The Book of Swords
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3.9 • 27 Ratings
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
New epic fantasy in the grand tradition—including a never-before-published Song of Ice and Fire story by George R. R. Martin!
Fantasy fiction has produced some of the most unforgettable heroes ever conjured onto the page: Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian, Michael Moorcock’s Elric of Melniboné, Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Classic characters like these made sword and sorcery a storytelling sensation, a cornerstone of fantasy fiction—and an inspiration for a new generation of writers, spinning their own outsize tales of magic and swashbuckling adventure.
Now, in The Book of Swords, acclaimed editor and bestselling author Gardner Dozois presents an all-new anthology of original epic tales by a stellar cast of award-winning modern masters—many of them set in their authors’ best-loved worlds. Join today’s finest tellers of fantastic tales, including George R. R. Martin, K. J. Parker, Robin Hobb, Scott Lynch, Ken Liu, C. J. Cherryh, Daniel Abraham, Lavie Tidhar, Ellen Kushner, and more on action-packed journeys into the outer realms of dark enchantment and intrepid derring-do, featuring a stunning assortment of fearless swordsmen and warrior women who face down danger and death at every turn with courage, cunning, and cold steel.
FEATURING SIXTEEN ALL-NEW STORIES:
“The Best Man Wins” by K. J. Parker
“Her Father’s Sword” by Robin Hobb
“The Hidden Girl” by Ken Liu
“The Sword of Destiny” by Matthew Hughes
“‘I Am a Handsome Man,’ Said Apollo Crow” by Kate Elliott
“The Triumph of Virtue” by Walter Jon Williams
“The Mocking Tower” by Daniel Abraham
“Hrunting” by C. J. Cherryh
“A Long, Cold Trail” by Garth Nix
“When I Was a Highwayman” by Ellen Kushner
“The Smoke of Gold Is Glory” by Scott Lynch
“The Colgrid Conundrum” by Rich Larson
“The King’s Evil” by Elizabeth Bear
“Waterfalling” by Lavie Tidhar
“The Sword Tyraste” by Cecelia Holland
“The Sons of the Dragon” by George R. R. Martin
And an introduction by Gardner Dozois
“When fine writer and expert editor [Gardner] Dozois beckons, authors deliver—and this surely will be one of the year’s essential anthologies.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Swords and sorceries abound in this massive anthology, featuring several luminaries of the fantasy genre. A few of these stories stand out, including Ken Liu's "The Hidden Girl," in which a girl in mythical China is kidnapped by a sorceress and trained to become a brilliant assassin who walks between worlds. " I Am a Handsome Man,' Said Apollo Crow" by Kate Elliott also breaks the mold with a man, or maybe a banished god, who's bound by a curse to serve but may remain wily enough to choose his own master. Robin Hobb's "Her Father's Sword" will take her regular readers back to familiar territory as a young village girl struggles to cope with an attack in the setting of her Farseer novels. Other works, such as Daniel Abraham's "The Mocking Tower" and Ellen Kushner's "When I Was a Highwayman" (which takes place in her Riverside setting), feel familiar for a different reason, differentiating themselves very little from general fantasy tropes. The anthology has strengths and weaknesses, but many readers will pick it up just for a new George R.R. Martin short story tied to the Song of Ice and Fire series.
Customer Reviews
Yawn
Well now we know what hits the floor when great authors ideate.
Nothing of material consequence
It’s a shame. It’s a click bait stratagem at best.
The GOT histo-novella feels like HBO is running a market survey.
Screw you all. What a waste