reviews

Ravenloft Revisited Author: David A. Page A spin-off from the Dragonlance realm of Krynn, the dark domain of Ravenloft contains cursed lands, bound together in a never-ending hellscape. Ravenloft merges fantasy with horror and is (or really, was) its own series like Dragonlance and the Forgotten Realms. In Ravenloft, doomed places and their denizens find themselves suddenly on a demi-plane of horror – a place that is basically hell, ruled by fiends and sojourned by strange creatures from zombies to werewolves and more. The series contained twenty books and ran briefly in the 90s before shattering fans by concluding abruptly as its [...]

Traveling in chains... Author:  Octavia E. Butler I read a lot of science fiction when I was a teenager.  Mostly from the Golden Age when authors like Asimov, Bradbury, Clarke and Heinlein reigned supreme.  I have to admit that at the time I was reading it – late ‘70s and early ‘80s – the obvious fact that all of these authors – and the vast majority of their contemporaries – were white men didn’t really catch my attention.   I’m sure that wasn’t the case for Octavia Butler.  The fact that there were no black or female science fiction writers when [...]

Childhood at war... Author:  Svetlana Alexievich It took me months to read this book.  Not just a few, but many.  It may seem strange, but I really can’t think of a way to recommend the book more strongly.  There are exactly 101 stories in Last Witnesses.  Almost every one of them is so gut-wrenchingly powerful that you really shouldn’t plan on reading more than two in sitting.  I found myself avoiding the book at times, knowing that each encounter would be so profoundly upsetting, maybe more than I could handle. Based on interviews with adults who were children during World [...]