2010

One by Conrad Williams

2009

Memoirs of a Master Forger by William Heaney (Graham Joyce)
reviewed by Tammy Moore
This is an elegant, brilliantly written novel that spins the plates of three, possibly four, different threads with the élan of a seasoned circus performer. A compelling narrative and unique voice makes the book almost impossible to put down -- despite Tammy's somewhat ambiguous feelings towards the main character.

2008

The Grin of the Dark by Ramsey Campbell
reviewed by David Hebblethwaite
Horror fiction is still a relative rarity in the British mass market, so it's great to hear that Virgin Books are starting a monthly series of horror titles. It's also good to hear that the first few will be reissues of small press publications. Of course, we still want the books to be good -- but, with the first two at least, there's nothing to worry about in that regard.

2007

Dusk by Tim Lebbon
reviewed by David Hebblethwaite
A man wearing a red robe enters the village of Trengborne and proceeds to slaughter everyone there -- all except two people, that is: Rafe Baburn, the young boy he's looking for; and Kosar, a former thief who hid when he saw the man approaching the village. Leaving Trengborne, Rafe falls in with the witch Hope and Kosar with his ex-lover, a warrior named A'Meer from the mysterious Shantasi people. The truth about the red-robed man becomes clear...

2006

Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman
reviewed by Alma A. Hromic
By this stage in his career, Neil Gaiman is in the enviable position of being a Household Name and legions of fans out there not only buy his books as soon as they hit the shelves but pre-order them in droves in the months prior to that. Contraband pre-publication copies even manage to turn up on Ebay. He is certainly one of those writers whose work people will buy without so much as having set eyes on it, simply because they know he'll tell a rollicking good tale.

2005

The Dark Tower: The Dark Tower by Stephen King
reviewed by Matthew Peckham
The seventh book in a cycle of seven called The Dark Tower opens with Jake and Father Callahan in a showdown at the Dixie Pig in New York circa 1999, as Roland and Eddie in Maine circa 1977 attempting to ensure the safety of a vacant lot that contains a single rose -- our world's manifestation of the Dark Tower. Eventually the broken ka-tet is reunited, and its members resume their journey along the path of the beam to the place the breakers are kept. There, they must permanently end the plot to break the beams before the final stage of the journey.

2004

Full Dark House by Christopher Fowler
"When a bomb devastates the office of London's most unusual police unit and claims the life of its oldest detective, Arthur Bryant, his surviving partner John May searches for clues to the bomber's identity. His search takes him back to the day the detectives first met as young men in 1940. In Blitz-ravaged London, a beautiful dancer rehearsing for a sexy, sinister production of 'Orpheus In The Underworld' is found without her feet. Bryant & May's investigation plunges them into a bizarre gothic mystery, where a faceless man stalks terrified actors and death strikes in darkness."

2003

The Scar by China Miéville
reviewed by Donna McMahon
Bellis Coldwine is taking passage on a ship, fleeing persecution in her home city of New Crobuzon for an uncertain future in distant Nova Esperium. An urban intellectual, Bellis loathes the prospect of years of exile in the colonies, but when her ship is captured by pirates, she realizes she may never see her home again. The pirates live on Armada, a secret floating city haphazardly lashed together from ships and debris.

The Scar by China Miéville
reviewed by William Thompson
In many ways, this novel bids to carry on the existential delving into the hidden and wounded nature of human experience, reinforced by a return to the wonders and horrors of Perdido Street Station's New Crobuzon. Here, however, the author chooses to build his city anew, in the form of a floating Armada, a pelagic architecture constructed of decaying and rusted ships roped together by rigging, catwalks and suspended bridges of cordage and plank that drifts upon the currents of the sea. Unknown to the authorities of the city-state of New Crobuzon, Armada is a loose confederation harboring many of their former misfits and criminals, a refuge for escaped Remades, divided into semi-autonomous ridings that support themselves by their own industry, thaumaturgy and piracy. Strange and exotic gardens grow and overhang decks and crowded, tottering tenements built upon the raised and gutted hulks of ironclad steamers and rotted wooden frigates that continuously bob and shift upon the water, weathering calms and storms far from any shore, dwarfed in the vast expanse of the Swollen Ocean.

2002

The Night of the Triffids by Simon Clark
"At the end of The Day of the Triffids, the hero, Bill Masen, his wife and four-year-old son leave the British mainland to join a new colony on the Isle of Wight to begin its work not only to eradicate the triffid menace but also to lay the foundations for a new civilization. The Night of the Triffids takes up the story twenty-five years later. David Masen, the now grown-up son of Bill, is a pilot, still searching for a method of destroying the implacable triffid plant as it continues its worldwide march, seemingly intent on wiping out humankind. David eventually manages to reach New York, where a very different sort of colony has been set up, a colony whose members seem to be immune and where David comes face to face with an old enemy from his father's past. "

2001

Perdido Street Station by China Miéville
reviewed by David Soyka
If you're one of those people who avoid fantasy novels for fear of even the slightest whiff of wizards or elves, here's a well worthy quest: make haste to where your bookstore stuffs the countless Tolkien spawn and rescue a copy of of this book from the mediocre horde. This is a novel that has more in common with the work of that similarly named fellow, Melville, than any mere commercial conjuring of fairyland.