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Uncharted Seas: The Collected Jarl Furris and Coalbeard Adventures
Set sail with Captain Jarl Furris and Coalbeard the Dwarven sailor in a world of tall sailing ships, late Medieval-early Renaissance technology, maybe a little magic still, definitely dragons of a kind, fierce tribal clans of lizard men and Cyclopses, and an even fiercer race of Nordic-style Amazons called Valkyries.
196 pages, Paperback
Published April 3, 2019
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May 28, 2019
Uncharted Seas is a collection of five closely linked stories - each one longer than the one before (so like from a quick-paced 6-page short story to two very involved novellas by the end). Set in a world of sailing ships and city-states, the feeling is a little more like historical fiction than fantasy (there's no magic for example).
Jarl Furris begins as an unlucky ship captain for hire and rises and falls and rises and falls as the stories progress, always accompanied and supported by his devoted sidekick Coalbeard the dwarf. Jarl wins a few and loses a few and gets himself caught up in events and conspiracies way beyond what he's signed up for.
Each story is essentially a voyage, and while you'd think this would get formulaic and tedious, it doesn't - each one is very different in scope, mood, and the characters Jarl and Coalbeard deal with along the way. There are love interests, but kind of off-beat, and only one of the stories feels like a romance (the author actually states this is his personal least-fav).
There are non-human societies, some just touched on, but two more significant are the Valkyries - a Nordic-styled Amazon group that Jarl encounters in the very first story, and whose warrior Wurna plays a pretty big shaping role in everything that follows - and the Pride, a very intriguing tribe of cat-evolved thieves.
I'm being purposefully vague on story details so as not to spoil; I will say the first three stories were written much earlier than the last two, and they show it. Not to say they're not good, just that they show the author in an earlier state of development (the first story was originally published in 1987!) - they're fast-moving adventures without investing as much time in detail as the later two.
All in all, I found this collection to be very enjoyable, and more than I thought it would be.
Jarl Furris begins as an unlucky ship captain for hire and rises and falls and rises and falls as the stories progress, always accompanied and supported by his devoted sidekick Coalbeard the dwarf. Jarl wins a few and loses a few and gets himself caught up in events and conspiracies way beyond what he's signed up for.
Each story is essentially a voyage, and while you'd think this would get formulaic and tedious, it doesn't - each one is very different in scope, mood, and the characters Jarl and Coalbeard deal with along the way. There are love interests, but kind of off-beat, and only one of the stories feels like a romance (the author actually states this is his personal least-fav).
There are non-human societies, some just touched on, but two more significant are the Valkyries - a Nordic-styled Amazon group that Jarl encounters in the very first story, and whose warrior Wurna plays a pretty big shaping role in everything that follows - and the Pride, a very intriguing tribe of cat-evolved thieves.
I'm being purposefully vague on story details so as not to spoil; I will say the first three stories were written much earlier than the last two, and they show it. Not to say they're not good, just that they show the author in an earlier state of development (the first story was originally published in 1987!) - they're fast-moving adventures without investing as much time in detail as the later two.
All in all, I found this collection to be very enjoyable, and more than I thought it would be.
Displaying 1 of 1 review