Urban Fantasy: Zombies, Wizards, and Pyromancers! Oh My!

As the summer slowly approaches it's end, kids start going back to school, and the days start to be come shorter many people start gearing up for the fall and winter months. Some try to squeeze in their last minute vacations, some people start gearing up for Halloween already, and some are just trying to hang on to that last bit of summer before the temperature drops on us.

Not me. This time of the year means one thing: AMC's The Walking Dead is coming back. And since its fresh in my head, its reminding me that over the past year I have really fallen in love with a new subset of narrative that has really become one of my favorites in recent readings: Urban Fantasy. Urban fantasy is for the most part exactly what it sounds like; The fantastical and unbelievable in the current day modern setting as opposed to High Fantasy where the world and its rules are completely fabricated. In preparation for the return of one of my favorite programs, I wanted share some of the tidbits I've been nibbling on to hold me over.

The Walking Dead: By Robert Kirkman

 

Well let's just get this one out of the way. This is comic and graphic novel series that started of the flag-bearers of the the zombie boom. Written by Robert Kirkman (who you might remember from my Marvel Zombies review), this series lays the groundwork for what fans of the show will remember. But if you came into this series of comics expecting to see the same story from the show, you will be very much surprised. 

As the show takes liberties to this source material, reading through you will find that the story moves at a much faster pace than its television counterpart, You will find that some of the characters aren't the same the first time around, some of the characters were created specifically for the show, in the comic a number of them develop differently and have very different personalities, and some scenes that I thought were highly memorable sometimes didn't even happen in the comic series. 

Arguably you can consider the zombie genre to be more dystopian than it is urban fantasy, but since you are dealing with monsters I feel it fits here. It is always interesting to me to see how when a book or comic series gets translated to more visual medium like TV or Movies. The Walking Dead is a great example of both of them can sustain life and maintain an interesting level of involvement of each other without feeling like one is doing an injustice to the other. There are two Compendiums of the comic series available and I suggest you give them a read if like me  you are bitten by the zombie bug. 

The Dresden Files: By Jim Butcher

This series... THIS SERIES..  Man. My friend at my local game night started recommending when I explained to them how much I liked Hold Me Closer, Necromancer as one of my first real entries of urban fantasy genre. As explained to me, Harry Dresden is a private eye working in Chicago, but he is also the city's only practicing Wizard (you can find him in the yellow pages). So along those lines, I expected to read murder mysteries with an occasional splash of magic in some of the hairier moments.

What I wasn't expecting was some of the funniest and cleverly written dialog between an incredibly lovable cast of characters spanning through pretty much every single realm of fantasy I can think of. Seriously, this series has everything: Wizards, necromancers, teens who turn into werewolves, evil fairy godmothers, pixies with an uncontrollable affinity for pizza, three different families of vampires, holy knights, fallen angels, archangels, living temple dogs, mobsters, Valkyries, Greek gods, Santa Claus, and one poor diminutive police sergeant just trying to do her job. 

I ate this series up. I think in the span of like 3 months, I read all 15 released volumes of this series, all of the available graphic novels, a series of side stories from compilation books, and even gave a few episodes of the failed TV show a try. Fans of this series tend to be pretty ravenous about it, and it didn't take me long to see why. The first few kind of set the stage but when the main narrative starts to roll, it was next to impossible for me to put this series down. If you are a fan of fantasy in any capacity, this series has a little bit for everyone. 

Firebug: By Lish McBride

This YA novel is what I am currently reading.  It is set in the same universe as the previously mentioned Hold Me Closer, Necromancer. Written by Lish McBride, this story focuses around Ava, a young girl who is half Human and half Firebug. This gives her innate ability to control pyrokinetic powers. Quite simply, she is able to form a massive fireball to the tiniest wisp of a flame using only her thoughts.

