d get “free” books from those book clubs, but we all know they weren’t really free because you had that commitment hanging over you to buy only six more books in the next year at regular club price and you had to return that card on time or they’d send you a crappy book of the month instead of something you wanted. These books are free. I don’t have to buy anything or “just pay shipping and handling.” And yes, I’m bragging about it. I’m having a nice brag right now, because this is the coolest perk I never expected for getting published. I didn’t expect any perks, to be honest; getting published is satisfactorily perky all by itself. It doesn’t need perks. But they are there, and this is one of them.

In coming days, weeks, (months?) I’ll be reviewing these. I’m reading The Warded Man first because I’ve heard nothing but stellar things about it and I’m fond of reading stellar books. But after that and The Desert Spear, I’m digging into Richard Morgan’s book. His Altered Carbon was awesome stuff and so were the sequels, so I can’t wait to see what he’s done here. Oh, and you know what? I almost bought that book over the weekend! I picked it up, all excited, and then I checked the publisher on the spine and went “WHOA!” kind of like that loud man in the Staples commercials but several decibels quieter. Richard Morgan’s with Del Rey, too! I had no idea. I put the book down—very reluctantly—because I thought maybe, just maybe, Tricia would surprise me with it. And she DID! So that is Exhibit B. The books & authors in the front row are unknown to me, but I’m looking forward to this particular introduction and I’ll share the experience when I get to them.

I really need to write an effusive missive o’ thanks to my editor now.

School’s keepin’ me busy and it’s tough to find the headspace to write, but I’m at 30K on Hammered now and deep in research on the Kabbalah for my Kabbalist warriors. Happy Passover to all my Jewish friends.