I read Peadar Ó Guilín’s The Call before I got into blogging, but I circled back to the sequel when I found myself struggling to fill the Gothic Fantasy square on my all-sequel themed Bingo card. As it happens, a lot of Gothic fiction seems to be standalone. But while I’m not sure the Grey… Continue reading Fantasy Series Review: The Grey Land by Peadar Ó Guilín
My second year of completing an r/Fantasy Book Bingo card was also my first year of recording a card that hit Hard Mode for every single square. As with last year, I’m finishing with a ranking of the books I read this year, along with some mini-reviews, and a brief note on how bad the… Continue reading 2021 Fantasy Bingo Card (Hard Mode)
I tend not to read many non-fiction books. Without an overarching narrative to sustain me (or a consistent reading time, like with my lunch-break short stories), I’ll read a chapter, find it interesting, and then set down the book to be forgotten for weeks. Essays are no problem—I’ll see those linked somewhere online, read them… Continue reading Essay Collection Review: Appropriately Aggressive by Krista D. Ball
I’ve had some fantastic success lately with Adrian Tchaikovsky’s novellas, so I figured it’d be worth my while to go back to the well with One Day All This Will Be Yours, which came out last spring accompanied by a rash of glowing reviews in my circles. Unsurprisingly, this one was yet another win. One… Continue reading Sci-fi Novella Review: One Day All This Will Be Yours by Adrian Tchaikovsky
How do you review Lafferty? I asked myself a similar question when I wrote an Author Spotlight post about him last year, and it returns as I consider the short story collection The Best of R.A. Lafferty. Because this isn’t a novel, there is no plot to summarize, but even if there were, it wouldn’t… Continue reading Sci-fi/Fantasy Collection Review: The Best of R.A. Lafferty
Sarah Pinsker has written some of my absolute favorite short fiction over the last couple years. And while I know the jump from short fiction to extended work is non-trivial, her shorts had hit a level of consistent quality that made it an easy call to move her second novel to the top of my… Continue reading Sci-fi Novel Review: We Are Satellites by Sarah Pinsker
This review is based on an eARC (Advance Reading Copy) provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Ogres will be released March 15, 2022. Adrian Tchaikovsky has only come to my attention in the last couple of years, but he’s quickly becoming a must-read author. After loving a pair of… Continue reading Sci-fi/Fantasy Novella Review: Ogres by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Xiran Jay Zhao’s Iron Widow was billed as an angry feminist tale inspired by Chinese history and featuring anime-style mech battles. That billing didn’t appeal to me much, but I heard so many people talking about its quality that I thought I should give it a read anyways. A few days later, I feel comfortable… Continue reading Sci-fi Novel Review: Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao
If you spend a lot of time among heavy readers of self-published fantasy, it’s hard not to have heard of The Thirteenth Hour, Trudie Skies’ tale of a conspiracy that threatens the established order of a steampunk world of twelve races living in a tenuous peace. My SPSFC judging has shifted by indie reading heavily… Continue reading Fantasy Novel Review: The Thirteenth Hour by Trudie Skies
January delivered plenty of “Best of 2021” recommended reading lists, and so February was my heaviest month of short-fiction reading since I jumped back into the form in 2020. I made plenty of additions to my Hugo Nomination Draft, and I had such a good time reading that, even after going back at the end… Continue reading February 2022 Round-up and Short Fiction Focus
