fantasy – Page 4 – Kristen Brand

Five Favorite Book to Screen Adaptations

“The book was better.”

If I had a dime for every time I’ve heard that about a movie or TV show, I… well, I wouldn’t be rich, but I could certainly buy myself something nice.

Adaptations of books to the big and small screen have a tricky balancing act to pull off. It’s impossible to accurately turn every single page of a book into a movie or TV show; the visual medium is a completely different animal from the written word. Screenwriters and directors have the challenge of making structural changes to adapt the story to the screen while remaining faithful to the spirit of the book.

Or at least, that’s how I think about it. Some movies don’t seem to care, presenting an adaptation that shares nothing in common with the source material except for a title, leading to masses of disappointed fans.

But I’m not here to talk about the disasters. I want to talk about my favorites. Continue reading Five Favorite Book to Screen Adaptations

Turn Back the Pages: Red Sonja

Turn Back the Pages is a biweekly monthly feature where I spotlight a comic that is not fresh and new. It may have come out a few months ago or even a few years ago. Maybe it was hyped and popular, or maybe it was an underappreciated gem. Whatever the case, it’ll be a great comic that’s well worth a read.

My first exposure to Red Sonja was that weird movie from the 80s, so while I was aware the character existed, I wasn’t a particular fan. The chainmail bikini is not a fantasy trope I generally enjoy, and I doubt I’d have been interested when the comic series was announced if the writer hadn’t been Gail Simone—one of my all-time favorite people in comics.

I caught previews and snippets of the issues online and was hooked. When the first trade paperback came out, I had to buy it.

Best decision ever. Continue reading Turn Back the Pages: Red Sonja

Clockwork Fairies

by Cat Rambo

This is one of the greatest examples of an unsympathetic narrator that I’ve ever come across. Really, though, the story isn’t about him but his fiancé. I would gladly read an entire series starring her, but this story is complete and lovely. Try it if you like a little magic in your steampunk, or if you enjoy stories about brilliant ladies dumping dudes who aren’t good enough for them. Continue reading More Spectacular Steampunk Short Stories

Turn Back the Pages: Spectacle by Megan Rose Gedris

I love when stories have circuses. From the magic and mystery of The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern to the weird and eerie Dead Moon Circus in Sailor Moon, the setting has so much to offer. I can even appreciate the creepy circus aesthetic in horror movies even if I’m way too much of a wimp to watch them.

So I was hooked when I first learned about Spectacle by Megan Rose Gedris. Here’s the blurb:

Pragmatic engineer Anna works as a psychic in the Samson Brothers Circus, but she doesn’t believe in anything supernatural—until her twin sister Kat is murdered and comes back as a very demanding ghost. Sharing a room with her sister was hard, but now they’re sharing a body while trying to identify the killer. With few leads, a troupe full of secretive folk, and strange paranormal occurrences popping up around the circus, solving the case seems near impossible. But the murderer in their midst may be the least of their problems… Continue reading Turn Back the Pages: Spectacle by Megan Rose Gedris

Spectacular Steampunk Short Stories

Interested in traveling back in time and across dimensions? Good, because I’ve got a collection of steampunk short fiction to transport you to other worlds. The steam and clockwork-powered robots in these stories range from evil to enchanting, from sentient beings to human-piloted machines of mass destruction. The one thing they all have in common is being highly entertaining.

The Mark V Eleganté by Nelson Stanley

The Mark V Eleganté is a fantastic audio short over at Gallery of Curiosities. It’s set around an insanely dangerous race of massive steampunk contraptions where the only rule is that anything goes, and stuff gets smashed up worse than when the Hulk comes to town. The main character has a memorable voice, and the narrator fits him so perfectly that I can’t imagine anyone else reading it. The story manages to be both super fun and really tragic at the same time, and you should definitely give it a listen.

If you like podcasts and steampunk in general, Gallery of Curiosities is a delightful little corner of the internet, and you won’t regret checking out the other stories they’ve published. Continue reading Spectacular Steampunk Short Stories

Turn Back the Pages: Lady Sabre and the Pirates of the Ineffable Aether

Turn Back the Pages is a biweekly feature where I spotlight a comic that is not fresh and new. It may have come out a few months ago or even a few years ago. Maybe it was hyped and popular, or maybe it was an underappreciated gem. Whatever the case, it’ll be a great comic that’s well worth a read.

When was the last time you read some good old-fashioned swashbuckling adventure? It’s probably been too long, right? Well, brush up on your sword-fighting skills, because today we’re diving into Lady Sabre and the Pirates of the Ineffable Aether.

Here are just a few things you’ll find in the pages of Lady Sabre: airship pirates, steampunk robots, stone-cold cowboys, and tons of sword duels. Now, just because you throw a bunch of cool things into a comic, that doesn’t automatically mean you’re going to have a good story. But Lady Sabre combines these elements into an epic steampunk adventure. And it does it with style.

I’d say there are two main characters despite only one being mentioned in the title. The first, of course, is the lady herself, and to quote her own introduction:

“Name’s Sabre, Lady Seneca Sabre… Fourteenth Marchioness of Cascadia, Captain of Pegasus, muse of Darent Found, and a host of other titles that would probably bore you to tears if I recite them, which I shan’t, as I’ve recited enough.” Continue reading Turn Back the Pages: Lady Sabre and the Pirates of the Ineffable Aether