Solaris review round-up - Monday 14th May 2012

In keeping with the near-constant downpour outside, we have a deluge of new reviews of Solaris titles for you upon this drenched morning which should be enough to keep the memories of the gloriously sunny weekend in your minds...

First off, Starburst has given Guy Haley's Champion of Mars an excellent eight out of ten, calling his first title for Solaris "highly entertaining and original, and well worth a look."

There's also love for Deadfall Hotel over at Invisible Vanguard, with Steve Rasnic Tem's blend of weirdness, surrealism, and horror getting a nice write-up: "fans of the graphic novels Locke and Key, House of Mystery, Fables, or the work of Edward Gorey will feel right at home here, as will anyone who ever wished that Neil Gaiman had written The Shining instead of Stephen King."

And talking of horror, Christopher Fowler's excellent Hell Train has gone head-to-head with Tempest by Julie Cross in a competition to see which of the two books the reviewer most wanted to continue reading after the first 50 pages. Hell Train delivered a knock-out blow and has progressed to the next round, where it could end up facing Simon Bestwick's The Faceless.

In a great Solaris round-up, The Nameless Zine has reviewed a whopping FIVE of our titles this month, including calling Juliet E. McKenna's Darkening Skies "enthralling", saying that House of Fear is "one of the best thematic anthologies to come along in years", declaring that James Maxey's Greatshadow is "a must for dragon fantasy lovers who demand good writing and can't put it down action. If I used a star system it would get a five", recommending that "lovers of horror with [a] unique twist" will love Simon Bestwick's The Faceless, and admitting that they "couldn't put down" Paul Kearney's Kings of Morning.

And finally, Regicide by Nicholas Royle gets reviewed by the Sacremento/San Francisco Book Review site which calls it "interesting and thoughtful" and says "when the plot engages in the second half, it all comes together nicely in a spooky kinda way".