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Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

Month: January 2015

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High Deryni: I plan to continue

High Deryni by Katherine Kurtz

High Deryni, originally published in 1973, is the third novel in Katherine Kurtz’s DERYNI CHRONICLES. In the first novel, Deryni Rising, young Prince Kelson, who has inherited some Deryni magic, took his dead father’s throne after fighting an evil sorceress. In the second novel, Deryni Checkmate, tensions rose after the Church (obviously based on the medieval Catholic Church of our world) excommunicated Alaric Morgan and Duncan McLain, two of Kelson’s relatives and advisors.


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January 6th, 2015. ´s rating: | | | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |

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Grass for His Pillow: It’s impossible not to get swept up by the characters’ plights

Grass for His Pillow by Lian Hearn

We saw myth, legend, folklore and tradition of feudal Japan seamlessly woven in Across the Nightingale Floor, and Grass for His Pillow offers equal richness and storytelling depth. In what marks the second book in the trilogy, Lian Hearn returns to the stories of Takeo and Kaede as they choose their alliances amidst increasing unrest between the clans.

Grass for His Pillow opens with Shirakawa Kaede lying in the temple;


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January 6th, 2015. and ´s rating: , | | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Magazine Monday: Crossed Genres, Issues 24 and 25

The theme for Issue 25 of Crossed Genres Magazine is “Indoctrinate,” but the theme is only loosely applicable to the first story, “Cabaret Obscura” by Julian Mortimer Smith. The first-person narrator, Truddla, once catered to the kinky sexuality (or, at least, sexual curiosity) of humans at the Rialto. Most of her audience left “titillated but embarrassed,” she tells us, but some send her marriage proposals, and the dangerous ones lie in wait for her after shows. She’s a hobgoblin. Whether that means she’s a creature from the fairy tale world or an alien to whom a handy word has been applied isn’t made clear — that’s the “crossing” of genres in this story,


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January 5th, 2015. | | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |

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The Broken Road: Dark and gritty

The Broken Road by T. Frohock

“T. Frohock” is Teresa Frohock, the author of the well-regarded fantasy debut Miserere: An Autumn Tale. The Broken Road is a novella that belongs to the “grimdark” genre: it is dark and gritty and there is no happily ever after. Frohock herself calls it “gothic horror,” and that description works, too. It’s good.

Travys du Valois is the younger of Queen Heloise’s twin sons.


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January 5th, 2015. ´s rating: | | , | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |

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Superheroes Anonymous: A light, fun twist on superheroes

Superheroes Anonymous by Lexie Dunne 

Superheroes Anonymous by Lexie Dunne follows the adventures of Gail Godwin, otherwise known as Hostage Girl, in a world where superheroes and villains exist as celebrities and fodder for gossip websites. A Chicago reporter, Gail — or Girl, as her friends call her — is constantly kidnapped and held hostage by supervillains and subsequently saved by Blaze, one of the most popular heroes. The gossip columnists speculate that Blaze’s identity is Jeremy, Girl’s real-life boyfriend, but she doubts it.


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January 5th, 2015. ´s rating: | | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |

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Dracula adapted and illustrated by John Green

Dracula adapted and illustrated by John Green

Dracula is not a easy novel to abridge, especially when one is trying to compact it to the size of a graphic novel and at the same time aiming it at a middle-grade audience, and to be honest, I can’t say this version, adapted and illustrated by John Green, succeeds all that well.

One problem is that transitions are often awkward and abrupt. For instance, we cut from a panel telling us that Jonathan realizes “his only chance of escape was to scale the castle wall,” which sets the reader up for several expectations of what’s to follow: we expect to see Jonathan still in the castle trying to get out and we expect to see him climbing upward — the meaning of the word “scale.” But the next panel (a full page one) shows him already outside the castle and climbing down the cliff outside,


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January 3rd, 2015. ´s rating: | | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |

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The Lost Boy: Beautiful artwork makes up for a derivative story

The Lost Boy by Greg Ruth

Beautiful artwork makes up for a derivative story, but some “homage” should be acknowledged

Middle grade readers who like The Amulet will probably enjoy Greg Ruth’s graphic novel adventure, The Lost Boy, published by Scholastic. This is a conventional tale, enlivened with beautiful black and white artwork that looks like it’s done in pencil. I have to admit that the cover immediately sucked me in.

Nate Castle has just moved to a new house in a new town,


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January 2nd, 2015. ´s rating: | | | SFF Reviews | no comments |

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Golden Son: The world deepens and broadens

Golden Son by Pierce Brown

There’s not a lot to say about the plot of Pierce Brown’s Golden Son, the sequel to the fantastic Red Rising, because outside of the density and complexity of the story, which would necessitate a lot of summary space, Brown fills the novel with so many twists, turns, backstabs and back-back stabs that it would be difficult to offer up a synopsis that both gives a true sense of what happens and does not at the same time give spoiler after spoiler.


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January 2nd, 2015. ´s rating: | | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |

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Across The Nightingale Floor: So much more than advertised

Across The Nightingale Floor by Lian Hearn

The tagline stamped across the cover of Lian Hearn’s Across the Nightingale Floor is ‘One boy. One journey. One hidden destiny.’ Not only is this toe-curlingly clichéd, but it’s also pretty deceptive. It’s too reductive, too suggestive of the bog standard hero’s journey every fantasy fan has seen a million times. The book’s plot is complicated and surprising; its backdrop of a political feudal system riveting; the delicate Japanese-style landscape and customs are intricate. Across the Nightingale Floor,


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January 2nd, 2015. , , , and | | SFF Reviews | 6 comments |

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Our favorite books of 2014

Here are our favorite books published in 2014. Hover over the cover to see who recommends each book and what they say about it. Please keep in mind that we did not read every SFF book published in 2014, so we know we’ve missed some good ones! Please add your comments — we’d love to hear your opinions about our list and to know which were YOUR favorite books of 2014. What did we miss? One commenter will win a book from our stacks.

ADULT SFF

MIDDLE GRADE / YOUNG ADULT SFF

ANTHOLOGIES / COLLECTIONS / MAGAZINES / UNTOLD HISTORIES

NEWLY RELEASED ON AUDIO IN 2014:


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January 1st, 2015. | Best of the Year | 17 comments |

Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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