Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

Month: September 2017

Hellboy (Vol. 1): Seed of Destruction: Atmospheric and beautiful

Hellboy Vol. 1: Seed of Destruction by Mike Mignola & John Byrne (An Oxford College Student Review!)

In this column, I feature comic book reviews written by my students at Oxford College of Emory University. Oxford College is a small liberal arts school just outside of Atlanta, Georgia. I challenge students to read and interpret comics because I believe sequential art and visual literacy are essential parts of education at any level (see my Manifesto!). I post the best of my students’ reviews in this column.

Dark Fantasy Meets Real-Life Disease: What I Learned from Cancer about Writing, and Vice Versa

Today, we welcome Tom Doyle, the author of a contemporary fantasy trilogy from Tor Books. In the first book, American Craftsmen, two modern magician-soldiers fight their way through the legacies of Poe and Hawthorne as they attempt to destroy an undying evil — and not kill each other first. In the sequel, The Left-Hand Way, the craftsmen are hunters and hunted in a global race to save humanity from a new occult threat out of America’s past. The final book of the trilogy, War and Craft,

September 29th, 2017. John Hulet | Tom Doyle | Expanded Universe, Giveaway! | 22 comments |

The Accelerators Vol. 3: Relativity

The Accelerators Vol. 3: Relativity by R.F.I. Porto, Gavin Smith, Tim Yates

Warning: There will be some spoilers for both The Accelerators: Time Games and The Accelerators: Momentum. As with any time-travel story, the best place to begin is at the beginning.

At the end of Momentum, Spatz was separated from his fellow time-travelers and held back in the last years of the third millennium with an old Spatz while the rest of the group skipped ahead to the 88th century and met yet another Spatz — this one just a little older,

September 29th, 2017. Jana Nyman´s rating: 3.5 | Comics | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Thoughtful Thursday: Thank Kahless, Star Trek is back!

Thank Kahless, Star Trek is back! Now we can obsess over it.

After watching the first two episodes, I was struck by the writers’ attempts to mislead the audience. The title of the first episode, “The Vulcan Hello,” suggests that it would be about the Vulcan greeting, “live long and prosper,” but it was actually about attacking Klingons. The captain we first meet, Georgiou, seems like a central character, but she died by the end of the second episode. I appreciate that the writers are trying to zig when they could zag, but the first thing I said to my father on Sunday was “I bet Michelle Yeoh dies.”

September 28th, 2017. Ryan Skardal | Giveaway!, Thoughtful Thursday | 9 comments |

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket: Poe shines in his only novel

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe

Note: This public domain title is free on Kindle.

In his short story entitled “Ms. Found in a Bottle” (1833), author Edgar Allan Poe told a tale of shipwreck on the high seas, following the mother of all storms. Along with one other survivor, our narrator drifts helplessly on the surface of the water, later encountering what seems to be a ghost ship, on which he climbs aboard, only to be swept toward the south polar regions and to an unknown fate.

WWWednesday: September 27, 2017

Conventions:

HawaiiCon was held on the big island of Hawai’i, September 14-18. The theme was “Slayer Wars,” which sounds odd, but it allowed the planning board to celebrate both the 50th year of Star Wars and the 20th anniversary of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Charisma Carpenter, Nicholas Brendon, Emma Caulfield and Amber Benson all attended to represent the BTVS contingent, while Daniel Logan (young Boba Fett) and Temeura Morrison (Jango Fett) were there from Star Wars. Your humble correspondent and our own Terry Weyna also participated,

September 27th, 2017. Marion Deeds | World Wide Wednesday | 1 comment |

If This Isn’t Nice, What Is?: Advice to the Young: Selected graduation speeches

If This Isn’t Nice, What Is?: Advice to the Young by Kurt Vonnegut

If This Isn’t Nice, What Is?: Advice to the Young collects nine graduation speeches delivered by Kurt Vonnegut. Published in 2013, this posthumous collection is introduced by the writer Dan Wakefield. The earliest speech was delivered in 1978, while the latest was given in 2004.

These speeches are almost exactly what Vonnegut’s fans would expect of him — so much so that I wish I’d attempted to write a speech from the point of view of Kurt Vonnegut before beginning this book.

Magonia: What YA should be like

Magonia by Maria Dahvana Headley

Come for the wonderful voice (and attitude) of Aza Ray, the teenage narrator. Stay for a suspenseful plot, vivid characters, and fantastical worldbuilding.

Magonia (2015) is one of those books that, while still partway through the sample, I knew I wanted to buy. It’s difficult to create a truly original character voice, but Maria Dahvana Headley pulls it off with Aza Ray. She even pulls it off again with Jason, Aza’s best friend, though his voice is less distinctive (this shouldn’t be taken as a criticism;

She Said Destroy: A good introduction to Bulkin’s beautiful, creepy prose

She Said Destroy by Nadia Bulkin

Nadia Bulkin’s horror stories are surreal, subversive, often political. 2017’s short story collection She Said Destroy offers 13 stories, some set in our world, some set in worlds almost exactly like ours and some set in strange, feverish landscapes unlike what we’ve seen before.

“Intertropical Convergence Zone” and “Red Goat, Black Goat,” are set in an imaginary country that looks more than a bit like Indonesia. (Bulkin writes many stories set in this place.) “Intertropical Convergence Zone” follows the country’s dictator,

SHORTS: Marshall, Campbell, McBride, Hawthorne

Our weekly exploration of free and inexpensive short fiction available on the internet. Here are a few stories we’ve read that we wanted you to know about.

“Red Bark and Ambergris” by Kate Marshall (Aug. 2017, free at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, 99c Kindle magazine issue)

Sarai is forcibly taken from her paradisiacal island home by the queen’s men when they discover that the young girl has the magical ability of a scent-maker, one who can concoct fragrances that will powerfully affect people, evoking memories and calling forth emotions.

September 25th, 2017. Tadiana Jones and Marion Deeds | Horror, Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |

Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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