Book Review: One Horn to Rule Them All [Anthology]

The purple unicorn anthology One Horn to Rule Them All started out as a teaching tool. I had the good fortune to get to see a Dragon Con panel featuring Kevin J. Anderson and his wife, Rebecca Moesta. One of the things they teach is that every piece of work could be the first piece of work someone ever reads from you, so always do your best work. The advice goes like this: "If someone asks you for a purple unicorn story, you better write the best purple unicorn story you can". This advice has been given by them hundreds of times over the past years and at one time, the editor for the anthology, Lisa Mangum, approached them saying she would curate the, at that point, mythical anthology. Then several big names, such as Jody Lynn Nye and Todd McCaffrey offered their talents in writing stories. Then to make it even more special, the anthology features the work of several of the graduates of the Superstars Writing program run by Anderson and Moesta. The proceeds from the sales of the book go to a scholarship for the writing program.

The anthology is pure magic. Every single story draws you in and gives you a small spin before letting you go. My personal favorite was "A Single Spark" by Mary Pletsch. It features a girl whose name, Sharareh, translates into 'a single spark', hence the name of the story. She is a young woman in a terrible situation. Her father sells her to foreigners to be unicorn bait and instead of getting a European unicorn, the white kind, they encounter the purple kind, a karkadann.

A karkadann is described as:

taller than the hunter's horses, taller even than John's black gelding, the beast was easily the size of a camel. Like a camel, its hooves were split in two, the better to carry it across the shifting desert sands. Its tongue descended to the surface of the pool from between two razor-sharp fangs that protruded over its lower lip. Its horn was a serrated scimitar, caked with dried blood. Its thick hide, like leather armor, glistened in the sunlight, glittering the resplendent purple of kingship. Sharareh beheld it and understood why the storytellers called it the lord of the desert.

Sharareh has a simple choice: wait there on her knees for death in the form of the purple unicorn to come to her or to stand up and face what is coming on her feet. It may have been a simple choice but it was most definitely not an easy one knowing what she knew about what was bearing down on her.

It's hard to pick a second favorite story, so many of them are wonderful, so I'm going to stick with the one that affected me the most. It's an anthology well worth the time and money to read. And remember the proceeds go to a good cause, the scholarship to the Writing Superstars conference.

You can buy a copy of the anthology HERE

Book Review: The Dragon Business by Kevin J. Anderson

"The Dragon Business" by Kevin J. Anderson is a romp of a read. It's subject matter is the standard dragons and damsels seen in a much more comedic light. You start the book with King Cullin and his son, Maurice. King Cullin is hailed as a dragon slayer, but he fears his son will aspire to much less. So he means to tell him all about 'The Dragon Business'.

'The Dragon Business' is a con pulled off by Cullin and his friends Reeger and Sir Dalbry where Sir Dalbry offers his dragon slaying skills against a fake dragon created by Reeger. It's a lucrative con, but it runs into a problem when all of a sudden there is a real dragon involved. But before you get to the real dragon, you get a real princess, Princess Affonyl. She really doesn't want to be a princess, she was just born into the role. And as part of the role, she's been forced into an arranged marriage with a disreputable Duke Kerrl. Just at the time that Cullin and his group make it to her kingdom, she stages a dragon of her own to escape to freedom. It was all done very well with chiseled out dragon claw marks and a fantastic explosion.

Cullin and his group eventually find Affonyl and draw her into their game. That's when the real dragon rears its ugly head. Along with the real dragon come real knights to try and subdue it. That doesn't go quite according to plan. The dragon eats all but Sir Dalbry of the group of knights and Cullin manages to dispatch the creature after it's been made dull and slow by overeating.

For his good deed, Cullin is given the hand of a princess (not Affonyl) and finds out he really isn't cut out for being a prince. How he eventually becomes king is not covered, but Maurice is suitably impressed by the story of his father's life.

Reeger turned out to be my favorite character, he's a pragmatic cynic who deep down has a soft heart and great loyalty. He doesn't smell very nice or have good manners, but he is true to himself and his friends.

Pick up a copy of The Dragon Business on Amazon HERE