Icehenge by Kim Stanley Robinson Icehenge is Kim Stanley Robinson’s second published novel. It was published the same year as his first novel The Wild Shore, the first part in his THREE CALIFORNIAS triptych. The subject of Icehenge is very different from The Wild Shore. It would be selling the book short to say it is a first step […]
Read MoreRob Weber | Kim Stanley Robinson | SFF Reviews | | 7 comments |
The Wild Shore by Kim Stanley Robinson Kim Stanley Robinson’s debut novel, The Wild Shore, was first published in 1984 but its story begins decades after nuclear bombs were set off in America’s cities. Now, in 2047, Californian survivors in San Onofre dedicate their days to gathering food and maintaining their shelters rather than filming […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 4 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Audio | SFF Reviews | | 2 comments |
The Gold Coast by Kim Stanley Robinson Jim McPherson is unsatisfied with the future. Unable to find steady, well-paid work, Jim mostly spends his time partying and casually hooking up with random women. Jim’s family is of small comfort to him since he spends most family dinners enduring his father’s many complaints about how Jim […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 3 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Audio | SFF Reviews | | no comments |
Pacific Edge by Kim Stanley Robinson Where The Wild Shore shows us a post-apocalyptic California and The Gold Coast deals with future where urbanisation is out of control, in Pacific Edge Kim Stanley Robinson explores a utopian future: a California where people have learned to listen to the land and to pursue more sustainable population […]
Read MoreRob Weber´s rating: 4 | Kim Stanley Robinson | SFF Reviews | | no comments |
The Memory of Whiteness by Kim Stanley Robinson The Memory of Whiteness is Kim Stanley Robinson’s third novel, after The Wild Shore and Icehenge. It’s a very unusual book, standing out in Robinson’s oeuvre. Much of his work deals with science and many of his characters are scientists. In this novel science plays a large role as well, […]
Read MoreRob Weber | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | no comments |
Escape from Kathmandu by Kim Stanley Robinson Kim Stanley Robinson is primarily known as a science fiction writer, but that category doesn’t fit all of his work. For example, just before he published the novel A Short, Sharp Shock (1990), which could be labeled as surrealistic fantasy, he published Escape from Kathmandu, a collection of four linked […]
Read MoreRob Weber | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 1 comment |
Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson When the First Hundred arrive on Mars, they find a beautiful red planet that’s all but untouched by humanity. What should they paint on this amazing canvas? The question turns out to be very political, and the discussion of politics in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Red Mars perhaps begins with […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 5 | Kim Stanley Robinson | BSFA Award, Nebula Award | SFF Reviews | | 2 comments |
Green Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson It took me about 200 pages to get into Kim Stanley Robinson’s Green Mars (1994), the first sequel to Red Mars, and even after I connected with it I found myself working through slow patches. Although the inside cover of the edition I read describes KSR’s novels as “thrilling,” I […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 4 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Hugo Award, Locus Award | SFF Reviews | | 7 comments |
Blue Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson Earth is powerful but overpopulated, and its many billions of people now look at the Martian frontier with desperate envy and resentment. Is war inevitable? Peace in the short term will require a delegation to co-opt the “feudal capitalist” Earth’s selfish politics, it will require history’s most ambitious Model […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 5 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Hugo Award | SFF Reviews | | 1 comment |
The Martians by Kim Stanley Robinson Kim Stanley Robinson’s MARS trilogy is a landmark of science fiction. The books visualize the terraforming of the red planet from a desert wasteland to a verdant living space while Robinson examines humanity from economic, psychological, political, sociological, and ecological viewpoints, culminating in the most in-depth look at colonizing […]
Read MoreJesse Hudson´s rating: 3 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | | no comments |
Antarctica by Kim Stanley Robinson X follows his girlfriend, Val, to Antarctica, only to learn that she is dumping him. A mountaineer, Val becomes an expedition leader while X becomes a grunt. While driving a convoy, one of his vehicles is hijacked, which is odd enough that the American Senator Phil Chase sends one of […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 4 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | no comments |
The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson In The Years of Rice and Salt, Kim Stanley Robinson uses the Black Plague to remove the Europeans, leaving the Old World to the Chinese, Islam, and the many cultural groups that end up in India. The Chinese discover the Americas, their diseases spread through […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 4.5 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 2 comments |
Forty Signs of Rain by Kim Stanley Robinson With the quality of special effects improved exponentially, the blockbuster disaster movie appeared in the 90s and hasn’t looked back. Tornadoes (Twister), meteors (Deep Impact and Armageddon), seismic activity (The Core), volcanoes (Dante’s Peak), massive weather events (The Perfect Storm), and, who can forget, Sharknado, have in one way or […]
