The Pale Hand of God, by S.M. White

This week we are looking at  The Pale Hand of God, a novel by indie author S.M. White. I have no memory of how I came to purchase this particular novel. Perhaps it was on a Kindle deals day, or perhaps I was simply looking for reasonably priced epic fantasy. Either way, it was an excellent choice on my part. I am now a great fan of author S.M. White.

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The Blurb:

"All Ages have a living darkness. In some, it is long buried. In others, it lives and thrives. And then there is the darkness no one sees, the patient darkness that reveals itself only when all light fails."

In an Age of fallen heroes, stolen princesses, and a city prison, the world balances upon the blades of haunted men.

Behind the walls of the clergy-controlled prison city of Iban Su, Lainn Sevai endures. But after losing his father and brother, Lainn finds the determination to seek freedom, following in the footsteps of the man whose iron tutelage molded him into one of the fiercest warriors Iban Su has ever known. In the process he discovers his father's terrible secret, and uncovers the thousand year mystery as to why the prophesied End of Days never came to the world. And in that sets in motion a terrible future.

With all the edge and grit of a Gemmell novel, The Pale Hand of God is the first half of a series that will determine the fate of a world fallen to cowardice and indolence. Heroes will topple, and villains will ascend. Light will fade, and shadows prevail. This is a tale of violence and peace, of love and hatred, and of how one man's fight to save his soul could very well damn all humanity.

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My Review:

There is a depth to this tale that goes well beyond the events it chronicles. Lainn Sevai is one of the most complex characters I’ve lately read. He is alternately likable and unlikable  His world is violent, and he makes decisions based on what he knows of his world, choices that seem harsh on the surface. Lainn’s brother Ereck is terribly important to him, as is his late father.  Lainn both loves and hates them both, envies and adores them. The brutalities of Lainn’s childhood follow him and color his perceptions—he is a charismatic warrior tortured by loss and self-doubt. In the end Lainn is one of the great heroes of epic fantasy, right up there with Fritz Lieber’s Fafhrd.

The prose is quite reminiscent of the truly great fantasy tales, those great epic sagas written in an age when authors of speculative fiction knew they were on the fringe of respectability in the publishing world and wrote tales to please themselves, simply assuming their readers would understand compound words. This high quality of storytelling makes for a tale that fully involves the reader. The surroundings are clearly drawn with an economy of well-phrased words, with all the sounds and scents of a dirty, medieval environment. I found myself immersed in the tale to the exclusion of everything else, reading until I fell asleep with the Kindle in my hands and letting everything else go to hell until I had finished the book.

THAT powerful sort of writing is what I want from my epic fantasy, and it is a rare commodity in this day and age, where authors of all genres are told they must write in 60 second sound-bites so their readers won’t lose interest on the first page.

This is a great fantasy journey through all the many twists and turns, and though the road is rough for the characters who live in this strange world, it is a fantasy I can highly recommend. The Pale Hand of God by S.M. White is a book for the dedicated reader, and not for the faint of heart.

Children of the Elementi, by Ceri Clark

This review celebrates the re-release of one of my all-time favorite books, Children of the Elementi by UK author, Ceri Clark.

The Blurb:

From the ashes of an ancient empire, five must save the future.

Jake: Last in line to the Elementi High King throne, sent through time and space to be brought up in an alien world, he has no knowledge of his past.

Mirim: As the caretaker of the mysterious Citadel which hosts the dying crystal mind of the Matrix, her air power is the only link to the old world.

Kiera: A Romani foundling with growing powers over nature, she is searching for a better life away from her criminal past.

They must find the other two heirs and reunite all their elemental powers over earth, air, fire, and water together with the Matrix to defeat the Empire that conquered their parents.

With a fire demon on his trail, can Jake bring together the last of the Elementi in time?

My Review:

In Children of theElementi, UK author Ceri Clark has written a modern fantasy that manages to create a place in today's world for magic.

This story starts out with action-packed adventure and does not quit until the end.  The twists and turns are quite unexpected, but all are well written and make complete sense. The powers and abilities that the characters have are not unlimited.  There are rules and consequences for using that power and using it draws the notice of the Magi.  This creates the tension and keeps the plot moving at a fast gallop.

Jake’s parents passed away, and he is living with his aunt and uncle; a situation that is less than ideal as his uncle is not a nice man.  Jake knows that he can do some things that are akin to magic, but he keeps his knowledge close to himself.  His ability to read minds has been both a blessing and a curse; and he has some control over fire.  One day he reads in his Aunt’s mind that he was actually adopted.  When he searches their home for the papers that prove this, he also finds a crystal on a chain that is from his birth parents.

