The SnowRaven Chronicles

Wine & Wizards, Volume 3

By: AJ Spencer

Narrated by: Adrienne Ellis

It is adventure on the high seas when the lady Snowraven sets sail to reclaim the fabled banner of the doomed expedition, lost long ago.

But, she is soon entangled in the war of ideology that is reshaping the very fabric of her world - between those creating machines of industry, fueled by ethanol, and those clinging to the old ways of "magic" holding steadfast to the glowing Nexil-Orbs and the elite classes that create them.

The Snowraven guided by fate.

For an ancient prophesy foretells the coming of a new age - heralded by a mighty queen to sit upon the throne of Nubodia - the wealthiest realm of them all.

But one inflicted with a truly monstrous foe of both nature and man's creation. A vile creature that shows the most terrifying enemy - is the enemy within.

©2012 Joseph Buzzoni (P)2014 Joseph Buzzoni

I thought it was reasonably exciting

The Snow Raven Chronicles: Wine and Wizards the third novella in the SnowRaven Chronicles series by AJ Spencer is a swashbuckling action novella and thus it was a short listen. This novella was good for what it was. It was a short exciting rush, without much depth. The main character, Lady SnowRaven, is a young, female ship captain, who rushes into quests. After one such quests, she gets wrapped up in saving a town that is balancing prosperity with evil. Determined to fight the evil, she is caught up in a mystical fight that might be fulfilling her destiny to be queen. The plot-line is exciting, but the characters are single minded and flat and there is little development. However, I think as an action novella, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And after I changed my expectation for what the novella was, I thought it was reasonably exciting. There was a lot of action, with the main character moving from one major life-threatening dilemma to the next very quickly. The main fight of the novella was set in the town where she is engaged to the ruler and she sets off to rid the town of the evil situation that is actually benefiting it, but with a large sacrifice.

I thought the narration by Adrienne Ellis was initially flawed. At the beginning, I couldn’t get into the novella at all because I was first trying to figure out what was happening because the speed of narration was very fast. And then stylistically, I thought that the novella might be poems rather than prose because of the way the sentences were read. After I got used to it, I was better able to follow along. Overall, while this novella was not my cup of tea, I would recommend it to someone who is looking for a short exciting action adventure.

Audiobook provided for review by the author.

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Shaska stikes another blow for babes in bodices

Holy Cats! AJ SPencer is rapidly becoming a favorite fantasy writer of mine. The man can pen an interesting character, powerful places, menacing monsters, and paralyzing plots that grip you from the moment that you begin and does not release you until the book is finally finished. All alliteration aside, ;P, there is some seriously amazing stuff going on here. I have to respect that SPencer can create powerful female character that keeps my attention just as well as how the male characters in other fantasy stories would do. He even manages to make her nudity a workable plotpoint, as opposed to Shatner losing his shirt four seconds into a fight.

The fights are fun and supremely interesting, and I enjoy the interaction that Shaska has with her talking pet, even if she does try to ditch him several times. Their interplay with one another is fun and light and enlivens the story. Let me tell you, there is never a shortage on action, either. You want monsters, they are there. You want weapons? Sowrds, there. Guns, there Wait, what? Yep there are even guns in this series, you might have seen them in earlier tales if you have those too. The story is basically our heroine fighting an evil presence in her fiance's city. A city that pretty much overwhelmingly benefits from the evil, even though there is a price tag attached to all the "benefits" for those involved. We even see a familiar Scout from the first story show back up and provide some awesome comic relief. I always think of Joxur the mighty when he shows up for some reason.

Sadly, the misfire for me is Adrienne Ellis, the narrator. I took off one star for her performance, but in truth it should have been two. I didn't want to hurt the story due to narrator issues, but it really did detractfrom the story to a certain extent, which is funny because I had wondered why a male narrator had been chosen for the first two stories. I now get a lady, and I really think the quality suffered. She was fine as Snowraven, but her other characters were flat or annoying. It felt like she did not have the range that the original narrator, Matt Franklin, had. I really found myself missing his tones and voices. I really had to work to get past the problems with her voice.

