Order [book in series=yearoffirstbook.book# (eg 2014.01), stand-alone or one-author collection=3333.pubyear, multi-author anthology=5555.pubyear, SFM/MM=5000, interview=1111]: 2022

testing

Tread of Angels: Exquisite setting, disappointing story

Tread of Angels by Rebecca Roanhorse The setting in Rebecca Roanhorse’s 2022 novella Tread of Angels is eerie and vivid, like a strange dream, both ethereal and concretely described. The conceit of this world is wonderful and I would like to read more stories set here. This particular one was disappointing, with fairly flat characters […]

Read More
testing

What Moves the Dead: A nifty horror story

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher Ursula Vernon, writing as T. Kingfisher, doesn’t try to out-Poe Edgar Allan in her 2022 novella What Moves the Dead. Instead, she flips “The Fall of the House of Usher” sideways, giving us a creepy, atmospheric, heroic and sometimes funny look at the doomed siblings Madeline and Roderick, […]

Read More
testing

The Spare Man: Nick and Nora Charles in space

The Spare Man by Mary Robinette Kowal Uber-wealthy inventor and heiress Tesla Crane and her husband, retired detective Shalmaneser Steward, plan to enjoy their honeymoon on the interplanetary luxury liner Lindgren as it travels from Earth to Mars. Horribly, the trip is interrupted when a person is stabbed to death right outside their luxury suite, […]

Read More
testing

Conan: Blood of the Serpent: Conan is back, Baby!!!

Conan: Blood of the Serpent by S.M. Stirling To say I was thrilled to discover a new Conan novel is the understatement of my year or maybe even decade. Conan of Cimmeria, barbarian, thief, warrior, outlaw, mercenary, reaver, king, Robert E. Howard’s legendary hero, the one who made him the father of Sword and Sorcery […]

Read More
testing

Little Eve: Best gothic horror book I read in 2022

Little Eve by Catriona Ward Little Eve is the best gothic horror book I read last year. Originally published in the United Kingdom in 2018, it won the Shirley Jackson award and the British Fantasy Award for Best Horror Novel. It’s a book saturated with atmosphere, filled with clues, puzzles, masks and secret identities. Ultimately, […]

Read More
testing

City of Last Chances: An intellectual pleasure

City of Last Chances by Adrian Tchaikovsky City of Last Chances (2022), by Adrian Tchaikovsky, is one of those novels that I completely admired all the way through but had a hard time connecting to many of the characters, so that while the reading experience was enjoyable, it was more an intellectual pleasure than an […]

Read More
testing

The Nightland Express: A solid YA fantasy

The Nightland Express by J.M. Lee  The Nightland Express (2022) by J.M. Lee is a solid YA fantasy that has its moments but also doesn’t quite reach its full potential due to several issues. It also suffers a bit perhaps from trying to take on too much, where a more streamlined approach might have allowed […]

Read More
testing

The Daughter of Doctor Moreau: A lush SF melodrama

The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia It’s 1877, and on a decaying rancho deep in the Yucatán peninsula, Carlota Moreau’s sheltered life — and world — is about to change. Carlota’s father, Doctor Moreau, conducts experiments on human-animal hybrids, with a stated goal of improving humanity. When his patrons, the Lizalde family, threaten […]

Read More
testing

The Nectar of Nightmares: Long may Gidney write!

The Nectar of Nightmares by Craig Laurance Gidney It’s horror season for me, the time of year where I usually settle in with a cozy haunted house story, but sometimes branch out into the region of the genuinely horrifying or the truly weird. Craig Laurance Gidney’s short story collection The Nectar of Nightmares, published in […]

Read More
testing

Stan Lee: A Life

Stan Lee: A Life (Centennial Edition) by Bob Batchelor Bob Batchelor’s biography of Stan Lee, titled unsurprisingly Stan Lee, is a solid if somewhat stylistically flat look at the life of a man who has had a huge cultural impact. People who pay attention to this sort of thing won’t find a lot new here, […]

Read More
testing

The Spear Cuts through Water: One of the best of 2022

The Spear Cuts through Water by Simon Jimenez Simon Jiminez’s The Spear Cuts through Water (2022) is one of the most vibrantly original novels I’ve read in some time, an enthralling work of creativity that even as it makes use of some familiar tropes arrives absolutely as its own unique self: richly mythic and startlingly […]

