THE DEVILS (The Devils #1) opens a fun alternate-Europe fantasy series...optioned by James Cameron!

THE DEVILS (The Devils #1)
JOE ABERCROMBIE (illus. John Anthony di Giovanni)
Tor Books (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

FINALIST for the 2026 Locus Award for FANTASY NOVEL!

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Holy work sometimes requires unholy deeds.

Brother Diaz has been summoned to the Sacred City, where he is certain a commendation and grand holy assignment awaits him. But his new flock is made up of unrepentant murderers, practitioners of ghastly magic, and outright monsters, and the mission he is tasked with will require bloody measures from them all in order to achieve its righteous ends.

Elves lurk at our borders and hunger for our flesh, while greedy princes care for nothing but their own ambitions and comfort. With a hellish journey before him, it's a good thing Brother Diaz has the devils on his side.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Lord Grimdark retunes his scabbard to launch a new fantasy series. It's one helluva ride, rising six hundred pages of scatology, dirty deeds, and mayhem. In short, Joe Abercrombie/Lord Grimdark at his grimdark best.

The Suicide Squad vibe, the gallows humor and banter between the villainous, heroic, and amoral-sexpot elements of the dramatis personae, and the hectic pace of the action all conspire to keep the pages flipping. The alternate-history vibes...there's a Troy but not a Rome?...make each characters' accustomed place in The Gang just that little bit off from here your experienced readers' radar says it ought to be. You'll know inside fifty pages if the tone works for you. What's likely to drive most of y'all off is the relentless onslaught of poo references. That wore my nerve one whole stars'-worth.

What I loved was Brother Diaz whose position as the vicar of the Chapel of the Holy Expediency, a secret society within the church that answers only to her holiness the pope (all of ten years old!) set to deliver the (unwilling) heiress to the imperial throne to take up her mantle (off the shoulders of the current occupant and her four sons, who have opinions about the effort), and if possible keep her extremely base origins from leaking out, as they scraped her literally out of a gutter. Keeping their Viking warrior comadre (not comrade; look it up) from shagging everything/one on the way there, and arriving before her monthly curse arrives. Werewolves don't tend to be good guardians of empresses. (Nor do anthropophagic elves, another gang member who's not intuitively part of the party but serves a function I won't spoil.)

For me, the battle scenes aren't as much fun as they are for Author Grimdark's more committed fans. This is an across-the-board observation appertaining to the gentleman's œuvre entire, so is not grounds for destarring this story. He is delivering the goods as demanded here, though I suspect even his most self-gratifying fans will be hard (!)-pressed to get all the way through the sea battle in the middle.

I enjoyed the trip to Troy a butt-hair less than the story after they reached Troy, when either Author Grimdark reached optimal operating temperature for his story engine or I just finally developed my poo-shedding coating. Whatever it was, that last fifth of the story was more fun than the rest for me. It was at this juncture I finally got the why of the very recent news that James Cameron's Lightstorm Entertainment production house has optioned film rights. The current plan calls for Cameron, busy making Avatar content for December 2025 release just now, to co-develop the screenplay with Author Grimdark.

I spent big parts of the read wondering how Cameron could do this with the swearing and the absolute mountains of poo...the Troy happened, and yeah, I see it.

I do not think the, um, the sensitive reader will disfruit this lectorial exercise. I do not recommend it for those who do not resonate like banged gongs to irreverence toward authority temporal and/or spiritual. If a happy day's reading is spoiled for you by the sudden, ghastly death of some character you enjoyed following, avoid all Abercrombie work and start with this one.

If you cannot read the death scene of Little Nell in The Old Curiosity Shop without laughing à la Oscar Wilde, OTOH, this book has a very good chance of keeping you amused and entertained.

I laughed.

THE SECRETS OF ALABURG (Alaburg University #1) has maps and cool character art on its Ammy page!

THE SECRETS OF ALABURG (Alaburg University #1)
GREG WALTERS (tr. Patrick Moffatt)
Kindle edition (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$3.99, or free to read on Kindle Unlimited

Rating: 3* of five

The Publisher Says: A hideous beast with glowing red eyes ambushes Bryn on his way home through the forest. After a narrow escape, the sixteen-year-old must flee with his foster father Gerald to the only place that promises Âlaburg University, where humans, dwarves, elves, and orcs come together to study the Colors of Magic.

Bryn soon discovers he can use all three magical colors, which renders him powerful and dangerous at the same time. Will he learn to channel his powers with the help of his unlikely new friends and secure peace for the land, or will he become the one who spells out doom for the enlightened nations of Razuclan?

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Aged-up wizarding school story but without the added transphobia that so appalls and offends me, though with forced heteronormativity...just let Bryn be a kid without a love interest!

