Save the date! Join us for our SPRING POP UP from April 12-14 at the new CPiF space in Via dei Serragli 58r. You'll find works by 8 artisans, artists and designers, including home decor, ceramics, fashion, accessories and art. We can't wait to s…
Save the date! Join us for our SPRING POP UP from April 12-14 at the new CPiF space in Via dei Serragli 58r. You'll find works by 8 artisans, artists and designers, including home decor, ceramics, fashion, accessories and art. We can't wait to see you there!
Doors open on Friday evening at 7pm for a toast with the designers!
Saturday 13.04 from 10-19
Sunday 14.04 from 10-18
Via dei Serragli 58r
SAVE THE DATE per il nostro SPRING POP UP dal 12 al 14 aprile presso il nuovo spazio CPiF in Via dei Serragli 58r. Troverete opere di 8 artigiani, artisti e designer, tra cui oggetti per la casa, ceramiche, moda, accessori e arte. Non mancate!
Vi aspettiamo venerdì sera alle 19 per un brindisi con i designer!
First a quick explanation! Due to some severe health issues over the last few years, and a lingering chronic condition, my planned review schedule went right out of the window and I have been scrabbling ever since to get it ba…
Due to some severe health issues over the last few years, and a lingering chronic condition, my planned review schedule went right out of the window and I have been scrabbling ever since to get it back on track.
In an attempt to try to regain some lost ground, I have been scrunching some of my (overdue) reviews together into one or two posts each week: shorter reviews, but still covering all of the points I intended to.
That's the plan anyway, so let's spring (groan) into a new selection from my back-shelves…!
Blurb: Worldwide bestseller and master of terror Michaelbrent Collings invites you to peer into the future, to uncover things long hidden, and to experience worlds of a Future Tense…
A world where suicide is illegal – unless you agree to kill yourself over and over again...
A place where childhood games turn back the clock – and bring with them monsters long forgotten...
A home where secrets abound – until the killing begins...
A reality where a writer's dreams can make her rich – if she's willing to sacrifice the universe...
All these, and more: stories of darkness and of light.
Stories of despair, and lingering hope.
Stories of a future unknown, where ignorance feeds our souls, and where the only hope that remains in a world gone dim… resides in Tales of Apocalyptic Vision!
Michaelbrent Collings, a double Bram Stoker Award finalist and voted one of the Top 100 All-Time Greatest Horror Writers by Ranker, invites you to brave a future unlike any you have experienced. Because the future is what we make of it… and we have made a monster.
Review: There are nine stories in this collection, featuring a mixture of sci-fi, horror, dark fantasy, dystopia and the surreal and giving the author a real chance to showcase his skills in various styles of dark short story form.
JINGLE ALL THE WAY - A sci-fi-type story about a company working on a perpetual suicide idea... and they have a great jingle for it!
I AM AN OCEAN - A post-apocalyptic dystopian horror sci-fi in which machines have taken over and offer humans the option of living as either an 'ocean' or an 'island' from the perspective of a potential 'island-keeper'.
THE FLOOR IS LAVA - Pure horror. A 'deal with the devil' story, in which old friends reunite, take drugs, and revisit childhood games in a far too literal way.
LUCID DREAMS - An agoraphobic woman starts a new medication which truly allows her to start living her dreams.
THE SHORTEST CON - Totally my favourite story! This is very funny urban fantasy noir (which is also one of my favourite genres). It's light-hearted and silly, but doesn't veer anywhere near stupidity. It gave me a Douglas Adams mixed with the Dresden Files kind of vibe. And the authorial self-insert reminded me a little of Anthony Horowitz's Hawthorne and Horowitz series. I will definitely be reading the full-length novel, The Longest Con, after this taster!
END OF SHIFT - A really clever, twist-in-the-tale story about what could happen if a well-known mythological figure changed to a darker, still-related purpose.
THAT'LL SELL - An author's character comes to life in reality and presents a tricky moral dilemma.
BUTTON MAN - A futuristic dystopia story about life after someone gave the order to press the big, red, bomb button. Grotesque and haunting, the ending of this story hit particularly hard and stayed with me afterwards.
THE STRANGER INSIDE - A novella which became the novel Strangers, this is a serial-killer horror about the darkest secrets of a picture-perfect family - dark, visceral and gory and the dog DOES die (horribly). The 'I Am Legion' books are some of this author's most popular and, while they are not my favourites of his work, they are top-class examples of this genre of horror-thriller for those who enjoy it.
If you are looking for a walk on the dark and disturbing side, with plenty of variety in style, content and genre, then this collection is exactly what you need. Every single story is well-written and works exactly as intended to make you shudder, gasp, but mainly, think.
