Forgotten Realms author Paul S. Kemp has posted a free preview chapter of his upcoming novel Shadowrealm. Paul has several free downloads on his website, including some chapters from other Forgotten Realms titles. Check out his Free Stuff page for more information. You can pre-order Shadowrealm at Amazon. Paul’s other books include Shadow’s Witness, Resurrection […]

Spartans Unleashed has created several free Cursed Empire items available for download at RPGNow.com The Cursed Empire Fantasy RPG provides a dark, comprehensive medieval fantasy game system with subtle undertones of the heroic age of Ancient Greece. This game offers Players and GM’s detailed and flexible rules to suit their gaming style for combat, movement, […]

House of Leaves is a peculiar novel, not precisely one thing and not quite another. It isn’t quite a dark fantasy novel, it isn’t quite a horror novel, it isn’t quite a piece of kafkaesque surrealism and isn’t quite a cohesive work of fiction. It is at once pretentious and deep, confusing and captivating, disturbing and curious. The thrust of the story, which is really several stories, is the discovery of a peculiar manuscript by ‘Johnny Truant’ a no good tattoo artist and deadbeat who, thanks to the manuscript, seems to start a slow descent into madness. The manuscript came to him via Zampano, a crazy old man who died and from whom Johnny effectively stole it. The manuscript itself is an examination, investigation and critique into a strange film called The Navidson Record which records the peculiar happenings at the titular ‘House of Leaves’ a place owned by Navidson, his wife and their children and where the house takes on a sinister aspect as it shifts shape and time and seems to try and swallow them up, all of which is supposedly documented on a peculiar film that is doing the rounds.

Review by James ‘Grim’ Desborough

Whether you have tried to publish one piece of fiction or 100, chances are you visited Ralan.com’s SpecFic and Humor Webstravaganza for better listings of publishers than the Writer’s Market has to offer. In this interview, we hear from Ralan himself about his work and the thoughts behind offering free information for all writers to access.

If you’re not familiar with the site, Ralan does offer this invaluable information for free and survives off of donations and the kindness of others. This massive source of publishers, webzines and contests features everything from Weird Tales to Ralan’s Flash Fiction Contest. So sit back and hear from the man behind Ralan.com about his fiction, freelancing and other projects.

I didn’t really know what to expect when I picked up The Fountain; I had read some other reviews of it before I went out and got it and was intrigued by Darren Aronosfky’s writing and film style. Going into it, I had thought it was a film about the fountain of youth, about a couple who were possessed with finding the mythic “fountain” to restore and heal Izzy (played by Rachel Weisz) from her terminal illness.

The first in a series of ten novels for Mirrorstone, the young adult imprint of Wizards of the Coast, In the Serpent’s Coils launches readers straight into the larger story. Corrine’s father disappeared during the Civil War, and her mother died while she had the swamp fever. She finds herself alone in the world except for an uncle who would rather not be responsible for her wellfare. Until, that is, she discovers people living in the hawthorn tree who promise to cure her in exchange for a small stone.

Scar Night is the debut novel from Alan Campbell who, previously, has worked as a designer and coder on the Grand Theft Auto games. It forms, apparently, the first novel in a series to come called The Deepgate Codex. A good, even great first effort Scar Night would seem to (hopefully) establish Campbell as another of the active British fantasists and SF authors that seem to be keeping the innovative side of those genres bubbling along a bit

I should probably note before I commence that I am not much of a fan of the original Ravenloft, or of the world as a whole. Of the alternative game settings offered in the last gasps of TSR Ravenloft is much weaker – in my opinion – than Dark Sun or Planescape. To me it just all seemed a little too cheesy, a little too Bela Lugosi and we all know how unscary the old 40s and 50s horror films seem these days. Some of that ‘cheese’ always seemed to taint my encounters with Ravenloft from fortune telling gypsies to vampire lords and, so, I’ve never been that enamoured of it. I know people love it though, so I’ll try to rate this d20 remake gazetteer based on its individual content rather than the world it describes.

Departure is the second book in the Redemption Trilogy set in the world of the Chronicles of Ramlar Role Playing Game, which is also known as Eranon. This book picks up where Into the Reach left off, continuing the adventures of Kennerly, Lydia, Nara and Taru as they build new lives for themselves away from their homes and events in their individual pasts that brought them to the Reach.

Cadwallon sells itself as a ‘tactical role playing game’ and it sits, uncomfortably and mystifyingly, somewhere between D&D and one of Games Workshop’s skirmish games like Mordheim or Necromunda. It never quite explains what tactical roleplaying is exactly and it comes across in the reading as either a dumbed down D&D where the board becomes necessary or a brightened up skirmish game where you actually roleplay. It is stuck between dimensions, neither one thing nor the other but given the D&D miniatures and the popularity of Clix this new middle ground seems to have become a fighting area for many of the companies so there must be something in it.

