The Annihilation Score by Charles Stross
The Annihilation Score (2016), by Charles Stross, is the sixth book in his LAUNDRY FILES series. Stross has hit on an interesting way to keep a series from flagging. He created a super-secret agency that fights extra-normal entities and events, and by doing this, he has a stable of characters who can take the lead in given books. Most of the LAUNDRY FILES books I’ve read featured Bob Howard as the main character,
October 13th, 2016. Marion Deeds´s rating: 3.5 | Charles Stross | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
Amazonia by James Rollins (aka James Clemens)
A scientific expedition of thirty people enters the Amazon jungle and is never heard from again. One of the expedition’s members was Gerald Clark, a former special forces turned CIA agent after he lost an arm in combat. Four years after he disappeared with the expedition, Agent Clark stumbles into a remote mission — covered in markings, his tongue cut out — and then dies in a fit of convulsions. That’s not even the strangest part. When Agent Gerald Clark comes out of the jungle,
October 13th, 2016. Justin Blazier´s rating: 3 | James Clemens | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
976-EVIL directed by Robert Englund
When the 1988 horror film 976-EVIL was first released in December of that year, its promotional poster bore the legend “Revenge Is On The Line.” However, I believe the picture might have improved on its $3 million U.S. gross at the box office if, instead, that poster had rightfully proclaimed “The Film So Shocking, It Could Only Have Been Directed By Freddy Krueger!” And indeed, 1988 WAS a big year for Freddy portrayer Robert Englund. Besides appearing as Krueger for the fourth time, in A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (and Englund would go on to portray his most famous screen persona four more times afterward!),
October 13th, 2016. Sandy Ferber | Film / TV | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
I hope all our readers in the Caribbean and on the US southeastern coast, and their families and loved ones, are safe in the aftermath of Hurricane Matthew.
Awards:
Underground Railroad, by Colson Whitehead, is shortlisted for the National Book Award. (Bill’s five-star review is here.)
Ian MacDonald won the 2016 Gaylactic Spectrum Award for his book Luna; New Moon. The Gaylactic Spectrum Award is given to outstanding works of speculative fiction that explore the lives of LGBTI characters in a positive way.
October 12th, 2016. Marion Deeds | World Wide Wednesday | 1 comment |
The Hundred Names of Darkness by Nilanjana Roy
In The Hundred Names of Darkness, Nilanjana Roy comes back to the cat colony she so convincingly established in The Wildings, back to the neighborhood of Nizamuddin in Delhi, and her irrepressible young Sender, Mara.
The challenges the cats are facing now are more nebulous — and more realistic — than they were in The Wildings. Instead of a tightly-knit and vividly characterized group of feral cats (led by the chilling Datura,
October 12th, 2016. Kate Lechler´s rating: 4 | Nilanjana Roy | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
It is truly remarkable how much work pulp author Robert E. Howard managed to accomplish during his brief 30 years of life. Indeed, a look at his bibliography, on a certain Wiki site, should surely flabbergast any reader who knows the Texan writer only as the creator of Conan the Cimmerian, King Kull, Bran Mak Morn, Solomon Kane and, essentially, the entire genre known as Sword & Sorcery. Hundreds upon hundreds of titles can be found there, in such variegated categories as boxing,
October 12th, 2016. Sandy Ferber and Greg Hersom´s rating: 4 | Robert E. Howard | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
Who Can Kill a Child? Directed by Narciso Ibanez Serrador
In the 10/27/66 episode of Star Trek, the one entitled “Miri,” Capt. Kirk & Co. beam down to a planet on which all the adults have long since expired, and only feral children reign. Well, although taken from a wholly different source, a similar setup can be found in the surprisingly excellent Spanish horror film Who Can Kill a Child? (1976). But while a planet-wide virus was to blame for the extinction of the adults in the classic Star Trek story,
October 12th, 2016. Sandy Ferber | Film / TV, Horror | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Having recently finished Death’s End (see my review here), the epic finale of the THREE-BODY TRILOGY by Cixin Liu, which rose to prominence when the the first book The Three-Body Problem won the Hugo Award for Best SF Novel of 2015 (translated by Ken Liu), I was intrigued by the process of translating foreign SF works into English, and was excited that Ken Liu, also the acclaimed author of The Grace of Kings (first book of the DANDELION DYNASTY series),
October 11th, 2016. Stuart Starosta | Ken Liu | Author Interviews, Giveaway! | 17 comments |
A Field Guide to Fantastical Beasts by Olento Salaperäinen
A Field Guide to Fantastical Beasts, by Olento Salaperäinen, is a nice if basic introduction to 50 mythological/supernatural creatures, one suitable more for younger readers than older ones (say, high school or up) due to its relatively brief entries and often familiar subject matter.
The guide is encyclopedic in form, dividing the creatures into six basic groups: Fairies and Little People, Demons and the Undead, Water Creatures, Hybrid Beasts, Humanoid Creatures, and The Sacred and the Divine. The groups themselves are organized alphabetically,
October 11th, 2016. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4 | Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds
I’ve been planning to read this series for many years, because Alastair Reynolds, Peter F. Hamilton, Stephen Baxter, Ken MacLeod, Charles Stross and Iain M. Banks are regularly mentioned at the forefront of the British Hard SF movement. Sure, there are many non-British well-known hard SF and space opera practitioners like Kim Stanley Robinson, Greg Bear, Gregory Benford, Vernor Vinge,
October 11th, 2016. Stuart Starosta´s rating: 3.5 | Alastair Reynolds | Audio | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
COMMENT Was I hinting that? I wasn't aware of it. But now that you mention it.... 🤔
So it sounds like you're hinting Fox may have had three or so different incomplete stories that he stitched together,…
It's hardly a private conversation, Becky. You're welcome to add your 2 cents anytime!
If the state of the arts puzzles you, and you wonder why so many novels are "retellings" and formulaic rework,…
I picked my copy up last week and I can't wait to finish my current book and get started! I…