URBAN FANTASY REVIEW: Fated - SG Browne

Release Date: 01/09/11

SYNOPSIS:

Over the past few thousand years, Fabio has come to hate his job. As Fate, he's in charge of assigning the fortunes and misfortunes that befall most of the human race - the 83 per cent who keep screwing things up. And with the steady rise in population since the first Neanderthal set himself on fire, he can't exactly take a vacation. Frustrated with his endless parade of drug addicts and career politicians, it doesn't help watching Destiny guide her people to Nobel Peace Prizes. To make matters worse, he has a five-hundred-year-old feud with Death, and his best friends are Sloth and Gluttony. And worst of all? He's just fallen in love with a human. Sara Griffen might be on Destiny's path, but Fabio keeps bumping into her - by accident at first, and then on purpose. Getting involved with her breaks Rule No. 1 - and about ten others - setting off some cosmic-sized repercussions that could strip him of his immortality...or lead to a fate worse than death.


REVIEW:

SG Browne is one of those authors that you’re never quite sure what you’ll get with their latest work. Breaking in on the Urban Fantasy Genre last year with Breathers (a zombie tale) I just couldn’t wait to see what would arrive next and believe me this latest title beats the previous hands down.

Within this book is a tale that is reminiscent of Piers Anthony’s Incarnations of Immortality series, with rounded characters that you’d love to hang around, a weird and quirky look at the universe as a whole alongside a plot that has hope for us all. It’s fun and whilst at times quite dark, this is a book that has that ray of light throughout. Finally add to this a dark twisted sense of humour mixed up with great pace as well as prose and it was a superb piece of escapism that was hard to put down. Cracking.

URBAN FANTASY REVIEW: Breathers - SG Browne

Release Date: 03/03/11

SYNOPSIS:

Meet Andy Warner, a recently deceased everyman and newly minted zombie. Resented by his parents, abandoned by his friends, and reviled by a society that no longer considers him human, Andy is having a bit of trouble adjusting to his new existence. But all that changes when he goes to an Undead Anonymous meeting and finds kindred souls in Rita, an impossibly sexy recent suicide with a taste for the formaldehyde in cosmetic products, and Jerry, a twenty-one-year-old car crash victim with an exposed brain and a penchant for Renaissance pornography. When the group meets a rogue zombie who teaches them the joys of human flesh, things start to get messy, and Andy embarks on a journey of self-discovery that will take him from his casket, to the SPCA, to a media-driven class-action lawsuit on behalf of the rights of zombies everywhere.


REVIEW:

I love a novel that strikes out on its own and if you’re fed up of the typical zombie bumbling cannon fodder affair that’s out there, then you really have to get yourself a copy of this book. It has misadventure, it has some twisted events and is a title that demonstrates that whilst you may be deceased you’re still human and need interaction. It’s very clever, it has some great authorly slight of hand and above all else it’s a book that the reader can really get their hooks into. Add to that an author with an understanding as well as a love of the Zombie and you know it’s a book that’s going to impress which made this hard to put down and a real joy to read. The only real warning to come out of this book is if anyone however offers you venison jerky you might want to pass. LOL