I was previously unfamiliar with Jedediah Berry, and despite a striking cover, I would have let The Naming Song pass me by without a strong recommendation from a book club friend who loved the language element. So I decided to give it a try after all. The Naming Song takes place after an underdescribed apocalypse—when… Continue reading Fantasy Novel Review: The Naming Song by Jedediah Berry
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez is an undisputed classic of magical realism, with a Nobel Prize under its belt and plenty of staying power. And so it’s been on my TBR for a long time. But at the same time, I don’t have a ton of experience with magical realism, so… Continue reading Magical Realism Review: One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
Grievers by adrienne maree brown wasn’t much on my radar at all going into this year, but a couple Redditors were consistently singing the praises of both it and its sequel, and I needed a pandemic novel for my Bingo board, so with apologies to TBR items like Doomsday Book, Station Eleven, and How High… Continue reading Sci-fi Book Review: Grievers by adrienne maree brown
For the fourth consecutive year, I am leading a judging team in the Self-Published Science Fiction Competition (SPSFC4), and my team has been given 32 books to whittle down to two semifinalists. To start, we’ve split them up so that each team member has nine or ten books to evaluate, and together we’ll pick the top 15-25% to pass… Continue reading Fantasy Novel Review: Norylska Groans by Michael R. Fletcher and Clayton W. Snyder
This review is based on an eARC (Advance Reading Copy) provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. ChloroPhilia will be released on January 14, 2025. I had read a short story or two by Cristina Jurado a couple years ago, and while I was a bit wary that she can lean… Continue reading Sci-fi Novella Review: ChloroPhilia by Cristina Jurado
For the fourth consecutive year, I am leading a judging team in the Self-Published Science Fiction Competition (SPSFC4), and my team has been given 32 books to whittle down to two semifinalists. To start, we’ve split them up so that each team member has nine or ten books to evaluate, and together we’ll pick the… Continue reading Sci-fi Novel Review: The Thief by G.S. Jennsen
I had heard almost nothing about The Ministry of Time in genre circles in the early part of this year, but it seems to have hit big enough in general fiction circles to have bled back into genre, and I thought I’d see what all the fuss was about with Kaliane Bradley’s debut. The Ministry… Continue reading Sci-fi Novel Review: The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley
I don’t often dip into speculative literary fiction, and my success rate is low enough that even when I saw an intriguing review of Scott Alexander Howard’s debut novel The Other Valley—and I don’t even recall where—I approached with some trepidation. But I do like time travel stories, and my library had a copy, so… Continue reading Speculative Novel Review: The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard
For the fourth consecutive year, I am leading a judging team in the Self-Published Science Fiction Competition (SPSFC4), and my team has been given 32 books to whittle down to two semifinalists. To start, we’ve split them up so that each team member has nine or ten books to evaluate, and together we’ll pick the… Continue reading Sci-fi Novel Review: Turn Left at the Mooncrow Skeleton by Linda Raedisch
I am not especially fond of zombies or especially deep into literary fiction, but I have been really enjoying stories about grief this year—notably “Death Benefits” and The Warm Hands of Ghosts—and so when a book club friend highly recommended Ursula K. Le Guin Prize-winning It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over by Anne de… Continue reading Speculative Novella Review: It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over by Anne de Marcken
