God Country by Donny Cates (author) and Geoff Shaw (artist)
God Country is a graphic novel you have got to check out. It is one of the best works by my favorite new comic book author, Donny Cates, who has written other great comics like Redneck for Image and Thanos Wins for Marvel. In God Country, Cates tells the story of the Quinlan family and the arrival of a powerful sword that enters their lives and changes them radically.
May 18th, 2019. Brad Hawley´s rating: 5 | Comics | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
A hundred years ago aliens defeated and colonized Earth. For the most part, humans now live in peace with the aliens. A minority of humans have been chosen to go through the aliens’ hardening process when they are young. This gives them a type of exoskeleton that makes them very hard to kill. These Exos constitute a military upper class and they look down on “squishies” — those humans who can’t be, or refuse to be, hardened.
Donovan Reyes, the son of the Prime Liaison to the aliens,
May 17th, 2019. Kat Hooper´s rating: 3.5 | Fonda Lee | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Nyxia Uprising by Scott Reintgen
Nyxia Uprising (2019) is the fast-paced conclusion to Scott Reintgen’s NYXIA TRIAD YA sci-fi trilogy, an adventure with several teenage protagonists. It’s set both in space and on a distant planet called Eden that has two moons, an alien race called the Imago, and an abundant supply of nyxia, a malleable mineral with near-magical powers. These three books tell a single, unified story, and it’s impossible to appreciate this series without reading all of the books in order … and here is your obligatory spoiler warning for the earlier volumes,
May 17th, 2019. Tadiana Jones´s rating: 3 | Scott Reintgen | Young Adult | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Red Moon by Kim Stanley Robinson
I’m a big fan of most of Kim Stanley Robinson’s output, especially his MARS trilogy, and so when I saw that he was out with a book entitled Red Moon (2018), with its echoes of said trilogy (Red, Green, and Blue Mars), that it had an AI character like Aurora,
May 16th, 2019. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
Aerie is the fourth and final book in Mercedes Lackey’s DRAGON JOUSTERS series. This review will spoil some of the plot for the previous three books, Joust, Alta, and Sanctuary, so it’d be best to not read further in this review if you haven’t read those books yet.
I’m convinced that Aerie exists only because Lackey left a thread dangling in the third book,
May 16th, 2019. Kat Hooper´s rating: 1.5 | Mercedes Lackey | Audio | SFF Reviews | no comments |
This week’s word for Wednesday is spelaean, an adjective, meaning like a cave. That’s no real surprise since I’m sure it’s from the same root as the verb spelunk.
Awards:
It’s awards season! And you don’t need an antihistamine to enjoy it!
File 770 wins the award for Most Meta; a list of Best Awards! The Awards Award. No surprise that the Hugo and the Nebula top the list, but I was surprised to see the Shirley Jackson award so low.
Paul Tremblay won a Bram Stoker award for The Cabin at the End of the World.
May 15th, 2019. Marion Deeds | Giveaway!, World Wide Wednesday | 9 comments |
SHORTS: Our exploration of free and inexpensive short fiction available on the internet. Here are a few Hugo-nominated stories we’ve read recently. (Due to Mother’s Day and other life events, SHORTS appears on a Wednesday this week.)
“The Tale of the Three Beautiful Raptor Sisters, and the Prince Who Was Made of Meat” by Brooke Bolander (2018, free at Uncanny Magazine, $3.03 Kindle magazine issue). 2019 Hugo award nominee (short story).
I was intrigued by the title of “The Tale of the Three Beautiful Raptor Sisters,
May 15th, 2019. Jana Nyman, Tadiana Jones and Sandy Ferber | Brooke Bolander, C.L. Moore, Henry Kuttner, Naomi Kritzer | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton
The history books say that the God of the Sky married the Goddess of Beauty and their children populated Orléans. But when Beauty started spending all her time with their children instead of her husband, Sky cursed the people of Orléans, giving them “skin the color of a sunless sky, eyes the shade of blood, hair the texture of rotten straw, and a deep sadness that quickly turned to madness.” So, Beauty created the Belles, special girls who have magic that can bring beauty and joy back to the people of Orléans.
May 15th, 2019. Kat Hooper´s rating: 3.5 | Dhonielle Clayton | Audio, Young Adult | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
Tyrant’s Throne by Sebastien de Castell
De Castell turned to Kest. “How would you rate our chances?”
Kest rifled through the manuscript. “We’ll get four and five-star reviews and show up on a dozen Best of the Year lists, after which you’ll get one, no two, major nominations. People will be very sad it’s over and will repeatedly beg you for more. Falcio will appear on five or six ‘Best Characters in a Series’ lists, which won’t do much for his humility, I hate to say.”
“I’ll have you know I have the best humility of anyone.”
“My point exactly.
May 15th, 2019. Bill Capossere and Marion Deeds´s rating: 4.5 | Sebastien De-Castell | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
The Buying of Lot 37: Welcome to Night Vale Episodes, Volume 3
Who’s a Good Boy?: Welcome to Night Vale Episodes, Volume 4
by Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor
So many spiders. So, so many spiders.
Night Vale, as a town, is not for the faint of heart, especially if one has a problem with arachnids. (“Throat spiders” is a common ailment, the very idea of which makes me want to vomit until I die.) It’s also infested with deer,
May 14th, 2019. Jana Nyman´s rating: 5 | Joseph Fink | SFF Reviews | no comments |
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…
Gentlemen, I concur! (Forgive me for jumping into your convo)
The cover is amazing. I love how the graphic novel (and the review!) hewed close to the theme of "good…
I've thought about picking that one up. The artwork looks perfect.