Lord Samper's Library

I had a lot of fun with David Wragg's 'The Hunters' (you can read my review Here ) and I'm already into 'The Company of the Wolf'. And yes, I should be finishing off 'Into the Narrowdark' as well, I'm working on it ;o) In the meantime, while I was grabbing a copy of 'The Company of the Wolf', I came across the cover art and blurb for the final instalment, 'The Iron Road'. I absolutely love the cover art for the series so thought I'd share the cover art and blurb here. Possible spoilers though if you haven't read the series. If you're still here, check it out, Rebellion’s about the journey, not the destination. Ree is at war. Determined to free the townships from the Guild's larcenous rule, she can’t take her eyes off victory. Not now, with the scent of blood in the air. Not for her consort, not even for her kid. Javani is ready for her own adventures. She’s no longer a child and determined to blaze her own trail, even ...

I'll be honest... I'd completely forgotten that 'The Navigator's Children' was headed our way, what with a whole load of other stuff going on right now. That and the fact that I've come completely unstuck with 'Into the Narrowdark'... Not the book's fault at all, that's all on me as well :o( And then I was mooching about on Amazon earlier this evening, it's my birthday next month and that's the ideal excuse to make another list of books that I want, and saw that 'The Navigator's Children' now has some rather nice looking cover art. I had to share so here we are ;o) I originally wasn't too keen on the switch in cover art, especially as the cover for 'Empire of Grass' was just gorgeous, but from where I'm sat, this cover art makes up for a lot. I'd never really given too much thought to what Utuk'ku's mask looked like but this is definitely it. Now I just need to dig out my copy of 'Into the Narro...

While I'm sleeping/trying to get over a monster hangover when I wake up... Have some rather lovely cover art for Brian Keene's forthcoming 'Island of the Dead'. Actually, have some blurb as well... ;o) World Horror Grand Master Brian Keene returns to zombies in this relentless sword and sorcery horror epic! Einar, an enslaved barbarian, plots his escape from a war galley transporting troops and a mysterious weapon to far enemy shores. But when an apocalyptic storm at sea leaves Einar and his fellow captives shipwrecked on a strange, uncharted island, friend and foe alike must band together against a ravenous, steadily growing horde of the undead... and even worse dangers. Not even death is an escape from the... ISLAND OF THE DEAD No matter what they say, there is always something new to say about zombies and long may that continue :o) I would have read this book anyway (I've been waiting on it ever since its Kindle Vella days (we never got Vella in the UK) but zombi...

My landlord has had enough of being a landlord (I'm not a bad tenant but I can't blame him to be honest) so my flat is on the market and I'm trying to make my book collection a little more portable for when I finally have to leave. Not the way I wanted to learn the 'Don't Have So Many Books' lesson but, here we are ;o) My habit of picking books up, wherever I find them, and then sticking them in the loft to 'read later' has led to a few surprises found in the stacks. Books like 'Jandrax' for instance... I don't think I'll be reading it any time soon but cast your eyes over that cover and you'll totally get why I picked it up and brought it home with me. Pardon the camera flash, turns out that I'm still awful at taking photos ;o) Isn't that just gorgeous? Kind of makes me wish that cover art was still like this, there's a real sense of 'I'm a sci-fi book and I don't care who knows' that you just don't se...

 I love this cover. That is it, that is the post :o) Just look at it... I thoroughly enjoyed 'The Justice of Kings' (review Here ) which makes 'The Tyranny of Faith' an absolute must-read when it hits the shelves in February, just before payday dammit... Oh well, here's some blurb in the meantime, A Justice's work is never done. The Battle of Galen's Vale is over, but the war for the Empire's future has just begun. Concerned by rumours that the Magistratum's authority is waning, Sir Konrad Vonvalt returns to Sova to find the capital city gripped by intrigue and whispers of rebellion. In the Senate, patricians speak openly against the Emperor, while fanatics preach holy vengeance on the streets. Yet facing down these threats to the throne will have to wait, for the Emperor's grandson has been kidnapped - and Vonvalt is charged with rescuing the missing prince. His quest will lead Vonvalt - and his allies Helena, Bressinger and Sir Radomir - to the...

