Here’s our now traditional Review of the Year, pointing out what we liked most. To begin with:
Part 1: Fantasy & Horror Books
(Part 2 will look at SF Books, Part 3 will look at Film and TV.)
First of all, Part 1A: Fantasy Books; (Horror we’ll look at in more detail below)
MarkY: For me this year there’s been a lot of Fantasy that’s been good, but not great. All the usual bugbears have reappeared – plot conveniences, unconvincing names, characters that go off-piste, things that destroy my suspension of disbelief. Nevertheless, I think that these are my “best” Fantasy/Horror reads of the year. (And yes, only 7 out of 5 this year!)
The Stardust Thief by Chelsea Abdullah
First novel from an author with potential, Stardust Thief takes an Arabian Nights-type setting and turns it into an action-adventure with contemporary sensibilities. Magic, genies and an engaging main character, with a few plot twists along the way, this one worked on the whole. There seemed to be a lot of books like this around this year, but this is the one out of all of them I enjoyed most. In the review I said: “… generally this is a book that overall makes the reader want it to succeed.
Whilst in the end the conclusion is not anything revolutionary – and a huge cliffhanger ready for the next book – the journey we take to get there is a lot of fun. This page-turner demanded I kept reading as much as I could until it was done.”
Not quite the enormous success I had hoped for from the writer of The Dagger and the Coin series (not to mention the co-writer of The Expanse.) But there was enough there to like, and in places really like, and it was still better than most of the Fantasy I’ve read this year. As ever, the setting is impressive, even if the characterisation is less successful for me. I am expecting this one to pick up a little in the next book, due in 2023. In the review I said, “Age of Ash is a very good example of those fantasies focused on the unpleasantness behind the gleaming facades of a sprawling city. Whilst it may not be quite as violent or as unpleasant as, say, Joe Abercrombie’s books, the overriding impression at the end is that Kithamar, and the people within it, is a complex tapestry of life – even if it is not a place you want to hang around too long in. I suspect that we may have much more to discover in future books.”
Fairy Tale by Stephen King
Not reviewed here at SFFWorld, but one that I thought showed Stephen even at 70, still has it. Although a bit long and a book of different parts, which work with varying degrees of success – the middle sags a little – this was nevertheless one of the most enjoyable recent King I’ve read for a while. In my review (soon to be published), I said “When King is good, he’s very good. And this is very good, perhaps one of his best in recent years. Fairy Tale feels like a story told not because it has to, but because it can, an adventure tale written with love and just for the joy of storytelling. A stand-alone novel (hurrah!) that you can immerse yourself in, encompassing many of the iconic elements that make a King story successful, Fairy Tale may not be entirely revolutionary for regular King Constant Readers (of which I am sure there are many), but it is terrific. It just goes to show that, like Radar in the novel, you can’t keep an old dog down. And I am very pleased to keep reading.”
Ordinary Monsters by J M Miro
Another one not reviewed at SFFWorld, but another hefty slow-burner that I really got to like. It’s not an easy one to summarise in few words, but Ordinary Monsters is a Victorian melodrama combined with the X-Files and the X Men, which sounds like it shouldn’t work but really did for me. Ordinary Monsters is the story of a disparate group of Talents who are brought together to a lonely house in Scotland, where they fight against an ancient force determined to break through to our world. With a nice literary feel, some great backstory, complex characterisation and some rather nasty things at large, Ordinary Monsters starts slowly but builds over nearly 900 pages to a real page-turner, with an impressive ending. In the review (soon to be published), I wrote: “Ordinary Monsters is an impressively detailed and well-thought-out novel, heavy in atmosphere and deep in plot that I suspect will repay rereading. I felt that this is a book to take your time with and savour all of the details and subtleties within. Although there is some closure by the end, it is noticeable that Ordinary Monsters is the first book in a trilogy and therefore the book ends with elements unresolved. Personally, though, I look forward to the next book with interest.”
The Citadel of Forgotten Myths by Michael Moorcock
This year has perhaps been most pleasing for me for the resurgence in interest in Michael Moorcock. One of my favourite authors, we’ve not only had the publication of the Elric stories in lovely hardback omnibus editions (thank you, Saga Press!), but also this, Mike’s return to writing Elric for the first time in years. For fans, like me, it’s unmissable. Other writers imitate Mike’s ideas, but it is his vibrant prose and vivid action sequences that kept me reading. A stand-alone novel that shows that even though the saga might tell you different, Elric can never die. In the review I wrote: “The Citadel of Forgotten Myths is a glorious return to one of Fantasy’s greatest characters that I stayed up reading much more than I should have, It does not pander, yet enhances what has gone before, adding a technicolor vividness to the complex multiverse of Elric.
