The nitty-gritty: An impressive, well-rounded debut, These Burning Stars is a must read for fans of intricately plotted and character driven stories. It was touch and go at first, but These Burning Stars ended up being a huge success for me. This is science fiction, but the story almost reads like epic fantasy. Think Fonda […]
The nitty-gritty: An ambitious SF dystopian tale with plenty of interesting characters and situations gets bogged down under some basic writing mistakes. I badly wanted to love Stars Like Acid, especially since my review copy came directly from the author. And the reviews on Goodreads are mostly rave reviews, so I’ll admit my expectations were […]
The nitty-gritty: Supervillains are super fun in this laugh-out-loud tale with sentient cats and dolphins, a secret lair and plenty of the author’s trademark social commentary. Scalzi takes on supervillains—sort of—in his latest comedic offering, and boy was this a bunch of fun. I think if I’d read this blind without knowing who the author […]
The nitty-gritty: Yume Kitasei tackles the “survival in space” trope but adds emotional themes as well in this stellar debut novel. “What was it about mothers, that they could know you so well? And not know you at all.” The Deep Sky is an exquisitely written SF debut, and I absolutely loved it. This is […]
The nitty-gritty: Four scientists undertake a dangerous mission to uncover the mysteries of a curious hole, in Christopher Paolini’s tense survival thriller. Sometimes going into a book with no expectations is a good thing, and that was my experience reading Fractal Noise, a prequel of sorts to Paolini’s To Sleep In a Sea of Stars. […]
The nitty-gritty: Another thrilling entry in David Walton’s series, Deadly Memory delivers fast-paced action—and dinosaurs. Dinosaurs. A deadly pandemic. A Thai Queen. An ancient extinction event. A group of dedicated scientists. What do all these things have in common? They are all elements in Deadly Memory, the exciting sequel to David Walton’s Living Memory. I […]
The nitty-gritty: Ai Jiang explores a couple of current hot topics—AI art and the human versus machine argument—in a short but engaging story that gives readers plenty to ponder. I Am AI is a short novelette that explores the pitfalls of AI generated art, a quite timely story in fact, since the headlines have been […]
The nitty-gritty: Wonder, whimsey, science and fantasy come together in Charles Soule’s latest, a highly original ode to finding happiness. Charles Soule comes up with the most unusual ideas for books, and in my opinion he’s outdone himself with The Endless Vessel. This is my third book by the author and my favorite so far. […]
The nitty-gritty: Chana Porter subverts our ideas of food and sex in this unique dystopian tale. “This is normally where we would have sex,” teased Georgina. “But you’re the girl who doesn’t like sex.” “I like sex,” said Beatrice softly. I just like food more. The Thick and the Lean has one of the most […]
The nitty-gritty: Gareth L. Powell raises the stakes—and then raises them again—in this stellar stand-alone sequel to Stars and Bones. Descendant Machine is the most fun I’ve had all year! Gareth L. Powell has not only written a sequel that’s better than the first book, but he completely changed the vibe as well. Stars & […]