It's going to be one of those weeks where not a lot of reading happens so lets see what else I can fill it with, starting from... Now! ;o) I've never been one for understated cover art on any books that I read. The way I see it, if you're enjoying what you're reading then let everyone know about it (taking public decency into account of course, I'll never forget seeing this guy, in the Trocadero Centre, being told to either put his porn mag away or find somewhere else to read it...) This is especially the case with horror fiction and I, being a child of the 80's it was inevitable really. It was all over the place back then and it's always good to see it pop out of the shadows these days. Yeah, I'm feeling slightly nostalgic but I also like seeing what horror can do and the first place you see it is on the cover of a book or DVD. Which brings me round to these Italian covers for Brian Keene's 'Ghoul' and 'City of the Dead'. I speak no ...

'With Teeth' has been available for pre-order for a few days now so I think I'm good to post the cover art and go on about how great it is :o) Here goes... For a group of middle-aged friends, the trip into the forest was supposed to be simple.  All they had to do was find a place to set up their criminal enterprise, and all of their financial problems would be solved.  But now, night is falling, and with the darkness comes something else.  Something fast.  Something ferocious.  Something...with TEETH! Now, I'm a huge Brian Keene fan so I'd buy 'With Teeth' if the cover art was the Count from Sesame Street. Luckily, I don't have to :o) I'm also a big fan of cover art that isn't ashamed to match what's inside the book and that is exactly what we get here. The 'With Teeth' cover is very much 'by horror fans, for horror fans' and I love that, even while I'm wondering whether our redneck vampire has a gigantic mouth in his sto...

Unfortunately, Guy N. Smith is no longer with us but the books he was working on (just before his passing) will be in the near future. Books like 'Satanic Armageddon', a 'pulp title' with some gloriously pulp cover art to go with it. Check it out... Just look at that, totally encapsulates what Smith's thriller and horror writing is all about. I've been debating over whether I pre-order or not and I probably will, actually of course I will (more than likely after I post this). There are a couple more books to come (the short story collection, 'From the Dark Hours' and a collaboration with J.R. Park, 'Beheaded') and then that's it, I think this book is worth having as a physical copy. The blurb is below but be warned, if you're planning on reading 'The Black Fedora' for the first time then I'd skip reading this blurb if I were you... The forces of evil, led by Satan's disciple, were massing worldwide to overthrow democracy....

Another cover art post courtesy of Tor.com , you can read their post over here ... This time, a subject a little closer to my heart with some absolutely gorgeous looking 'Elric of Melnibone' Omnibus covers. I like the way they've stayed close to the original cover art but changed the poses a little bit, just to freshen it up a little. The results look amazing, check it out... Don't they look amazing? The collector in me wants to get his hands on these as they come out ( Saga will publish one book per month, beginning September 28 with the first volume,  Elric of Melniboné , followed by  Stormbringer  on October 26, and  The White Wolf  on November 30) but my wallet has already started making disapproving noises and pointing at the perfectly fine Gollancz editions (and the rest) that are already on my shelves. We'll see who wins...

 I saw this featured on Tor.com and it's too good not to blog about here, both for the cover art and the concept... A junior anthropologist on a distant planet must help the locals he has sworn to study to save a planet from an unbeatable foe. Lynesse is the lowly Fourth Daughter of the queen, and always getting in the way. But a demon is terrorizing the land, and now she’s an adult (albeit barely) and although she still gets in the way, she understands that the only way to save her people is to invoke the pact between her family and the Elder sorcerer who has inhabited the local tower for as long as her people have lived here (though none in living memory has approached it). But Elder Nyr isn’t a sorcerer, and he is forbidden to help, for his knowledge of science tells him the threat cannot possibly be a demon… I love this cover and the way it starts all fantasy at the bottom but turns into something completely different by the time you get to the top of the book. And it's al...

Shamelessly erm... 'borrowed' from those nice people at Tor.com ...  I'm up to my ears in work, and looking for lost keys, today so while I've never read anything by Cameron Johnston (don't take it personally, there are so many authors that I haven't read anything of...), I thought I'd share the cover anyway as it brought a little colour into a drab afternoon. Okay, a lot of colour. Check it out... When you are all out of heroes, all that’s left are the villains. Black Herran was a dread demonologist, and the most ruthless general in all Essoran. She assembled the six most fearsome warriors to captain her armies: a necromancer, a vampire lord, a demigod, an orcish warleader, a pirate queen, and a twisted alchemist. Together they brought the whole continent to its knees… Until the day she abandoned her army, on the eve of total victory. 40 years later, she must bring her former captains back together for one final stand, in the small town of Tarnbrooke—the l...