Read More
testing

The Witch and the Tsar: Solid, but a bit flat

The Witch and the Tsar by Olesya Salnikova Gilmore “Solid” is the best description I can give for The Witch and the Tsar by Olesya Salnikova Gilmore, a debut novel that shows flashes of hitting its potential, particularly in its folkloric elements, but overall feels a bit flat and overlong. A retelling of the Baba […]

Read More
testing

Ghostlight: An entertaining and engaging MG ghost story

Ghostlight by Kenneth Oppel Kenneth Oppel’s Ghostlight is a quick-moving MG story involving a trio of teens battling a long-dead villain seeking to raise an army of ghosts in modern-day Toronto. Full of action, the narrative also includes a number of brief but effective emotional moments and also highlights the poor treatment of Native groups. […]

Read More
testing

The Greatest Invention: A History of the World in Nine Mysterious Scripts

The Greatest Invention: A History of the World in Nine Mysterious Scripts by Sylvia Ferrara, translated by Todd Portnowitz Sylvia Ferrara is an Italian scholar/researcher/professor who has devoted much of her life, both in solo work and (more importantly and effectively to her) in collaboration, to learning how writing developed/develops and to deciphering a number […]

Read More
testing

The Extractionist: Enjoyable, left me wanting more

The Extractionist by Kimberly Unger With The Extractionist, Kimberly Unger presents a pretty typical futuristic-internet-cybersetting-with-a-name background (in this case the cyberverse is called “the Swim”), but enhances the familiar setting with an original spin — a class of workers called Extractionists whose job it is to rescue people who get “stuck” in the Swim by […]

Read More
testing

Spear: Go read it. Now.

Spear by Nicola Griffith Nicola Griffith’s Spear glides effortlessly and confidently into the Arthurian cycle, while giving us a completely new character and an outsider’s perspective of Arthur, his court, Merlin, and the Holy Grail. Published in 2022, this novella starts with the account of a young girl who lives in a cave in the […]

Read More
testing

Last Exit: Complex, compelling, and intense

Reposting to include Marion’s new review. Last Exit by Max Gladstone Here is Max Gladstone’s recipe for a Last Exit (2022) cocktail: One part fervent, confident intensity of young adulthood One part fever dream (or nightmare) of magic and alternate worlds Add bitters in the form of mid-life fears, regrets, and resignations born out of […]

Read More
testing

Shelterbelts: An in-depth look into a Mennonite community

Shelterbelts by Jonathan Dyck With Shelterbelts, Jonathan Dyck joins the ranks of other great Canadian comic book creators such as Seth and Jeff Lemire, who both write and draw their own works. Shelterbelts is a sensitive book about a Mennonite town undergoing changes. We get glimpses of different parts of the community through a series […]

Read More
testing

The World According to Color: A Cultural History

The World According to Color: A Cultural History by James Fox Most people wouldn’t think of a squashed fly as the gateway to a world of beauty and art, but that was exactly the path art historian James Fox took, describing in the opening pages of The World According to Color (2022), how when he […]

Read More
  • 1
  • 2
We have reviewed 8040 fantasy, science fiction, and horror books, audiobooks, magazines, comics, and films.

Under ConstructionWe’re updating our theme, so things may be a little messy or slow until we’re finished. Thank you for being patient with us!

SUBSCRIBE TO POSTS

You can subscribe to our posts via email, email digest, browser notifications, Twitter, RSS, etc. You can filter by tag (e.g. Giveaway), keyword, author. We won't give your email address to anyone. Enter email to subscribe:

SUPPORT FANLIT

Want to help us defray the cost of domains, hosting, software, and postage for giveaways? Donate here:
You can support FanLit (for free) by using these links when you shop at Amazon:

US   UK    CANADA

Or, in the US, simply click the book covers we show. We receive referral fees for all purchases (not just books). This has no impact on the price and we can't see what you buy. This is how we pay for hosting and postage for our GIVEAWAYS. Thank you for your support!

LOOKING FOR SOMETHING?

Archives