Jake has excellent skills with the internet, but when he puts the crystal around his neck his ability to use the internet is transformed exponentially.  An incident occurs at school during which he inadvertently uses his powers.  This alerts Mirrim, who has been looking for him, to get him to safety.  With Mirrim, Jake embarks on a series of adventures that will eventually reunite him with all four of the other Children of the Elementi.

I love the basis of Clark’s universe, and the logic that went into creating it.  The Elementi originally gained their powers through a close association with an immense, crystalline power source called the Matrix. This is a creation of an even older society and is, among other things, an uber-internet created from living crystal. The Matrix has access to an immense knowledge base and gains knowledge at every opportunity.  It is linked to certain crystals that each of the hidden children can use. Members of the Elementi can tap into the Matrix with their minds and have other unique powers related to their family’s particular element that they can use IF they know how.  This melding of science fiction with magic is both intriguing and original.

The Covenant of Faceless Knights, Gary Vanucci

The Covenant of Faceless Knights,by  Gary Vanucci

This is an old-fashioned sword and sorcery novel, in some ways quite reminiscent of the great swashbuckling novels of Fritz Lieber’s Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser series. That is refreshing in itself! Nothing has more escape value than a tale of flawed heroes and heroines dukeing it out, both with each other and the minions of evil!

The Blurb

When a dangerous artifact goes missing from the Temple of the sun-god, the high priest charged with its protection must come to grips with the fact that he cannot retrieve the stolen relic alone. Calling upon a man who was once his own apprentice, Tiyarnon the High Priest enlists the aid of Garius Forge, who is now an Inquisitor among the Order of the Faceless Knights.  Garius, a man of power and reputation, gathers a handful of allies to help complete his quest--but who among them is worthy of his trust? Aided by the mischievous Rose Thorne, a rogue among rogues, the stoic and bloodthirsty Saeunn, and a promising but naïve elf named Elec, the Inquisitor hopes his training as one among the Faceless Knights has prepared him to keep his companions focused and prepared to survive the trials to come.  Garius must lead his band of allies into dark regions to recover the tainted artifact before it falls into the hands of the evil being that once held or it could spell doom for the inhabitants of Wothlondia and the entire Realm of Ashenclaw.

My Review:

I really enjoyed this book. It’s Dungeons and Dragons on steroids, and indie author Gary Vanucci is the Dungeon Master.

Noble Garius is in way over his head with the group of allies he has gathered. But he’s got no choice, he has to use them. It was a toss up between him and  Elec the Elf  as to who my favorite male character was. Elec is awesome, so young and naïve. 

Rose Thorne is aptly named. She is one tough lady, sharp, sweet and dangerous to know. She is bold and unashamed to use every one of her many weapons to make her point.

Saeunn is the heavy on the good-guys side. Filled with anguish and darkness, she, too, is dangerous to know. I wanted to see more of her in this tale, and that means she is an awesomely written character. Every one of these people is exactly what a true fan of epic fantasy expects to find in a book.

Even the side characters have great stories. So much angst! At times this tale is quite entertaining as Rose’s colorful past poses difficulties for certain respectable men with whom she has a history. That is one of the better threads in this tale!

The plot is great, and the twists and turns are engrossing and at time hilarious. I LOVED the villain! Big, bad, horrifyingly evil villains are what make a tale, from my point of view. The fight scenes are really well thought out and kept me on the edge of my seat. Vanucci’s magic system is logical. Things don’t just happen randomly, which can be a problem in today’s tidal wave of wannabe epic fantasy on the indie front.

Gary Vanucci’s great strength as an author is the ability to create a real, tangible world filled with the right sounds and scents that make the reader forget they are reading. He fills that world with real people, fully drawn and fleshed out, behaving the way they should, and never losing that momentum. As events unfold, things don’t always go the way they want them to, and their reactions to those moments are spot on. 

If I had any complaint, it is that there are a few places where the author seems to repeat himself, but that is by no means a detraction. All in all, the book has a great flow. It is written with passion and I highly recommend it to anyone who loves truly epic fantasy.

Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson

Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson

Okay—I had to do it.  I love manga and anime, and while this book has no illustrations, any book that involves an ordinary Joe taking on superheroes gone bad, in an anime-style post-apocalyptic setting was bound to interest me.

