I’d heard a decent amount of praise for Katherine Arden’s Winternight Trilogy, but the TBR is too long to read everything that’s praised, and she dropped far enough off my radar that I barely noticed when The Warm Hands of Ghosts released earlier this year. But I’d seen people calling it their favorite book of… Continue reading Historical Fantasy Novel Review: The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden
I did not grow up reading comic books, so perhaps it’s no surprise that as an adult, I haven’t gotten into graphic novels. I read Watchmen in college and that might be it…ever. But the English translation of Shubeik Lubeik by Deena Mohamed came with enough hype from people that don’t normally read graphic novels… Continue reading Fantasy Graphic Novel Review: Shubeik Lubeik by Deena Mohamed
I read plenty of C.S. Lewis as a kid, but the reputation of Till We Have Faces for philosophical density scared me off. Then, as an adult, my lukewarm feelings toward Greek myths and desire to diversify my reading kept me from picking it off the stack. But an offline book club picked it for… Continue reading Fantasy Novel Review: Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis
I go back and forth about whether to review readaloud children’s literature as part of my regular blogging, but I was using Wise Child by Monica Furlong toward my 2023 Bingo challenge for the elusive Druid square, and honestly, I thought it was good enough to deserve a standalone review. Wise Child is a short… Continue reading Fantasy Novel Review: Wise Child by Monica Furlong
There were a pair of novels in 2023 with eerily similar—and discouraging—hype cycles. Both Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh and Witch King by Martha Wells were hailed as the next big thing, with as much pre-release buzz as anything I saw last year, and then completely fell off a cliff post-release, with a few… Continue reading Sci-fi Novel Review: Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh
I’ve spent a lot of May being caught up in Hugo reading, but I’m still plugging away with my regular magazines, and I’ve found at least one story that I expect will be in the front of my mind when thinking about Hugo nominations for next year. So let’s get to it! Clarkesworld The May… Continue reading Tar Vol Reads a Magazine (or Two): Reviews of Clarkesworld and GigaNotoSaurus (May 2024)
If I’m looking for excellent sci-fi from the 2000s that has been largely forgotten, the first stop has to be the recommendations of Janny Wurts. Our tastes aren’t exactly the same, but she is a tremendous champion of character-driven speculative fiction—and a pretty good writer in her own right—and her recommendations have taken more than… Continue reading Sci-fi Novel Review: Warchild by Karin Lowachee
This review is based on an eARC (Advance Reading Copy) provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Navola will be released on July 9, 2024. Paolo Bacigalupi is an author that hit big while I was in a reading hiatus. I missed the boat, but I’ve been meaning to circle back… Continue reading Fantasy Novel Review: Navola by Paolo Bacigalupi
Hi, I am still here reading short fiction. I read two magazines each month, along with dips here and there into others. This is a review of the first two, for April 2024 Clarkesworld Clarkesworld rarely disappoints, and I’ve yet to see it ever disappoint two months in a row. So after my least favorite… Continue reading Tar Vol Reads a Magazine (or Two): Reviews of Clarkesworld and GigaNotoSaurus (April 2024)
I first read Sarah Pinsker when “Two Truths and a Lie” was a Hugo Award finalist for Best Novelette in 2021 (it won). Three or four stories later, she’d become one of my absolute favorite short story authors, and picking up a copy of her second collection, Lost Places, was an easy decision. Lost Places… Continue reading Sci-fi/Fantasy Collection Review: Lost Places by Sarah Pinsker
