Previous SFF Author: Vera Nazarian
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.
“Lois Lane: A Real Work of Art” by Gwenda Bond (2015, free at Amazon)
The first of two prequel stories for Gwenda Bond’s Lois Lane: Fallout, “A Real Work of Art,” is a quick story in which pre-Metropolis Lois Lane puts her investigatory skills to use at a new school.
January 4th, 2016. Jana Nyman, Kat Hooper and Tadiana Jones | Gwenda Bond, Kij Johnson, Neil Gaiman | Nebula Award, Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 8 comments |
The Voice From the Edge, Vol 2: Midnight in the Sunken Cathedral by Harlan Ellison
As much as I dislike the man personally, I have to say that Harlan Ellison writes great stories. Even the stories that I don’t like — because they’re violent, gory, gross, or full of others varieties of ugliness — are good stories. And if there’s anything that Harlan Ellison does better than write great stories, it’s narrate them. He’s a superb story teller. That’s why I’ve picked up all of his Voice From The Edge recordings at Audible.com.
December 18th, 2015. Kat Hooper and Stuart Starosta´s rating: 4 | Harlan Ellison | Audio, Hugo Award, Locus Award, Nebula Award | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream: The Voice From the Edge Vol. 1 by Harlan Ellison
Probably everyone who knows anything about Harlan Ellison knows he’s a jerk (please don’t sue me, Mr. Ellison). I had to consciously put aside my personal opinion of the man while listening to him narrate his audiobook I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream: The Voice From the Edge Vol. 1. I was disgusted by some of these stories, but I have to admit that even though I suspect Ellison delights in trying to shock the reader with his various forms of odiousness (mostly having to do with sex),
December 14th, 2015. Kat Hooper and Stuart Starosta | Harlan Ellison | Audio, Horror, Hugo Award, Nebula Award, Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 13 comments |
Women Destroy Science Fiction! Lightspeed Magazine Special Issue: The Stories edited by Christie Yant, Robyn Lupo, Rachel Swirsky
Last June, Hugo-winning Lightspeed Magazine, which is edited by John Joseph Adams, devoted an entire issue (Women Destroy Science Fiction!, June 2014, issue #49) to female science fiction writers and editors. Under Christie Yant’s and Robyn Lupo’s editorial leadership, they accepted 11 original short science fiction stories and 15 original pieces of SF flash fiction. Rachel Swirsky chose and reprinted 5 stories previously published elsewhere.
December 4th, 2015. Kat Hooper´s rating: 4 | Amal El-Mohtar, Charlie Jane Anders, Harlan Ellison, Jonathan L. Howard, Maria Dahvana Headley, Maureen McHugh, N.K. Jemisin, Rachel Swirsky, Seanan McGuire, Tina Connolly | Audio, Hugo Award, Nebula Award, Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 5 comments |
Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany
Babel-17 won the 1966 Nebula award for best novel, tying with Daniel Keyes’s Flowers for Algernon. Samuel Delany’s space opera novel is dated in many ways, but still holds up.
In the future, humans have colonized many star systems. Currently, the Alliance is engaged in a war with the Invaders, who, despite the name, are also human. The Alliance has intercepted many dispatches in a code they can’t break. They’ve labeled it Babel-17. Desperate, they turn to the inter-galactically renowned poet Rydra Wong to help them decipher it.
November 21st, 2015. Marion Deeds, Stuart Starosta and Kat Hooper´s rating: 3, 4 | Samuel R. Delany | Audio, Nebula Award, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
The Best of Nancy Kress by Nancy Kress
Reading Nancy Kress’s work is a disconcerting experience for me. I love her ideas; there is no one quite like her when it comes to integrating a Big Idea into a believable world. On the other hand, I often don’t understand her characters’ motivations and frequently find them unengaging. Subterranean Press’s new story collection, The Best of Nancy Kress — edited by Kress herself — provides some insight into her ideas and her storytelling, and is an educational,
November 17th, 2015. Marion Deeds´s rating: 4 | Nancy Kress | Hugo Award, Nebula Award, Short Fiction, Theodore Sturgeon Award | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |
Doomsday Book by Connie Willis
Although it took a good two-thirds of the novel for me to decide, I’ve come to the conclusion that I really enjoyed this multiple award-winning book by Connie Willis. At its core, Doomsday Book is sci-fi time travel, but it’s got depth and intelligence, and leaves little wonder that it won both the Nebula and Hugo Awards for Best Novel (in 1992 and ’93, respectively), as well as the Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel in 1993,
November 4th, 2015. Jason Golomb´s rating: 4 | Connie Willis | Hugo Award, Locus Award, Mythopoeic Award, Nebula Award | SFF Reviews | 2 comments |
A Time of Changes by Robert Silverberg
After four years of successive losses, sci-fi great Robert Silverberg finally picked up his first Nebula Award in 1972. His 1967 novel Thorns had lost to Samuel R. Delany‘s The Einstein Intersection, his brilliant 1968 novel The Masks of Time had been bested by Alexei Panshin‘s equally brilliant Rite of Passage, 1969’s time travel tale Up the Line had succumbed to Ursula K.
October 23rd, 2015. Sandy Ferber, Stuart Starosta and Kat Hooper´s rating: 5 | Robert Silverberg | Audio, Nebula Award, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 5 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.
Grand Jeté (The Great Leap) by Rachel Swirsky (2014, free at Subterranean Press)
“Mara, please wake up. I’ve made you a gift.” But gifts can be complicated: often there are strings attached, and the giver may not be completely in tune with the desires of the recipient… may, in fact,
October 19th, 2015. Tadiana Jones, Jason Golomb, Katie Burton, Marion Deeds and Kate Lechler | John Scalzi, Rachel Swirsky | Nebula Award, Short Fiction | SFF Reviews | 1 comment |
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin
The Left Hand of Darkness (1969), part of THE HAINISH CYCLE, won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best SF Novel, and is well known as one of the first books in the genre to intelligently explore the nature of gender and identity. Ursula K. LeGuin is a highly respected writer known for her anthropological and humanistic approach to SF, and her presence has attracted many mainstream readers and forced literary critics to take the genre more seriously.
September 11th, 2015. Stuart Starosta and Kat Hooper´s rating: 5 | Ursula K. Le-Guin | Audio, Hugo Award, Nebula Award, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 5 comments |
Previous SFF Author: Vera Nazarian
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