June had an excellent roundup of new stuff! We’ve got everything - rereleases, weird questionable games, new romances and period pieces...
Masquerade by Jeanette Battista is a retelling of the original story with multiple changes, including Christine being the one who rescues the Phantom from captivity in a carnival, her history as a con artist who shenanigans her way into her role in the opera, and the conflict between Raoul and Erik being a rivalry she has intentionally set up to help her career. An interesting new take.
A Strange Duet by Alyssa B. Coles is the sequel to her previous A Cacophanous Melody, in which Erik and Christine meet years later at Carnivale in Venice and perhaps rekindle a long-dead relationship.
Clockwork Phantom by Cecilia Dominic is a steampunk version of the story in which the protagonist falls in love with a violinist Raoul character while being stalked by a Phantom and trapped at the opera while the Prussian siege of Paris prevents anyone from leaving. And, of course, there’s steampunk stuff happening, like mechanical animals and aether-based magic. It’s the second in a series, but it looks like the series focuses on the steampunk rather than the Phantom elements.
The Spellbinder’s Sonata by Stephanie Keyes is another one of those stories calling itself a cross between the Phantom story and the Beauty & the Beast fable; semi-modern-day, it involves an honest-to-god ghostly Phantom and a woman whose ambitions to be a professional clarinetist may be either supported or stymied by his eldritch influence.
His Dark Obsession by Jenna K. Lawson is a period retelling of the story in which Christine was not able to become an opera singer, but still falls in love again with her childhood sweetheart Raoul and becomes the focus of the Phantom’s obsession as a nobody accompanist. It says it’s more horror- and drama-focused than the usual adaptation!
The Phantom’s Lady by Maryann Sires is set in the 1920s, Depression-era New York, with a female protagonist, a run-down destroyed theater that burned down some years before, and a Phantom that doesn’t want it reactivated. Possibly a sort of sequel to an original Phantom story; it says it’s “faith-based”, although which faith that is is not elaborated on.
Masquerade by Amanda Ashley is a rerelease of a short story from way back in 1994, and it perfectly captures the early 1990s vampire Phantom story zeitgeist. Read it and bask.
The Music of the Night by Amanda Ashley is also a short story rerelease, just as 1990s, just as based on Lloyd Webber’s musical (which is literally in the story), and just as delightfully romance-novel corny.
Phantom Detectives from Happy Games is a Chinese board game in which players attempt to discover the secret identity of the Phantom (or, directly translated, SKULL KING which is amazing), while one player who takes on that role tries to stop them. It’s hard to tell from the translations if it’s really Phantom-related, but that cover art definitely looks like a creepy take on the 2004 Phantom’s skull mask!
I’m extremely loopy right now from having just had dental surgery so I’m going to leave it at this list of fabulous stuff and go on pass out. See you in July!
