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), […]
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Marion: I read Crownbreaker, the final book in Sebastien de Castell’s SPELLSLINGER series. I’ve skipped one book in Kellen’s adventures, and it’s the one before this one, but I think I kept up well enough. Kellen is sent off to kill a god in this one, but as always, his real problem is his relationship with […]
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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 […]
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One commenter selected at random will win a copy of Veronica Roth’s Arch-Conspirator. Alexi Vandenberg appears to be the latest competitor in the George Santos Sweepstakes. Known at conventions for his large bookselling booth, often under the name of Bard’s Tower, Vandenberg presented himself as a publisher and as someone who once worked with President […]
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The Lies of the Ajungo by Moses Ose Utomi The Lies of the Ajungo (2023), by Moses Ose Utomi, is as close to perfect a modern parable as I’ve read in some time, with prose as sparse as its desert setting and lessons just as unforgiving. I loved pretty much everything about it from its […]
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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 […]
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Nerds of a Feather reports on the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) bookfair in Seattle last weekend. A speculative fiction feature, Everything Everywhere All At Once, swept the Oscars on Sunday. In Argentina, an immersive drama introduces participants to an eerie underground labyrinth and the woman architect who designed it. Leigh Bardugo has […]
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The Super Barbarians by John Brunner Ever since the mid-15th century, and continuing on for some 600 years now and counting, coffee has been one of planet Earth’s favorite beverages. Today, I believe, it holds the No. 3 spot, with only water itself and tea being consumed more frequently. But whether taken black or light, as […]
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Reposting to include Marion’s new review. Yellow Jessamine by Caitlin Starling Having thoroughly enjoyed Caitlin Starling’s 2019 novel The Luminous Dead, I was very happy to learn that I wouldn’t have to wait long to read more of her work. Yellow Jessamine (2020), Starling’s new novella, is completely different from The Luminous Dead but similarly […]
Read More Marion: I finished the Veronica Roth novella Arch-Conspirator, that Bill recommended, and thought it was very good. Now I’m halfway through a thriller by Paula McLain called When the Stars Go Dark. It’s set in the village of Mendocino, CA, and other north-coastal spots in 1993. While it’s well-written, the blending of her fictional missing-girl […]
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Wormwood: Gentleman Corpse (Vol. 2): It Only Hurts When I Pee by Ben Templesmith The slapstick horror of Wormwood: Gentleman Corpse continues in volume two, It Only Hurts When I Pee. Wormwood is an “intergalactic, interdimensional, immortal, happy-go-lucky larval worm thing” that “wears corpses likes suits.” You can see the worm he is in the eyeball […]
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In honor of International Women’s Day, the image is of writer, teacher and activist Toni Morrison receiving the Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama. Nerds of a Feather announces editorial changes as Arturo Serrano, Roseanne Pendlebury and Paul Weimer join their editorial crew. Adri Joy and Joe Sherry move to Senior Editor staff. On […]
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Dead Country by Max Gladstone Dead Country (2023) is Max Gladstone’s seventh title in his highly recommended CRAFT series (OK, technically, it’s the start of a new trilogy entitled CRAFT WARS), which might make some readers who sadly have yet to wade into the series hesitant to pick it up. But in some ways, Dead […]
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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 […]
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The Atlantic Abomination by John Brunner In his 1953 novel The Kraken Wakes, English author John Wyndham gave his readers a tale concerning aliens who land on Earth and proceed to terrorize the planet from their bases on the ocean floor. But this, of course, was not the last time that a British writer would […]
Read More Marion: I read the latest Vera Stanhope mystery by Ann Cleeves and didn’t care for it much, but the mystery centers around a bunch of 60-somethings who went to a “retreat” and encounter-session when they were teens in the 70s, and I laughed out loud. I went to those. Cleeves nailed it. After that I read […]
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The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty Shannon Chakraborty, author of the recommended THE DAEVAVAD TRILOGY, is back with the start of a new series, and if the first book, The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi, is any measure, it’s sure to be as fun and magic filled as the first (sharp-eyed readers will at […]
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It’s the first Thursday of the month. Time to report! What’s the best book you read in February 2023 and why did you love it? It doesn’t have to be a newly published book, or even SFF, or even fiction. We just want to share some great reading material. Feel free to post a full […]
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Single topic column this week. One commenter will get a hardcopy of The Secret Skin by Wendy N. Wagner. The Eidolon is billed as Book One of the MAGNUS ACADEMY series, part of K.D. Edwards’s TAROT SEQUENCE world. It is a companion piece to the third book of his first trilogy, The Hourglass Throne. It […]
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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 […]
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