The Game Bird

Longlisted for the Booknest 2018 Fantasy Awards - Best Debut NovelSPFBO 2018 Semi-Finalist"...I loved it - The Game Bird is intricately constructed, intelligently written and just a fabulous page-turner."An evil is growing. The Realm is under attack. A leviathan has risen from the depths and is destroying the fleets that feed Stormhaven.Stuck ashore and drowning in debt, Captain James Faulkner resolves to hunt the sea monster and claim the enormous bounty on the beast.Sophia Blake's life looks effortless. But she carries a secret, an occult curse that is capable of destroying both her and her nation. Sophia knows her time is running out.The Tallowman is a slowly decaying melding of demon and man. This monstrous assassin is desperate to capture Sophia and will let nothing stand between it and its prey.Since his wife died, the sober lawyer Uriah Blake has wanted nothing more than to live a quiet life and enjoy what time he has left with his daughter, Sophia. When he learns that the Tallowman is pursuing her, he is forced to cast aside his books and his ink and join a shadowy war against a terrible foe.As these hunts build to their shattering conclusion, Faulkner, Sophia and Uriah will be thrown together and forced to confront malevolent forces beyond their imagining.The Game Bird is a swashbuckling black powder fantasy, wrapped around a spine of darkness.This superb debut will appeal to readers who like the idea of a novel that Georgette Heyer, Scott Lynch, Patrick O'Brian and George R R Martin might have come up with - if they were trapped in an open boat together.