Month: January 2015

Magic in the Brightmoon world

With ‘The Fire Mages’ now out, I thought it might be interesting to look at the way magic is used in the book, and compare it with magic in ‘The Plains of Kallanash’. WARNING: slight spoiler for ‘The Fire Mages’ at the end. ‘The Fire Mages’ is set in the realm of Bennamore. Magic is invoked by the use of spellpages: a trained scribe writes out the words of a spell using magically imbued paper, pen and ink. A special script is used, with many flourishes and symbolic additions to each letter, which can subtly modify the spell, for instance to change the strength, to add constraints or expand it. The spellpage is then burnt in a crucible, with an invocation to the gods: “By the sun, bring light and fire and colour; by the moon, enable the darkness.” The Bennamorians believe that the gods are the final arbiters of […]

Posted January 30, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in Brightmoon world, The Fire Mages, The Plains of Kallanash / 3 Comments

Five-Star Archives: ‘The Name of the Wind’ by Patrick Rothfuss

I thought it might be amusing to dig out some of my old reviews from the mists of time. This is one I read and reviewed in February 2011, and despite the glowing five star review, I haven’t yet got round to reading the follow-on. Hmm. Maybe I’m just less interested in wordy, doorstopper books these days. This is a debut book, and inevitably the first in a trilogy (‘The Kingkiller Chronicles’), by this author, and it is quite stunning. It is focused quite tightly on just one character, for it is his story, told largely in autobiographical form, from the perspective of a point in his life when he is still relatively young but has already become something of a legend. Unlike many fantasy books, the reader is not dropped headfirst into a morass of names and places and customs. Rather it builds very gently and precisely, a step […]

Posted January 27, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in Archive, Review / 0 Comments

Fiction Review: ‘See You’ by Dawn Lee McKenna

I hardly know what to say about this book. I cried almost all the way through, yet I couldn’t put it down. Actually, I laughed almost as much as I cried. So be warned – unless you’re made of much sterner stuff than I am, you’ll need a good supply of hankies nearby while you read. This is an extraordinary book. It’s a love story, and no, that’s not a euphemism for romance, this really is a story about love. And not your conventional couple, either. Jack was raised by his best friend’s mother, Miss Margret, and returned every year to visit her and her granddaughter, Emma Lee. When Miss Margret died, the visits stopped but now Jack’s back, and finds Emma Lee still living in the same house, and raising her own daughter. Jack has some secrets to share, but Emma has a secret of her own – she’s […]

Posted January 22, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in Review / 4 Comments

Fantasy Review: ‘To Whatever End’ by Claire Frank

This is an unusual book in a couple of ways. For one thing, the main protagonists are a happily married couple. When Daro is kidnapped, Cecily sets out to find and rescue him. No, no, that’s not the other unusual thing. Surely it’s not unusual for a woman to rescue a man? The second unusual thing is that this story is set some years after a major upheaval in the kingdom. The old king was overthrown and his son and heir killed in a bloody war which Daro, Cecily and their friends helped to orchestrate. The first section of the book, where we meet the companions in ones and twos, and they mull over the previous events and remind each other of this or that close shave or dramatic moment, made me wonder if I’d strayed into the second part of a trilogy. Actually, no, this is the first part. […]

Posted January 20, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in Review / 2 Comments

‘The Fire Mages’ still at a special low price

Just a reminder that ‘The Fire Mages’ is still available at the new-release price of $0.99. To buy, click the link in the box at the right, which takes you to your local Amazon. You have a few more days to buy before it goes to the normal price of $3.99. If you’ve already bought it – thank you! Please tell your friends about it, too. And if you’ve read it, an honest review on Amazon, Goodreads or your blog would be very much appreciated, to help other readers decide if they would enjoy it. The book has had a few reviews already. Here’s a snippet from the first to hit Amazon.com: “The main characters were more authentic than I think you usually get in fantasy stories, but just like Robin Hobb, Ross is a master at crafting authentic characters. This story had everything I look for in a fantasy […]

Posted January 17, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in Publishing/marketing, The Fire Mages / 2 Comments

For fans of libraries…

wouldn’t this be an astonishing place to read in? This is the National Library of Prague. Lots more amazing libraries at BoredPanda.

Posted January 10, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in General / 0 Comments

‘The Fire Mages’: now available!

My new epic fantasy ‘The Fire Mages’ is now available to buy at all Amazons! The first review at Amazon.com starts: “I could not put this book down. The pacing was perfect and kept me engaged from beginning to end.” For the next two weeks it will be priced at just $0.99 (regular price $3.99), so this is a good time to pick up a copy. The paperback is also available, at a regular price of $11.99, but Amazon is offering it at $10.79 at the moment, and if you buy the paperback you get the ebook for free. If you have a subscription to Kindle Unlimited or Prime, you can also borrow the book for free. ‘The Fire Mages’ is an epic fantasy coming of age adventure with (naturally!) a bit of a romance. It’s 150,000 words, or 386 pages. Here’s the blurb: Kyra has always been drawn to […]

Posted January 10, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in Publishing/marketing, The Fire Mages / 0 Comments

‘The Fire Mages’: coming soon!

‘The Fire Mages’ will be published this Friday, January 9th! An early Goodreads reviewer said:‘This is one of the best epic fantasy books I’ve read in a long time and I don’t say that lightly.’ To get your copy as soon as it’s released, you can now pre-order at Amazon (the link takes you to your local store). For a limited time, it will be priced at just $0.99. And it’s available right now as a paperback, priced at $8.39 (buy the paperback, and you can get the ebook free!). ETA: As part of the pre-release build-up, Enchanted Blog Tours arranged a cover reveal party for me – a dozen blogs, all showing the cover and blurb. Karen, at ‘Karen Writes Stuff’ (great name for a blog!), got quite excited about it. Thanks, Karen, I think it’s an amazing cover too (designed by Streetlight Graphics). ‘The Fire Mages’ is an […]

Posted January 4, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in Current writings, Publishing/marketing, The Fire Mages / 1 Comment

Happy New Year!

The turn of the year is a time for looking both back and forwards. This is probably the forty seventh you’ve read, so to keep it brief, here’s a quick summary of my year: Memorable events of 2014 (good and bad): I published a book! ‘The Plains of Kallanash’ went live on 12th September 2014. [Kind of a roller-coaster, but mostly good] I learned that when you spend time writing, you get less reading done. [Bad] I taught myself the 400 steps necessary to obtain an EIN from Uncle Sam to avoid withholding tax on my book royalties (ha! If only…), which involves dancing naked with unicorn feathers and the sacrifice of one’s first-born (sorry, James, but needs must), not to mention visiting the American Embassy in London, which is almost as far from here as it’s possible to get without falling into the ocean. And then the system was […]

Posted January 2, 2015 by PaulineMRoss in General, Writing musings / 0 Comments