Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

Author: Marion Deeds

Men at Arms: The Watch is Growing

Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett

Odd though it may be, most people agree that Ankh-Morpork is a city that works. Its citizens pay dues to the Thieves Guild so that they will not be robbed, and because the city’s leader, Havelock Vetinari, was a member of the Assassin’s Guild, there is little chance that he will be overthrown through assassination. (The assassins would of course kill Vetinari, but the price they have listed for his head is prohibitive). The guilds all agree that they would be worse off without Vetinari,

July 15th, 2013. Ryan Skardal and Marion Deeds´s rating: 3 | Terry Pratchett | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Numbers Don’t Lie: A cocktail of laughs and what-ifs

Numbers Don’t Lie by Terry Bisson

In 2005, Tachyon Press published three of Terry Bisson linked novellas in one volume, called Numbers Don’t Lie. This short, fun book follows Irving, a Brooklynite lawyer, and his genius best friend Wilson Wu on a series of adventures.

Wilson is a six-foot-tall Chinese American polymath; he is a math genius, he’s studied meteorology, botany, Chinese herbs, pastry-making, law and the care of camels at a caravansari in the Gobi. The three stories collected in Numbers Don’t Lie were published separately in Asimov’s.

Cold Copper: This steampunk series continues to thrill

Cold Copper by Devon Monk

Right now it’s about eighty-five degrees at my house, and there is a mockingbird singing somewhere outside, but the trek through the blizzard that opens Cold Copper, the third book in Devon Monk’s Age of Steam series, is so compelling that I feel like I’m walking through the snow with Cedar Hunt.

This series continues to thrill with the third installment.

Cedar Hunt is a bounty hunter. He was cursed by a Pawnee god;

July 2nd, 2013. Marion Deeds´s rating: 4 | Devon Monk | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |

Shades of Milk and Honey: A Regency romp with magic

Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal

Jane Ellsworth is resigned to spinsterhood. At twenty-eight, her chances of finding a husband are dwindling. Her long nose and sharp chin make her less than a beauty, and she can’t help but compare herself to her younger sister Melody who is a beauty. Jane’s proficiency in the art of glamour, manipulating etheric energies to enhance art, music or decoration, is above average, but in Jane’s mind, this is nothing special, because glamour is “no more a necessary than playing the piano.”

With Shades of Milk and Honey,

June 29th, 2013. Marion Deeds and Terry Weyna´s rating: 4 | Mary Robinette Kowal | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Glamour in Glass: I would like to see more of Jane and Vincent

Glamour in Glass by Mary Robinette Kowal

Glamour in Glass in a fast-paced magical adventure set in the Regency period, during the Peninsular Wars. This is Mary Robinette Kowal’s second book in her series that started with Shades of Milk and Honey.

Kowal captures the language and sensibility of Jane Austen’s era exactly. Jane and Vincent, both accomplished glamourists, have been married for three months. After Jane struggles to get through a nerve-wracking state dinner hosted by the Prince of Wales,

June 25th, 2013. Marion Deeds´s rating: 4 | Mary Robinette Kowal | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |

Orlando: Witty and fun

Orlando by Virginia Woolf

[In our Edge of the Universe column, we review mainstream authors that incorporate elements of speculative fiction into their “literary” work. However you want to label them, we hope you’ll enjoy discussing these books with us.]

Orlando, by Virginia Woolf, is funny. Okay, it’s not snort-beer-out-your-nose funny, (it’s Virginia Woolf after all,) but it’s still witty and fun… probably about as “fun” as Woolf got. The writing is poetic, political and smart, and the story goes nowhere you would expect from the woman who wrote Mrs.

Clockwork Princess: Has this series lost steam?

Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare

Clockwork Princess, by Cassandra Clare, felt like an overloaded cargo plane lumbering down a runway, trying to get airborne. This is the third book in Clare’s INFERNAL DEVICES series, the Victorian prequel to her MORTAL INSTRUMENTS books, and in this one the soap opera overwhelms the story.

The INFERNAL DEVICES series follows Tessa Gray, an orphaned American who came to London to live with her brother. Tessa was captured by demons and forced to use her unusual abilities for their benefit.

June 19th, 2013. Marion Deeds´s rating: 2.5 | Cassandra Clare | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |

Doktor Glass: Steampunk police procedural with a stunning architectural conceit

Doktor Glass by Thomas Brennan

“Not enough time had passed since he had sat on the side of that very bed, there, and held Sarah’s hand while the drugs had struggled to do their work. He didn’t know if he could trust himself. He felt like one of the Span’s great cables wound too tight. Even braided steel snapped under enough strain.”

To differentiate it from alternate-history fantasy or “gas-lamp” tales, steampunk almost has to have some outstanding piece of technology. It might be airborne penny-farthings,

June 6th, 2013. Marion Deeds´s rating: 3.5 | Thomas Brennan | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |

Marion visits the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum

The Nebula Awards event which Terry and I recently attended also offered tours of the Computer History Museum and the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum. I chose the latter. Growing up in northern California I had heard about this museum. I had always assumed it would be vaguely campy, filled with Rosicrucian mysticism and quasi-historical replicas.

To my surprise, it is an elegant Egyptian museum with genuine artifacts. San Jose’s Rosicrucian Park and museum were founded in 1928 by H. Spencer Lewis, an explorer and mystic who was very interested in bringing the Rosicrucian movement back to the United States.

June 1st, 2013. Marion Deeds | Rachel Swirsky | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |

Marion and Terry report on the 2013 Nebula Awards Weekend

The 48th Annual Nebula Awards weekend was held by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America at the San Jose Convention Center in northern California from May 17 through 19, 2013. Terry Weyna and I, who both live in Northern California and both are aspiring writers, decided to see what a bunch of published writers get up to when they party together.

Marion Deeds: I think what surprised me most is how light on programming the weekend was. I thought there would be sessions about the nuts and bolts of a writing career,

May 28th, 2013. Marion Deeds | Aliette De_Bodard, Connie Willis, E.C. Myers, Gene Wolfe, Joe Haldeman, John Scalzi, Ken Liu, Kim Stanley Robinson, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Rachel Swirsky, Robert Silverberg, Saladin Ahmed, Sarah Beth Durst, Steven Gould, Terry Bisson, William C. Dietz | Nebula Award | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |

Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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