The Affair of the Chalk Cliffs by James P. Blaylock
Langdon St. Ives returns in The Affair of the Chalk Cliffs, James P. Blaylock’s latest Langdon St. Ives Adventure.
St. Ives is described as “the greatest, if largely unheralded, explorer and scientist in the Western World … piecing together a magnetic engine for a voyage to the moon.” Unfortunately, the premise of The Affair of the Chalk Cliffs is less ambitious than its protagonist. Although our heroes are explorers and scientists,
June 21st, 2011. Ryan Skardal and Terry Weyna´s rating: 1 | James P. Blaylock | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
The Twilight Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko
The Inquisition carefully manages the balance of power between the Day and Night Watch, and nowhere in the world is it as precarious as in Moscow. At any given moment, the leaders of the Moscow Watches, Gesser and Zabulon, could carry out a diabolical scheme to seize power for their side in this never-ending cold war of magicians. As always, middle-class magician-detective Anton Gorodetsky is caught in the middle. As always, the world does not make sense. The magicians feel like they must regulate their own activities to keep balance,
June 14th, 2011. Ryan Skardal´s rating: 3 | Sergei Lukyanenko | SFF Reviews | no comments |
A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin
George R.R. Martin’s A Game of Thrones is set in Westeros, a continent that was divided into Seven Kingdoms until the Targaryens and their dragons conquered it. Fourteen years before the story begins, Ned Stark, Robert Baratheon, and Jon Arryn led a rebellion against the mad king Aerys Targaryen. Robert became king, Jon became the King’s Hand, and Ned returned north to govern his lands. Now, Jon has died and Robert demands that Ned come south to help rule the realm.
June 11th, 2011. Ryan Skardal, Rebecca Fisher and Jason Golomb´s rating: 5 | George R.R. Martin | SFF Reviews | 6 comments |
Congo by Michael Crichton
[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.]
Michael Crichton’s Congo (1980) is an adventure story that should recall Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World (1912) and Henry Rider Haggard’s King Solomon’s Mines (1885).
May 20th, 2011. Ryan Skardal´s rating: 3 | Michael Crichton | Edge | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |
Embassytown by China Miéville
Embassytown, China Miéville’s latest, is a sharply honed science fiction tale of linguistics. Yes, linguistics. And skeptical as one may be, it more than works. Despite its science fiction trappings, I would place Embassytown very close to The City & The City rather than Perdido Street Station and its sequels or Kraken in terms of style. I say that because while the strange alien race,
May 12th, 2011. Bill Capossere, Ryan Skardal and Marion Deeds´s rating: 4, 4.5, 5 | China Mieville | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 8 comments |
The Gates of Rome by Conn Iggulden
I was surprised to discover that Conn Iggulden’s The Gates of Rome isn’t a fantasy novel.
Sure, The Gates of Rome is about Julius Caesar. And there is an author’s note discussing historical authenticity at the end of the story. Clearly, this is supposed to be a work of historical fiction. Nevertheless, that doesn’t stop Conn Iggulden from borrowing liberally from fantasy’s most enduring tropes, ranging from the defiance of bullies to the ascension of a child of fate.
April 22nd, 2011. Ryan Skardal´s rating: 3 | Conn Iggulden | Edge | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The final entry in a trilogy requires something special. In fantasy, that usually means finding godly machinery and amassing armies that will face each other on some distant, volcanic plain while a small band of covert heroes pull off a daring, one-in-a-million scheme.
However, up to this point, Glen Cook’s Black Company series has stood out for its noir atmosphere more than its epic company of mercenaries. Surprisingly, in The White Rose, Cook sacrifices his hard-boiled narrative for an epic fantasy storyline.
April 18th, 2011. Ryan Skardal´s rating: 4 | Glen Cook | SFF Reviews | 6 comments |
The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton
[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.]
When Michael Crichton wrote The Andromeda Strain, he was not just writing a mediocre novel about extra-terrestrial bacteria. He was founding a (sub) genre of SFF that found a massive mainstream audience.
The techno-thriller has all of the pacing and suspense that we might expect of a John Grisham novel,
April 8th, 2011. Ryan Skardal´s rating: 2 | Michael Crichton | Edge | SFF Reviews | 5 comments |
Mau returns home from a rite of passage concerning his transition from boyhood to manhood to discover that every member of his island village, the “Nation,” has been killed in a tidal wave. Who will teach him to be a man now that he has only himself to rely on?
Daphne, a distant heir to the British throne, is shipwrecked on a small island in the ocean. She has received the best education that a woman of her station can receive in Victorian England, so she is well versed in English customs,
March 27th, 2011. Ryan Skardal and Ruth Arnell | Terry Pratchett | Stand-Alone, Young Adult | SFF Reviews | 5 comments |
The Day Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko
The Day Watch is the second novel in Sergei Lukyanenko’s Watch series. Like its predecessor, The Day Watch contains three short stories set in Russia and Europe that can be read independently or as part of a larger narrative arc. His work has once again been skillfully translated from the Russian by Andrew Bromfield.
Unlike its predecessor, Anton Gorodetsky is not the narrator of The Day Watch. Instead, all of our heroes are from the “Day Watch,” ostensibly a villainous faction of magic users known as “Dark Others.” However,
March 19th, 2011. Ryan Skardal´s rating: 3 | Sergei Lukyanenko | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Thanks for the kind words, Marion! Coming as they are from a professional writer, they are much appreciated!
Wonderful review, Sandy.
The "body count" bothered me a bit less because being dead seemed more like an inconvenience than anything else... unlike…
Detailed, thoughtful review, Bill. I'm going to read it for two reasons. First, Karen Russell wrote it, and second, it…
this sounds like a fun one