Dark Fantasy
Dark Fantasy is a genre that combines some aspects of Horror, also defined as a type of horror story in which humanity is threatened by forces beyond human understanding. This genre can be mixed with most other sub-genres, with the possible exception of comedy fantasy.
Books Reviewed
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![All the Murmuring BonesA G Slatter]()
FantasyHave you ever sat down and read some Fairy Tales to your children? Not the sanitised versions that we read today, but the originals. If you have, you gave the kids nightmares a s these are stories not about happiness and magic but o f creatures and consequences . If you do something naught...
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![A Forest, DarklyA G Slatter]()
FantasyDealing with major changes in your life is not easy. You can find help in your community, but when you are a Witch who is hunted down, this is not so simple. Any other Witch that you come across is also being hunted or is too young to know what to do and needs a mentor. All Merhrab wants is to be le...
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![Symphony of BloodAdam Pepper]()
FantasyHank Mondale is a rough and ready P.I. who likes to drink and gamble more than he should, a lifestyle choice which has led to his landlord threatening to evict him and bookie threatening a great deal worse, he desperately needs a break. When the real estate mogul Thomas Blake calls with a paid job o...
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![House of Open WoundsAdrian Tchaikovsky]()
FantasyThere are authors that you love because you can pick up one of their books and know what you are going to get, like putting on your favourite pair of comfortable slippers again. There is also that rarer breed of author that you love, maybe even a little bit more. Those authors that will not be pigeo...
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![BenothingedAlvar Theo]()
HorrorYou do not have to delve onto the fiction shelves to find horror, you can just watch the news. Wars breaking out, people starving. Closer to home there are murders and violence. Most of us are cocooned from these horrors, living in bubbles of our own creation, but some horrors we cannot escape; grie...
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![Where Decay SleepsAnna Cheung]()
HorrorI do not like to think about death much as it makes it seem a little too real for my liking. I am still sticking to the hope that they invent that infinity pill before it is my time. If you are going to explore death, you may as well make it as beautiful as you can, and poetry can have a beauty. It...
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![The House of Sorrowing StarsBeth Cartwright]()
HorrorGrief can feel like a weight that you carry with you. The luckiest people will feel the weight get lighter as time moves on, always there, but more bearable over time. In The House of Sorrowing Stars by Beth Cartwright there is a home that captures all the real stories of sorrow in its vast library....
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![Blood of an exileBrian Naslund]()
FantasyOnce a noble lord, after a failure on the field of battle, Silas Bershad "The Flawless" was stripped of all titles and forced into the life of a dragonslayer, moving from one perilous hunt to the next. Stalking dragons and collecting their valuable oil, his only escape seems to be death. But death h...
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![The Maleficent SevenCameron Johnston]()
FantasyAs you grow older you start to realise that people are not black and white, but shades of grey. The nicest people can do terrible things and even bad people can sometimes be good. This argument is hard to use with the likes of Demonologists, Necromancers, Mad Scientists and Vampires. What type of ev...
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![UltimartCarl Wilhoyte]()
Science FictionThere was a time in my life that I would sit down and read some Dystopian Fiction and not consider at all that it would happen in my lifetime, but all I need to do is some doomscrolling on my social medias to think that elements of Carl Wilhoyte’s Ultimart may not be long in our future. This is a bo...
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![The Redemption of Morgan BrightChris Panatier]()
I love to read books; they transport me to unfamiliar places. I will go there even if these unfamiliar places are dangerous like the Hollyhock Asylum found in Chris Panatier’s The Redemption of Morgan Bright . A story can transport you, as can characters, but sometimes the structure of a book does t...
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![The House of Last ResortChristopher Golden]()
HorrorYou do not have to travel as far as Italy to get a bargain house, but I like the hills and sunshine of Sicily over a row of abandoned terrace housing in the wet UK. In the past you could pick up houses for as little as £1/€1 in both these places as the local councils encouraged younger people to mov...
