Taste and all that but in modern Fantasy I find the idea of Sherlocks and their lookalikes locked in combat with Lovecraft's dull critters about as appetising as Harry Potter porn fan fiction to be as boring as hell. That’s why I don’t like Fantasy. The last two fantasy books I’ve read seemed promising but one thing about those fantasy novels? Good grief! I share the eye-rolling exasperation with 'stock Arthurian templates' but I do wonder, apropos that the last volume of fantasy fodder I’ve read, if readers as steeped in Indian myth as we are in Arthurian myth, would read this review and think: “'Come on, not another fucking djinn - and an evil mystic: please shoot me now!'? Why is it that audiences and apparently authors have almost abandoned science based fiction even social or political science as exemplified by Heinlein, Phil Dick, Asimov or Ursula K. Le Guin for fantasy or at best offer variations on cyberspace themes? A good piece of writing by a real scientist with some idea of the potential direction of his specialism is rare. It is a cultural shift which seems to be part of a zeitgeist which turns to superstition, racist pseudo-science and religious fundamentalism. The current tendency of those who write about SF to be so inclusive as to see almost all fantasy as SF is deplorable enough. Here in my blog we now also have a wonderful fantasy novel (praised for being better than your average fantasy the first time I read it when it come out more than 10 years ago) and a “sturm-und-drang” book with the dreaded ingredients '18th Century Urban Fantasy' and 'magic realism' (both mostly terms used by people who think genre is beneath them really). But this cannot be applied only to fantasy. Because there seems to be too many SF books recently which are effectively the Battle of Trafalgar in space and war stories, usually designed as a cheap "taster" with a cliff-hanger to encourage the reader to buy the whole series. Or consider the world-building of Harry Potter where the headmaster flies back tool late on a broom in book 1 and they can teleport by book 6. Terrible world-building. But acceptable as the plot needed it. And the reader will make their own excuse up. Narrative and character rule. The world is formed out of hints around that. It can be inconsistent if the story is well enough told. Anyone creating a world for adult readers where magic has no penalties and can do pretty much anything finds they have no plot they can’t deus ex out of. Would be a terrible read. None of that in “The Anvil of the World”. If you’re into climate-minded quarter demons, go for it. You won’t regret it.

When the shelves are stuffed with the heavily promoted or sure-fire sellers then there are no more gems like “The Anvil of the World” to be (re)-discovered. ( )

It grew on me. Now I want to start the sequel immediately. ( )

A delightfully skewed fantasy, lightly told (reminded me ever so slightly of Asprin). Engaging and often surprising, full of memorable incident and imagery, there's not much depth here, but I still found it surprisingly touching. ( )

This is less a novel than three novellas following a set of characters through three different adventures. Three different very funny, decidedly lethal, light-hearted adventures, which touch on themes of racial prejudice, environmental degradation, and practical theology. Baker handles her potentially mismatched subject matter gracefully. ( )

Two of the stories from Mother Aegypt were connected to this story. It's actually a set of three stories centered on a retired assassin and his misadventures in a gently satirical fantasy setting. I smirked a few times, but no big laugh moments. Clever and enjoyable. (October 01, 2004) ( )