Stoneskin's Revenge

David Sullivan #5

by Tom Deitz

Stoneskin's Revenge (Paperback) by Tom Deitz

Genres: Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, Mythology, Fiction, Science Fiction Fantasy, Adventure

10 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1991

About the author

Thomas Franklin Deitz (January 17, 1952- April 27, 2009) was an American novelist from Georgia. He had a B.A. and M.A. in medieval English from University of Georgia. He was the author of the "Soulsmith Trilogy," comprised of the books Soulsmith , Dreambuilder , and Wordwright . He also wrote a popular series consisting of Windmaster's Bane , Fireshaper's Doom , Darkthunder's Way , Sunshaker's War , Stoneskin's Revenge , Ghostcountry's Wrath , Dreamseeker's Road , Landslayer's Law , and Warstalker's Track . His stand-alone novel The Gryphon King centers around a few of the characters from the later novels in the last series mentioned.

Deitz also won the Phoenix Award in 2007. This award is given at the annual DeepSouthCon to a professional who has done a great deal for Southern Fandom.

Deitz was a well-liked college instructor as well, with stints as an adjunct English faculty member at Gainesville State College, Lanier Tech, and Tri-County Community College, and received a tenure-track appointment as assistant professor in Fall 2008 at Gainesville State College. He was recognized as GSC's adjunct faculty member of the year in 2008.

In addition to writing, Deitz's creative outlets included visual art (murals, fantasy art, and more); drama (with minor roles in a number of community and college productions); model automobile collecting; costumery; and other pursuits via the Society for Creative Anachronism. He was a founding member of the SCA's Barony of Bryn Madoc.

Deitz died on Monday, April 27 2009 of heart failure. He had a heart attack in January of this year and was a candidate to receive a Ventricular assist device (VAD) but had suffered too much damage to his heart for the device to be implanted.
(From Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Josh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid entry in this series, but I haven't read anything in it for quite some time, so it felt a little disconnected. The focus on Calvin is an interesting divergence, bringing a supporting character to the fore for essentially a solo outing.

This one focuses more on Cherokee magical traditions and lore, and it's pretty interesting overall. Calvin is a solid lead, someone still trying to figure out his place in the world and what his role and responsibilities are. Not sure all of the emotional responses hit the right beats (or land as hard as maybe they should) but he's got a bit of a spider-man appeal to him.

The supporting cast is a bit weaker, unfortunately, with a fair number of people swirling in but having minimal impact in terms of narrative weight. There's a lot of plot aspects going on, but things like police brutality are casually tossed into the mix with little comment. And several people are way too accepting of the magical aspects intruding into their mundane lives considering they've literally never truly experienced it directly before.

But it's still solid, and Deitz is good at digging into differing magical traditions and working them into a modern setting.

[James Noyes · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book picks up where the fourth book left off, but it focuses on Calvin. So this book focuses more on his story and his mythology.