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![The Hunters GambitCiel Pierlot]()
FantasyWhen it comes to vampires, I understand that there is a rich tapestry of versions you can now read about, but I like mine to have that old fashioned appeal. The type of vampire that does not want to talk about their feelings or act like the average tween, but instead wants to wear lace frills and su...
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![Acquired TastesClay Mcleod Chapman]()
HorrorWhat do you want from a collection of horror short stories? A complex mix of different styles and authors, or a single voice? When it comes to horror, I want them to feel like a quick punch to the guts, only for you to look down and find that the punch was more of a stab. Clay McLeod Chapman knows w...
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![The Scarlet GospelsClive Barker]()
HorrorIt has to be said that even though I don't entertain much horror, Clive Barker is somewhat of a legend. Growing up in the 80's his name was often spoken in quiet awe by impressionable teenagers, not least due to his infamous Books of Blood collections. For me though it was the character of Pinhead t...
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![JuddermanD. A. Northwood]()
HorrorSome people love the city life, there is something to do every hour of the day. I find it a little odd. You can open the door of your million - pound house an d have to step over the passed out person on your step. One street can look like it is from a movie set, whilst only one road over it...
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![Blood ReactionDL Atha]()
FantasyAsa, the century old, vindictive and cruel vampire invades the home of single mother and physician Annalice forcing her to strike a bargain for her daughters life as the monster takes control of her own life and home. Caught in a race against a genetic timeline she must rely on her skills as a physi...
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![Marchs EndDaniel Polansky]()
FantasyKeeping it in the family sounds like a wonderful idea. Surround yourself with people you can trust, blood is thicker than water, but do family businesses work? Why do so many fail by the third generation? The first generation build the company from nothing, the second grow it further, the third – sq...
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![John Dies at the endDavid Wong]()
FantasyThere is a new Drug on the street known as Soy Sauce which kicks you across time and through dimensions, but some who come back could no longer be called human. David Wong and his best friend John (those names are fake) are ready to tell you about the sauce, about Korrock, about the invasion, and th...
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![GuillotineDelilah S. Dawson]()
HorrorThere are enough stories escaping from Private Islands that makes me think that the rich do not think there are consequences for their actions. What happens on the island stays on the island. With luck, it may just be a celebrity marriage, but on the other hand it could be some of the darkest moment...
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![Cry, VoidbringerElaine Ho]()
FantasyI enjoy a dose of Low Fantasy; a bit of grimdark and violence feels like a good counterpart to High Fantasy with its heroism and magic. A fantasy tale that is told from the muck and the trenches just feels more real, even if it is fantastic, a fantasy for our modern troubled world. But there is Low...
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![The VengeanceEmma Newman]()
FantasyI have not read the synopsis of a book I am about to read for over twenty years, ever since I read a spoiler on the back of the novel that revealed the massive twist that occurred two thirds of the way through. I will have to add Series Titles to the list of things not to read as The Vengeance by Em...
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![At Dark I Become LoathsomeEric Larocca]()
HorrorLike every genre, there are several aspects to Horror that you can focus on. My preference is the supernatural, something big and scary, preferably not overexplained. There is another subgenre, one that is arguably far scarier. I call it the horror of the mundane. Those killers that live among us, t...
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![Anji Kills a KingEvan Leikam]()
FantasyIn the fantasy that I usually read Regicide is usually the goal for the end of the book. In fact, I have read entire trilogies in which the protagonist is trying to kill a royal. You get the sense that Evan Leikam is going to tackle things a little differently in Anji Kills a King when the first sce...
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![The Second BellGabriela Houston]()
FantasyIf the past twelve months has taught us anything is that rules will only work so well . One person may stick fast the letter of the law, another may bend them a little, an other may ignore them completely. All three believe they are doing the right thing and all three may be at odds with one ano...
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![Pay the PiperGeorge A Romero]()
HorrorThere are many unique and diverse names in horror making it, for me, one of the most interesting genres out there, but to the layperson they may only know a few names. Stephen King, maybe Dean Koontz. In film they may have heard of Wes Craven, or one of the newer horror auteurs. Zombie fans should h...