If this is Mike’s last return to one of perhaps his most-beloved characters, he goes out in a memorable manner. You have been missed – welcome back, Elric!”
I think that both Rob Bedford and I were surprised how much we liked this one, and as a result wrote a joint review of it. It is a game tie-in, which may put some readers off, but to us it read like traditional Fantasy with its mystical Fantasy setting, a great plot and impressive pace, not to mention a minimum of frills that allows the book to focus on its core story. I know nothing about the game on which this may be part of, but I found this surprisingly refreshing. I read it quickly and enjoyed it a great deal. The packaging of the book from the double-sided dustjacket artwork to the foiled cover deserves mention as well, at a time when book cover artwork seems to be pretty much frowned upon.
Family Business by Jonathan Sims
My favourite horror novel of the year, as Jonathan writes a subtle chiller that has engaging characters and a lovely sense of place. In the wrong hands it could have ended up as an episode of Eastenders, but it doesn’t. A young girl takes up an unusual job cleaning up after dead bodies with a long-standing family business, to find that they have an unusual history. Great characterisation and a nice setting that feels like contemporary London. In the review I wrote: “As much as I liked Thirteen Storeys, I felt that this one was better. Family Business is a great Halloween read I found difficult to put down. A realistic setting, with likeable characters and some genuinely icky and creepy moments along the way. As such I wholeheartedly recommend it to you on our Countdown to Halloween.”
Honourable Mentions: The Anomaly by Herve Le Tellier, Justice of Kings by Richard Swan, The Garden of Empire by J. T.Greathouse, The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle (sorry, not that one…)
RobB: Top 5 Fantasy – For the first time in…forever? Fantasy wasn’t the top genre I read in 2022. That isn’t to say I didn’t read a lot of fantasy books, because I did. Over 30 (across all years) as of this writing on the third day of December, as a matter of fact. It was just as difficult to come up with a top 5, but here they are. I’ll list these alphabetically.
The Engines of Empire (The Age of Uprising #1) by RS Ford
This was a surprise for me as I hadn’t read anything from Ford previously (or known too much about him), but The Engines of Empire set the bar early for Epic Fantasy for me and has me very excited to read the second book in the series, Engines of Chaos. From my review: “Ford does many, many things very well in this novel, which launches The Age of Uprising trilogy. He’s nailed the character portion of the novel, each of the Hawkspur family members came across as believable and empathetic. One of Fulren’s driving forces was to see revenge against Lancelin Jagdor, the man he sees as murderer of his father. …The thing that works most strongly with the characters is Ford’s ability to make each character’s storyline seem the most important thing in the book when you are with each POV chapters. This element made for an extremely compelling and immersive reading experience that made the pages fly past rather quickly. Never once did I feel I was reading a hefty tome of nearly 600 pages. Conversely, I was happy to be immersed the novel and was a little sad to see it end at “only” 575 pages.”
Perhaps my favorite element of this novel is the world-building. The way the magic of the pyerstones powers the technology, like airships and engines, is borderline steampunk. In fact, I’ve seen the setting described as “aetherpunk,” a term I surprisingly (having been reading this stuff for a few decades) wasn’t aware of before reading this book, even if I was familiar with the definition. Anyway, it is a fun setting and “-punk” varietal.”
Fairy Tale by Stephen King
This is a book I’ve been anticipating since I heard about it in January of this year (2022). I immediately thought of The Eyes of the Dragon and The Talisman when the title was announced and there are some parallels to those King classics, but this one is its own story. Charlie Reade lives with his father, a recovering alcoholic. Charlie’s mother was killed in a freak car accident when he was younger. Charlie managed to push through his challenges, becoming a star athlete. When he befriends a mysterious man who lives in the oldest house in the neighborhood, Charlie learns of another world filled with magic, strange creatures, and evil. He also befriends the neighbor’s dog, Radar.
