Critiques en avant-premièreMark Lawrence

Available as mobi, ePub, and kindle. David Gemmell passed away in 2006, leaving behind a legacy of memorable characters, epic settings, and thrilling tales. In 2008 a group of fellow writers and friends led by Deborah J Miller and Stan Nicholls founded the David Gemmell Legend Award in his honour. In 2013, NewCon Press released Legends, an anthology of original stories by some of today’s leading fantasy authors in honour of a man whose work has so inspired them. We are now proud to announce Legends II, featuring an all new cast of distinguished authors in a volume that fully lives up to the high standards of its predecessor. As with the first volume, Legends 2 acts as a fundraiser for the David Gemmell Awards. Welcome to the land of Legends… Contents: 1. Introduction – Stan Nicholls 2. The Blessed and the Cursed – Gav Thorpe 3. A Rescue – Mark Lawrence 4. The Lowest Place – Edward Cox 5. The Giant’s Lady – Rowena Cory Daniells 6. An Oath Given – John Gwynne 7. The Singer – Stella Gemmell 8. Sandrunners – Anthony Ryan 9. Smokestack Lightning – Gavin Smith 10. Oak – Lou Morgan 11. An Owl in Moonlight – Freda Warrington 12. Heaven of Animals – John Hornor Jacobs 13. The Iron Wolves: Retribution – Andy Remic 14. About the Authors

A Goodreads Choice Award nominee for King of Thorns, fantasy author Mark Lawrence presents Prince of Fools, the first book in his Red Queen’s War series. Set in the bloody Broken Empire, the tale follows the exploits of Prince Jalan Kendeth—the Red Queen’s grandson and a decadent philanderer. As he fights against enemies of the Empire, Jalan realizes he is merely a pawn in the Red Queen’s game. Fantasy Hailed as “epic fantasy on a George R. R. Martin scale, but on speed” (Fixed on Fantasy), the Broken Empire trilogy introduced a bold new world of dark fantasy with the story of Jorg Ancrath’s devastating rise to power. Now, Mark Lawrence returns to the Broken Empire with the tale of a less ambitious prince … The Red Queen is old but the kings of the Broken Empire dread her like no other. For all her reign, she has fought the long war, contested in secret, against the powers that stand behind nations, for higher stakes than land or gold. Her greatest weapon is The Silent Sister—unseen by most and unspoken of by all. The Red Queen’s grandson, Prince Jalan Kendeth—drinker, gambler, seducer of women—is one who can see The Silent Sister. Tenth in line for the throne and content with his role as a minor royal, he pretends that the hideous crone is not there. But war is coming. Witnesses claim an undead army is on the march, and the Red Queen has called on her family to defend the realm. Jal thinks it’s all a rumor—nothing that will affect him—but he is wrong. After escaping a death trap set by the Silent Sister, Jal finds his fate magically intertwined with a fierce Norse warrior. As the two undertake a journey across the Empire to undo the spell, encountering grave dangers, willing women, and an upstart prince named Jorg Ancrath along the way, Jalan gradually catches a glimmer of the truth: he and the Norseman are but pieces in a game, part of a series of moves in the long war—and the Red Queen controls the board.

Prince of Thorns is the first volume in a powerful new epic fantasy trilogy, original, absorbing and challenging. Before the thorns taught me their sharp lessons and bled weakness from me I had but one brother, and I loved him well. But those days are gone and what is left of them lies in my mother's tomb. Now I have many brothers, quick with knife and sword, and as evil as you please. We ride this broken empire and loot its corpse. They say these are violent times, the end of days when the dead roam and monsters haunt the night. All that's true enough, but there's something worse out there, in the dark. Much worse. From being a privileged royal child, raised by a loving mother, Jorg Ancrath has become the Prince of Thorns, a charming, immoral boy leading a grim band of outlaws in a series of raids and atrocities. The world is in chaos: violence is rife, nightmares everywhere. Jorg has the ability to master the living and the dead, but there is still one thing that puts a chill in him. Returning to his father's castle Jorg must confront horrors from his childhood and carve himself a future with all hands turned against him. Mark Lawrence's debut novel tells a tale of blood and treachery, magic and brotherhood and paints a compelling and brutal, and sometimes beautiful, picture of an exceptional boy on his journey toward manhood and the throne.