Wednesday, October 30, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: A House of Rage and Sorrow by Sangu Mandanna




A House of Rage and Sorrow is the second in Sangu Madanna's "Celestial Trilogy", a trilogy that began with last year's "A Spark of White Fire" (Reviewed Here).  The trilogy is a SciFi/Fantasy (there's aspects of both) adaptation of the Indian epic, the Mahabharata, with a slight YA slant - and is actually one of two adaptations of that epic (Ashok K Banker's "Upon a Burning Throne") I know of being published by western publishers over the past year.  I really liked A Spark of White Fire - the book was short, but contained a fascinating universe of worlds, stations, gods, and mortals, with a really likable heroine struggling to find peace and family despite prophecies and curses suggesting those may be a mere pipe dream.  It had some flaws, but I really enjoyed it despite those flaws and have been looking forward to the sequel pretty much all year.

And well, A House of Rage and Sorrow delivers tremendously on the promise of its predecessor, despite being even shorter in length.  Now that the stage has been set, we go fully into epic scifi/fantasy as Mandanna presumably adapts the sprawling nature of the original epic into her world, and despite packing everything into a short package, she manages to fill the world and characters with such depth as to keep me riveted throughout.  This is a story of mortals, gods, sentient space ships, great beasts, and more, and it even somehow manages to address some of my key flaws of the prior book.  Yeah, I love this one and I cannot wait for the conclusion.

Spoilers for A Spark of White Fire below are inevitable, be warned.

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Tuesday, October 29, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review:A Chain Across the Dawn by Drew Williams




A Chain Across the Dawn is the second book in Drew Williams' "Universe After" series, after his "The Stars Now Unclaimed" (Review Here).  In that review, I compared the first book to Star Wars in its space opera roots - but in retrospect, I've seen a few other reviews which make what I think is a better comparison: Mass Effect, being a space opera universe featuring a crew of misfits of different species being forced together to deal with a major threat.  And it was a hell of a lot of fun, with great action set pieces and fun characters, so I was really interested in reading the sequel.

And I think A Chain Across the Dawn is actually a bit better - whereas the first book was Mass Effect-esque, this book is a little bit like Mass Effect crossed with Alien.  The book also switches its viewpoint character to Esa, the young girl with telekinesis from the first book, now 3 years older and an agent in her own right (at age 17), and the switch works really well, giving a fresh look at a plot that once again contains a number of excellent action sequences.  That, along with some excellent character work, makes this book one that I really enjoyed and tore through, and i can't wait to get the trilogy ender in February.


Note: This book was again read as an audiobook, and the reader is excellent once again.  That said, as a result, if I misspell some names, that's why.


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Monday, October 28, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Song of the Abyss by Makiia Lucier




Song of the Abyss is a YA fantasy novel that is the stand-alone sequel to Makiia Lucier's earlier Isle of Blood and Stone (Review Here).  I enjoyed the world of that first book quite a bit - featuring an Island Kingdom with a culture towards exploring, and a trio of protagonists who weren't warriors like the typical fantasy protagonists, but explorers at heart, looking into a mystery.  That said, while the setup was very good, the book kind of dropped the ball with its abrupt ending and had some character beats I found annoying, which kept me from truly loving it as much as I'd hoped.  Song of the Abyss is, as I mentioned before, stand-alone and takes place years after the first book, featuring a character who was merely a young girl and has now grown into a young woman as its heroine.

And I liked Song of the Abyss quite a lot honestly, with the book improving significantly on its predecessor.  Again, the book features a protagonist who is an explorer/surveyor more than anything, working to solve a mystery in a way that would not involve violence.  And again, the book features a solid romance between its two most prominent characters, who have a lot of chemistry between them.  But the ending is a lot more satisfying this time around, and while the book isn't perfect - I actually wanted a little more from the romance - it's very easy to recommend for its strong world, strong heroine, and satisfying plot that moves at a nice brisk pace.


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Thursday, October 24, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Shadowshaper by Daniel Jose Older




Shadowshaper is a YA Urban Fantasy novel by Daniel Jose Older, set in modern day New York City, particularly Brooklyn.  I haven't loved the two prior books(Half Resurrection Blues, Star Wars: Last Shot) I've read by Older - I've found them functional novels that generally work, but unimpressive as a whole. Moreover, novels set in NYC tend to be hit or miss, with the books more often than not just using the setting as a generic setting, to my disappointment (as a local New Yorker).  Fortunately, Shadowshaper is the exception to that: quite clearly using its setting for specific reasons and showing a clear understanding of the areas involved, which I really appreciated.

Even more so, Shadowshaper uses this setting to tell a story of people from a "minority" community dealing with class and racial issues - such as gentrification and cultural appropriation - through a fantasy lens in a way that really works.  The story still has some of the same issues I had with the prior Older works - its pacing is very jumpy and it feels like characters jump in certain directions early just because the plot says they have to - but overall it comes together nicely to tell a story with some satisfying turns, some enjoyable characters, and an ending that has me looking forward to getting to the sequel eventually.

Note: I read this as an audiobook, and the audiobook reader is very good at handling the different voices and accents of the characters involved.  Definitely recommended in this format.