There are little shout outs to past King works, it is a novel that blends so many things King is good at doing; youthful protagonist, monsters, character, friendship between an older and younger character, and dogs. I suspect Molly, AKA the Thing of Evil may have helped there, too. I wouldn’t be surprised if some Constant Readers will end up naming their dogs “Radar” in the future.
Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher – Kingfisher has been finding spots on my favorite reads for the past couple of years with her horror novels, this one is a fairy tale with modern sensibilities. From my review: “What a delightful and intelligent novel! Let’s unpack that. Kingfisher (a.k.a. Ursula Vernon) has a great penchant for story and having a great understanding and love of classic stories. She uses the framework of a classic fairy tale only to upend some of those conventions, thus allowing her to highlight some of the inherit modern problems with those kind of stories, like the assumed goal for a woman is to become a princess which allows them to live happily ever after… I also thoroughly enjoyed how Kingfisher imbued elements of the story with an air of fairy tale, like the bone dog and “dust wife.” She never explains what a “dust wife” is, the story allows the reader to infer what she might be, but the aura around the character (who never gets a name) is that her role is something that is assumed to be known in the world.”
Kagen the Damned (Kagen #1) by Jonathan Maberry – I’m a fan of Maberry’s Joe Ledger Military SF/Horror thrillers and was excited to see him turn his pen to Epic Fantasy. This has some nice horror flourishes; too, with a Cthuhlu/Lovecraftian vibe lurking in the background. From my review: “I realize the plot seems fairly straight-forward, revenge, quest, evil king and all that, but damn if Maberry doesn’t make it feel fresh and exciting. A large part of what makes this novel, and the world, feel so fresh is how much horror, specifically cosmic horror, informs the world-building. Elder Ones like Hastur and Cthulhu are major elements of the world’s mythology with the R’lyehian language appearing in the text. There are some decidedly dark and horrific passages and allusions throughout the majority of the novel and the Lovecraftian flavor is very welcome in an Epic Fantasy setting. It is a seamless infusion, and an elegant one that simply works to the point that I’m surprised it hasn’t been done before. I love that element of this novel and world because the delight in which Maberry reveled during the world-building emanates off the pages.”
Into the Narrowdark (The Last King of Osten Ard #3) by Tad Williams – I’ve made no bones about the fact that Tad Williams is a Mount Rushmore author for me, especially in the Fantasy genre. His continuation of the landmark Memory, Sorrow and Thorn saga over the past few years have been highlights of my reading experiences over that time period. The premise of the series is that about three decades have passed since the end of Memory, Sorrow and Thorn with Simon and Miriamele ruling. Their son has passed away and their heir, Morgan, has not turned out to be the prince they’d hoped. In this novel, Tad deftly balances multiple points of view as the world is on the precipice of another momentous change. He does a fantastic job of balancing the weigh of each character’s storylines and weaving in plot threads dangling from 30 years ago. As it turns out, there’s been about 30 years since Memory, Sorrow and Thorn concluded and that’s about the same time that has elapsed in Osten Ard. Those older mysterious and revelations to the characters make for some great moments.
I like what Tad has done with the character of Morgan over the course of these books as the young man matured and is coming into his own. He’s paired up with Nezeru, a harsh sacrifice who acts as his guide through the wilds while he guides her to a life that could be better than what she knew.
My only real slight on the book – and this is no fault of Tad Williams – is that DAW books decided to drastically change the look/cover art of the book. The legendary, iconic Michael Whelan painted all the Memory, Sorrow and Thorn covers and the two earlier volumes in this series (as well as many of the covers for Tad’s novels). That is not the case with this book. The cover is fine and eye-catching, but a small bit of magic is missing from the overall physical element of the book. A big, fat, Tad Williams tome just doesn’t seem right without a Michael Whelan cover.
Honorable Mentions (published in 2022): The Hunger of the Gods by John Gwynne, The Starless Crown by James Rollins, A Mirror Mended by Alix E. Harrow, and Ruination by Anthony Reynolds.
MarkC:
Fairy Tale by Stephen King
I say it most times when it comes to King’s releases – he rarely disappoints, and Fairy Tale is no exception. In fact, King manages to really hit the nail on the head here with a contemporary story that feels like a tale of old. From the real-world start through to the vividly realised fantasy world, there is very much to admire and enjoy.
