Queen of the Dark Things audiobook

This is the second book about Dreams and Shadows that is (mostly) set in Austin, Texas. After the heartbreaking events at the end of book 1, we are now looking at the devastation 6 months later.Colby isn't doing so well. Guilt-ridden, he can't get over the fact that (view spoiler)[he wasn't able to save his best friend (hide spoiler)] despite his best efforts. It doesn't help that he is treated as the villain by almost everybody else. Into this "relaxed" atmosphere comes a woman seeking his help with a child-stealing ghost. But when Colby gets involved, as is his right according to the pact agreed on in the previous book (and, let's face it: human decency), the city isn't thrilled. And I mean "the city". *lol*But that is only the beginning and far from the worst. Because there are ominous shadows gathering and suddenly Colby is stalked by demons and even Dukes of Hell and although he doesn't want to be dragged into their mess, he once again doesn't really have a choice (which is why it's so infuriating to read about him getting all the blame). His past is haunting him now and we therefore get a good look at what happened about 11 years ago when they were in Australia on their trip of Yasher showing young Colby "everything" (I did wonder if (view spoiler)[the author had included that hint about Australia having gone dark and being out of the picture (hide spoiler)] in the previous book on purpose because he knew already where he'd take the story - if so, me likey very mucho). Simultaneously, we're also back in the here and now in Austin, where the threat looms large, and Colby races to find a solution that means he and maybe even someone else can survive the upcoming encounter, even if it also means having to cooperate with creatures like Rhiannon (the crone).Here is irrefutable proof that Cargill is indeed an enchanting author, that the first book wasn't just a fluke. The second volume is quite different - both the actual tale and how it is told - but there is still the same beautifully magical tone to it that lures you in like a siren lures the sailor, there is still breathtaking action that leaves you on the edge of your seat throughout the timelines, there are still incredibly vivid characters that make you cry and rage and laugh uncontrollably. Such a character, by the way, was Gossamer (the Golden Retriever). But I was also very pleased to have Yasher back, albeit in a smaller role than before. Overall, I think one of the things I liked so much was that all the characters are important, nobody is just background decoration. And oh, did my heart break yet again! After the beginning of the book, I had actually thought this one might be lighter for some reason, but of course it wasn't. It wouldn't be a proper fairytale if it didn't kill you at least 3 times before breakfast. However, it is remarkable how the author does it. He doesn't just crudely kill someone off for cheap effect, no. That would be unskillful and he definitely isn't that. Instead, he made the very fabric of the story in a clever and cunning way, toying with the readers as Coyote, any of the Clever Men or Austin manipulate people. Sometimes you see it coming but hope against hope, sometimes you are blindsided. But always is it done with craft.The way the story was told was once again a puzzle, the pieces falling into place one after the other, but the timeline worked a little different than with the mosaic from the first volume and that made for a nice change while keeping it familiar enough.Moreover, the author has proven twice now just how well he knows different kinds of mythology. In this case, it's mostly Aboriginal mythology. Thus, on top of the creatures we already got to know in Austin and the Limestone Kingdom, we also got Clever Men, crows, kangaroos that are more than just kangaroos, pirates, shadows, bunyips and more here. I seriously adored him stepping through trees with us readers, taking us on the long walk, dreamwalking, and letting us experience this slightly different magical world with its unique set of creatures in such a wonderful way.I've said it in my review for the first book already and will gladly repeat myself here: Cargill is a master storyteller, who not only is a talented writer but an equally wonderful weaver of tales, creating his very own deep and rich fairytale world that is woven into our modern one. So much so that I hope there will be more books in this series (though chances are slim as this book was released back in 2014 already, but one should never give up hope).

What can I say? I'm a HUGE FAN of Cargill. The first book in the Dreams & Shadows was freaking brilliant, full of fae and magic, jinn and coyote. All the dark things were front and center. The eating and the eaten. Colby the little kid and Colby the adult was brilliant.This second book carries Colby along his destiny. Extraordinary magician, keeper of Austin, TX, bane of the fae, drinker of the not quite great hooch. He does what he does for good reasons and yet he's proven himself one of the damned. I feel for him. Every step of the way, I've felt for him. The wish from his best friend, the jinn, has brought him around the world to see all the magical things in it. He was also given the power to shape reality. This is no small thing.In this book, we wrap ourselves in the Dreamtime. We hang out in Australia a bit. We get ourselves enmeshed in good friends and horrible choices and demons. Lots and lots of demons. 72 of them. And the best part? Solomon's Ring. :)This book is SUPER rich with mythology. Like, you can wallow in it, love every magical reference, and sink your teeth into really great plot. And not only that, every character is a fantastic treat. :)I think of this as a combination Gaiman (as per American Gods), Cat Valente (for her prose poetry) and even a bit of Kevin Hearne thrown in. And not just for his UF, but for the great mythology.As such, I'm completely head-over-heels in love with it.Mythopunk. :) Easily, this is gonna be one of my all time favorites.