Overall I still loved this story. I love seeing tech slowly creeping into a sword and sorcery type setting, it adds a new fun element, and shows that you can still have an incredible tale even if firepower is involved. I'd like to think that guns in a fantasy setting just makes it an equalizer, Sam Colt made all men equal, why not the same in this kind of setting? Wizrds have to watch out that they don't get popped. Since this is mostly sword play, I'd still say that it works to make things even more interesting.

Once again, I must compliment the artwork and say that I would love to see a graphic novel made from this series. The art is truly a thing of Beauty. Get into this series as soon as you can, don't miss out on something really awesome!!!! Even though I did receive a promo code for this review it in no way influenced my considerations of the material, and in fact, inspired me to be more honest. Getting a code generally makes me harsher as a reviewer as I am more often concerned what someone like Me will decide based on my review.

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The clash between magic & tech continue!

Note: Even though this is Book 3 in the series, it works as a stand alone.

In this edition of Shaska (or is it spelled Saska?) the SnowRaven’s adventures, we have high seas, mud monsters, guns, wine, and magic. Plus a little nudity. Shaska is a woman who can fight under all circumstances, armed or not, in fair weather or poor, outnumbered, and unclothed. This volume holds just as much action as the previous books, but a touch more lot. Indeed, I do believe it is my favorite so far.

First, Shaska is still accompanied by her pet Lynx, the mutant fox serpent that can talk. She tries to leave him behind once or twice, to no avail. Her first adventure involves sailing with crew into unknown peril to retrieve the flag of a long lost something or other. Supposedly, many have tried to reclaim this banner and failed. And Shaska doesn’t lose a few sailors in the reclaiming of the banner, but then she gives the remaining crew a burlesque-like show using the flag afterwards. This scene in particular made me think of a short story written by Robert E. Howard in which the pirate queen gives Conan a similar dance.

But once she makes it back to land, there are more adventures, more plots and schemes, and more bad guys. If you have read the first 2 books, then you will know that there is a touch of machinery and modern weapons. Here, in this volume we see more of that and it is well done. Even Shaska, a traditional warrior Shepherdess from the high snowy mountains, finds it hard to argue with the advances that come with engineering.

Once again, the Scout Tommy Calvor (spelling?) makes an appearnce. He’s been in the series since Book 1 and I really should give him credit. He provides comic relief and sometimes the common sense. By now, he has rescued Saska a few times, even if sometimes it was just by happenstance.

As with all the books so far there is nudity using such terms as buxom or rock-hard thighs or lithe figure. Shaska ends up naked more than once and yet still defeats her foes. We had one mud monster last book – and we have another in this installment. I don’t mind the nudity because Shaska doesn’t – in herself or in others. Plus, these books are written in such a way as to be just a smidge over the top, like an epic warrior poem where all the deeds, all the foes, all the curses by the gods are a bit exaggerated. And I like it. A lot!

Narration: You might have noticed that the first 2 books had a different narrator (Matt Franklin) than this book (Adrienne Ellis). With the first 2 books, I was positive the narrator was saying ‘Shaska’ but with this book the narrator is obviously saying ‘Saska’. I had to dig through the SnowRaven Chronicles FB page, but the spelling is Saska. So thanks to Adrienne Ellis for saying it clearly and setting me on the right path.

Unfortunately, I really enjoyed Matt Franklin’s performances more. He had more of a stage voice making it feel like an epic poem read out loud to a crowd over a campfire. Adrienne Ellis had a decent voice for Saska and for the plot narration. However, most of her side character voices all sounded very similar and for some reason they sounded like slightly screechy old grandmothers. I noticed this for high nobles (male) and women and sometimes Lynx. When we did have an old woman, the voice worked. All together, she didn’t have the variety of character voices I was hoping for.