Received: April 2013

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Received: April 2013

Posted on 2013-05-03 at 19:42 by Sam

I took it pretty easy on the review copy front in April, to the tune of three titles:

  1. No Return by Zachary Jernigan, read by John FitzGibbon for Audible Frontiers.
No Return | [Zachary Jernigan]

This is one I finished listening to a couple of week ago now, so here’s a snippet of my review, A stunning and original debut fantasy: “In a crowded year of strong debut fantasy novels, “No Return” is a very strong contender. Beginning with an assured voice, a prologue of a pitiless landscape of an hallucinogenic salt lake, expanding out to a world whose currency is the powdered skin of an Elder race, populated by (among others) rival enclaves of warrior monks engaging in ritualized battles to defend and proselytize their competing faiths. There is a god with city-killing orbital kinetic ordinance at his whim; there are deeply weird and sexualized alchemistic magics; there are sentient constructs of magical metal spheres; there are dragons and ghosts.”

  1. River of Stars by Guy Gavriel Kay, read by Simon Vance for Penguin Audio.
River of Stars | [Guy Gavriel Kay]

I haven’t gotten to this one yet, but it’s due up this weekend, where a road trip to and from DC should allow plenty of uninterrupted listening.

  1. YOU by Austin Grossman, read by Will Collyer for Hachette Audio.
You | [Austin Grossman]

I did listen to and very much enjoy this one; as a “software engineer by day” who has worked for quite a long time in a big software project release environment, and as a gamer, this one really was quite fantastic. I don’t have a full review put together, but I did have a quip: “With apologies to Jonathan Coulton, this is what it feels like to write software for a living.” The Guilded Earlobe does have a full review up.

Posted in received