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Kindred: The Embraced is something I think was fairly unique in its time… a television series (or, arguably, soap opera) based on a roleplaying game. Specifically, based on White Wolf’s Storyteller system, the first game in which was Vampire: The Masquerade. As you might expect from such a humble beginning, this series wasn’t exactly the best thing on TV. Even so, it wasn’t awful. The series lasted for 6 episodes and was not renewed.

Disaster. Betrayed by the rulers of Taglios at the very gates of the Glittering Plain, betrayed again as those few surviving members of the Old Company are just beginning to explore the mysteries they have long sought. Only Goblin and One-Eye of the Old Company have escaped the trap, joining with their Taglian brothers to continue the battle. Water Sleeps, the Book of Sleepy, details that struggle as it takes on the quality of a guerilla war.

The Silver Gryphon is the third book in Lackey’s Mage Wars trilogy, which itself is an attempt to fill in some major backstory to her Valdemar universe. It’s not particularly memorable, and there are few ties to the larger world and story of Valdemar itself. Even if you’ve read the first two books in this trilogy, you’re safe skipping this one. It’s really bad, but in an inoffensive way.

Etjole Ehomba is just a herder of sheep and cattle among the small tribe of the Naumkib. When strange-looking foreigners wash up mostly dead on the beach near their village, Etjole is suddenly propelled on a journey of unknown (but presumably high) difficulty by the dying charge of one of the light-skinned strangers. Taking up a quest to rescue a woman he has never met from an evil that has already claimed dozens, if not hundreds of lives of those who have already tried, Etjole seems completely outmatched.

The Black Company opened Glen Cook’s dark military fantasy with a flood of smoke and flame. The story continues in Shadows Linger, as the Black Company begins to learn the dirty little secret the Lady left in her grave when an unwitting wizard freed her. If the Lady is a merciless, uncaring tyrant, than the Dominator cares very, very much about the betrayal that left him trapped. And not in a loving, tender sort of way.

The Family Trade is probably best described as a unusual take on the usual sort of crossover story. The heroine, a trade journalist who has just uncovered the details of a massive money laundering scheme, finds herself at loose ends when her magazine’s ownership turns out to be involved. As if avoiding the mafia and finding a new job wasn’t enough to worry about, her adoptive parents finally reveal the details of her birth family, along with her mother’s personal effects and newspaper articles suggesting she was murdered, with a sword, in the middle of a 20th century city.

In his Tales of the Otori series, Lian Hearn presents a vision of Japan passed through a lens of subtle distortion. The main character, Tomasu/Takeo, has ties to three factions: the noble clan Otori, whose head rescued him from the destruction of his village; the persecuted religious cult of the Hidden, who believe in a deity that holds all men equal, and who raised him; and the Tribe, a faction of secretive assassins and magicians, from whom his father came.

Like the movie Highlander 2, fans consider Tehanu to be a novel that doesn’t exist. The original EarthSea trilogy (A Wizard of EarthSea, The Tombs of Atuan, and The Farthest Shore) represented a glorious and powerful work of fantasy literature, with depth of character and emotion, powerful themes, and a joy in the simple things that are the greatest mysteries. Tehanu is a novel written explicitly to destroy everything that was good about that trilogy.

The final installment of the Catechist trilogy isn’t much different from the previous volumes, other than a few twists at the end. Etjole, Simna, Hunkapa, and Alitah cross an ocean and a salt plain, do battle with a townful of demons and a forestful of undead, and make an agonizingly easy entrance into Hymneth the Possessed’s stronghold. Aside from not having read the Evil Overlord List, Hymneth actually does have some character depth, though this is not really explored.

Fans of the vampire genre and anime have both embraced Vampire Hunter D, the tale of a conflicted vampire hunter in a far-future world where a nobility made up of vampires rule a distinctly more supernatural and dangerous earth. A bizarre mix of magic and technology allows humans to hold their own against the monsters, but when especially powerful monsters are involved, they must turn to the specialists. Want to know about vampires?