Dead Man’s Hand by James J. Butcher
A very enjoyable debut from James J. Butcher, and one that gets progressively better as the story continues, building the world around the characters without being too heavy-handed. A very interesting world too, with magic out in the open and some intriguing ways that is dealt with by authorities. I blasted through this and look forward to seeing what Butcher does in the sequel.
Gwendy’s Final Task by Stephen King & Richard Chizmar
The finale to King and Chizmar’s Gwendy series, and this is the longest and possibly best of the three as we revisit an adult Gwendy who is now a US Senator. In a final stint as caretaker of the button box, this holds a potential world-ending fate that she must do her best to deal with before it’s too late. This whole series is just great and highly recommended.
The Warrior by Stephen Aryan
Aryan’s finale to his Quest for Heroes duology that started in The Coward is a great and very suitable ending to Kell Kressia’s journey. The two plot threads are equally engrossing, and while more could have been fleshed out to expand aspects of this, the final product stands tall and concludes a highly entertaining story.
Part 1B: Horror
A section that some of our reviewers felt should deserve its own sub-category this year! Over to Rob and Randy!
RobB: Top 5 Horror – I read more horror than any other genre this past year (a first) to the tune of 37 horror books read in 2022 across all years. There’s been a nice renaissance in the genre the past few years, but that’s made it tough to whittle down to just 5 novels here for the purposes of SFFWorld. Be that as it may, here are my 5 favorite 2022 Horror novels. Since it was difficult enough to shave down the 20 horror books I read in 2022 to just five, let alone down to one. Therefore, I’m listing these alphabetically.
Ghost Eaters by Clay McLeod Chapman – This is the third novel I’ve read by Chapman and he’s a must buy at this point. The story of Ghost Eaters focus on Erin and her toxic ex-boyfriend Silas. She keeps trying to get away from him and his addictions, but she finds it difficult. He eventually turns up dead of an overdose. Erin can’t hold on, she always feared he may wind up dead, but it actually happened and she has difficulty dealing with it. Then she learns about the aforementioned drug called Ghost. There’s an escalating creep factor that sets it apart. Chapman’s characters seem genuine and are empathetic and not since Jeff VanderMeer have mushrooms been so very creepy.
The Violence by Delilah S. Dawson – Dawson has become of the most prolific and consistent writers in the vast landscape of speculative fiction. This one has elements of horror, post-apocalypse, and a touch of science fiction and a dash of professional wrestling. For me, it fits most cleanly into the horror genre. Here’s a snippet from my review: “Most novels set during a pandemic and/or on the cusp of an apocalypse (pandemics can be precursors, of course) are about survival. But survival in terms of human race or just living. Dawson makes it more personal for her characters, yes they are trying to survive and live, but Chelsea, Patricia, and Ella are trying to find themselves, and allow their souls to survive and thrive. The Violence is terrifying, heart-rending, rewarding, and hopeful. Perhaps the most terrifying element is how plausible it is, if just in the effects of the disease on society. I don’t know if it is the first to directly address the COVID-19 pandemic, I know it won’t be the last, but it is a novel that addresses it smartly and believably.”
Such Sharp Teeth by Rachel Harrison – I read Harrison’s debut novel The Return earlier in the year and I was very impressed so I was excited to try her new (in 2022) novel which was about werewolves. Well, one werewolf in particular. Harrison tells the tale of Rory (short for Aurora) Morris, who returns to her hometown to be by the side of her twin sister Scarlett during the last weeks of her pregnancy. On the way there, Rory is bitten by a creature and she finds her body going through changes. She’s stronger and transforms during the full moon. Harrison does a fantastic job of paralleling the experiences of the twin sisters, and telling a compelling, addictive story. I read it over the course of two days.
Black Mouth by Ronald Malfi – I’ve been seeing good things about Malfi for a couple of years so I finally picked up this book because the description grabbed me for its very superficial similarity to books like King’s IT and Dan Simmons’s Summer of Night – friends reunite in their hometown to take down a monster they thought was gone. Those similarities, as I noted, are just superficial. Malfi’s tale is a little more confined, in that there are fewer characters and much more despair surrounds the characters; protagonist Jamie Warren is an alcoholic struggling with his addiction; his mother is a junkie who killed herself, thus brining Jamie back to Sutton’s Quay, VA. His disabled brother was found wandering. Dennis’s other friends Mia and Clay have their own demons, but they were very close friends when they were kids, but haven’t seen each other in years, since an eerie man known only as the Magician touched their lives. Malfi excels with his characters and building a sense of creepiness, between the Magician and the haunted region of Black Mouth itself.