Qin is to China’s mythological history what Legend of the Five Rings is to Japan’s. While there are superficial and stylistic similarities between the two games and they share the same broad appeal the similarities in no way mean they’re the same any more than the broad similarities between Japan and China themselves mean they’re in any way the same country.

Qin takes a more historical approach – though don’t worry, there are monsters and magic – and has a much more egalitarian and open society structure (considering the source material) than Legend of the Five Rings. Being a peasant or bandit is a much more viable option in Qin and while the social order is divinely mandated and enforced – particularly for women – the period of the setting is chaotic enough and in enough upheaval that this is no longer an issue.

From first edition Vampire through to about a year or so before the end of the Old World of Darkness line I was a bit of a White Wolf fanboy. Not a drooling fanboy, they still did things that annoyed me, but by and large I agreed with their design philosophy and found that their games appealed to my style of play and the sort of games I wanted to run. With their cackhanded interference in their LARP society (not that it could have made things much worse than they already were) and their wrap up of the oWOD I fell out of love with them for the most part and aside from the occasional bit of curiosity I haven’t really followed their games.

Except for Exalted.

I was one of the lucky few, thanks to the sharp attention of the wife and her amazing persuasive abilities, to pick up an early release volume of The Savage World of Solomon Kane by Pinnacle Entertainment. Like a great many other game designers I am afflicted with a great love of the pulps and related ‘trash’ forms of fiction such as B-movies, exploitation cinema and so forth. Alas for us game designers the appeal that these genres have for us don’t often translate into good sales or successful games, with the notable exceptions of Mongoose’s Conan and, perhaps, Spirit of the Century (which has plenty of industry kudos but I’m not so certain on their sales).

300 is adapted from Frank Miller’s graphic novel of the same name about the 480 B.C. battle at Thermopylae between a monolithic and massive invading Persian army led by King Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) and merely three hundred of the most brave Spartans led by King Leonidas (Gerard Butler). As both history and the laws of probability dictate, our noble Spartans lost, but they did inspire the rest of their fellow Greeks to resist which ultimately preserved the genesis of Western Civilization.

As reviewers, we are trained to assess the strength of a book by its readability as well as its marketability. In other words, we understand that the art of writing and publishing is also a business, and one that always seems to have many twists and turns. Sometimes, we read books that don’t seem to fit in one place or another, but the story is amazing. Other times, we read a book that when you’re done you know it should be found smack dab in the middle of the fantasy, horror, or science fiction section in your bookstore. Often, though, it becomes increasingly difficult to read a book that stretches beyond the boundaries of genre to simply be a “good book.”

Review by Monica Valentinelli

Prophecies, magic, and a powerful darkness come to life in the novel End of Heroes, written by an up and coming author. Although this is a fantasy novel, there are many elements that do not follow the mainstream cutouts you might find in your local bookstore hidden away on the shelf. First and foremost, it is strongly apparent that there is an intelligent author behind the planning of this book. Herbst has created a very, well-detailed setting with a complex wizard society and magical rules.

Review by Monica Valentinelli

I was under whelmed and uninspired by nearly everything I saw in 2006. Genre flicks were particularly bad. Aside from “The Descent,” one of the few notable exceptions, it was a year full of more bad sequels and blasphemous remakes. That said, I was hopeful about Guillermo del Toro’s “Pan’s Labyrinth” as I made my first trip to the theatre this year. However, I decided to leave my expectations at the theatre entrance just in case—a defense mechanism against brilliantly marketed bad movies.

The official Wraeththu (pronounced RAY-THOO) roleplaying game is based on a body of fiction by Storm Constantine. I should note that, prior to reviewing the product in question, my exposure to Ms. Constantine’s fiction has been exactly none. That said, after reviewing the RPG, I’m tempted to look into it. I found the game itself to be conceptually intriguing, though its execution leaves much to be desired. Something appears to have gone horribly awry between the initial spark of inspiration and the finished product.

Into the Reach brings a small group of “heroes” together through unlucky circumstances that are forced to work together against an evil necromancer and his undead minions. Each of this tale’s protagonists have lost someone dear to them in the recent past and are attempting to start new lives on the outskirts of the Reach (a Northeastern corner of the continent, well-known for its blasted wasteland and mixed population of outcasts and outlaws). Some of them meet along the way to their new home and finish the journey together.

The most praise that I have is for the magic system. It reflects the dangerous nature of magic (as well as it’s unpredictability) and the steps needed to advance along your arcane studies. The power of spell casters is minor in the beginning, but just by looking at the math of any mid/high level spells you can tell that they will one day be capable of easily destroying hordes of enemies. In short, magic is taxing, dangerous, and a life long learning process, but well worth the effort in the end.