One book to rule them all!!
25 December 2014
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Fantasy Review Barn, Kings, Tough Travelling
Every Thursday Nathan from the Fantasy Review Barn invites us to go tough travelling through the tropes of fantasy. This week the topic is KINGS:
KINGS come in four kinds: Puppet Kings, Bad Kings, Good Kings (rare), and Long Lost Kings
So, let’s face it – there are no shortages of Kings in epic fantasy. To narrow it down I’ve tried to get an example of each from the same book. Yes, Lord of the Rings! It had to be done!!
Puppet king – Theoden – King of the Mark or King of Rohan – endured a brief spell as a puppet with Grima Wormtongue seemingly having the majority of sway in the kingdom. Of course Grima operated under instructions from Saruman.
Bad king – The Witch King of Angmar. Leader of the Nazgul, formally a king of men, one of the nine kings given a ring of power by Sauron and eventually became corrupted by it’s power.
Good king – Elrond King of the Elves – the elves are a singular bunch of characters and quite single minded but I’m putting Elrond as a good King because he fought in the last alliance of elves and men that originally destroyed Sauron and he tried to convince Isildur to destroy the Ring.
Lost king – Aragorn or Strider – starts the story as a ranger but concludes the story as king. Heir of Isildur.
‘Oh the posh posh travelling life, the travelling life for me…’
17 December 2014
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Fantasy Review Barn, Tough Travelling, Travelling Folk
Every week at the Fantasy Review Barn we go a travelling through the tropes of fantasy. This is a whole bunch of fun and I love seeing what everyone comes up with! This week the topic for discussion is Travelling Folk:
TRAVELLING FOLK are quite common. They are of two kinds: Land travellers and River travellers.
These people are merry, colourfully dressed, dishonest, and knowledgeable…they will cheat you, cure your wounds, and hustle you off to the cart of their oldest lady who will tell you something about the future you need to know.
- Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Dracula has a whole bunch of travelling people, they’re tough no nonsense, characters.
- Philip Pullman, His Dark Materials – this has a group of nomadic people who go from place to place upon barges on the water.
- Joanna Harris, Chocolat – similarly – travelling people who use barges, sell things and mend things.
- Mark Lawrence’s Prince of Fools – okay, not sure if this counts but there are a group of performers in Prince of Fools and I’m also fairly certain that amongst their group is a fortune teller?? Tah Dah!
- Smiler’s Fair by Rebecca Levene – the name gives it away. This is basically a huge travelling carnival where any pleasure or vice can be sought. Basically this world doesn’t lend itself to any structure that stays still for too long (unless its based on rock that is) – otherwise nasty critters come from out of the earth!
- Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere – i could be wrong with this one but it has a floating market that is in a different spot all the time. I’m kind of assuming they’re may be travellers but that could be wrong.
- Neil Gaiman’s Stardust – again – well, there’s a fair. There’s also a witch who travels around in a caravan!!
- The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss – travelling entertainers!
That’s it for me – I’m sure I should be able to get LoTR and Harry Potter in there somewhere but my mind is a blank! So everything normal over here then.
Death is only the beginning!
3 December 2014
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Fantasy Review Barn, High Priests, Tough Travelling
Every week a whole bunch of us go trekking through the tropes of fantasy with Nathan over at the Fantasy Review Barn as part of Tough Travelling. This week the topic for discussion is HIGH PRIESTS
HIGH PRIEST is nearly always evil, either on his own account or on behalf of the dark lord.
Well – I’ve had a melt down this week! I’ve left it too late and then couldn’t think of any high priests – I thought of a couple of high priestesses and a movie high priest so I’ve gone with these. Basically, I did worse than ever! I’ll go and sit in the naughty corner for a week and hopefully come up with something better for next week’s topic!
Riftwar Saga by Raymond Feist – Silverthorn – has a high priestess character who brings two characters back from the dead in order to interrogate them.
Priests and Priestesses of Naamah from Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey – not really baddies though!
Catarina from Teresa Frohock’s Miserere – High Priestess to the Fallen Angel – defo a baddie.
Imhotep – film character – definitely a high priest and not a very nice man!
Spins a web, any size. Catches thieves, just like flies…
27 November 2014
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Fantasy Review Barn, Spiders, Tough Travelling
This week Nathan over at the Fantasy Review Barn has decided to take us on a really Tough Travelling journey. Through the tropes of creepy crawlies, insects, bugs, spiders and the like (brrr):
‘BUGS- Not in the Tough Guide but it should be. Let’s all find anything creepy or crawly, big or small, six legs, eight legs, or more. Bugs, bugs, bugs.’
Shelob – Lord of the Rings by Tolkien – one big ass spider!
Harry Potter by JKRowling – Aragog – not to mention a legion of other massive spiders (all related!!)
Charlotte’s Web by E B White – Charlotte is the spider – clearly – otherwise what the hell does she have a web for. But, contrary to our feelings she’s a good spider!
James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl – an excellent story and packed full of insects – none of which make James run away – in fact they all help him on his journey. His aunts – well, that’s another story and worth running away from!
Spiderman – Marvel superhero! He has spideryness going on in his blood!
Honorary Mentions:
Incy wincy spider and Miss Moffat – okay, these are nursery rhymes and just go to show how we like to give our children the heebeejeebies about spiders!
Aarachnaphobla and Eight Legged Freaks – call me a maniac but I love both these films
You may have noticed I went for a theme of spiders – once I’d started it just seemed to flow so why not! Stop on over to check out the other petrified travellers and see what they’ve come up with to terrify you this week.
We come in peace…’ack, ack, ack’
13 November 2014
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Art It Up, Fantasy Review Barn, Not Yet Read, Tabitha, Tough Travelling
Art it Up. This is a weekly meme hosted by Tabitha over at Not Yet Read. The idea being to see if you can come up with some 
inspiration for a little sketch or doodle from your last week’s reading or just anything else in general. So, this week my reading has mostly been dreadful – too much going on at the moment!! I’m reading Ancillary Justice and The City Stained Red but couldn’t come up with anything for those so I’ve gone for an alien – to coincide with Sci-Fi November ’14 and also for a random person with a couple of swords which sort of ties in with Tough Travel’s theme for this week (named weapons – over at the Fantasy Review Barn – come on, this person at least is carrying two swords so it sort of ties in). They’re not terribly inspiring so you should probably check on over to Not Yet Read and see what’s going on there!
Books and travelling with Lynn 