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Halt’s Peril is the ninth book in John Flanagan’s RANGER’S APPRENTICE series. It’s a direct sequel to the eighth book, The Kings of Clonmel, in which we learned Halt’s backstory while he, Will and Horace attempted to save the country of Clonmel from Tennyson, a cult leader who was planning a coup. They did manage to save Clonmel, but now Tennyson and his followers have left the country and our heroes suspect that they are on their way to Araluen with similar intentions.
July 31st, 2015. Kat Hooper´s rating: 2 | John Flanagan | Audio, Children | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
Citizen of the Galaxy by Eric Gignac and Robert Lazaro
Citizen of the Galaxy is one of the classic Robert Heinlein juveniles, and would seem a perfect choice for a graphic adaptation — a relatively simple, straightforward plot, a wholly linear structure, a coming-of-age story with space slavers, all told in a relatively few number of pages. Unfortunately, IDW’s graphic version by Eric Gignac and Robert Lazaro is not close to a perfect adaptation.
The story is, as mentioned, relatively simple.
July 18th, 2015. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2 | Robert A. Heinlein | Comics | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Quantum Rose by Catherine Asaro
I have really really tried to give Catherine Asaro’s SKOLIAN EMPIRE series a fair chance. As I keep saying in my reviews, this should have been just my thing — space opera written by a female physicist. I should be loving this! Instead, to get straight to the point, so far these books have been mostly insipid insta-love romances with some quantum theory thrown in. As a woman who enjoys hard science fiction, and especially quantum theory, I was disappointed to find that these books do not appeal to me.
July 9th, 2015. Kat Hooper´s rating: 2 | Catherine Asaro | Audio, Nebula Award | SFF Reviews | 14 comments |
Serafina and the Black Cloak by Robert Beatty
Serafina and the Black Cloak, a Middle Grade book by Robert Beatty, has its moments, but a thin plot, a meandering middle segment, and several gaps of logic/plausibility come close to outweighing its positives, and probably will outweigh them for any readers older than middle grade.
Set at the opulent Biltmore Estate in 1899 (and having been there, oh my, is it opulent), the story is centered on a sudden rash of disappearances amongst the children at the Estate.
July 3rd, 2015. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2 | Robert Beatty | Children | SFF Reviews | 10 comments |
The Einstein Intersection by Samuel R. Delany
It doesn’t get any more New Wave SF than this very slim 1968 Nebula-winning novel (157 pages), and it’s hard to imagine anything like this being written today. The Einstein Intersection is a mythical retelling of the Orpheus and Eurydice story in a far-future Earth populated by the mutated remnants of humanity. Being a Samuel R. Delany book, the writing is disjointed, jazzy, lyrical, playful, and tantalizing. The surface events are fairly obscure, but it’s clear that the real narrative is buried beneath,
July 2nd, 2015. Stuart Starosta´s rating: 2 | Samuel R. Delany | Nebula Award, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
Ascendant Sun by Catherine Asaro
This review will contain spoilers for previous books.
I keep working through Catherine Asaro’s SKOLIAN EMPIRE series. I keep expecting to love the next book, but here I am on book five and it’s still not working for me.
Ascendant Sun is a sequel to The Radiant Seas and a direct sequel to The Last Hawk which, frankly, I didn’t like. The Last Hawk was about Kelric,
June 30th, 2015. Kat Hooper´s rating: 2 | Catherine Asaro | Audio | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
The Last Hawk by Catherine Asaro
The Last Hawk is the fourth of Catherine Asaro’s SKOLIAN EMPIRE saga, if we’re going in publication order, but it’s the first book about Kelric Valdoria, one of Sauscony Valdoria’s brothers. You don’t have to read the previous three books first (Primary Inversion, Catch the Lightning, The Radiant Seas), but you need to read The Last Hawk before you read Ascendant Sun,
June 23rd, 2015. Kat Hooper´s rating: 2 | Catherine Asaro | Audio | SFF Reviews | 5 comments |
Catch the Lightning by Catherine Asaro
If we’re talking about publication order, Catch the Lightning is the second book in Catherine Asaro’s SKOLIAN EMPIRE series. It stands between Primary Inversion and that book’s direct sequel, The Radiant Seas. If you’re coming from reading Primary Inversion, I suggest you skip this one for now and read The Radiant Seas first… Actually, it’s not a bad idea to skip this one altogether…
June 19th, 2015. Kat Hooper´s rating: 2 | Catherine Asaro | Audio | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
Each book in Mercedes Lackey’s ELEMENTAL MASTERS series is a stand-alone re-told fairy tale set in a world where some humans are elemental masters — magicians who have control over an elemental power. Some of the stories are more closely tied to the original fairy tale than others. For some, the source material is almost unrecognizable.
Blood Red, the tenth ELEMENTAL MASTERS novel, starts out sounding exactly like Red Riding Hood — there’s an Austrian girl (Rosamund) wearing a red cape who’s bringing a basket of food to an old lady that she thinks of as her grandmother.
June 17th, 2015. Kat Hooper´s rating: 2 | Mercedes Lackey | Audio | SFF Reviews | 5 comments |
Dawn of the Algorithm by Yann Rousselot
Dawn of the Algorithm is a collection of 33 poems by Yann Rousselot that take a wryly dark look at humanity — mostly our faults — through the lens of science fiction tropes, most pulled from pop culture. We’ve got AIs, giant monsters, depressed T-Rex’s, aliens, and loads of references to anime, science fiction films and fiction. It’s a collection that should have been right up my alley, but though it has its moments, I just didn’t connect with much of it,
June 10th, 2015. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2 | Yann Rousselot | Edge | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
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That list of anticipated books is certainly odd, although it does align with the type of books ReacTor and Locus…
If it doesn't have a ripped shirt, is it *really* Doc Savage?
Ooh, I DO kinda like that Doc Savage action figure! But without the ripped shirt, I think I will take…
I like the analysis of the artwork here--detailed and thoughtful. Thanks for sharing this review!
Please contact me Scott I know who got us away and contacted social services.