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The Fall of Gondolin by Christopher Tolkien
Last year, when Christopher Tolkien published Beren and Lúthien, an exploratory history/retelling of one of his father’s three “great tales” of the First Age, he noted that due to his 93 years of age, “it is (presumptively ) my last book in the long series of editions of my father’s writing.” That parenthetical qualifier turned out to be a good idea, as here we are a year later, and he’s back with The Fall of Gondolin.
August 31st, 2018. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4.5 | J.R.R. Tolkien | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
The Descent of Monsters by J.Y. Yang
Every page of J.Y. Yang’s newest TENSORATE novella, The Descent of Monsters (2018), carries a pervasive and steadily-increasing sense of dread. But when the primary character announces straight off that “You are reading this because I am dead,” it’s hard not to wonder how and why that comes to pass, and which event will be the one which ends Tensor Chuwan Sariman’s life.
Note: It will help to read The Black Tides of Heaven and The Read Threads of Fortune before beginning The Descent of Monsters,
August 28th, 2018. Jana Nyman and Marion Deeds´s rating: 4.5 | JY Yang | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |
The Equations of Life: How Physics Shapes Evolution by Charles S. Cockell
Watch any nature show and at some point you’re sure to hear the soft-voiced narrator (usually David Attenborough or someone doing their best Attenborough impersonation) marvel at the “boundless variety” of life, of its seeming infinitude of shapes, colors, forms, and its tenaciousness in colonizing apparently every niche of our planet, no matter how harsh or isolated. Or, as theorist Ian Malcolm puts it in Jurassic Park:
If there is one thing the history of evolution has taught us,
August 15th, 2018. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4.5 | Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal
Elma York has a PhD in physics, and her husband has one in engineering. They are enjoying a much-deserved weekend getaway in the Poconos in 1952 when a huge meteorite destroys Washington DC and much of the North American eastern seaboard. Experts fear the aftermath will create an extinction-level event, and this accelerates the race to the stars. Elma has a front row seat, but she wants more; she wants to go into space.
2018’s The Calculating Stars is the first novel of Mary Robinette Kowal’s LADY ASTRONAUT series.
August 13th, 2018. Marion Deeds and Jana Nyman´s rating: 4.5 | Mary Robinette Kowal | Locus Award, Nebula Award | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
The Wild Dead by Carrie Vaughn
Carrie Vaughn continues the fascinating post-apocalyptic BANNERLESS SAGA in The Wild Dead (2018), the first sequel to her Philip K. Dick Award-winning novel Bannerless. Murders are, thankfully, few and far between along the Coast Road, so it’s been about a year since Enid of Haven has needed to put on her metaphorical deerstalker cap. This time, she and her painfully inexperienced new partner, Teeg, are in the remote southern settlement of Desolata to mediate a dispute over a pre-Fall house: the house’s “owner” refuses to admit that his family’s cherished home is dangerously dilapidated,
August 9th, 2018. Jana Nyman´s rating: 4.5 | Carrie Vaughn | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Ruin of Angels by Max Gladstone
Ruin of Angels, published in 2017, is Max Gladstone’s sixth book in the CRAFT series. This story follows Kai, a priestess we met in Full Fathom Five. Kai is a, well, a “venture priestess.” She creates internal spiritual spaces for clients, and invests in projects that reach into the metaphysical — as everything in this world does. A project has brought her to Agdel Lex, a modern city nested in the time and space of Alikand and a dead city as well,
July 30th, 2018. Marion Deeds and Bill Capossere´s rating: 4.5 | Max Gladstone | SFF Reviews | 7 comments |
The Secret of This Book by Brian W. Aldiss
Brian Aldiss was one of the most versatile writers in speculative fiction. Published in a variety of forms (poetry, plays, short fiction, novels, and non-fiction), a variety of genres and sub-genres (fantasy, science fiction, and realism — to cover the big ones) and in a variety of writing styles, his dynamism, willingness to try new modes, and experimentation with prose made him one of the most important writers in the field. Capturing this versatility is Aldiss’s 1995 collection The Secret of This Book.
July 28th, 2018. Jesse Hudson´s rating: 4.5 | Brian W. Aldiss | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
No Enemy But Time by Michael Bishop
Mankind is a creature which occupies itself predominantly in the present. Smoking, murder, alcohol abuse, poor diet, resource wastage — all of these habits and behaviors alleviate the moment but do nothing to bolster the idea a human is aware of, or concerned with, the long term existence of itself or the species. Moreover, it’s fair to say that when one does bring in the long view, “recent” history and near future remain the focus. Our primitive roots are left to esoteric niches of science (archeology,
July 24th, 2018. Jesse Hudson´s rating: 4.5 | Michael Bishop | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Age of Myth by Michael J. Sullivan
With Age of Myth, Michael J. Sullivan begins a prequel series to his RIYRIA CHRONICLES and RIYRIA REVELATIONS series. The good news for newcomers to his books is that, since this series takes place about 3,000 years earlier, you don’t need to be familiar with either of those series or the world of Elan to enjoy this new LEGENDS OF THE FIRST EMPIRE series, so I was in good shape.
July 17th, 2018. Tadiana Jones and Marion Deeds´s rating: 4.5 | Michael J. Sullivan | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
Chasing New Horizons: Inside the Epic First Mission to Pluto by Alan Stern & David Grinspoon
To be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect of Chasing New Horizons (2018). Sure, a trip to Pluto is exciting and intriguing, and the results that have already come back are thrilling. But I wasn’t sure that a book about devising the actual mission would be — the planning, the meetings, the engineering, the pushing of buttons and waiting while radio signals traveled for hours after which one could push more buttons.
July 11th, 2018. Bill Capossere´s rating: 4.5 | Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
Pretty challenging book. Cut by half, speed up the cadence. Trying to figure out the plot, the main point of…
Thanks for the kind words, Marion! Coming as they are from a professional writer, they are much appreciated!
Wonderful review, Sandy.
The "body count" bothered me a bit less because being dead seemed more like an inconvenience than anything else... unlike…
Detailed, thoughtful review, Bill. I'm going to read it for two reasons. First, Karen Russell wrote it, and second, it…