Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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]: 2023

Rose/House: Hits the sweet spot

Rose/House by Arkady Martine

As I’ve noted multiple times, I often struggle with the betwixt and between nature of the novella. But Arkady Martine’s newest, Rose/House hit the sweet spot for me with its unique mash-up of a classic clinical locked-room murder mystery and a lyrical fever dream exploration of art and identity and narrative all held within just the right size container. I was variously enthralled, amused, and bemused and pretty much loved this richly layered story start to finish with just a few blips here and there.

The Magick of Physics: Uncovering the Fantastical Phenomena in Everyday Life

The Magick of Physics: Uncovering the Fantastical Phenomena in Everyday Life by Felix Flicker

Felix Flicker’s relatively unique take on popular science is right there in the title: The Magick of Physics: Uncovering the Fantastical Phenomena in Everyday Life. Taking Arthur C. Clarke’s old adage that “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,” Flicker presents his layperson’s explanations of modern-day physics as a wizard’s manual of sorts, as in one scene where a wizard illuminates her path with a crystal spelled into glowing and then cuts through a bolt with a “stream of light.” In reality though (at least our reality),

April 14th, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 3.5 | Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Untethered Sky: Enjoyable but doesn’t reach its full potential

Untethered Sky by Fonda Lee

Untethered Sky is a mostly enjoyable fantasy novella by Fonda Lee, but one whose brevity I felt prevented it from reaching its full emotive potential. This is, however, something I often feel upon reading novellas (though not always as per my 5-star review of The Lies of the Ajungo), so readers of this review should keep that in mind. Some of us, it appears, are just generally not built for the form, though exceptions can always break through.

The Mimicking of Known Successes: A great Holmesian adventure on Jupiter

The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older

Malka Older’s 2023 novella, The Mimicking of Known Successes, gives us a Sherlock-Holmes-like mystery-adventure set on Jupiter. The extraterrestrial locale is more than merely a setting; it’s part of the plot of this charming SF mystery romp.

When humans finally rendered Earth uninhabitable, they moved to other planets in the solar system; at least to Jupiter, which is called Giant. The surface of Giant is also uninhabitable, but engineered bands encircle the planet at the point where atmosphere and gravity allow for human life (with obvious adjustments).

White Cat, Black Dog: Link bats nearly a thousand

White Cat, Black Dog by Kelly Link

The vast majority of story collections by their nature vary in relative strength from piece to piece. I’m always happy when I fully enjoy more than half of the stories and thrilled if that hits three-quarters. Well, there are seven stories total in White Cat, Black Dog (2023), Kelly Link’s newest collection in which she brings her trademark style to a series of retold fairy tales, and of the seven I only disliked one, while the others ranged from really good to great.

Tenacious Beasts: Can’t We All Just Get Along?

Tenacious Beasts by Christopher J. Preston

Tenacious Beasts (2023) by Christopher J. Preston, is a rarity among environmental/ecological books nowadays — an uplifting work that highlights positivity, resilience, and hope for the future. As such, it’s a highly rewarding book and a breath of fresh air amongst all the depressing numbers out there having to do with our world and the creatures we share it with.

That isn’t to say Preston turns a blind eye to those depressing numbers. Far from it. In fact, he begins by listing some of those very numbers:

Wildlife populations have declined 20 percent over the last century.

March 16th, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 5 | Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Clytemnestra: A worthy entry

Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati

Clytemnestra (2023), as the style makes clear, is another entry in the ever-growing genre of Greek myth retellings. Casati does a nice job here of creating tension even within a well-known tale, and has several quite moving scenes, though the book’s somewhat flat style and — for me at least — odd choice of where to end, places it more in the middle tier of similar works.

After some a welcome family tree and large cast of characters that also serves to refresh a few details (who raped whom,

The Crane Husband: A movingly dark and vividly written fable for contemporary times

The Crane Husband by Kelly Barnhill

Kelly Barnhill’s novella The Crane Husband is a darkly grim reimagining of and response to the Crane Wife folktale. A tough read thanks to its bleak near-future setting and dark focus on abuse and family dysfunction, and at times quite blunt in fable fashion, it’s also a rewarding read thanks to its lovely sparse language and strongly voiced narrator.

The story is set in the run-down and nearly abandoned rural Midwest, a few steps into the future where farmland is owned by a single far-away large conglomerate that raises monocultured,

March 1st, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4 | Kelly Barnhill | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Arch-Conspirator: Roth pretty much nails it

Arch-Conspirator by Veronica Roth

Arch-Conspirator (2023), by Veronica Roth, is a tautly written reimagining of Sophocles’ tragedy Antigone. While some will probably wish for a bit more world-building detail and deeper development of some themes, fans of the novella form will find a lot to like here.

Set in a post-apocalyptic, far-future refuge where the land outside the story’s locale is uninhabitable, it’s a world whose population rests on a knife’s edge of survival and so has chosen to lessen the chance of extinction by mandating births (“It didn’t matter if a person wanted a child or not … If they were viable … they were required to carry a child,

The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms that Sustain Life

The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms that Sustain Life by Johan Eklöf (translated by Elizabeth DeNoma)

The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms that Sustain Life by Johan Eklöf (translated by Elizabeth DeNoma) is a solidly informative book that raises some serious questions and challenges us to think differently about how we might live our lives, though it suffers somewhat from its structure.

Eklöf is an ecologist who specializes in bats, so one can see where he might get his fondness for the darkness of night.

February 17th, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4 | Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |

Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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We’re in total agreement David!
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