Fans of heavy metal–style sword slashing nastiness will take to this outlandish adventure.
An illustrated novel about an unlikely hero and his adventures in a violent future.
From debut authors Zielinski and Stempka comes Boldizar Halfwater, a handyman drug addict who, at 5 feet 6 inches tall and “barely weighing over 100 pounds when fully clothed…was not an imposing figure.” Boldizar lives alone in a dusty, humble dwelling, fueling his days with cocaine and general indifference. “Simply put—he was lazy, and preferred to spend more time relaxing with a cool drink and a pile of drugs than toiling in his workshop fixing broken items.” After fixing a mechanical dog washer and polisher for local tough man Billy Von Bixby, Boldizar’s lazy life abruptly changes. Upon delivery of the repaired item, Boldizar inexplicably murders Billy with a pocket knife. Why would Boldizar murder one of the most dangerous men in town? Even he isn’t sure. Fortunately for Boldizar, his friend Reginald is around with his horse Alabama Cush. The two escape to the woods, where they are pursued by the corpulent, cannibalistic Bittertight (“Small pieces of food spit and hopped out of his flapping jaws like fleas from a dogs bark”), head of the Goughnuts Guard. Once out of immediate danger, Boldizar learns that the dog polisher contains a glowing blue pendant, leading him to ask, “What kind of fucked up jewelry is this?” So begins a quest to find out just what kind of jewelry it is while avoiding capture from the feared Bittertight. Encountering everything from a powerful gladiator to a Screamicorn, a “demonically hellish red horse” that kills its victims with a scream, the hero has multiple zany, gory exploits. The overall outrageousness of events will excite readers unperturbed by exploding body parts and allusions to crude sexual practices (“Usually he would look to mastiffs to service his sexual needs since they couldn’t judge him, and the rules of bestiality were long since forgotten”). While Boldizar himself does not prove the most intriguing hero, his story involves enough peripheral inventiveness to please readers of similar works.
Fans of heavy metal–style sword slashing nastiness will take to this outlandish adventure.Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2014
ISBN: 978-1499372342
Page Count: 288
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Dec. 8, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
At Buckkeep in the Six Duchies, young Fitz, the bastard son of Prince Chivalry, is raised as a stablehand by old warrior Burrich. But when Chivalry dies without legitimate issue—murdered, it's rumored—Fitz, at the orders of King Shrewd, is brought into the palace and trained in the knightly and courtly arts. Meanwhile, secretly at night, he receives instruction from another bastard, Chade, in the assassin's craft. Now, King Shrewd's subjects are imperiled by the visits of the Red-Ship Raiders—formidable warriors who pillage the seacoasts and turn their human victims into vicious, destructive zombies. Since rehabilitating the zombies proves impossible, it's Fitz's task to go abroad covertly and kill them as quickly and humanely as possible. Shrewd orders that Fitz be taught the Skill—mental powers of telepathy and coercion possessed by all those of the royal line; his teacher is Galen, a sadistic ally of the popinjay Prince Regal, who hates Fitz all the more for his loyalty to Shrewd's other son, the stalwart soldier Verity. Galen brutalizes Fitz and, unknown to anyone, implants a mental block that prevents Fitz from using the Skill. Later, Shrewd decrees that, to cement an alliance, Verity shall wed the Princess Kettricken, heir to a remote yet rich mountain kingdom. Verity, occupied with Skillfully keeping the Red-Ship Raiders at bay, can't go to collect his bride, so Regal and Fitz are sent. Finally, Fitz must discover the depths of Regal's perfidy, recapture his true Skill, win Kettricken's heart for Verity, and help Verity defeat the Raiders. An intriguing, controlled, and remarkably assured debut, at once satisfyingly self-contained yet leaving plenty of scope for future extensions and embellishments.
Pub Date: April 17, 1995
ISBN: 0-553-37445-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Spectra/Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1995
Gwynne’s effort pales in comparison to George R.R. Martin’s gold-standard work, but it’s nothing bad; the story grinds to a...
A middling Middle Earth–ish extravaganza with all the usual thrills, chills, spills and frills.
All modern fantasy begins with J.R.R. Tolkien, and Tolkien begins with the Icelandic sagas and the Mabinogion. Debut author Gwynne’s overstuffed but slow-moving contribution to the genre—the first in a series, of course—wears the latter source on its sleeve: “Fionn ap Toin, Marrock ben Rhagor, why do you come here on this first day of the Birth Moon?” Why, indeed? Well, therein hangs the tale. The protagonist is a 14-year-old commoner named Corban, son of a swineherd, who, as happens in such things, turns out to be more resourceful than his porcine-production background might suggest. There are bad doings afoot in Tintagel—beg pardon, the Banished Lands—where nobles plot against nobles even as there are stirrings of renewed titanomachia, that war between giants and humans having given the place some of its gloominess. There’s treachery aplenty, peppered with odd episodes inspired by other sources, such as an Androcles-and-lion moment in which Corban rescues a fierce wolven (“rarely seen here, preferring the south of Ardan, regions of deep forest and sweeping moors, where the auroch herds roamed”). It’s a good move: You never can tell when a wolven ally will come in handy, especially when there are wyrms around.
Gwynne’s effort pales in comparison to George R.R. Martin’s gold-standard work, but it’s nothing bad; the story grinds to a halt at points, but at others, there’s plenty of action.Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-316-39973-9
Page Count: 640
Publisher: Orbit/Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 16, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2013
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