After losing her mother, Ava finds herself under the control of a vampire named Venus. Venus is a major player of Boston's "magical mafia" called the Coterie, and she has been working Ava as the Coterie's reluctant personal assassin. That is however, until they charge Ava to kill someone incredibly close to her. Ava refuses, effectively signing her own death warrant, and is forced to go on the lam to try to evade capture against a very powerful supernatural organization.

Much like her previous books, a little bit of everything in fantasy comes into play in her series. McBride has always been very good at tongue-in-cheek dialog and has some great moments of tit-for-tat verbal sparring among the characters. I am currently in the early stages of the story but it already seems to be promising what I loved about her previous books and I'm looking forward to pressing on when I get home. 

Many of these titles can be found in our very own Kirtland Library and all of them can be found in the Clevnet catalog. So if you are a fan of fantasy, or perhaps put slightly off by classic fantasy, give the urban fantasy genre a try. It's a very entertaining way to try to fit the fantastical into modern mundanity. 

Staff Picks: Dragonlance Chronicles

I'm somewhat of an enigma when it comes to fantasy. I am a self proclaimed fan of the genre and often navigate to various things in that setting, but if there is a specific example of one that I don't much care for it's the Lord of the Rings trilogy.  I don't have much in the way of explanation for why, it's just something that never really appealed to me. (Probably not the smartest thing to say with a new Hobbit movie coming out or hobbit promotion in our Library)

In any case, there is one fantasy trilogy that I am absolutely in love with and have been since middle school, and that would be Dragonlance Chronicles by Margaret Weiss and Tracy Hickman. Since this duo is quite the prolific pair, I'd like focus on the Dragons Trilogy as it's probably the most notable story and the one where the major characters become the "Heroes of the Lance", and essentially lays the foundation for the all the stories that follow it. 

          

The tale sets up with a group of adventurers meeting up after a 5 years to reconnect after going their separate ways. The brothers Majere: Caramon and Raistlin, Tanis Half-Elven, the knight Sturm, Tasselhoff the Kender, and Flint the Dwarf. On the eve of their reunion they find that the village is currently under the occupation of a religious organization called the Seekers, who work for the Dragon Highlords who look to conquer the continent. 

They seek a blue crystal staff that supposedly has the power of the lost gods of good and has the ability to disrupt their plans for conquest. A staff that so happens to be in the possession of a Barbarian Princess, Goldmoon, who is also in the same tavern where our group has reunited.  After a display of the staffs healing powers and an altercation with Goldmoon's lover (Riverwind) the group confronted by the authorities and are forced to flee.

Thus setting in motion a pursuit of a Draconian empire, as the group makes way to find out more about the old gods that and recover an ancient series of disks that will be instrumental in returning faith to the True Gods, all the while defending themselves against attacks from Draconians and the eventual return of dark dragons.

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As a series of stories heavily based in the Dungeons and Dragons universe, I think what I ended up liking the most about the series is that it really is an ensemble piece. Right from the get go we have a pretty wide and diverse cast of characters that only grows as the story progresses. I find it to be a true ensemble piece because while certain points of the story focus on certain characters, there is no "Hero" of the tale. It will constantly shift focus in the group, allowing the reader to decide for themselves which hero they like instead of having one projected to you as your read.

Additionally, like a great game of D&D, many of the characters have their own motivations. One of the more popular characters and one of the primary antagonists, Raistlin Majere, is quite clearly from the onset an "evil" character. His motivations clearly are beneficial to himself, and he will often manipulate situations to further his own power under the guise of helping the group. Much to the dismay of his brother.

I really can only give such a small snippet of the story as so much takes place in these three novels, but if you are fan of the fantasy genre then this is a tale that you'll find incredibly easy to slip into. It has adventuring, fights with dragons, war, romance, splashes of comedy, and pretty much satisfies all my needs in a fantasy story. It's a series I've enjoyed as a kid and one I enjoy to this date.

Feel free to check out the CLEVNET catalog to check out these stories, and if you get as wrapped up in the universe as I have, we have a wide selection of the numerous other stories within the Dragonlance universe as well.