Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

Month: June 2014

The Forever Watch: This debut shows much promise

The Forever Watch by David Ramirez

You’re never quite sure what you’re going to get from a debut novel. Sometimes they come out of nowhere to blow you away — “Really? You did that on your first try?” (OK, we all know it wasn’t really a “first try” — drafts and all — but still). Sometimes you’re left wondering if perhaps the author should have tried for “debut short story” or “debut blogging” or even “debut fly swatting.” And then there’s the more common middle ground, where you can see some strong concepts,

June 19th, 2014. Bill Capossere´s rating: 3 | David Ramirez | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Samurai Jack: The Threads of Time: A good comic for children

Samurai Jack: The Threads of Time by Jim Zub

Samurai Jack: The Threads of Time is a fun comic book for kids. It is an episodic battle adventure with better-than-average art and excellent coloring. Samurai Jack was created by Grenndy Tartakovsky, so apparently The Threads of Time isn’t the first Samurai Jack story. However, he’s a new character to me. Author Jim Zub writes a good story for his primary audience of kids, but Andy Suriano’s artwork is appealing to any reader. It’s the part of the book I enjoyed the most.

June 19th, 2014. Brad Hawley´s rating: 3 | Children, Comics | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Thief of Time: Trademark storytelling, symbolism, setting, wit

Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett

Thief of Time is Terry Pratchett’s 26th official entry into the DISCWORLD series. Published roughly six months after The Truth and six months before The Last Hero, Thief of Time finds Pratchett in good form, extemporizing on the scientific quest to put time in a bottle versus more transcendental ideologies revolving around passive regard to the great clock of life (pun intended for those who’ve read the book!).

June 19th, 2014. Jesse Hudson´s rating: 3.5 | Terry Pratchett | SFF Reviews | no comments |

WWWednesday: June 18, 2014

On this day in 1178, five monks in Canterbury were observing the moon and saw “the upper horn split in two.” As they describe it, “A flaming torch sprang up . . . the body of the Moon which was below writhed . . . throbbed like a wounded snake . . . after these transformations, the Moon from horn to horn, that is along its whole length, took on a blackish appearance.”

Only in 1976 did geologist Jack B. Hartung suggest that this phenomena was the creation of the moon’s Giordano Bruno crater, and that the monks witnessed it as it happened.

June 18th, 2014. Kate Lechler | World Wide Wednesday | 7 comments |

The Gates of Sleep: Lush and engaging, but it loses steam

The Gates of Sleep by Mercedes Lackey

The Gates of Sleep by Mercedes Lackey, part of her ELEMENTAL MASTERS series, is a fun, harmless read based loosely on the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale.

Growing up, I had always been drawn to Mercedes Lackey books, mostly because of the lush cover art, usually drawn by Jody Lee. But then, unfailingly, I’d read the blurb and decide not to read it; they usually sounded too involved, too conspicuously “high fantasy,” or otherwise cheesy and formulaic.

Wolfblade: An epic political drama

Wolfblade by Jennifer Fallon

Wolfblade is the first book in Jennifer Fallon’s WOLFBLADE trilogy which is a prequel to her DEMON CHILD trilogy which I read several years ago. These are fat epic fantasies with lots of characters that are focused mostly on political drama but also contain plenty of magic and romance.

This story takes place in Hythria, one of the kingdoms in Fallon’s world. Lernen, the current High Prince (a Wolfblade) cares nothing for his country and is not respected by his people because he spends his time in the pursuit of unusually decadent pleasures.

Stoker’s Manuscript: Stoker award nominee

Stoker’s Manuscript by Royce Prouty

Royce Prouty received a 2013 Stoker Award nomination for superior achievement in a first novel for Stoker’s Manuscript. Because of the nomination and the fact that Prouty’s protagonist, Joseph Barkeley, is a rare book and manuscript expert, I couldn’t resist.

Joseph Barkeley has always had a knack for spotting rare editions in crowded used bookstores, and is able to tell if a manuscript is genuine without the need for any chemical testing. It’s an ability that makes him the subject of Arthur Ardelean’s search for the right man to verify the authenticity of the original draft of Bram Stoker’s Dracula,

The Legion of Time: Highly recommended for all fans of red-blooded, Golden Age sci-fi

The Legion of Time by Jack Williamson

The Legion of Time consists of two novellas that Jack Williamson wrote in the late 1930s, neither of which have anything to do with his wholly dissimilar LEGION OF SPACE novels of that same period. Both of these novellas are written in the wonderfully pulpy prose that often typified Golden Age sci-fi, and both are as colorful, fast moving and action packed as any fan could want. That elusive “sense of wonder” that authors of the era strove for seemed to come naturally for Williamson,

June 16th, 2014. Sandy Ferber´s rating: 4 | Jack Williamson | SFF Reviews | 7 comments |

Monster (Vol. 1): The Perfect Edition by Naoki Urasawa

Monster (Vol. 1): The Perfect Edition by Naoki Urasawa

Warning: This review is spoiler heavy, but I wanted to write a review of volume one that could let you know if you might want to read the entire series. You can read safely up to the first place I’ve marked for spoilers. There’s another place I warn of even more spoilers, so you have two places you might want to stop reading.

Monster by Naoki Urasawa is an award-winning manga that was written from 1994-2001, and once completed,

June 13th, 2014. Brad Hawley´s rating: 4.5 | Comics | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |

September Girls: This book does not stay safely in the shallows; it takes risks.

September Girls by Bennett Madison

[In our Edge of the Universe column, we review mainstream authors that incorporate elements of speculative fiction into their “literary” work. However you want to label them, we hope you’ll enjoy discussing these books with us.]

September Girls, by Bennett Madison was nominated for a 2014 Andre Norton Award for best YA fiction (it didn’t win; Nalo Hopkinson’s Sister Mine did).

Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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