Brent Weeks’ immensely popular Night Angel Trilogy was published in quick succession. Readers had all three of his debut books on hand, devoured them, and then had to wait for his next novel. While imperfect, it was easy to see Weeks’ potential for spinning a good yarn. THE BLACK PRISM has been released since then, but Weeks did take a little time to go back to the world he started out with, and gives us a novella about the assassin Durzo Blint.
Durzo is a character with a lot of back story, but since Night Angel wasn’t about him, we didn’t get to see much of it. “The Perfect Shadow” will give readers a glimpse into his life, specifically about how he became the man that is Durzo Blint. If you haven’t read any of the Night Angel books you wouldn’t know that Durzo is actually almost 700 years old, and has lived a lot of lives, in different countries, under different names.
Gill, former Olympic track hopeful, ends her running career after a life-changing car accident as well as a relationship with her trainer-boyfriend. Julianna, world-famous sculptor, is on the verge of bankruptcy as the result of not having sold a single work for the last fifteen years. It’s at Julianna’s remote British estate where their stories merge. Gill rents the little cottage on the grounds with the intent to recover in some peace and quiet. At the same time Julianna is hosting a summer art school, and plans to muddle through somehow and keep the creditors at bay.
Many people have strong feelings about Lev Grossman’s 2009 book THE MAGICIANS. It’s inspired no small amount of passion—both for and against. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the book, it tells the tale of Quentin Coldwater, a young man who’s about as diehard of a Narnia fan as you can get. (Except of course Narnia isn’t actually Narnia. It’s called Fillory—but the parallels are too strong for there to be any doubt in the reader’s mind.) He’s a genius, extremely gifted, and kind of a major self-obsessed jerk. You know—like a lot of teenagers you know, except Quentin really is a genius. But he hates his life, and he wishes more than anything that Fillory were real, and that he lived there, instead.