Wayward (Wanderers #2) by Chuck Wendig – Another book high on my anticipated reads list for 2022 and it lived up to that anticipation, although not quite in the way I expected. Wanderers had a very clean finish, everything introduced in the novel was resolved, even if there was a hint or two of potential threads to pick up. Mr. Wendig picks up those threads and weaves a powerful, gripping story of how the survivors of a plague-apocalypse (White Mask) try to survive as humanity with the “help” of an extremely powerful and convincing AI (Black Swan) who helped to “hand pick” a select group of people and protect them from the plague as a last hope for humaity. Picking up about five years after the events of Wanderers, Chuck keeps the pace addictive over the course of the novels lengthy 800 pages. There’s a sense of anger in this novel that is completely believable, especially with the returning characters like Shana Stewart and “President” Ed Creel, though scientist Benji Ray and rocker Pete Corley allow for signs of hope.
Honorable mentions (published in 2022): The Hacienda by Isabel Cañas Leech by Hiron Ennes, Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes, Full Immersion by Gemma Amor, A Dowry of Blood by S.T. Gibson, and The Book of Cold Cases by Simone St. James
RandyM: 2022 was a problematic reading year. I usually finish a book when I start it, but in 2022 I set aside three books. Nothing wrong with any of them, but whatever mood I was in, they were not the books for that mood. Fortunately, I found a few that were.
First, Something More than Night by Kim Newman, in which old school friends Raymond Chandler and William Henry Pratt – more widely known as Boris Karloff – tackle a Hollywood mystery. Newman doesn’t quite capture Chandler’s style, which is fine because in this “Chandler” was writing as Chandler, not as Philip Marlowe. The plot involves studio shenanigans, a mad scientist or two, and resurrection.
Second, and one of the best novels I’ve read in the last couple of years, was The Path of Thorns by Angela Slatter. Merging a Jane Eyre/Rebecca-like story with magic and fairy tale – not at all Disneyfied – Slatter tells of a new governess with secrets taking on the care and education of three children for a family with secrets. While that is not an unusual plot, what you do with it makes all the difference and Slatter masterfully unveils all of the secrets and their intersections while providing fully realized characters in a delightfully Gothic setting.
Two books from 2021 published in paperback this year provided a lot of entertainment. The Book of the Most Precious Substance by Sara Gran tells of the search for the titular book, a grimoire of sex magic that can bring whoever obtains it her or his heart’s desire. While promoted as an erotic thriller – which it is – Gran is also thoughtful about the wishes we make and the consequences thereof. Her witches are well-rendered and not exactly what one might expect, and the adventure of tracking down the book in the contemporary world is well-imagined.
Better still, Grady Hendrix’s The Final Girl Support Group is at times brilliant in its working out of how final girls would fit in the real world, the kind of endeavors they might tackle (or not), the way in which the trauma of watching friends and family die horrifically would condition their behavior for rest of their lives. If you were at all interested in reading any of the books I’m discussing, I’d strongly urge you to consider this and/or the Slatter.
Lastly, when in doubt, I often go to older works I have yet to tackle. Case in point, Kecksies and Other Twilight Tales by Marjorie Bowen, a collection of short ghost stories. All of the stories are enjoyable — Bowen had a flavorful style of writing that draws the reader in through the accumulation of telling detail — and a couple ae exceptional: “The Crown Derby Plate,” a frequently anthologized story concerning a collector who maybe should have left her collection as is without that one, missing piece, and “The Sign Painter and the Crystal Fishes,” a weird dream tale about lovers meeting.
As an aside aimed at those at SFFWorld who enjoy reading in other genres, I would note that the Newman, Slatter and Gran novels above share one thing in common: all could also be classified as mysteries. I found myself reading several mysteries this year, and none more enjoyable than Anthony Horowitz’s Magpie Murders. Beginning with an editor reading the manuscript of a new mystery novel by a famed client only to find the last chapter missing, and so the answer of who-dun-it, the novel then moves on to other mysteries, like where is the final chapter and was the death of the author accidental? Great fun in the tradition of Agatha Christie and other Golden Age mystery writers.
And that’s it for Fantasy & Horror this year. We hope you’ve found something worth reading in all of that. Next up: Science Fiction books!
