A California Online Magazine with Local Focus and Global Appeal
For the past seven years, once a year, I stop being a crime writer and become a bookstore manager, selling every genre under the sun. From the initial experience which I thought of as ‘helping out,’ things have evolved and the job has required a more fundamental change in me than anything I’d envisaged when I took it on. I shouldn’t be surprised. Running a bookstore is a wholly different role from writing novels. I simply hadn’t thought it through.
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Magic Misled is the seventh book in the Lizzie Grace fantasy series by Keri Arthur. Lizzie is a witch and a psychic who has been on the run for a long time from her powerful magical family. Her family blames Lizzie for her sister’s death, and they trapped her in an unwanted marriage. However, she is not alone she has her best friend and familiar Belle. The pair now runs a tea and psychic consulting business on a werewolf reservation in Australia.
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Daemon has two wives. One of them, Jaenelle Angelline, is dead, but she is a Queen of Power, a Witch, so she still watches over the Realm, her husband, his brother Lucivar, and the brother’s son Daemonar in Anne Bishop’s The Queen’s Weapons, the eleventh Black Jewels novel.
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Another year has ended and once again we take a look back at a few of the many books that were reviewed in KRL in 2020. 2020 was a year most of us want to forget, but one good thing that did happen is that a lot of great books were published! All but one of our main reviewers share in this post their top 5-10ish favorite books they reviewed in 2020. Katherine Costa wanted to include favorite authors and TV shows that she has reviewed, so hers went up in a separate post in this issue.
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Throughout the challenging and often depressing year that is 2020, I found writing anything truly discouraging. Why write when a pandemic ravaged the world, Black Americans are being shot down in the streets, and unemployment surged?
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I grew fond of Leopold Kazmer, The Great Enchanter, in his first adventure, The Daemon Device (2019), where he battled the encroaching demonic takeover of steampunk Victorian London and won. Of course, he had help, both natural and supernatural, and I hoped that all his cohorts and a few more would return when I learned the second in Jeri Westerson’s Enchanter Chronicles was coming.
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Forzare! While Peace Talks was tepid, Battle Ground by Jim Butcher is on fire. Literally. And the storyline in this one is excellent too.
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Mysterious Galaxy is an independent bookstore specializing in the genres of science fiction, fantasy, mystery, young adult, romance, and horror. Founded in 1992, the store has been an integral part of San Diego’s literary scene for readers ever since.
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I am a fan of Anne Bishop’s The Others series and The World of The Others. I enjoyed paranormal danger that could be fatal without being graphic, love with shapechangers that wasn’t sexual, and wry commentary on everything from prejudice to government. From the “Also By” lists, I knew that Bishop had other books and other worlds in her writing, but I had never read any of them. Oh, boy.
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Until I started writing The King of Next Week, my historical research focused on the medieval period: surgery during the fourteenth century in Europe, clockworks in China during the Mongol invasions, references to werewolves in eleventh century Wales. But during a visit to Phippsburg, Maine, to give a talk about writing, I became intrigued by the history of the area.
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You may think it’s a jackrabbit, or someone you know, but….
If it bites you, the puncture wound begins to smoke.
It takes over your body and your life.
It uses you to kill to gain strength and power.
When there is no more use for you, it tosses your body aside and turns into smoke.
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Moonrisers is the first in a brand new series by author Jeri Westerson. It is a spin-off of her Booke of the Hidden series, which I really enjoyed. Moonrisers features the werewolf character Jeff Chase.
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When it comes to the imagination, the sky’s the limit for Gail Daley. With three science fiction and fantasy series underway, the Central Valley author feels as much at home exploring distant galaxies as she does creating memorable characters who leap off the page. Kings River Life spoke with Daley about inspiration, genre bending, and writing’s biggest rewards.
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It was like being struck by lightning—the sudden and electrifying urge to pick up a pen. And that was the moment that inspired Sierra Nevada fine artist Vicki Thomas to add “author” to her career title. Kings River Life spoke with Thomas about her remarkable journey as a young adult fantasy writer, as well as the adventures that await her young protagonist Ivan Kimble.
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Meet Pete, who, according to his foster mom “is a huge sweetheart”! Not only is he a fuzzy wuzzy sweetheart, but he also has a big, happy, motorboat purr that he generously shares to announce his sweetness! He loves to play and enjoys every single toy he meets! This irresistible boy is a big boy and a hugely loving addition in a wonderful forever home of his own. Could sweet purrasaurus Pete be the great new addition in your loving family? Peter was adopted and returned by his original family at no fault of his own, there was a illness in the family, he might need some time to adjust to his new family. Pete is available from the Cat House on the Kings.