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Blade of Dream by Daniel Abraham
Blade of Dream is Daniel Abraham’s second book in his KITHAMAR trilogy, though to call it a “sequel” is a bit of a misnomer as rather than directly following the events of Age of Ash, this new story parallels that first book’s events in time, actually intersecting with a few scenes here and there but mostly, or at least somewhat, acting as a stand-alone novel. That said, while one can read this without having read its predecessor,
July 5th, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 5 | Daniel Abraham | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
A House With Good Bones by T. Kingfisher
“There was a vulture on the mailbox of my grandmother’s house.”
A couple of weeks ago there was a big discussion on Twitter about “cozy horror.” I followed it, but never really understood what “cozy” was supposed to be. I feel confident saying that T. Kingfisher is the queen of Cozy Horror, though —if “cozy” means there’s a house (haunted or not) and the ending has some bit of optimism. With 2023’s A House With Good Bones,
June 30th, 2023. Marion Deeds´s rating: 5 | T. Kingfisher | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Way Home by Peter S. Beagle
This is a glorious month for Peter S. Beagle fans, with The Way Home (2023) offering up two novellas set in the same world as The Last Unicorn, and not one but two retrospective collections of stories: The Essential Peter S. Beagle: Volumes I and II. Even better, one of those two novellas is brand new and serves to show that Beagle remains one of our most elegant of fantasists.
May 31st, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 5 | Peter S. Beagle | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | no comments |
All the Traps of Earth by Clifford D. Simak
Looking back, it strikes me with some surprise that, up until very recently, I had not read any of sci-fi Grand Master Clifford D. Simak’s shorter work in over 40 years. Oh, I had read any number of the author’s novels during those four decades, but since reading his 1968 collection So Bright the Vision back in 1981, none of his work of a shorter length. Coming to my rescue in this regard was the Wisconsin-born writer’s All the Traps of Earth,
May 18th, 2023. Sandy Ferber´s rating: 5 | Clifford D. Simak | Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |
The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence
A topical, deeply thoughtful, and wonderfully written love letter to books, to libraries, to the power of storytelling, to fantasy, and to epigrams, The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence will be appearing on my best of 2023 list at the end of this year. That’s not to say it’s perfect. After all, I now have to wait for book two in this new series. And, well, I don’t wanna wait. Me want. Me want now.
At nearly 600 pages,
May 16th, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 5 | Mark Lawrence | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
The Possibility of Life: Science, Imagination, and Our Quest for Kinship in the Cosmos by Jaime Green
In The Possibility of Life, journalist Jaime Green takes us on an expansive and open-minded exploration of whether or not life may have formed elsewhere in the universe and if so, what that life might be like. If this were only that book, it would be well worth reading. But Green makes two choices that elevate her work beyond a good exobiology book easily recommended and into a fantastic medley of science,
May 5th, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 5 | Non-fiction | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
The Between by Tananarive Due
The Between, first published in 1995, is Tananarive Due’s classic horror novel, about a man who must risk his life to save his family from malignant forces, both supernatural and all too human. In the mid-1990s, Hilton James suddenly starts experiencing the dreadful dreams he had before, early in his marriage. Time with a therapist and a hypnosis session seemed to help then, but now the episodes are worse, and he begins to have waking dreams, until sometimes he can’t tell when and where he is.
April 27th, 2023. Marion Deeds´s rating: 5 | Tananarive Due | Horror, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | no comments |
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.
April 21st, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 5 | Arkady Martine | Short Fiction, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | no comments |
The Shores of Another Sea by Chad Oliver
1961 was something of a banner year for Cincinnati-born sci-fi author Chad Oliver. In the first part of that year, having already released four novels of anthropological science fiction, he received his Ph.D. in anthropology at UCLA, a degree that would help him become an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin two years later, and the Chairman of the Dept. of Anthropology there in 1967. And in the latter part of 1961,
April 10th, 2023. Sandy Ferber´s rating: 5 | Chad Oliver | Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
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 opening line — “There is no water in the City of Lies” — onward.
The novella opens with a brief bit of worldbuilding history: Long ago when the City of Lies suffered greatly from its lack of water,
March 17th, 2023. Bill Capossere´s rating: 5 | Moses Ose Utomi | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
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