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![Sons of DarknessGourav Mohanty]()
FantasyFantasy is a wonderful genre, and it has become more so in recent years as it has grown in diversity. It felt for a while that fantasy was always epic and set in some sort of alternative Europe. There were plenty of alternatives to find if you looked, but today theses are abundant and that is fantas...
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![How to Sell a Haunted HouseGrady Hendrix]()
HorrorAny house of a decent age is haunted. There are no spectres, but there are ghosts of memories, the people that lived and died there over the years. I grew up in a house that was once a Victorian police station and then a Greengrocers. As I moved out, my parents stayed. When they left, instead of mov...
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![Dead by DawnGuido Henkel]()
FantasyDead by Dawn is the 7th novel in the Jason Dark series by Guido Henkel. A woman in good health dies overnight, and to make matters worse it's Jason Dark's next door neighbour who's snuffed it, something wicked is at work in London town. As his investigation leads him down to the seedy underbelly of...
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![From a Watery GraveGuido Henkel]()
FantasyFrom a Watery Grave is the 6th novel in the Jason Dark series of dime novels by Guido Henkel. A quaint seaside town seems the ideal place for an English summer holiday. Little do its inhabitants suspect, that a century-old curse is about to throw their idyllic existence into turmoil and terror. Wrai...
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![TerrorlordGuido Henkel]()
FantasyTerrorlord is the 9th volume in the Jason Dark series by Guido Henkel. Released by a dark and ancient ritual, the Terrorlord is freed once more onto the mortal plane, his one desire to open the seven gates of hell and unleash the undead hordes upon mankind. Jason Dark has the misfortune to have alre...
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![The Blood WitchGuido Henkel]()
FantasyThe Blood Witch is the 8th volume in the Jason Dark: Ghost Hunter series of Novellas by Guido Henkel. An ancient curse re-surfaces and from deep within England's dark forests comes a hideous terror, stronger than ever and stalking the fog wrapped streets of Victorian London. Young girls are disappea...
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![Logic of DemonsH A Goodman]()
FantasyLogic of Demons: The Quest for Nadines Soul is a contemporary fantasy novel by H A Goodman. Devin's life has been ripped to pieces, his wife raped and murdered while still carrying his unborn child, revenge is the only thing that drives his continued existence. He listens as his father-in-law counse...
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![Cabaret in FlamesHache Pueyo]()
HorrorWhen is a vampire not a vampire? When it is a Gul. These strange creatures are part of everyday life in this version of Brazil, the secret for the humans who want to survive is to stay at home after curfew, lest they be eaten by Guls or taken for enemies of the state by the Fascists who run the coun...
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![The Debtors GameIsabelle Mongeau]()
FantasyTwas in a café they first met, Romeo and Juliet. And twas the first day they fell into debt, because Rome-owed and Juli-eat. It feels to me that the entire system is rigged so that you never have quite enough money to escape, you work to live, and if you do not work, you do not eat. It is worse when...
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![PennybladeJ L Worrad]()
FantasyThe days of High Elves and spiffing adventures being the only choice in fantasy are long over. This is a vast genre that still has books of High Fantasy, but it also has Low Fantasy. This gritty version of the genre is more prevalent than ever with some of the best being made into TVs shows and film...
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![The Keep WithinJ L Worrad]()
FantasyThere is something about Low Fantasy that makes it such a good genre. It is not the violence, swearing or muckraking, it is the people. Reading a fantasy book where the heroes are not in white and the villains in black. In J. L Worrad’s The Keep Within the nominal hero is one Sir Harrance 'Harry' La...
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![Dreaming in the DarkJack Dann]()
FantasyReaders and reviewers of dark fiction have certainly noticed, during the last years, that the number of Australian authors appearing in books published in the UK and in USA is constantly on the rise, and that the quality of their contributions is usually top notch. This Australian renaissance, reach...
