Jana: Sorry you haven’t heard much from me lately! The last few weeks have been rather busy, but I did manage to read Sofiya Pasternack’s Anya and the Dragon and its sequel, Anya and the Nightingale, both of which are entertaining MG books. I also started reading Sarah Gailey’s upcoming novel The Echo Wife, and am very much looking forward to discussing it with Tadiana and Kelly.
Bill: This week I read Elatsoe,
December 6th, 2020. Tim Scheidler | Status Update | 1 comment |
Anya and the Dragon by Sofiya Pasternack
With just a month before her bat mitzvah, Anya’s life is mostly preoccupied with keeping her family’s goats out of the garden, her worries over being unable to see the hidden threads of magic connecting everything in the world, and staying out of trouble both at home and in the neighboring village of Zmeyreka, since the local magistrate is actively working to throw Anya’s family out of their home. If only her beloved papa would come home from the Tsar’s faraway war against Sultan Suleiman!
December 4th, 2020. Jana Nyman´s rating: 3.5 | Sofiya Pasternack | Children | SFF Reviews | no comments |
How to Fracture a Fairy Tale by Jane Yolen
One year after Tachyon Publications published The Emerald Circus, a collection of Jane Yolen‘s fantastical short stories based on various fairy tales and legendary people (both fictional and real), it has followed up with a similar collection, How to Fracture a Fairy Tale (2018). Like The Emerald Circus, this is a compilation of Yolen’s older, previously published stories, spiffed up with new author’s notes in which Yolen briefly discuss each story and how she “fractured” it with significant departures from its original source material.
December 4th, 2020. Tadiana Jones and Skye Walker´s rating: 0.1, 3 | Jane Yolen | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
It’s the first Thursday of the month. Time to report!
What is the best book you read in November 2020 and why did you love it? It doesn’t have to be a newly published book, or even SFF, or even fiction. We just want to share some great reading material.
Feel free to post a full review of the book here, or a link to the review on your blog, or just write a few sentences about why you thought it was awesome.
And don’t forget that we always have plenty more reading recommendations on our Fanlit Faves page and our 5-Star SFF page.
December 3rd, 2020. FanLit | Giveaway!, Thoughtful Thursday | 15 comments |
The Bright and Breaking Sea by Chloe Neill
Kit Brightling, who grew up in a home for orphaned girls, is now the captain of her own ship. She’s a good leader, has a great crew, and her magical ability to influence water makes her especially formidable.
Kit works for Queen Charlotte, a benevolent monarch who doesn’t quite feel secure on her own throne. That’s because there are rumors that its previous occupant, the exiled emperor Gerard Rousseau, has been secretly corresponding with disgruntled nobles and may have plans to return with an army and/or a secret weapon.
December 3rd, 2020. Kat Hooper´s rating: 3.5 | Chloe Neill | Audio | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Obituary:
David Prowse, best known to me as the towering, menacing Darth Vader, passed away this week. He was 85. I knew the man was tall; I didn’t know he was that tall.
Books and Writing:
After Fireside Fiction’s editor Pablo Defendini selected a white male reader as the voice talent for a nonfiction piece by a black woman, Brian J. White has stepped in as the interim editor. Defendini, who is the majority owner of Fireside and Fireside Books,
December 2nd, 2020. Marion Deeds | World Wide Wednesday | 1 comment |
The Dark Chamber by Leonard Cline
Just recently, I had some words to say concerning British author J. B. Priestley’s chilling second novel, Benighted, which was released in 1927. But, as it turns out, that was not the only atmospheric and genuinely unnerving horror exercise to come out that year. On the other side of the pond, Michigan-born author Leonard Cline, in his third novel, The Dark Chamber, would create a work so very macabre that it would later earn enthusiastic praise in H.
December 2nd, 2020. Sandy Ferber´s rating: 4 | Leonard Cline | Horror, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
Flash: 100 Greatest Moments by Robert Greenberger
Flash: 100 Greatest Moments (2020), by Robert Greenberger, is a browser’s reference book that doesn’t stint on illustrations, always a plus for this sort of subject.
As the title says, it’s a look at a (obviously subjective) list of highlights from the eight or so decades the character has been around.
While some fans might quibble here and there, the list as a whole is most likely going to find general consensus.
As noted, while one can read it cover to cover,
December 1st, 2020. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4 | Comics, Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Serpentine (2020) is a tiny tale set in between the two trilogies that have defined Philip Pullman‘s writing career. Whilst at a mere seventy pages it may seem, by Pullman’s standards, brief, it plays a vital function in understanding the adventures the future Lyra will embark upon in the THE BOOK OF DUST.
A note from the author explains that the story was originally written 2004,
December 1st, 2020. Ray McKenzie´s rating: 4 | Philip Pullman | Short Fiction, Young Adult | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
We’re in total agreement David!
I felt just the same. The prose and character work was excellent. The larger story was unsatisfying, especially compared to…
Hmmm. I think I'll pass.
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,…