That series wasn't the first iteration of the story, so no talk of "ripping off," please. In that case everyone owes the Mauschwitz people royalties for that revolting rodent's "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" bit in 1940's Fantasia. Or the composer, Paul Dukas, of that bit owes at least a nod to Goethe for the poem from 1797; which is a nod to Classical sources that likely derive from ancient Egyptian sources. This idea, laddies and gentlewomen, does not belong to, nor was it originated by, the transphobic Scottish woman.

Thank all those useless gods.

Okay, well, that's one hobbyhorse ridden. Now why did I give the read three stars? Simple. I'm tired of this story. Let this field lie fallow a few generations. The translator from the original German, Patrick Moffatt, did an okay job. I don't know what he had to work with, but it's pretty much all "low, green armchair"s and "dust dancing in golden light beam"s level stuff. It works; it's not clunky; but I remember no specific line at all.

So a serviceable read? Yep. I resent not one minute of those five hours. I don't think I'd say yes to a DRC of #2 in the series...just not that excited. The folks who love the special-orphan-learns-magical-truth books will eat it up with a spoon. On current evidence, that's a whole huge heap of y'all. PLUS there's seven of 'em and the series is completed!

I am not now, nor have I ever been, a massive fan of this plot. Earthsea thrilled me as a ten-year-old; the transphobic woman's book had to be read due to FOMO; other than that I'm a resolute take it or leave it guy fatigued into resistance by ubiquity. YMMV, and most likely will, so give it a whirl. It's low risk for these prices, and free on KU means you're really not risking anything except time.

SEEKER, the first book of The Sentinel Archives, indie fantasy novels with an edge

SEEKER (The Sentinel Archives #1)
SAMUEL GRIFFIN
Panthe Press (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$5.99 Kindle edition, available now

Rating: 3.75* of five

The Publisher Says: "Today I am equipped with the knowledge that my future was to be far greater, more exciting, and more disturbing than anything so simple as my young imagination could then conjure. Indeed, looking back, my forecast was positively quaint. I ask myself a question often, and it is this: if I had understood all that was to befall me, would I have run, that day, or exulted?

I find I do not know."

Ancient leviathans have stirred from their long slumber. Their scent song marks where they might be found but only to those who have the means to somewhat hear it: Sentinel Archivists.

Shay Bluefaltlow finds herself training to become such a specialist when she is forced into indentured servitude. Her new home, the city of Fivedock, is strange and unfamiliar, as are her new companions: a belligerent surgeon, a remarkable little boy, and a formidable Sentinel Archivist tasked with teaching Shay the terrifying ways of the trade.

Her unanticipated position requires rigorous training, diligent study and a strong constitution. Shay, afraid she is unequal to the prodigious task but desperate to impress her superior, struggles to prove herself.

When war breaks out across the Concord, the office of the Sentinel Archivist is threatened by a terrible betrayal. And Shay has secrets of her own.

Packed with era detail to bring the world to vivid life, realistic, but with strong fantastical elements, a rich regency voice, and a bewitching touch of strangeness, Seeker is an immersive first-person fantasy for adults.

Griffin does for regency era fantasy what Robin Hobb did for medieval: this isn’t just a fiction, this is a living and breathing world you dunk yourself in. An intimate journey with real characters. With incredibly accomplished, enchanting prose, and a beating heart of a story.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: You like fantasy novels more than I do. I promise you this is true. So why did I get a DRC of this title?

To see if there are cracks in my walls of resistance. And, well, I like this novel just fine. The ideas don't cause me to roll my eyes...the worldbuilding, in other words, does iits job with reasonable facility...but neither did the idea of an orphan-special-chosen-one meets scoobygroup cause me to get all excited. Executed well, or I'd've made tracks for the door; still, not the most energizing choice for this fantasy agnostic.

The faux-archaic tone, for some reason, hit me the right way. I was surprised by this, honestly because I usually find it arch and/or tedious. Author Griffin did a good job finding a middle ground between those unpleasant poles. As a result, I really enjoyed the read.

It moves slowly. The first half of the book is just not paced correctly, in that there were many times scenes went on way too long, and I was sorely tempted to shut the Kindle and move on to other things. That I didn't is honestly a little miracle. The Archivists kept me going. I wanted to know what the heck this was all connected to. But keep in mind I'm not a fantasy-novel reader as a rule. Maybe you fantasy aficionados will respond differently. Those who like the trend towards library- and archive-centered stories could, in particular, find something special.

Why I think you should give it a chance really boils down to that. You read the genre? Read widely! Wider than usual, for you "high-fantasy" folks. Much on a par for those who loved Susanna Clarke's magisterial Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. Magic and fantasy, books and lore, people and quests, just belong together. Come get some more.