I'm in that really enviable, yet awkward, position where I have several great books on the go but they are all so good that I only make it through a few pages of one before jumping into another instead. And I have work that needs to be done as well, and a daughter who's learning to ride her bike and needs me to pick her up off the ground when she rides into walls... Can anyone tell me how to fit all of this into one day...? ;o) One of the great books, that I have on the go, is 'Northern Wrath' (by Thilde Kold Holdt) and it's an amazing read so far. Seriously, if I were you I'd grab a copy and get reading as the nights slowly draw in... That's all I'll say, on the book itself, for now ;o) In terms of the cover art for the next two books though... Solaris are getting ahead of themselves (in the best way) and have released the cover art for the next two books in the trilogy. It's all on the Sci-Fi Now site  (along with a link to a really interesting int...

 I can't believe it was a year ago that I read R.J. Barker's 'The Bone Ships'... It was though and here's the review to prove it ;o)  It was right at the end of the review that I said I'd be all settled down and waiting for book two... Well, it's almost that time. 'Call of the Bone Ships' is out towards the end of next month so I figured now was a great time to have a look at the cover art and blurb (there's also the small fact that I've been doing Halloween stuff with the girls so a cover art post is all I'm good for right now but it still would have been about 'Call of the Bone Ships', honest!) First up then, the cover art... Just look at that cover... Gorgeous, isn't it? I'm more of a 'I know what I like' kind of guy, rather than someone who knows the first thing about artwork, but I love the 'map feel' of this cover and I love how fresh and crisp it looks, I'm guessing rather like the seas that the...

Because it struck me yesterday that I'm never going to catch up with everyone else reading all the latest stuff. Yeah, I am a bit jealous but I just can't read that quickly anymore (especially when I spent what felt like most of yesterday evening trying to get my youngest daughter to go to sleep...) so my slightly later than normal New Year's Resolution is not to feel bad about it and just post about whatever makes me happy as far as books and TV go :o) Just remind me I said that the next time I get all annoyed at myself for reading slowly... ;o) So, I'm clearly still working my way through 'The Wolf of Oren-Yaro' and 'The Prefectly Fine House' then... What do you get in the meantime? How about some really lovely looking cover art for a book that's been out a little while and will be read after I finish up the books I'm reading at the moment... The kingdoms of Osten Ard have been at peace for decades, but now, the threat of a new war gro...

Because I've been putting it off for well over a year now but there's no way round it. I need reading glasses as words everywhere have been getting blurry for slightly longer than I'm going to admit to. It's not like I can't read now so it's not a massive big deal. It's just that if I do read anything at the moment, I have to stop and give my eyes a break. Glasses it is then and while I'm waiting to get those sorted, you'll probably see a few more comic books and movies being reviewed here (more pictures and not so many words...) Which leads me, in a slightly roundabout way, to this cover post... To me, cover art is all about catching the readers eye and getting them to think to themselves, 'I'm going to read that book'.All this cover art does for me is to make me feel slightly bemused and that's a real shame as I'm enjoying 'The Ruin of Kings' ... Possible spoilers in the blurb that I'm going to post just under the ...

I saw this on Tor.com and, even though it was posted on Friday (and the book itself won't be available until October this year), I'm a bit of a fan of the 'Laundry Files' books so thought I'd share anyway ;o) Cover art and blurb then... As magic and superpowers emerge in the unruly masses, the government has begun to employ private sector contractors to capture felons. This is how supernaturally gifted Wendy Deere gets her job bagging and snagging supervillains. As Wendy hunts down Imp—the cyberpunk head of a band calling themselves “The Lost Boys”— she is dragged into the schemes of louche billionaire Rupert de Montfort Bigge. Rupert has discovered that the sole surviving copy of the long-lost concordance to the one true Necronomicon is up for underground auction in London. He hires Imp’s sister, Eve, to procure it by any means necessary, and in the process, he encounters Wendy Deere. In a tale of corruption, assassination, thievery, and magic, Wendy...

Don't worry, I am still feeling it :o) It was a long day at work yesterday and I didn't have a lot of time left for other things last night, hence this post. That's not necessarily a bad thing though... Every couple of weeks, work takes me in the direction of Wimbledon which I love for a number of reasons, not least of which is the Waterstones and scattered charity shops on the high street which feel like they have been placed there just so a chap like me can spend his lunch hour having a stroll and a browse. My best book find, so far, has been a copy of 'The Goblin Emperor' for 20p but I digress. Yesterday's stroll saw me wander into Waterstones and find this on the 'hardback shelf'... Now, I'm not sure that it's a book that I'd buy (at least not right now, some books are just made to be purchased in paperback...) but that's not what I'm here for. Just one look at that cover took me back to a far simpler time whe...