Thoughts to come.I am not ready to say goodbye to Colby and Yashar ffs

Reality-based fantasy is a rough genre for me. When you have fairies and trolls and wizards and Keeblers operating in real-life places and interacting with "normal" people, the tropes that we accept in more fantasy-based fantasy look less like the fantastic and more like the lazy. Gandalf shows up in Lord of the Rings, casts some Deusicus Exicus Machinacus bullshit, and we just nod and turn the page, because the whole POINT of fantasy is that anything can happen. It's fantastic!But in order to have that shit fly in reality-based, modern-day fantasy, one of two things has to be firmly in place. Either the rules of the universe have to be clearly established and unbreakable, or the writer has to be so goddamn good that you'll accept anything he dishes out. C. Robert Cargill is that goddamn good. In lesser hands, I probably would have rolled my eyes so hard that I'd turn dyslexic every time some dipshit rules about demons were discussed and then subsequently broken. Instead, I happily buckled in, enjoyed the ride and forgot that Neil Gaiman ever existed. Cargill somehow makes dumbfuck fantasy gobbledygook seem real, with real stakes. And he does it in a story that has GENIES in it. The man's a magician.

This book isn't as great as the first book of the series Dreams and Shadows but I like how it takes on faerie lore, myths and supernatural creatures. The author, Mr. Cargill really did build a world full of imagination whilst basing his world upon ancient folklore and myths.Most of the characters are doing great, really; although by the middle of the book the story starts to get a bit dragged and losing a bit of its focus--too many sub-plots, too many supernatural creatures showing up, too many schemes, too many players in the game, I guess? Still I'm eagerly waiting for Mr. Cargill's new works.

I loved the first book and this follow up definitely lived up to it. Cargill has a dark dark imagination. He has built a world filled with magical creatures and demons full of not just a well thought out mythology but a science system of sorts and sll this sitting alongside our own world. The evilness flowing through this world alongside an extremely interesting main character, Colby Stephens , coming together in a fantasticaly well planned plot results in a brilliant book. The new demons appearing in this book are a great addition and the extra depth to Colbys background fleshes out the character well.This is shaping into a great series

This was the 2nd book. Not sure if there’s to be another. I wasn’t sure I was going to like it as much as the first when I started reading , but this author really is a magician. The way everything gets introduced and wound together, only to be sling- shorted loose the last 150 pages or so. Completely brilliant. Loved it.

In the first book, Dreams and Shadows, a young Colby wishes himself into a world of the supernatural and magic and causes a showdown against the fairy realm. In Queen of the Dark Things, Colby must face the consequences of another choice he made as a child when he did not save a young dreamwalking girl Kaycee. This time he is facing off against demons in addition to his past.This was one of the rare sequels I liked better than the first novel. Parts of the story were predictable but the story was still engaging. While everything was tied up cleanly at the end, I hope there are further novels in this series.

Brilliant - just brilliant. This is largely a placeholder review (which I will forget to ever change, so y'know, just read the first three words again.)

The end of the first book Dreams and Shadows left me in a fury. I needed to know what was going to happen with Colby after the loss of his best friend, Ewan, but I had to wait a whole year to find out, however this one gave me everything I wanted and more. We find the wizard Colby wallowing in guilt, we meet the avatar for the city of Austin and a young Australian girl caught in the web of demons and blaming Colby for putting her there. It will take all of Colby’s wizard skills and a ton of tricky tact and diplomacy to make a bargain with demons and djinn that will see him live through this. The ending is masterfully contrived to tie up every loose end and the big question is – can Coyote be trusted? Read it and find out.

