Search Results for: hard-to-be-a-god

Anton is an undercover operative from future Earth, who travels to an alien world whose culture has not progressed beyond the Middle Ages. Although in possession of far more advanced knowledge than the society around him, he is forbidden to interfere with the natural progress of history. His place is to observe rather than interfere – but can he remain aloof in the face of so much cruelty and injustice …?

At first, Thongor’s goal seems simple – rescue his princess from her kidnapper. But on the lost continent of ancient Lemuria, where science is hardly distinguishable from sorcery, things are seldom clear-cut. Soon Thongor finds his mighty Valkarthan sword pitted against the sinister magic of those who serve the Black Gods of Chaos.
Wherever dangers threatens, Thongor must be ready to fight – for the survival of mankind depends on the outcome of his cosmic contest!

It all seemed so simple: take a small, sealed container to the planet Fraxilly, and hand it over to the planet’s ruling God-King. Hardly a problem for someone with the reputation of Del Curb interstellar courier and self-styled hero.

Draken’s queen is presumed dead. His adopted country is buckling under attack from religious fanatics, and he must try to protect both his country and family. Draken’s daughter is the only thing that gets him through the long days, but when her life is threatened, he must make hard choices about whom he can trust and whom he can no longer protect. The Gods themselves stalk Draken across the war-torn landscape, and his daughter somehow seems to be at the center of it all. Bitter from fighting an insurmountable war, feeling the life he’s rebuilt crumble around him, the ghosts of past mistakes drive him to blindly chase revenge. But Draken is about to learn that in the pursuit of retribution, gods and wars have a way of catching up to a man. In the thrilling conclusion to Dornbusch’s Book of the Seven Eyes trilogy, one man must fight to keep the things he holds dear, and find peace and security at the end of a life of bloodshed.

An epic sword and sorcery fantasy, this novel continues the history of the people and gods of Midguard. Following 300 years after the tumultuous events of CHILD OF THUNDER it tells of a new threat to Midguard’s hard won peace.

The old king of Bearn is dying and his heirs are falling prey to disease and murder, those not killed outright are failing the traditional test of kingship. With their failure comes the threat of chaos-without a tried and tested ruler Bearn will fall and the balnce between good and evil won by the legendary Renshai,Colbey Calistinsson, will be lost. A new Renshai of equal talents to Colbey’s is the only hope for Midguard…

The hard years on the Amber Road had changed Photinus the Greek. He had won a fortune and lost an eye and married various wives and become a God. His cousin Philebus had played the game of the pea and the three cups; now, reluctantly, Photinus – Votan – set off to retrieve the Deed of Monopoly to all the Gold of Ireland.

Sequel to the remarkable VOTAN, NOT FOR ALL THE GOLD IN IRELAND continues the adventures of John James’ reluctant hero Photinus. One of the forgotten classics of fantasy, the duology is ripe for rediscovery. Fans include Neil Gaiman, who has provided a new introduction to the Fantasy Masterwork collection.

They call it Asgard, the Home of the Gods. Beneath its artificial shell are at least three vast cave-systems, each one the size of an Earth-like world; and beneath those, possibly many more. No one knows how many layers there might be, and no one knows what secrets might be buried down at the “center”–if there is a center. At some time in the distant past, Asgard had suffered a terrible catastrophe. Now its outer layers are cold, its builders presumed dead. Explorers and exploiters from a hundred different worlds and races are scavenging among the ruins–but deep down, there might still be light, warmth, life…and perils unknown. Mike Rousseau was one of the first humans to come to Asgard, decades earlier. Now he’s challenged by both friends and foes–and it’s hard to tell them apart on this icebound planet. He might also be the one man who can solve the biggest puzzle in the galaxy…if only he can stay alive!

It is hard to say how it started – all the unexplained little signs of a new baby about the house in ‘The Silent Cradle’ – but soon none of the O’Bannons could deny that there had been a highly irregular addition to the family. In ‘Max Haunting’ a middle-aged hippie, preserved almost intact from the Sixties, starts showing up on the doorsteps of his old friends and loves who, in acquiring jobs and furniture, have ‘sold out’ rather less than he thought. Hauntings of curious varieties continue in other stories: the sort manufactured out of glass by a man who thinks his godly wife deserves a miracle; the visitation of a mother’s cruelty into the mind of her daughter as she confronts the frustrations of coping with her own child; the specters of opportunities lost or spurned which nag to be laid, like ghosts.



Elsewhere Leigh Kennedy considers the impulse of cannibalism in a future world whose greed has induced ecological upheaval, and the phenomenon of speaking in tongues as investigated by a sociology professor. She views the world through the eyes of a victim of seizures and of a primatologist whose devotion to apes has gone a bit too far.