[09] Voltaire's Adventures Before Candide by Martin Gibbs review, guest post and INTERNATIONAL GIVEAWAY of The Spaces Between

Read this post and find the giveaway at the end :)

Voltaire's Adventures Before Candide 

by Martin Gibbs

(2012)

This is seriously bizarro space fantasy. It revolves around wacky adventures, space and time travel, characters with ridiculous names, and random stream-of-unconsciousness blather.

Voltaire is the hero in this short adventure. With his cleaver (which he did not have in 1484), and his amazingly versatile and ill-described spacecraft, he launches into the greater unknown to save the universe. Or to get a story idea. Or maybe he just wants a nice warm meal. Who knows. The author sure doesn't have a clue.

You will find yourself stranded in a world of complete weirdness. Hang on. I'm not sure where the exits are.

Sane people won't read it, insane people won't understand it. 

I had to read Candide for my literature classes, then I got review request from Martin. I'm still not sure which book was better.

Voltaire's adventures before Candide are trully bizarre. Nothing there makes sense, but yet... Everything is connected. I stopped reading few times just to wonder - is it really so meaningless? 

It's not. It takes your mind off the screaming hell that is reality, author said. And it's true.

It is harmful for sane people, but I'm not sane. You will realise that you're not sane too after reading this story.

It's witty for sure, has some scenes that are hard to describe, but it's perfectly written... And shows you that Voltaire didn't have sanity in 1484.

TIME FOR GUEST POST BY MARTIN :)

The Sane... and the Rest of Us

Thank you so much, Disincentive for allowing me to post!

Voltaire's Adventures was one of those stories that was very therapeutic for me to write, because I could let go of my tenuous grasp on reality and just have fun. But, you wonder, isn't that what fantasy is for? Yes, but fantasy still has to fit into some sort of mold that connects it to reality—it would not make sense for Rand al'Thor to suddenly be assaulted by a pink unicorn wearing a mongoose costume. That would surely rock the house, but it would also lose 98% of readership. 

That is why the strange and bizarre will always hold a dear place in my heart. Or my head. Or whatever counts for a brain. We need stories like "Death by Zamboni" and "Lost in Cat Brain World" , as much as we need Candide, Jane Eyre, and Tennyson.Reality is wide-awake nightmare full of scary people, senseless violence, and complete random garbage. Fiction, fantasy, heck, even romance, are great escapes from that world. But so often those genres still tie back to reality and our "real" world—I do it with my own fantasy work, and Jordan and others have done likewise. When you can't escape reality with fantasy, you need the insane.  

For the readers out there: I encourage you to take that leap and try something so utterly crazy that you'll wonder which end is up. When you open the garage door, you'll take a step back, wondering if that door will open to reveal a giant cesspit full of oversized leeches named Solomon. Try it, you'll like it. 

And for writers, it doesn't hurt to go absolute stream-of-consciousness and spew out a word salad full of absolutely absurdist craziness. You might hit upon something, the next Hunger Games... or, well, probably not. But it will be fun! Is there a point to any of this?No. 

Well, maybe. Authors create wonderful worlds, worlds intended to take us away from ours. But too often those constructed realities are far too close to our own that we cannot fully escape because we keep drawing parallels. That has its place and I don't see any real harm in it, unless you truly want to escape. And so there is a time and place for bizarro, as wacky as it can get.It keeps us insane people well away from all of those sane folks.   

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(And talking about fantasy mimicking reality: The magic system in the fantasy book is more like a hybrid of quantum, nuclear, and particle physics as opposed to just pretty streaks of lightning).

Twitter: @MartinGibbs2

FB: http://facebook.com/drunkardsjourney

My blog: http://drunkardsjourney.blogspot.com

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Okay, I know you have been waiting  for this. Voltaire's Adventures is .99 and is in the KDP select program, so it will go free often. The next free day is April 21, 2012. That’s why Marin is offering to giveaway his fantasy novel, The Spaces Between.

Seems good, huh? I haven't read it, but I'd love to. You have a chance anyway!

You can win it by simply using the Rafflecopter. If you have any problems, tell me.

This giveaway is INTERNATIONAL and there will be ONE(1) winner who can choose to get Kindle gifted or paperback copy of The Spaces Between! And yes, international readers can choose paperback copy too, as Martin offered to ship it anywhere (just not to Pluto, I guess). Amazing, right?

I know you love free books, so what are you waiting for? J Leave a comment for author too!

The Spaces Between
by Marin Gibbs

A brazen mercenary believes he can learn magic from an exiled warlock. Not content with taking along experienced help, he enlists Zhy, the town drunk, to escort him on his journey. Convinced he is part of some misdirected script, Zhy joins the strange quest, hoping only to keep the ale flowing. However, the pair is soon saddled with an aloof and peculiar companion, and the three find themselves fighting demons, elite assassins, the elements, and each other. An idiot man-child follows, guided by Zhy’s dead father, who hopes he can keep Zhy away from the threshold of Hell. Sadly, each man is only a pawn in a wicked scheme.

This giveaway is sponsored by the author and prize will be emailed or shipped to the winner by author, too.
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