I thoroughly enjoyed this, which was a bit of a surprise, to be honest. I read and enjoyed CRC's Sea of Rust, which was a well-paced and occasionally thought-provoking action thriller in science fiction garb, so chanced my arm with this. I only realised afterwards that this is actually a sequel to the author's very first novel, but it stood on its own two feet very capably. Fantasy written in a present-day setting is not normally my thing, as it has to utilise the invisible and dream worlds to skirt around the lack of the obvious. Fantasy involving demons and angels is DEFINITELY not my thing. The horror of Dan Brown's putrid prose put me off that genre for life. Thankfully, the start of this book was sufficiently obscure and interesting to grab my attention before the devils started waving their forked tails. The book is set predominantly in the present day but also to a lesser extent in the near past, yet begins in the 1600s. These separate timelines aren't immediately apparent, but the author doesn't fall into the trap of using too many timelines and introducing too many characters, which usually just adds confusion and dilutes interest. We mostly stick with our small set of protagonists, allowing them to be engagingly fleshed-out. I like strong characters. I also very much liked the use of aboriginal mythology as its fantastical grounding, rather than the usual Christian, Norse or Hellenistic (no offence intended to any believers in any of the above). It was novel - to me, at least - and pitched perfectly; detailed enough to be interesting, yet not so heavy as to feel like a text book.So far, so three-point-five-star. What elevated this book above the norm was its excellent pacing and use of language. Taking the latter first, crude prose makes my blood boil, and no amount of fascinating material can offset poor writing. No strangled sentences here. As for the former, the pacing was wonderful. Tedious plodding towards a rushed finale? No - each chapter served to reveal and entice in equal measure, adding impetus yet tempering the urge to rush ahead by gently shedding light on previous material, requiring pause to consider. By the book's final chapters all loose ends had been effortlessly tied.In short - excellent. I look forward to the next.

After reading his debut novel, ‘Dreams and Shadows’, I was very eager to jump back into the mystical world created by C. Robert Cargill. This sequel is perhaps not as strong as the previous entry but it does make up for it with its ambition.Once again we follow Colby Stevens as he navigates the dangerous world of magic and monsters that hides in plain site in Austin, Texas. We also get to see one of Colby’s adventures he had with Djinn, Yashar when he was a child, taking him to Australia where we learn about the creatures there and how the magic introduced in the first book is used differently in the outback. We also slightly follow Kaycee Looes, a young Australian girl who discovers the supernatural world due to her ability of leaving her body when she dreams.What makes this book interesting isn’t just the new creatures and magical concepts that the new location introduces but also with the demons that Colby encounters. These demons want something from Colby and it links back to the events that took place in Australia years ago. The seventy two demons also offer a look into the larger parts of the supernatural world that the ones we’re already familiar with are afraid of, things which I feel were merely hinted at in the previous book.The biggest problem I have with ‘Queen of the Dark Things’ is the pacing. We begin with Colby in the modern day where he is still mentally recovering from the events of ‘Dreams and Shadows’ and is being drawn into a bigger conflict, we are then dragged away from that in what feels like a very large flashback to the events of young Colby in Australia. The flashback sequence is important to the story, it very much is needed and I think the story would suffer without it but it really slows down the book for me and takes you out of the mid point of the story to drop you into a new one, even if they do link back together. The final act really regains momentum as Colby works with the bizarre supernatural spirits to stop the oncoming threat.Despite my pacing issues with this book, I still applaud it as a fantastic piece of urban fantasy and I look forward to Cargill’s next instalment of this series.

It's funny that on my review of the first book, Dreams & Shadows, my main complaint was that there was a flash-forward and we missed out on the early years of Colby as a young wizard. Well, we get plenty of that in this book.Well, what insight we get of a young Colby is mainly via flashbacks, but it was enough to give us a background as to what kind of things shaped Colby into the adult that he is for the majority of the two books. But, that's not the point of the book, though.This book starts of with the legendary "La Llorona" of Texas-Mexican fame. Actually, the legend of La Llorona is of Mexican origin, but the legend is well known throughout Texas that it has been adopted as a local legend in the state.After Colby's encounter with La Llorona, we find Colby encountering an entity that goes by "Austin". The Limestone Kingdom is still there and Colby fashions himself to be the savior of the city of Austin from any ill intentioned characters from the Limestone Kingdom. However, Colby is unaware that he is not the most powerful person in the area and his actions put him on notice.This book, however, has Colby facing old faces. He once again has to face the consequences of past actions and we get to see exactly what actions he took that created the consequences he is forced to face.We are taken back to when Colby was younger and a trip to Australia that he made. He is put into the care of the "Clever Man" and what was supposed to be a pleasurable trip turns into a series of disasters where he is forced, or manipulated, to take action. Those actions lead to him facing the dreaded 72 Demons and a familiar friend turned foe.There is so much more happening in this book that opens up the world that Cargill has created. In particular, I love what he has done with Australia. I love how Australia is created to be the oldest region in the world and is home to some of the strongest and strangest magic.This was a book I enjoyed through and through and I can't wait for the follow up.