The Blurb:

Ten years ago, Calamity came. It was a burst in the sky that gave ordinary men and women extraordinary powers. The awed public started calling them Epics.

But Epics are no friend of man. With incredible gifts came the desire to rule. And to rule man you must crush his will.

Nobody fights the Epics . . . nobody but the Reckoners. A shadowy group of ordinary humans, they spend their lives studying Epics, finding their weaknesses, and then assassinating them.

And David wants in. He wants Steelheart—the Epic who is said to be invincible. The Epic who killed David's father. For years, like the Reckoners, David's been studying, and planning—and he has something they need. Not an object, but an experience.

He's seen Steelheart bleed. And he wants revenge.

My review.

Wow!  Action from page one, right to the end.  Sanderson is back to writing in a way that is fresh and out-there.  You feel like he has fallen in love with writing all over again, and it is awesome.

The protagonist, David is young, hotheaded and naïve. He is smart and too bold for his own good.  He meets people who are justifiably wary of him, and that is when his adventures really begin. David gets put through the wringer and keeps coming back for more.

The Epics are nothing more than common thugs, street-criminals with no class and no conscience.  They abuse their super-powers as much as they can, and they flaunt their power. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. The more powerful an Epic, the higher they rise within their own ranks. Like most street-gangs they are always jostling within their own ranks for power.

This is not a two dimensional tale of good versus evil. The Reckoners are not without flaws of their own, and that gray area is what make this tale interesting.  There are layers here, and yes, it is a setup for the rest of the series, but I don’t care. I enjoyed the heck out of it, and can’t wait for the next installment!

The One-Eyed Man, by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.

The One-Eyed Man: A Fugue, With Winds and Accompaniment, by L.E. Modesitt Jr.

The Blurb:

In The One-Eyed Man: A Fugue With Winds and Accompaniment,  by L. E. Modesitt, Jr., the colony world of Stittara is no ordinary planet. For the interstellar Unity of the Ceylesian Arm, Stittara is the primary source of anagathics: drugs that have more than doubled the human life span. But the ecological balance that makes anagathics possible on Stittara is fragile, and the Unity government has a vital interest in making sure the flow of longevity drugs remains uninterrupted, even if it means uprooting the human settlements.

Offered the job of assessing the ecological impact of the human presence on Stittara, freelance consultant Dr. Paulo Verano jumps at the chance to escape the ruin of his personal life. He gets far more than he bargained for: Stittara’s atmosphere is populated with skytubes—gigantic, mysterious airborne organisms that drift like clouds above the surface of the planet. Their exact nature has eluded humanity for centuries, but Verano believes his conclusions about Stittara may hinge on understanding the skytubes’ role in the planet’s ecology—if he survives the hurricane winds, distrustful settlers, and secret agendas that impede his investigation at every turn.

My Review:

One thing you can always count on L.E. Modesitt Jr. to give you is a real morality tale.  He asks the tough questions about how far we are willing to go to and what we are willing to sacrifice, pointing out as always, that there WILL be sacrifices. Deciding what the sacrifices will be is never easy, but that tension makes for a great tale.

In a move that is a bit unusual, L.E. Modesitt Jr. begins this sci-fi fantasy in a divorce court. Dr. Paulo Verano is left wondering what to do with his share of the nothing, wondering if he will even be able to keep his business alive.  Also, most unusually, one of the supporting characters speak in cryptic rhymes.  The subtle use of short snippets of poetry at the beginning of some chapters serves to create an image of a wealth of culture in the mind of the reader, building the world without resorting a boring infodump.

Paulo, as a protagonist, is a real departure for Modesitt, in that he is not the naïve likeable young man usually found at the beginning of a Modesitt tale. Instead we meet a bitter, cynical and paranoid man. Paulo jumps at the opportunity his job offers him, glad to leave his selfish, ungrateful daughter and exwife behind, both in terms of distance and time. His reasoning is, during the short (to him) time he is gone,  145 years will have passed on his home world. They will have grown old and forgotten him, and his financial holdings will have recouped his losses.

Paulo’s cynicism and inability to trust affects each of his relationships. Of the passengers he travels with on the ship, none are what or who they appear to be. Several are lying as to their identities. Once on Stittara, he can’t be sure who is lying, and he is not sure who will harm him. He is not sure what his investigation will uncover, or how far those affected will go to protect their empires.

