Author Archives: Michael

The Game of 100 Candles – Marie Brennan

Following on from The Night Parade of 100 Demons, Marie Brennan’s The Game of 100 Candles – her second novel in Aconyte Books’ Legend of the Five Rings range – once again balances supernatural investigation and gentle queer romance to engaging, heart-warming effect. The months since their victory over the Night Parade at Seibo Mura have largely kept Ryōtora and Sekken apart, until the two samurai meet again at the Phoenix Clan’s Winter Court. Amid the cut and thrust of court life, as the pair struggle to find their feet together again they come under suspicion when members of the court start to mysteriously fall asleep, and are unable to be woken. Even as they search for answers to what’s afoot, they also have to come to terms with the reality of the bond between them, and learn anew what they mean to each other.

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Short and Sweet – May 2023

Hello and welcome to the May 2023 Short and Sweet roundup here on Track of Words, where I’ve chosen three more recent reads to talk about. This instalment is very much a set of twos: I’ve gone for the second book in a fantasy duology, the second novel in a science fiction trilogy, and the second part of a Black Library duology. I didn’t set out to pick all these book twos, I promise – it just happened that way! As always, these are books that I want to make sure I talk about, but which for one reason or another I don’t have the time or headspace to cover in a full standalone review.

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Working With Reviewers

Every book blogger and reviewer I know wants to read and talk about as many books as possible, but the simple truth is that we all have far too many books we want to read, and nothing like enough time in which to read them all. If you’re an author then, how do you get your book into the hands of reviewers who have the interest, motivation and time to be able to read your book and write about it? That’s what I want to tackle with this article. I obviously can’t speak for all reviewers, but I can offer some suggestions based on my own experiences, which I think will stand you in good stead for encouraging reviewers to want to read your book.

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Spotlight On Danie Ware’s Original Fiction

Regular Track of Words readers will probably be familiar with SFF author Danie Ware from her excellent IP fiction, but like many writers Danie also has a rich catalogue of original fiction with novels published by Titan Books and Fox Spirit Books, and short stories in all sorts of anthologies (there’s even a short story of Danie’s available to read for free right here on Track of Words!). As part of an ongoing series of ‘Spotlight On…’ author guest posts, I’ve invited Danie onto the site to tell us more about her original fiction, and in particular which books she recommends as starting points. So settle in, and get ready for some new books to hit your TBR list!

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The Malevolent Seven – Sebastien de Castell

Irreverent, foul-mouthed fun is the order of the day with Sebastien de Castell’s The Malevolent Seven, an action-packed fantasy romp in which a mismatched group of mercenary wonderists (i.e. dangerous, largely unhinged wizards) find themselves in the unlikely position of having to save their world. And not even getting paid! After their last mission goes spectacularly, messily wrong, sort-of-friends Cade Ombra and Corrigan Blight take on a new job that they hope will keep them out of trouble for a little while. Recruiting a handful of fellow war mages (and a dog…ok, a jackal) along the way, little do they know that they’re actually going to be facing up against appalling odds, bargaining with angels and demons, and generally getting caught up in the machinations of the powerful beings that battle eternally over the mortal realm.

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AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Sebastien de Castell Talks The Malevolent Seven

Hello and welcome to this Track of Words author interview, in which I welcome Sebastien de Castell onto the site to tell us all about his latest fantasy novel – The Malevolent Seven, which is out now from Jo Fletcher Books! A fun slab of foul-mouthed magical mayhem, The Malevolent Seven takes loads of the usual magical tropes and turns them on their heads, offering something a little different to a lot of fantasy novels. In this interview Sebastien gives us the lowdown on what to expect from the book, what inspired the world and the magic system, what he learned from writing something purely for himself, and loads more!

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Terror World – Cath Lauria

The second novel in Aconyte Books’ Zombicide Invader range (zombies in space!), Cath Lauria’s Terror World offers another fun, horror-tinged slab of sci-fi action which sees a disparate, multi-species team brought together to investigate an ancient distress signal on a remote world. In true SF zombie fashion, when they arrive on Sik-Tar the team discovers an ancient spaceship full of strange mysteries and unanswered questions, which soon turns into a deathtrap when the long-dead bodies of the original crew start coming back to life in horrifying fashion. Before long, what began as a scientific mission becomes a frantic scramble for survival in the face of rampaging alien-mold-monsters (otherwise known as Xenos) and a fracturing team.

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Spotlight On Guy Haley’s Original Fiction

As journalist, critic, editor and author, Guy Haley has been involved in SFF publishing for well over 20 years, in that time writing over 50 novels and novellas, as well as countless short stories. You might be familiar with Guy’s work in the worlds of Warhammer, but over the years he’s written plenty of original fiction too – seven novels and two novellas for publishers including Angry Robot, Solaris and Tordotcom. After a long hiatus he’s recently returned to writing his own material – his most recent was the short story The Cure, published in Grimdark magazine in April (I thought it was great, and reviewed it here).

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Monthly Roundup – April 2023

Hello and welcome to the April 2023 Monthly Roundup on Track of Words. After talking quite a lot in the last instalment about how slow March was for me (particularly in terms of writing) I was hoping I’d have more to talk about this time around. As it happens though, April has in fact been even slower, not least because I’ve spent more than half of the month unwell. I do have a few pieces to talk about from what I posted in April so I’ll go through those as usual, and talk a little about the month’s reading, but once again I’ll keep things quite short overall.

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Short and Sweet – April 2023

Hello and welcome to April’s Short and Sweet review roundup on Track of Words, where I’ve picked out a trio of my recent reads to talk about in relatively little detail. This time around I’ve gone for a modern fantasy novel that a lot of people have been talking about, a brand new Black Library novel (which is something of a novelty for me these days), and a reread of a classic epic fantasy book, that’s part of one of the biggest fantasy series of all time. As always, these are books that I’d like to talk about, but which for one reason or another I don’t have the time or headspace to cover in a full standalone review.

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