Title: Anger & Hope Author: S.W. Stribling Publisher:Independently published
Blurb: War was easy. The battle with himself is another story...
When Will returns to America after years overseas, he comes with high hopes of reconnecting with his younger brother. But being a disgruntled veteran and a struggling depressive, Will isn't easy to love.
Misunderstood, homeless, and with little reason to live beyond his faithful companion, Maverick, Will must face his past to find peace with his family and himself.
But when it comes to family, is love enough?
'Anger and Hope' is the second book in the 'Sin and Zen' series.It is the Philia love to 'S&Z's Eros love, and it deeply explores the ideas of shame, pride, anger, hope, and what home truly means.[Important note: Though 'Anger and Hope' may follow Will beyond 'Sin and Zen', each story is standalone. In fact, the themes and 'nature' of each story definitely stand on their own and are not dependent on each other.]
Review: As noted in the blurb, this story is the sequel to Sin & Zen, featuring main character Will Strief, who is ex-army and recently returned to the US from his tour of both sin and zen in Europe (specifically France). The narrative is told in the first-person and carries on from where the previous book left off, but you don't need to have read one to read the other.
There is an oppressive darkness to a lot of this story, as the only person Will seems to really like (including himself) is his dog, Maverick (and yes, a dog counts as 'a person'!). He looks down on his family members for their beliefs and/or their lifestyles, craving their approval whilst furiously denying that he needs it. His long-distance relationship with ex-girlfriend Tania is characterised by him mainly longing for her when they are split up, but then recognising that they aren't meant to be whenever they reconcile, and his shorter encounters with women via online dating sites are mainly focused on satiating his lust, as he struggles to connect with women whose text-talk, living circumstances and poetry he despises. It is no surprise that he is so full of anger and ever-looming depression when he can only seem to want people when they don't want him and vice versa.
The story follows him as he wanders the country, directionless and unhappy, rejecting society's expectations but having no solid beliefs or dreams to replace them with and anchor himself to.
But amidst his black, depressive, almost-suicidal nihilism, there are green shoots of hope found in his love for his dog, the solace he finds in nature and his philosophical and spiritual musings on the meaning and purpose of life. Will doesn't give up on attempts to better understand himself, the world and the people around him, and his persistence and resilience reward him towards the end of the novel with him finding it in himself to forgive his family and accept himself, before heading into a new, brighter future with Maverick.
The author does a great job, in both this and the previous novel, of exploring both sides of his books' titles openly and with lots of character self-reflection and growth. While bleak at times, the story ends with a tilt towards optimism and hope that leaves the reader feeling that Will may eventually find the meaning and happiness that he continually seeks. I hope he does.
Title: Anthracite Author: Matt Thomas Publisher:Unbound Digital
Blurb: Deadbeat Kevin Jones finds himself kidnapped to an alternative reality where Wales is the single global superpower. Abducted from his mundane existence by the mysterious Gwen, she tells him there are forces seeking his destruction – he has to run or die. It turns out Kevin's story holds the key to why all worlds but ours turn out the way they do – Pax Cambria.
Featuring a host of mysterious characters, cheese-on-toast based fast food, alt-right druids and the deadly all-knowing Taffia, Anthracite begins the battle to address the woeful lack of Welsh themed comedy cyberpunk. The fearsome Jones-Corporation might run the world but they have a dirty little secret they don't want to get out. Swansea has never looked more like near-future LA. It's already got the rain.
Review: The first time I read this book, I didn't really 'get' it. Then I realised at the end that this is the same Matt Thomas who wrote one of my favourite books, Before & After, so I had to go back and give it another go, and I'm glad I did!
There is plenty of action and tongue-in-cheek humour; a main character who starts out as a bit of an Adrian Mole, but develops nicely as the plot progresses; and the author plays gleefully with the theme of Welsh world domination, subverting a few ropes and expectations on the way.
And with all the twists and turns the main plot takes, I ended up still being surprised by the ending (because it didn't take the double-blind-surprise-twist that I had expected... although would it still be a surprise twist if I had expected it...? Never mind!). But my understanding is that the author may be revisiting this world and characters for a sequel, which might explain a few things... or confuse them further, you never know! I'm mainly just glad that Matt Thomas is back writing again - there's not enough light-hearted sci-fi/fantasy in the world: we need him!
Title: The Traveller's Tale Author: Stacey Upton Bracey Publisher:EWP Publications
Blurb: A blood curse. A first kiss. When she triggers a terrifying spell, can a young woman save her family from a hangman's noose?
Stuttgart, Germany, 1450s. Bella longs to get out from under her mother's strict thumb. Stifled throughout childhood, the high-spirited Traveller is curious about her growing attraction to a longtime friend. And when she surrenders to the awakening desire to feel the touch of his lips, the teen unknowingly sets off a vengeful hex.