The world is vividly drawn in small strokes, emerging gradually as the tale progresses. The plot never stalls, and the action is both believable and engrossing. As always in Modesitt's work, music and the quest for love are a large part of the tale.The events that unfold, taking Paulo to the final crisis had me obsessively clicking to the next page, unable to put my Kindle down.  A wonderful read for true sci-fi lovers.

My only issue with this book is the incredibly high price the publisher set for the Kindle download. $10.99 in today’s market is highway robbery and may well keep the eBook sales down, which may be the publisher’s misguided intention.

Arthur: Grail Quest 1 by J.R. Rain

I stumbled across Arthur: Grail Quest 1, by J.R. Rain when I was cruising the top one-hundred Arthurian tales on Amazon (doesn't everyone?) and wondered what sort of a twist J.R. Rain would bring to the old grail-tale. The cover is quite misleading in that this book is an urban fantasy, and very little of it is truly Arthurian, although there are some references. But that is okay--the story itself it what is important, not the historical antecedents.

The Blurb:

Hidden deep within the ancient, mist-covered hills of Glastonbury, England is a secret that could forever change the world. A secret that could help usher in a new age of enlightenment for all mankind.

Or so the legend goes....Plagued by months of persistent dreams of King Arthur, Merlin and the Holy Grail, mystery novelist James Dupree finally sets out to England to understand the meaning behind his nightly visions. 

Upon arriving in Glastonbury, a locale deeply connected to stories of Camelot, Avalon and the Knights of the Round Table, James quickly discovers that not all is as it seems in this quaint little town. There's a raven-haired girl dying of a rare lung disease, knights with swords, and perhaps strangest of all is the man who emerges from the forest...a man who just might be the greatest king Britain has ever seen.

Something is happening in Glastonbury, something mysterious and powerful and not-of-this world, and somehow James Dupree is in the thick of it. Mankind is ready for the next great spiritual shift. But to do that, one man, one simple writer, must journey deep into the heart of a mystical land in search of a legendary relic.

But there are others who seek the treasure...dark forces who will stop at nothing to keep it for themselves, and end Dupree's quest for good.

At once inspiring and pulse-pounding, ARTHUR is for anyone who dares to dream—and dares to slay dragons.

My Review:

Well...this is certainly not a serious, knights-in-sweaty-armor kind of a book. It is a modern urban fantasy where the past intrudes upon the present and things quickly spiral out of control. It is, however, a window into the human condition, and done with humor and a light-hearted flair that makes for an enjoyable diversion.

I remained engaged though the book, although there were some moments of hmmm.... James is a bit of a wimp to start out with, Arthur is more like Thor on steroids, and Marion is an enigma. Rain does get a bit preachy when it comes to Arthur discussing new-age philosophy and God, but hey, it's his forum and I enjoyed the book over all.

There are dragons, there are knights and there is an evil-bad-dude--Merlin. He is definitely not your mama's Merlin. There is a lot of action and the book is fairly well paced. It is definitely a set up for a trilogy, and while it doesn't really have a satisfying end I felt that overall, it was an entertaining tale.

The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern

I am not sure how I happened to come across The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern, but it is a book that kept me reading all weekend. I was looking for a little steampunk or maybe an urban fantasy, and instead I found this morsel of exquisite beauty.


The Blurb:


The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night.

But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.

True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus per­formers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.

Written in rich, seductive prose, this spell-casting novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.


My Review:


This is an unusual book. It is most certainly not written in the dumbed-down 60-second sound-bites current wisdom tells us we must write all fantasy in. The beautiful, dreamlike prose is written with an Edwardian flair and care for the crafting of the words, yet it is written in modern English.


The magic is completely unexplainable, and is meant to be that way. No believable explanations are given for how each of the protagonists create their magic. It is a performance, solely for the amazement of the reader and is completely in keeping with the mood and ambiance of the tale. I know I am a stickler for realistic magic systems but in this case I am letting that criteria slide, because the magic is not the point of the plot.


The contest, the minor characters who are unaware they are caught up in the contest, and how Celia and Marco counter each other's moves is the central facet of the tale.


The characters are not fully fleshed when they are set before you. Instead they are revealed slowly, with each revelation enticing you to stay riveted to the book.


What IS fully fleshed is the dreamlike environment of Le Cirque des Rêves, the amazing, mysterious Circus of Dreams.


This is a beautiful, dark and moody book. The characters and the Cirque des Rêves stay with you, long into your own dreams.