CSFF Blog Tour-Storm Siren, Day 1

This month the CSFF Blog Tour is featuring Storm Siren by Mary Weber. Although the publisher doesn’t list this book as geared toward a young adult audience, the Library Journal review labeled it as appropriate for grade 8 and up.

I also haven’t seen any genre label other than fantasy. It’s not dystopian or post-apocalyptic, it’s not fairy tale fantasy or urban fantasy, and it’s not really epic fantasy either. It dawned on me somewhere in the middle of the book that it’s more nearly like a superhero story—a fantasy style X-Men, but without the comic book feel.

There are a number of similarities, at least on the surface. Though I’m fairly ignorant of the X-Men stories, I noted that there’s persecution of the “mutants,” there’s a place where these people with superpowers—in Mary Weber’s world, called Elementals—are being trained so they learn how to control their powers, and there’s a powerful Elemental with borderline telepathic ability who can manipulate others to a degree.

But this story is still a fantasy, so the world has a medieval feel, though there’s the introduction of some weapons technology that plays a key part in the plot. In other words, Storm Siren is a unique blend of superhero and fantasy genres.

The book has been out since August 2014, and during this time it has garnered considerable attention. There are reviews and author interviews all over the web.

Happily, book two in this series, Siren’s Fury, is scheduled for release in June, so the CSFF Blog Tour comes at a great time to draw attention once again to Mary Weber and to her debut novel.

Recently Weber wrote a guest post for Speculative Faith, sharing a little about the inspiration for her characters and a bit more about her life apart from writing.

The tour is well underway, so I invite you to stop by the blogs of these CSFF participants and see what all they have to say about Storm Siren. As usual, a check mark links to a tour post. You might especially be interested in Julie Bihn‘s comments on costumes and the ending of this first installment in the series or Phyllis Wheeler‘s remarks after reading the book a second time.

√ √ Julie Bihn
Lauren Bombardier
√ Beckie Burnham
√ Vicky DealSharingAunt
George Duncan
April Erwin
√ Carol Gehringer
√ Victor Gentile
Ryan Heart
√ Timothy Hicks
√ Janeen Ippolito
Carol Keen
Emileigh Latham
√ Simone Lilly-Egerter
√ √ Jennette Mbewe
√ √ Shannon McDermott
√ √ Meagan @ Blooming with Books
√ Joan Nienhuis
√ Nissa
Jalynn Patterson
√ √ Audrey Sauble
√ Chawna Schroeder
Jojo Sutis
√ Steve Trower
√ Phyllis Wheeler
√ Michelle R. Wood