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![Conan: Cult of the Obsidian MoonJames Lovegrove]()
FantasyWhat makes a good Conan novel? It seems like a simple calculation, a brawny barbarian, a massive sword, wine, woman, and violence. Mix the lot into a pot and you have a Conan adventure to be proud of, except it is not that easy. Conan lives in a vibrant and complex world that can be stodgy to read i...
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![The Sad Tale of the Brothers GrossbartJesse Bullington]()
The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart is a dark fantasy novel, the debut of Jesse Bullington. The year is 1364 and in the plague infested, devil-haunted darkness of Medieval Europe most of the population struggle to survive, living in abject poverty while the opulent few enjoy a life of luxury. The...
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![A Little HatredJoe Abercrombie]()
FantasyA fantasy writer needs to be aware that they could fall into a rut. Another trilogy of books set in the same world, with similar characters doing similar things. This may appease those fans that fear change, but to drive themselves as a writer it is important to evolve; even if evolving within the f...
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![The Grey BastardsJonathan French]()
FantasyThe clue to what makes the Fantasy genre so great is staring you straight in the face; it is fantastical. It gives author the chance to transport their readers to a different time and place. Lands full of wonder, populated by creatures only seen in your dreams. So, it is sometimes a little sad to se...
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![The Shadow GlassJosh Winning]()
FantasyIf you are of a certain age, you will know that the 80s was by far the best decade for pop culture, the films, music, comics, books, all unbeatable. All the films and TV shows basking in that 80s nostalgia prove it so. But wait, what is that? A load of 90s-based films and TV shows are starting to be...
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![The Missing BoatmanKeith Blackmore]()
FantasyAll over the World, Miracles are taking place, on a wintery highway in Quebec a man crashes his car and survives, in New York a homeless person is run over by a bus and lives. In Tokyo, a teenager jumps off a high rise building and fails in taking her own life. While many see these marvels as a posi...
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![The ButcherLaura Kat Young]()
HorrorI find sometimes find myself wondering how a dystopian world became so bad. What happened in a society that they thought making children battle to the death was a good idea? Or how a world forced woman to bear children? Sometimes it is better not to know how a society got there, but just embrace the...
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![The Bastard WonderlandLee Harrison]()
FantasyThe Bastard Wonderland is something of a suprise. The debut of Lee Harrison, it describes a complex alternative world where a war wages between the North and the South. It's this tiresome war that is thrust upon northern lad Warboys and his father as they are strong-armed into a foolhardy campaign....
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![The Tangleroot Palace & Other StoriesMarjorie Liu]()
If you go down to the woods today, you are in for a big surprise. Something far worse will be waiting for you than a few bears holding sandwiches. These are the ancient woods that our ancestors grew up near, pockets of civilisation surrounded by darkness and danger. When myths and folklore were bein...
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![InfernalMark De Jager]()
FantasyStratus wakes up in a field with no idea who he is. All he knows is that his name is Stratus and he doesn't seem to be human. He quickly learns that he possesses an in-human strength, natural gift in magic and an insatiable hunger. Well that and the fact that there seems to be a raging beast inside...
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![That Which Stands OutsideMark Morris]()
HorrorWhat makes a good folk horror story? It is not just the tension and gruesome moments, but the feeling. You need to get the tone right. A visitor to a new place that is familiar in some ways, but alien in others. You can experience some of this unease yourself just by travelling to somewhere abroad o...
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![The Black CoastMike Brooks]()
FantasyIn Science Fiction and Fantasy, I have visited a multitude of different worlds. In some cases, it feels like all the people on the planet ha ve similar sensibilities, but how is this possible ? Even within our own country you get people from the North who are different from the South, never...
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![We are the DeadMike Shackle]()
FantasyThe Fantasy genre has the unwarranted reputation of being staid. If you do not read it, you may think that it is all still elves and dwarves hanging out in some sort of fellowship. Fantasy fanatics know different. There are distinct fashions within the genre that has evolved between high and low, ma...
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![A Fool's HopeMike Shackle]()
FantasyTo the uninitiated, the fantasy genre is stagnant. The same old dwarves and elves going on long journeys and then back again. Any fan of the genre knows that this is just not the case. The genre has evolved with soc iety. The fantasy books of the 80s and 90s differ greatly from Tolkien and modern...
