Tag Archives: heroic

Review of “The Olympian Affair: Book Two in the Cinder Spires Series” (2023)

olympian

© James Pyles

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Yesterday, I finished reading Jim Butcher’s 2023 novel The Olympian Affair. It’s the second in his Cinder Spires series and the sequel to The Aeronaut’s Windlass which I read and reviewed.

Butcher doesn’t disappoint. This is another terrific adventure novel set (supposedly) in the far-future where our own civilization has long-since fallen. People live in floating cities called “Spires” ruled by various presidents, kings, and such. Trade is conducted by skyships powered by fantastic crystals. Those, and many other things, including meat, are grown in vats ruled over by powerful (and not-so-powerful) family houses.

The central character in these tales is Captain Francis Grimm, commander of the light-trader “Predator.” He was once in the Albion Navy but sacrificed his career and his honor for a close friend.

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The Other Side of the Storm

malestrom

© Annija Veldre

Alise Egan’s scarlet gown fluttered behind her like a great cape as she faced the maelstrom. When she’d first seen the painting in Keyne Harlan’s private collection, she recognized herself immediately, even though she had never met the anonymous artist. But she assumed that whatever the woman was confronting was an ocean wave. Now she knew that the plasma field was the conduit between her world and another.

Long, slender legs walked forward with surprising confidence as her blonde hair, like her dress, billowed behind her, blown backward by an unseen discharge from the phenomenon just three meters in front of her. One moment, she had been admiring her billionaire benefactor’s painting and listening to him recite the legend and the curse attached to the artwork, and the next, the mystic tale had come to life, and she was inside living it.

“I’m here, Alise.” The familiar voice echoed out of the swirling energy ripples.

“Daddy?”

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