Jonathan Strahan. Night Shade (www.nightshadebooks.com), $19.99 trade paper (500p) ISBN 978-1-59780-345-8
Strahan’s sixth annual genre-spanning anthology lacks the clarity (or perhaps narrowness) of purpose of a series focusing solely on fantasy or SF, but the 31 selections demonstrate a knowledge of and affection for the fantastic that rival editors...
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K. J. Parker, Author . Orbit $12.99 (635p) ISBN 978-0-316-00338-4
Parker (the Scavenger trilogy) raises the bar for realistic fantasy war craft with this series opener. When the engineering guild sentences Ziani Vaatzes to death for improving on its supposedly perfect specifications for mechanical toys, he manages
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K. J. Parker, Author . Orbit $24.99 (419p) ISBN 978-0-316-03853-9
This exquisitely written novel by a pseudonymous popular author blends gritty military fantasy with the 18th-century “island story” tradition. Seven years after the end of a war between unnamed countries, four friends who fought together
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K. J. Parker, Author . Subterranean $25 (113p) ISBN 978-1-59606-241-2
In this heartbreaking epistolary novella, pseudonymous military fantasist Parker (The Company
) keeps the letters, humor and tension moving at a quick clip. Nicephorus becomes the reluctant emperor of the Vesani after all his imperial relatives kill
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K.J. Parker, Subterranean (www.subterraneanpress.com), $25 (104p) ISBN 978-1-59606-327-3
Parker (Purple and Black) opens this darkly comic novella with a grandiose proclamation from its flawed narrator. Saloninus claims to have mastered the art of turning base metal into gold and confesses to poisoning Eudoxia, his wife and the sister...
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K.J. Parker, Orbit, $14.99 trade paperback (432p) ISBN 978-0-316038-56-0
Which matters more, intent or outcome? Parker (The Folding Knife) explores this dilemma in an understated tale of vengeance, along with the social paradox of keeping the peace when justice demands stirring up old crimes. In the backwater colony of...
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K.J. Parker. Orbit, $15.99 trade paper (480p) ISBN 978-0-316-17775-7
On the surface, Parker’s newest stand-alone, like the earlier Fencer Trilogy, is a ripping good adventure yarn, laced with frequent barbed witticisms and ace sword fighting. Fencing champion Suidas Deutzel of the Republic of Scheria is caught up in...
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K.J. Parker. Subterranean (www.subterraneanpress.com), $40 (536p) ISBN 978-1-59606-609-0
Parker (the Engineer trilogy) collects 10 stories and three essays to deliver all the cynicism, dry wit, and gray morality that fans have come to expect. The World Fantasy Award–winning “A Small Price to Pay for Birdsong” explores the tense...
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K.J. Parker. Subterranean (subterreaneanpress.com), $40 (392p) ISBN 978-1-59606-615-1
Parker delivers another solid standalone adventure filled with political and social intrigue. The titular savages (the Aram Chantat from 2012’s Sharps) only gradually come to the forefront of the plot through their alliance with a corrupt, failing...
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K.J. Parker. Subterranean, $40 (112p) ISBN 978-1-59606-755-4
In this bitingly witty fantasy novella, Parker (the pseudonym of British author Tom Holt) imagines life from the perspective of a higher (though not necessarily better) being. The Lady of the Moon listens to prayers and grants absolutions, but when...
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K.J. Parker. Tor.com, $10.99 trade paper (128p) ISBN 978-0-7653-8789-9
The one rule for reading any Parker story is never to assume that anything is what it appears to be, and that rule especially applies to this novella, set in a fantasy world. The devil of the title, really a hands-on functionary ensuring that people
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