Sword & Sorcery fans rejoice:
Savage Realms Monthly returns with not one but two new audiobooks! Catching up
with the old print/Kindle issues, we get Book 7 from October 2021 as well as
the recently published, February 2023 issue, Book 18. Let’s dig in, shall we?
Book 7 features three stories and
runs at a little over two and a half hours. It marks the return of the popular
Redgar and Natali stories from Willard Black. This month’s tale is
Halloween-centric (to coincide with its October release) and is titled “Death
in Darkness.” This one is more action-packed than usual and has our duo facing werebeasts
this time around. I had a blast with it and continue to look forward to the
next installment in this ongoing series. Next up is Richard L. Rubin’s “Duel at
Dragonspoint Valley”, which sees a mercenary by the name of Shreve going up against
trolls and other creatures to steal an amulet. It’s got Conan vibes and is an
engaging tale from beginning to end. The third and final yarn is titled “Royally
Screwed” by Morgan Kane. It’s a humorous story that fans of Terry Pratchett are
bound to enjoy. It features a duo of adventurers, Scar and Cyril (along with a
talking skull) on a quest to rescue a princess. This is my favourite of the
bunch—yes, I liked it even more than the Redgar tale!
Book 18 delivers another trio of
tales and runs at about an hour and forty-five minutes. First up, Richard L.
Rubin’s “The Sorcerer’s Tower” sees his mercenary Shreve from book 7 return.
This time he’s hired by a wizard to steal a sorcerer’s bane and is given a
powerful sword to do the deed. I enjoyed this story even more than the previous
one and am happy to say that we now have two fun ongoing series we can follow
in the pages of SRM. “In the Ruins of Carath-Narr” by L.T. Adams tells the tale
of a group of adventurers on a mission to slay a beast. This was a really fun
story and it definitely had Dungeons & Dragons vibes. Last but not least,
Pedro Iniguez’s “Urak, The Terror” is about a necromancer by the name of Eneko
who faces a cult of Kraken worshippers. How can you go wrong with a premise
like this? Probably my favourite of the three stories. It channeled H.P.
Lovecraft at times with its echoes of “Dagon”, one of my all-time fave Lovecraft
tales.
Moose Matson is our ever-reliable
narrator once again. He narrates the stories with aplomb as usual. He goes
all-out for “Royally Screwed”, injecting life into the various characters and
using a wide palette of voices for the occasion. His pacing, enunciation, and portrayal
of the cast of rogues and heroes found within these stories only raise their enjoyment.
He clearly has a lot of fun reading these tales for us. There is a gap of 11
issues between Book 7 and Book 18, but the quality hasn’t gone down a single
bit. Both books are awesome and get a perfect score from me. I look forward to Books
8 and 19 in the very near future. As usual, even if there are returning
characters/series, no previous knowledge is required to enjoy these tales, so
you can pick up any issue of Savage Realms and join the fun.
Rating: Five
stars out of five
Get Book 7 on Audible
Get Book 18 on Audible
Moose Matson here, I am absolutely thrilled that you enjoyed these two new Audio releases. And I got to tell you you're right. I have a lot of fun doing these stories! Also I'm right there with you.
ReplyDeleteI had so much fun doing Royally Screwed. I was about 5 minutes into recording when I realized it was a comedy and just had a blast with it.