Fantasy review: ‘The Healers’ Home’ by S E Robertson

Another awesome story from the author. A world you can immerse yourself in. Characters who are so real, you’re sure you must have met them some time. A story that weaves itself around you like a silk cocoon, soft and gentle and totally mesmerising. If you’re looking for action, this really isn’t the book for you, but if you want literary fantasy, where the characters matter more than anything else, this is the book for you. The premise: in the first book of the series, The Healers’ Road, Agna the healer and Keifon the Medic, with their very different backgrounds and approaches to healing, were thrown together and had to reach a working accommodation. Two years on the road and a lot of adjustments saw them become strong enough friends to consider settling in the same northern town, Wildern. Agna hopes to open an art gallery. Keifon wants to become […]

Posted October 2, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in Review / 1 Comment

Fantasy review: ‘For The Wildings’ by Kyra Halland

This is the sixth and final part of the Daughter of the Wildings series. I’ve been trying to think how many series I’ve managed to keep up with for six books, and it’s not many. A couple of murder mystery series, perhaps. But in fantasy? Nope. I rarely even get beyond the first book, and only a few stand-out series keep me hooked for a trilogy. So it’s a testament to the strength of the author’s writing that I’ve read and enjoyed every word of all six books. It was the premise that first caught my eye. Wizards and magic combined with old west cattle ranching and guns? Count me in! And the stories were just as good as I’d hoped. Leading man Silas is a true western hero, tough and determined, but a real gentleman too. His lady, Lainie, is his equal in every respect, and maybe, just maybe, […]

Posted September 29, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in Review / 0 Comments

Now out! ‘The Second God’

Yes, folks, the story that started in The Fire Mages and continued a generation later in The Fire Mages’ Daughter now reaches its dramatic conclusion, as Drina and the two men in her life, Ly-haam and Arran, are forced to make difficult and dangerous choices to defend their country from new threats. The Second God is currently just $2.99 for a short time, and The Fire Mages’ Daughter is just $0.99. If you’d like to pick up a copy of The Fire Mages too, hold off until 3rd October, when it will be FREE. All these discounts are available worldwide for the Kindle. If you have a subscription to Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Prime, you can borrow all three books free. You can also buy the books in paperback, and download the ebook free of charge. Click the cover image to be taken to your local Amazon. Here’s the blurb […]

Posted September 24, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in Publishing/marketing, The Fire Mages, The Fire Mages' Daughter, The Second God / 0 Comments

Mystery review: ‘A Case of Blackmail in Belgravia’ by Clara Benson

For anyone who read all ten of the Angela Marchmont series of murder mysteries set in the 1920s, this spin-off series is an absolute must. Featuring the gloriously insouciant Freddy Pilkington-Soames, this first book in the new series has all the author’s trademark elegant phrasing and delightful humour, combined with twenties glamour and a gentle murder mystery to be solved. I was a little concerned that Freddy, a comedic bit part in the Angela series, might be too lightweight to carry an entire series on his own, but I needn’t have worried. Freddy turns out to have a very deft hand in managing affairs so that the murderer is brought to justice without his society cronies missing the cocktail hour. Here’s the plot: the magnificently named Ticky Maltravers is the toast of London high society, adored by everyone—or so it seems, until somebody poisons him over dinner. Now it turns […]

Posted September 11, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in Review / 0 Comments

New release round-up: books I’m looking forward to reading

Once again, my backlog of books to be read is growing and, with two new releases of my own this month, the time for reading has shrunk alarmingly. I hope to catch up a bit next month when I’ll be off to Australia for three weeks, with my trusty Kindle fully charged. Until then, here are some recently released books that I’m really excited about reading. Finally, finally a sequel to the amazing The Healers’ Road by S E Robertson, which was a five star read for me back in 2014. I described it as literary fantasy, a beautifully written story of two very different people thrown together and gradually inching towards an accommodation as they travelled about offering their opposing styles of healing skills as needed. In The Healers’ Home, the two have a settled place to live for the first time. I can’t wait to find out how […]

Posted September 10, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in Books that caught my eye / 0 Comments