Cornelia Funke's MIRRORWORLD series, RECKLESS I: THE PETRIFIED FLESH is first of 5-book illustrated YA Dark Fantasy Series

RECKLESS: The Petrified Flesh (MirrorWorld #1)
CORNELIA FUNKE (tr. Oliver Latsch)
Pushkin Children's Books (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$9.99 Kindle edition, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Jacob has uncovered the doorway to another world, hidden behind a mirror. It is a place of dark magic and enchanted objects, scheming dwarves and fearsome ogres, fairies born from water and men born from stone. Here, he hunts for treasure and seeks adventure in the company of Fox - a beautiful, shape­shifting girl, who guides and guards him. But now Jacob's younger brother has followed him into the mirrored world, and all that was freedom has turned to fear. Because a deadly curse has been spoken; and Jacob must risk his life to reverse it, before his brother is turned to stone forever... Revised and updated by Cornelia Funke, The Petrified Flesh is the first book in the thrilling Reckless series.

First book reviewed here—Second book reviewed here
—Third book reviewed here—Fourth book reviewed here

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Don't mistake "young adult" for "fluffy." This story of brothers, orphaned early in life by a father whose abandonment of them without a word also cost them their mother to her grief, as they find the "Mirrorworld" that their father vanished into...inside his study!

This is a portal fantasy, with a secondary world that resembles our own enough to be an alternate-history wrold except for the fact that magic works. "Austry" is the name of the Mirrorworld country the brothers, and their father before him, arrive in, not the Austria they leave behind. The family's disintegration, as abetted by the mirror, is not something that the hero Jacob is trying to fix or to escape, like Meg in A Wrinkle in Time or the Pevensies in The Chronicle of Narnia. Jacob's a young adult, he fled into Mirrorworld to find a place for himself not look for someone else. Of course he finds others...a bad father-figure but a good mentor in Albert Chanute, innkeeper and treasure hunter in Austry, a girlfriend of sorts in Fox the shapeshifting...fox. He's got a life as a treasure hunter! He's met the Empress six times! (But don't tell Chanute that, he's only met her three times for treasure-hunting and now he's past it, so there'd be jealousy and trouble.)

The stakes this secondary world introduces to us could not be higher. Jacob's treasure-hunting ways are threatened by the Goyls, put a gar- in front and you'll get it, finally having effective leadership and thus starting to win battles in the eternal war between humans and their kind. What matters about that is that Will, Jacob's brother, has been bitten by a Goyl and is suffering the inexorable fate of such: He's turning into the stone creature that we call a Goyl but, since he's human, he won't survive the change. He will be a stone human...dead, but still walking without his soul. And Jacob, whose running away to find a life in this other world, now can't figure out how to save Will...and his refusal to share knowledge of Mirrorworld with Will is what left him susceptible to the bite in the first place. Oh! Wait! That's not enough pressure, not enough baggage. Will's utterly innocent girlfriend Clara finds the mirror and enters Mirrorworld, too!

Now, let me not spend more time in Spoilerville than is necessary. Will and Clara are serious Mary Sues. The world happens to them. They're not possessed of Jacob's trove of information...and this is something he quite rightly blames himself for not imparting to his adoring little brother. He spends just enough time recognizing that he's set these conditions in motion, and the success or failure of Will's future life among the living not-Goyls is entirely on him.

Celeste/Fox surprised me as a character. Will is younger than Jacob and he has a blah girlfriend, but Jacob's magical girlfriend is...a real full-bodied relationship partner! I wasn't thinking that would work in a kid-aimed story. But this, with its neither dwelt-on nor avoided sexuality and its frank presentation of bodily suffering...Chanute's arm is lost for a singularly stupid reason, for example, but it's before the story we're being told now starts, and is reported not experienced...is part of the not-quite-adult storytelling world. I'd give this to any sixteen-year-old and expect them to feel positive about it. Not younger, though. The consequences of stupid actions aren't minimized!

But sometimes, stupid people just can't be forced to stop being stupid. Clara simply can not be made to see what is completely obvious to the meanest intelligence: She is NOT in her own birth-world anymore and can NOT act like she's out for a particularly strange walk there! It gets wearing, her insistence that Jacob act as though her world's rules still hold sway. And he, fool of a man that he is, keeps explaining and explaining why her way won't work! Because she's unwilling to learn!

But Jacob...he's fighting through death and resurrection, he's fighting enemies he knows are enemies as well as friends he doesn't know are worse than enemies..."Who makes peace when you can have victory?" muses one such...Jacob fights until the fabric of Mirrorworld finally delivers him the thing he's consistently asked for, demanded, begged to receive. The thing he's died inside and out to cause to happen.

He's received the gift of an ending.

What a lovely way to make your portal fantasy pop! Make it such that there is no more severe betrayal that can occur to anyone in this world. Give everyone an ending. Then, stand back and watch the fun begin!

So perfect for its intended audience, so much in accord with the end-of-adolescence access of adult emotions but without the perspective to manage them. This should take the world by storm, and I hope it will.