Read MoreJesse Hudson´s rating: 3.5 | Kim Stanley Robinson | SFF Reviews | | 5 comments |
Fifty Degrees Below by Kim Stanley Robinson Forty Signs of Rain identified the themes and mode for Kim Stanley Robinson’s SCIENCE IN THE CAPITOL series. As is expected for the middle novel of a trilogy, Fifty Degrees Below (2006) further unpacks the ideas while escalating the story to new heights of excitement. Salting what was a rather tasteless […]
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Galileo’s Dream by Kim Stanley Robinson I’m a huge fan of Kim Stanley Robinson’s The Years of Rice and Salt, which is a terrific blend of pseudo science fictional philosophy and religion, and fun and entertaining alternative history. It’s deep and touching and provides a strong sense of activity (if not specifically action and adventure). […]
Read MoreJason Golomb´s rating: 3 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 2 comments |
The Lucky Strike by Kim Stanley Robinson The Lucky Strike collects a short story and an essay about alternate history by Kim Stanley Robinson. At the end, readers are treated to an interview with the author. It is part of a larger series of publications that highlight “outspoken authors.” “The Lucky Strike,” the short story, […]
Read MoreRyan Skardal´s rating: 3 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | | 3 comments |
Shaman by Kim Stanley Robinson I tell you, once upon a time kids had to walk to school barefoot. And not just barefoot, but naked. In snow and rain. Uphill. And they had to not get eaten by wolves. And be chased by Neanderthals. And eat shrooms. Or at least, they did if their school […]
Read MoreBill Capossere´s rating: 4.5 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 1 comment |
Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson Aurora, by Kim Stanley Robinson, has major issues with pacing, characterization, and to some extent, plotting. Which would seem to make this review a no-brainer “not recommended.” But if one can overlook issues of plot, character, and pace (and granted, that’s a Grand Canyon-level overlook), there’s a lot here to […]
Read MoreBill Capossere´s rating: 3.5 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 5 comments |
New York 2140 by Kim Stanley Robinson Kim Stanley Robinson is among the best there is at hard science fiction; he can write characters who feel like real people and give you ideas that keep you thinking well after you’ve set the book down. Unfortunately, New York 2140 (2017) is not up to the mark of his […]
Read MoreNathan Okerlund´s rating: 3.5 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 1 comment |
Red Moon by Kim Stanley Robinson I’m a big fan of most of Kim Stanley Robinson’s output, especially his MARS trilogy, and so when I saw that he was out with a book entitled Red Moon (2018), with its echoes of said trilogy (Red, Green, and Blue Mars), that it had an AI character like […]
Read MoreBill Capossere´s rating: 2 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 2 comments |
The Ministry for The Future by Kim Stanley Robinson Kim Stanley Robinson’s new novel, The Ministry for The Future (2020), feels like a blueprint. Set in our near future, it follows a set of diverse characters living all over the world who are trying to solve the climate crisis, repair our world and, essentially, save […]
Read MoreKat Hooper´s rating: 4 | Kim Stanley Robinson | Audio, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | | 2 comments |
There is so much free or inexpensive short fiction available on the internet these days. Here are a few stories we read this week that we wanted you to know about. “Aye, and Gomorrah” by Samuel R. Delany (1967, free at Strange Horizons) “Aye, and Gomorrah” was first published as the final story in the ground-breaking […]
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Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories edited by John Joseph Adams Even people who don’t usually read science fiction will often be familiar with a few classic titles in the “dystopian SF” sub-genre. After all, 1984, Fahrenheit 451, and of course the famous Aldous Huxley novel Brave New World are some of the few SF titles […]
Read MoreStefan Raets (RETIRED) and Ruth Arnell (RETIRED)´s rating: 5 | Caitlín R. Kiernan, Carrie Vaughn, Charles Coleman (C.C.) Finlay, Cory Doctorow, Genevieve Valentine, Harlan Ellison, Kate Wilhelm, Ken Liu, Kim Stanley Robinson, Kurt Vonnegut, Neil Gaiman, Orson Scott Card, Paolo Bacigalupi, Philip K. Dick, Ray Bradbury, Robert Silverberg, Tobias Buckell, Ursula K. Le-Guin | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | | 6 comments |
Terry Weyna and I attended the 2013 Nebula Awards Weekend in San Jose, California last week. The event focused mostly on the Saturday awards banquet, and programming was rather light, but I did attend a panel called “Writing the Other,” subtitled, “How do we write about what we cannot know?” “Writing the Other” looked like […]
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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 […]
Read MoreMarion 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 | Convention | | 4 comments |
Last month Marion and I attended FOGCon 5 in Walnut Creek, California (in the San Francisco Bay area) where I served on a panel called “When the Setting is a Character.” FOGCon, which stands for Friends of the Genre Convention, has a literary bent. Marion and I are going to discuss our experience here, and we’ve got a book to give […]
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