Urban fantasy review: ‘Gathering Black’ by Jen Rasmussen

Oh, that difficult second book of the series. The first is always full of surprises, every quirk of the author’s created world new and fresh. The final part is the big battle where evil is defeated, all the wrongs are set right and everything ends on a happy note. And then there are those middle books (this is the second in a planned five-book series). It’s very easy to drop the ball at this point, but here the author distracts with plenty of action and a whole heap of mysteries. Where are these precious sapwood seeds that both sides want so badly? Who is the traitor in the clan that’s supposed to be protecting them? And most of all, who can be trusted and who’s following their own agenda? The most delightful aspect of this series, for me, is the concept of place magic, something that our heroine, Verity, has […]

Posted September 7, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in Review / 0 Comments

The Brightmoon world has a map!

In less than three weeks, on 23rd September, The Second God will be released, my seventh epic fantasy, yet up to now there’s never been a map of any part of the Brightmoon world. But this book is a little different, it covers a wide area of the southern Plains of Kallanash, and with multiple plot strands taking place simultaneously at different locations, it was time to bite the bullet and become a proper, grown-up fantasy author. I have a map! It was drawn for me by Write.Dream.Repeat Book Design, using map elements by Ignacio Portilla M. And here it is: Most of the Brightmoon books so far take place within this map. Here’s how they fit in: The Plains of Kallanash: in the Karningplain. The Fire Mages: in Bennamore. The Mages of Bennamore: in the Port Holdings. The Magic Mines of Asharim: at the top of the Sky Mountains […]

Posted September 4, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in The Second God / 2 Comments

Authors Answer 17: What authors, styles or intellectual movements have most influenced your writing?

For the fantasy, I can’t honestly say that anything has really influenced my writing. I haven’t read a vast amount in the genre, and what I have read is mostly of a type I wouldn’t wish to emulate. Game of Thrones is too dark and nihilistic. Robin Hobb is downright depressing — beautifully written work that I hated. The authors whose work I most admire — Mark Lawrence, Daniel Abraham, Glenda Larke, Guy Gavriel Kay — are so brilliant I feel embarrassed to call myself a writer. My own work is such a mishmash of genre tropes that if someone asks me: “What other books are like yours?” I genuinely can’t answer. This isn’t a boast, by the way — it’s a Very Bad Thing not to be able to place your own books in the pantheon of genres. It’s embarrassing, and the result of ignorance of the genres rather […]

Posted August 19, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in AuthorsAnswer, Regency romances, Writing musings / 1 Comment

Authors Answer 16: What are your favorite online resources/websites for writers?

I haven’t done any of these for a while, so duck while I lob my backlog out there… This is an interesting question, because the resources needed vary depending on where you are in your career path. The information you need when you first begin (what exactly makes a compelling protagonist?) is very different from what’s wanted after you publish (where can I advertise my books?). So here are some sites that have been useful to me as I developed my writing and publishing skills. For writing: Mythic Scribes When you’re in the early stages of writing – your first book, or perhaps still dabbling with world-building – what you really need is a community of like-minded people. Even when you’ve read all the craft books, it can still be tricky to apply the advice to your own work. Should I introduce my antagonist earlier? Is this a punchy opening […]

Posted August 15, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in AuthorsAnswer / 0 Comments

Mystery review: Awash by Dawn Lee McKenna

Book 6 of the Forgotten Coast series already, and still more to come. Anyone who’s read this far will know what to expect — fascinating characters, lots of drama, plenty of humour and McKenna’s trademark brilliant dialogue, where the subtext beneath the words stretches halfway to the earth’s core. Never have characters said so much with so few words. I don’t always fully understand exactly what it is they’re saying (or not saying) but trying to work that out is part of the fun. For anyone whose interest is in the crime-of-the-moment, with the personal lives of the characters a minor note, this isn’t the series for you. Here the characters are what it’s all about, and again in this book the crime to be solved is deeply connected to Maggie, the female cop who is the heart of the series. Maggie was raped as a teenager, and when she’s […]

Posted August 15, 2016 by PaulineMRoss in Review / 0 Comments