Best of 2014 Part 2a: Novels

Doing one of these posts often takes a lot out of me because of all the linking and checking and verification and formatting and everything, but lists like this also help me crystalize my year in reading, so I value them quite highly. Thankfully, I’m able to get this list out in time and most of the books on the list have already been reviewed as well, so that’s something too.

With the year 2014 now done and over, it is time to do the first of my “Best of the Year” posts, for the period 1st July to December 31st. I didn’t read as many books this time as I wanted to, primarily because I got married in the first week of July itself, and things have changed a fair bit. But life remains exciting and interesting in equal measure, and my reading also happens to match that rather closely, so I’ll take that in full indeed!

Let’s see what makes the cut and which comes close then!

12 Days of Best Covers of 2014: Day #7

The seventh book cover I pick for the 2014 edition of “12 Days of Best Covers of…” is for Star Trek: The Poisoned Chalice by James Swallow, which is the fourth novel in last year’s The Fall quintology, itself a series that is a part of the larger Typhon Pact mega-arc in the setting. James carried on from David Mack’s excellent A Ceremony of Losses in this novel, and the story he told, focusing on William Riker and Tuvok, among other characters, totally pulled me in. There’s a larger story at work here of course, and I’d certainly recommend reading from the first novel in this series, Revelation and Dust by David R. George III, which is a bit of a rough start, but builds up towards the end and the other two novels after that, The Crimson Shadow by Una McCormack and David Mack’s A Ceremony of Losses are all damn good reads.

The seventh set of comic covers I pick this year are for Death Vigil #1 by Stjepan Sejic, with cover by him as well, and the second of the set is for Grimm Fairy Tales #99 by Joe Brusha, Joel Ojeda, Stephen Schaffer, Eric Arciniega and Jim Campbell with the cover by Artgerm. Death Vigil is Stjepan’s first full work in that he is the writer and artist both, and he has been absolutely fantastic on this series. Month after month he’s delivered a great story and even better art, and the title is definitely among the best of the debuts this year. Grimm Fairy Tales #99 is basically one of the keystone moments of Zenescope’s massive Age of Darkness crossover event that has been going on for more than a year already, and it sets in motion some of the biggest events of the crossover, and is a prelude to the big… defeat of the Realm Knights themselves, the guardians of all the different Realms that connect to Earth in Zenescope’s reimagining of various fairy tales and folk tales and other myths and legends.

So without further ado, hit the break to see both the covers in all their glory! The full list of all these covers is available here.

Star Trek: The Poisoned Chalice by James Swallow (Book Review)

Star Trek: The Fall has proven to be a most enjoyable event series from all that I’ve read. My interest was piqued because of the cover to Una McCormack’s Crimson Shadow, and diving into the four-part series with David R. George III’s Revelation and Dust proved to be a good place to get back into the status quo of Star Trek tie-in novel fiction. The nature of these books, taking a look at several major characters and crew and locations of this wonderful universe has been the major attraction for sure, and I really applaud the creators and the publisher for going this route.

The Poisoned Chalice is meant to be the cap-stone to this wonderful series, and it does fulfill that promise. James Swallow has been one of my favourite writers for a number of years, ever since 2006 when I started reading his Warhammer 40,000 novels. He has never really disappointed after an initial hurdle and his output in recent years has been top-notch. The Poisoned Chalice clearly is among his best works to date and it brings this series to a close in a spectacular fashion, with all that’s best about the Star Trek universe and none of the drawbacks.

Star Trek: A Ceremony of Losses by David Mack (Book Review)

In the last year, roughly, I’ve slowly gotten back on track with reading Star Trek novels. First with James Swallow’s Cast No Shadow last year, and then with the first two books in the Typhon Pact: The Fall 5-book series this year, the experience has reminded me again and again of how and why I fell in love with Star Trek in the first place. The aforementioned series also happens to be on my “25 Series To Read in 2014” reading challenge list as well, and is one of the more rocking series I’ve had the pleasure of reading as part of that challenge. The first book Revelation and Dust was slow-paced and a bit too complex but the second one The Crimson Shadow really blew my mind. Going into the third book, I wanted more the latter and none of the former.

A Ceremony of Losses is written by Star Trek stalwart David Mack and is definitely among the finest examples of tie-in fiction I’ve read to date, in the context of the best novels I’ve read to date in the Stargate, Star Wars, Star Trek, Warhammer, WarCraft and a bunch of others. This time the focus of this novel is on the Andorian fertility crisis and the consequences of the Andorians’ secession from the Federation two years ago. And our characters are also much different, although many of them are drawn from Revelation and Dust since one half of the novel takes place on the newly consecrated Deep Space 9 and on Bajor. Just as Una McCormack did with The Crimson Shadow, so does David Mack with A Ceremony of Losses and presents one of the finest examples of Star Trek fiction.