Full review (and more ) up on my blog: http://bit.ly/2uxz95hThis was such an odd moment for me. I actually liked the sequel more than I liked the first book? How often does that happen? I genuinely can’t think of an example…maybe let me know if you can.Where the first book was tied into a lot of Irish and English folklore, this book actually looks a lot more at the folklore from the Aboriginal people of Australia. While this does obviously create some issues as to the sensitivity of the way these cultures are handled and portrayed I didn’t notice anything that made me think that these stories were dealt with in an insensitive way (as ever please do correct me if I am wrong).Much like the first book, this story is interrupted at various points by excerpts from fictional academic works. I really liked the use of this in this particular book because, unlike the first novel, I didn’t feel like I was being bashed over the head with how clever and well researched the author is. Rather I felt like it was saying ‘look how interesting this is don’t you want to learn what I have learned’ which is much nicer.What I think really made this book better than the first is that the focus was on Colby, a character I grew to care about a lot more than Ewan in the first book, it also adds more characters who fascinated me and drew me in. This is how you do a second book people! You improve upon the things that were perhaps not perfect in the first.I actually think I might recommend reading this book first before reading Dreams and Shadows. Both of them work as standalone novels and you could certainly only read this one if you wanted. But I do think this is worth reading if you’re interested in exploring a new avenue of folklore.My rating: 4/5 stars (for reference, I gave Dreams and Shadows 3/5 stars)

Back in 2017, my closest friend loaned me a copy of Dreams and Shadows and it was the book that changed my life. I had only ever read one book to completion before then. One book, in 21 years. Dreams and Shadows made me rediscover reading in a way that I never thought words on paper could do. And this, Queen of the Dark Things, is the work of wonder continued. When I finished Dreams and Shadows, I immediately placed an amazon order for Queen of The Dark Things. But I had to leave it a little while before opening it because I had to process the story, I was feeling it on such a deep emotional level. I'm a very slow reader. But I have to feel what I'm reading to be able to enjoy it properly, so basically it can take me months to fully finish a book, but I'm grateful for that because its less like chugging down a beer and more like savoring a wine. Sips, not gulps. Anyway, back to the book. If you enjoyed Dreams and Shadows, the last thing you want to do is leave it there. This is a triumph and C. Robert Cargill has outdone himself. I want to write something amazing about this book but I feel as though almost anything I say will be a spoiler, but if I try and censor myself, I might sell it short and I don't want to do that! So I will do my best. This is a very eventful continuation of Colby's magical but troublesome life. I thought what he went through before was bad, but the painful choices he had to make in this... harrowing. Parts of the book visit Colby's younger days and they add to his character and also develop new ones, this was something that I was hoping for and I was certainly not disappointed. The drama and mysticism of this new threat that Colby faces is terrifying but gripping... Really looking forward to reading The Coyote Laughs Last. I'm not great at writing reviews but C. Robert Cargill if you're reading this please don't ever stop writing.

I really enjoyed C. Robert Cargill's debut effort, Dreams and Shadows, with its creepy fairies and fascinating world building. To be honest, I thought it was a standalone work, so it was a pleasant surprise to find there was a book two.The second book moves away from the fairies and into demons, and although I miss the creepy, horrible fairies, the multitude of demonic creatures more than fill the gap.Everything that made the first book great is here again in spades - the world Colby lives in is explored in more detail, and remains a fascinating place to exist in for a few hundred pages. The plot twists and turns so much it walks a fine line between 'rollercoaster' and 'unfollowable' - though it manages always to stay on the right side of that line - and the characters are colourful, varied and interesting.I loved the ghosts looking for their lost hands, I loved all the different demons, and I loved how, even though you knew there was going to be a positive resolution, that it wasn't immediately clear how that was going to happen until the very end when everything that had been mentioned in the novel clicked together in a really satisfying way.This didn't quite blow me away '5 stars' worth, however. Not really sure why - it didn't quite have the same page turning ferocity of the first novel. Perhaps it's just because it is familiar now, and not the brand new experience it was the first time round. Anyway, it's a minor niggle in an otherwise fantastic book that I thoroughly enjoyed.