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![These Deathless ShoresP H Low]()
FantasyYou either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain. Peter Pan is cheeky, certainly a hero, but he was also annoying and domineering. Did the Lost Boys want to stay on the island, or did Peter force them? On reflection, Peter Pan had some issues, but Disney put an airbrush t...
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![Darkness FallsP. J. Flie]()
Science FictionThere are two ways of writing a trilogy of books. One way is to produce three separate novels that can be read independently or viewed as a whole. The other way is to start each book as soon as the last one ends and power through the tale a great speed. This is how P. J. Flie’s Darkness Falls , star...
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![Slaine DragontamerPat Mills]()
FantasyI love 2000AD, it is a fantastic serial comic that is filled with some of my favourite characters. Judge Dredd is omnipresent, but there are other characters that I picture when I think of opening a new issue; ABC Warriors, Rogue Trooper and of course, Slaine. Slaine felt a little different as it wa...
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![Paved With Good IntentionsPeter Mclean]()
FantasyThey say never judge a book by its cover and this is a good lesson to take heed of with Peter McLean’s Paved With Good Intentions , as the UK cover stars Eline dressed in regal splendour. You see, Eline is also someone you should not judge from by her looks. She may be presenting as a member of the...
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![Alien: Seventh CirclePhilippa Ballantine]()
Science FictionIt is not that the aliens in Alien are constantly evolving, it is that they are constantly adapting to the scenario they are in. We usually see them egging up humans, but if they landed in a world populated by cows it would only be a few days that a bovine Alien was ripping up the locals. Aliens are...
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![The Siege of Burning GrassPremee Mohamed]()
Science FictionScience Fiction can be upbeat and utopian or downbeat and dystopian. The current trend is to focus on the negatives, but even these books have a glint of hope in them. When it comes to dystopian visions of the future, they do not come much more intense than Premee Mohamed’s The Siege of Burning Gras...
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![The Butcher of the ForestPremee Mohamed]()
FantasyThere is a perfectly sensible reason why the concept of Fairy Woods exist. Back in the day, the land was covered in thick forests, any person that travelled too far from the village or well-trodden tracks could easily get lost and become victim to one of several predators from wolves to wild boars....
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![The Serpent Called MercyRoanne Lau]()
FantasyThere are shifts in the Fantasy genre that perhaps only the ardent fan will notice. The epics of Tolkien and the 80s are still being written, but now there are more intimate stories that follow one or two characters as they graft in their small way among the wider Fantasy world. These are often cosy...
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![Small Town HorrorRonald Malfi]()
HorrorThe horror genre has taught me how to deal with events that happened in my childhood. If you and a bunch of friends accidently run over a homeless person or set fire to a witch, the best thing is just to admit it without delay and take your lumps. You see, no matter how many years pass, they always...
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![What Big TeethRose Szabo]()
HorrorI do enjoy a good gothic novel. A tale about a once impressive house that has fallen into ruin, its location remote, its inhabitants an enigma. The tales are often full of thrills, romance and even a little horror. But what do you do about a gothic house full of horrific creatures? A story that tell...
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![Seven Recipes for RevolutionRyan Rose]()
FantasyThe fantasy genre is a form of comfort reading for me. The genre often follows similar tropes, and you can get into the rhythm of the story quickly. However, increasingly often in modern fantasy, authors are creating new and challenging ideas to shake up the genre. Magical systems are an area you ca...
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![Way of the WalkerSalinee Goldenberg]()
FantasyNaming your book The Last Phi Hunter comes with some idea that this will be the last of their kind, but Salinee Goldenberg proves this is not the case with a sequel, Way of the Walker . But is this Walker an actual Phi Hunter? If your job is to find and kill the undead (Phi), befriending them and he...
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![The Poorly Made and Other ThingsSam Rebelein]()
There is something to be said for designing a creative sandpit, a place that you can return to and play within. Rather than writing new characters in a new place every book, you can return to the known. A shorthand exists. However, this is a double-edged sword, you can end up recreating the same sta...