Learning of the evil promise placed upon her at birth, a horrified Bella immediately makes a desperate plan to free her unfairly imprisoned parents. And when she launches her planned jailbreak by taking a potion to appear dead, she fears reawakening to even worse nightmares.
Has she swallowed down the cause of her own doom?
The Traveller's Tale is the twisted first book in the Tales of Darkwood dark fantasy series. If you like flawed heroines, endless suspense, and chilling retellings of popular stories, then you'll love Stacey Upton Bracey's coming-of-age page-turner.
Review: This is a twisted fantasy loosely-based on the Sleeping Beauty story, with some Romeo and Juliet thrown in, and an evil, dark magic Burgomeister villain.
The story follows traveller Belladonna and her family as they face the consequences of a terrible curse that has been hanging over their heads since Bella's birth. And the story gets pretty dark. There is some torture described, and lots of threats of peril, and even a few deaths, and this is only the first book in the series!
Bella's fate is left hanging in the balance at the end of this book, leading tantalisingly towards a sequel, and I believe that the next three books in the series follow new characters and twist new versions of old fairytales (Hansel and Gretel, Jack and the Beanstalk) before uniting the storylines (and cursed bloodlines) for book 5.
While aimed at the Young Adult market, I - an oldish adult - would definitely be tempted to read more Tales of Darkwood. After all, I need to know whether Bella manages to find a way to her Happy Ever After!
Title: The Hard Blokes of Sparta: The Zombie in the Fire Author: Jamie Brindle Publisher:Independently published
Blurb: IMPORTANT: PLEASE NOTE THIS BOOK IS INCOMPLETE!! SEE BELOW FOR DETAILS!
The far side of the Level is weird. Really weird.
Phil's on a quest. He's not found who he's seeking yet, but as long as there are huge, terrifying monsters to fight, and as long as he gets to spend time with Liz, he's hopeful that everything will work out. But then he finds the child, and everything gets, well, complicated…
Dave's having a spot of R&R. The weird thing in his case is that he's doing so within the confines of a story. And as oddly soothing as it is to relive the same tale again and again, out in the castle, time is ticking away. Something bad is happening there. Really bad…
And Chad…well, since joining forces with the Squid Squad, Chad's life has got significantly - not to put too fine a point on it - wetter. Now an opportunity has arisen, and Chad doesn't think he can turn it down, whatever that means for the kind of person he used to be. After all, change is good….isn't it?
As the tensions rise, the Spartans start to realise that more than their own lives hangs in the balance. Level 31 is much bigger and much stranger than they ever thought possible…and yet it is just one part of the vast interlocking multiverse of the Storystream. And however isolated Level 31 has been, the Storystream will soon come a-knocking…
As mentioned above, despite being over 139K words long, this book is not yet complete... ...it is composed of semi-contained novellas - as further novellas are written, they will be added to this book; if you purchase the book, you will be able to download the updates. If it ends up being more than 200k words long...well, at that point I'll hang my head in self-disgust, and start 'Zombie In The Fire - Part 2' or something. But you will get up to 200k words, and you won't get short-changed in that sense; in fact, I'll keep this book at £2.99 or lower until it is complete, at which point the price will go up...
Review: As noted in the book blurb, this book is an work-in-progress, but a pretty substantial one... the most recent page count on Amazon is 531!
The story brings us back to Dave and Phil - Spartans in a strange, fictional land - but they are on separate quests, so it's not really a case of 'the old team back together'. Instead, Dave is recovering from the events of the previous book between the pages of an old-fashioned murder mystery... literally. And Phil is with his rather scary magical girlfriend Liz, attempting to reconcile himself to his new magic sword and repeatedly fling himself planlessly at danger in the hopes of getting to stab some monsters before he is taken apart by the void. In fact, it's all getting a little bit meta on Level 31 (which is fairly standard in the Storystream multiverse).
While this features the Hard Blokes' usual fun fantasy adventure shenanigans, it did start to feel a little bit drifty and directionless. Perhaps this is simply because the book is unfinished and so nothing is really resolved yet, but it doesn't feel like events move forward much either. In some places we actually come full circle and end up back where we started!
I love this series - the worldbuilding, the characters - but this particular instalment just feels a little bit lost compared to the previous books. I'll be keeping an eye out for the final version so that I can update my thoughts accordingly once I know where it's all headed...
I love bringing you indie authors in a variety of genres and you'll see here some familiar faces (and one new one!).
From dystopian/horror short stories, through a journey of self discovery, via an alternate Welsh-dominated planet, with darkly twisted fairytales and ending with some ongoing swords-and-sorcery meta-fiction, this is a great little selection to keep you going over the Easter hols.