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![Crucible of ChaosSebastien De Castell]()
FantasyThe locked room scenario is a classic of the crime genre and does not have to mean just a locked room but the idea of a contained place that holds all the victims, suspects, and clues within. A monastery perched atop a remote island only passable when the tide is low would be a perfect place for thi...
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![Our Lady of BladesSebastien De Castell]()
FantasyI am not sure if readers have noticed, but we have quietly entered a new Golden Era of Fantasy writing. There is a handful or more of established fantasy authors who have the experience and skill to be writing at the top of their game. Fantasy novels that are not just simple retellings of old tropes...
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![KrakenShannon Eric Denton]()
HorrorIf pop culture has only taught me one thing it is that siding with the creatures from other realms is not a great idea. They tend to renege on contracts once they have what they want, usually via sucking your brain out through your nose. Also, the partnerships are not normally people you would want...
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![The BewitchingSilvia Moreno-Garcia]()
HorrorI enjoy reading about the occult in contrasting times in history. If someone came up to a modern person and said there was a witch in the woods stealing children, they would raise an eyebrow and swiftly walk in the opposite direction. A couple of hundred years earlier around the same woods the react...
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![The Drawing of the ThreeStephen King]()
FantasyDo not read this review if you have not read the The Gunslinger - it contains spoilers for it. The Drawing of the Three (or DT2) takes off where The Gunslinger ended, with Roland lying on the beach of the western sea. The book tells the tale of Roland as he journeys along this beach and draws "the t...
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![The GunslingerStephen King]()
FantasySometimes when I've read a really bad book it's hard for me to write a review about it - I just want to leave it at "this book is bad - stay away from it" and then forget about the book as fast as possible. With Stephen King's The Gunslinger it's the other way around. A short "Go buy this book at on...
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![The Eyes of the DragonStephen King]()
HorrorReviewed by Arron Clegg. Stephen King’s first foray into the realms of fantasy couldn’t really have been written any better. He manages to keep his familiar style of writing, one that keeps us turning the pages, long after the sun has set in the sky, and yet has written in an olde-worlde style that...
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![Nettle and BoneT Kingfisher]()
FantasyI have read many genre books and I see trends in what is currently popular or going through a period of high quality. The dark gothic fairy tale is having a moment in the sun as I have recently read some excellent stories that hark back to a feel of past fables but are their own modern take. T Kingf...
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![Songs of the SlainTim Lebbon]()
FantasyConan was a character that had a rich and long life. You may be a fan of the films and only imagine the man as a loincloth wearing barbarian, cleaving the heads of various cult leaders. That is a large part of his appeal, but he was also a bandit leader, pirate and eventually a King. In fact, he was...
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![NekropolisTim Waggoner]()
FantasyNekropolis is the first volume in a new series of fantasy horror, written by Tim Waggoner and is based on his novella Necropolis. Matt Richter is a former cop now a private eye with a big difference, he is a zombie (could happen to anyone really). A zombie private detective does have it's advantages...
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![A Market of Dreams and DestinyTrip Galey]()
FantasyThere are two ways to treat fairy folk in a fantasy novel. You can hide them, only the protagonist knowing that there is a secret world in the forest. Or you can embrace them. Make the likes of goblins and fairies' part of everyday life. In A Market of Dreams and Destiny by Trip Galey, an accord has...
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![The Last Blade PriestW P Wiles]()
FantasyDestiny is a tricky thing as it is something that you should not be aware of. I want to be surprised if it turns out that I save the world, or perhaps destroy it. Some characters have their destiny thrust upon them from a young age and are told what it will be. Anton is a Blade Priest for Craithe, t...
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![The Liar of Red ValleyWalter Goodwater]()
HorrorThere are many flavours of horror, but one that I prefer is American Gothic. There is something about the Deep South of America that mixes well with horror. It already feels like a foreign and mysterious place to many of us so when you add the notion of things that go bump in the night it seems to m...
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