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Tuesday, October 22, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Grave Importance by Vivian Shaw




Grave Importance is the final book in Vivian Shaw's "Dr. Greta Hellsing" trilogy.  I loved this series from book 1 (Strange Practice - reviewed here), and so was kind of disappointed to find out that this would be the end of it, at least for the moment.  But that disappointment was tempered by the joy of having a new installment to read, because what's come before was so good, and so different from the norm, that I couldn't wait to read it.  The difference in the series is clearly set out in the series' name: this is the story of not a monster hunter, or a monster preserver, but a monster doctor (Dr. Greta Hellsing), who really means it when she says "do no harm."  Yeah the books may involve conflicts that threaten entire cities (or worse), but Greta's only concern throughout is healing and helping, not destroying or stopping.  The sheer joy that results, from the (ironically) humanity of the characters to the humor of the dialogues and the situations involved, is tremendous, and wow did I need a fun book just at this time.

And Grave Importance is incredibly damn fun and a hell of a way to cap this series, if it is indeed the end.  Our heroine remains delightful in her commitment to helping monsters - in this case Mummies - and her sheer joy at the new tools she is presented with is so contagious.  And then there is her relationships with the other major characters, and their own relationships to each other, and I just couldn't help loving all of it.  And oh yeah, there's a reality-wide threat to the universe and a major artifact heist involved with it all as well, I guess, but really it's the characters and the reactions to everything that make this such a joy.  Also, you know, the demons, vampires, mummies, witches, and the like.  Those too.

Minor Spoilers for the first two books after the jump:


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Monday, October 21, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Stars Now Unclaimed by Drew Williams




The Stars Now Unclaimed is very much in the mold of classic Space Opera.  It features a galaxy of different species, including one sentient AIs in both ships and humanoid forms, planets with varying degrees of technologies and climates, battles with high tech guns on the feet and in the air, etc.  The main cast and enemy will give a reader pretty easy Star Wars vibes as well.  In short, it's not trying to do anything particularly unusual in any way in its plot.

That's not a bad thing mind you, and The Stars Now Unclaimed is executed very well, with a very likable cast of characters and a plot that, while never wholly surprising, still manages to take some interesting twists and turns along the way to keep the reader hooked.  The battles and set pieces - not usually something I care too much about - are written pretty excellently as well.  The result is a space opera that may not be original in form or setting, but is definitely fun and enjoyable.  A pretty strong effort from what seems to be author Drew Williams' first novel, too.

Note:  I read this as an audiobook.  The reader is excellent, and made me very much want to keep listening as the story played out, to the point where I finished this book in a week, which is pretty impressive given it's not short (it's not long either, around 14 hours).  So yeah, I'd recommend this book in this format.


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Thursday, October 17, 2019

SciFi Novella Review: To Be Taught If Fortunate by Becky Chambers





To Be Taught If Fortunate by Becky Chambers:

Becky Chambers' Wayfarer series has been one of my favorite works of SF since I got back into the genre - character focused with lovely characters, featuring an optimistic universe of cohabitation and ideas extending that optimism toward an interesting and worthwhile future.  So naturally I tried to pick up her latest work, this novella To Be Taught If Fortunate, as soon as it came out....only to find out that a bunch of others had the same idea, so it took until this week for me to get it.  And then I finished it in one day, so you know, of course.

It's a bit of a different type of work than the Wayfarer series in some ways, but not others.  This is a novella that features a far more near future - about a hundred years or so - featuring a group of scientists exploring other planets and cataloging the environments and life found on those planets.  Like the Wayfarer series, it features a crew who are dedicated to their jobs and try to cooperate together to ensure those jobs are done well, with rivalries between the crew non-existent and collaboration being as natural as breathing.  Unlike the series however, the book deals with more clear ethical and moral questions, and while optimistic at heart, it holds less answers.

It's a fascinating piece of work that I definitely recommend.


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Wednesday, October 16, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Warrior Moon by K Arsenault Rivera





Since I got back into reading genre in 2015, there are few books that I've loved more than K Arsenault Rivera's, "The Tiger's Daughter" (Reviewed Here), the first book in her "Ascendant" trilogy.  That book was just such an amazing fantasy romance tale that I put in on my list of "perfect" books - just a perfect romance between two fantasy heroines as they grew up and faced a world of demons and evil humans that threatened not just destruction, but to pull them both apart.  The book was followed up last year with "The Phoenix Empress" (Reviewed Here), which couldn't quite measure up to its predecessor - the book was a little less focused and centered more firmly on the fantasy side than the romance unlike the first book - but was still really good, and ended with things firmly set up for the concluding volume.  And now, with The Warrior Moon, that concluding volume is here.

And what a volume it is - The Warrior Moon still doesn't measure up to The Tiger's Daughter's perfection - the book is much more epic in scope, with far more characters to keep track of, whose stories are being told alongside our main duo and as such Rivera can't quite keep everything together without a few noticeable flaws sneaking in.  But Rivera manages to come incredibly close to doing so, wrapping up the trilogy, and the stories of not just our main duo, but of several other:  characters we've come to know and love, in a satisfying, if sometimes bittersweet manner.  It may not measure up to the trilogy's beginning, a tour de force of a love story's first act, but as the final act of that story it's still pretty damn incredible.

Spoilers for the first two books are inevitable after the jump, although I don't think they'll reduce your enjoyment of the series if you haven't read those books before this review.  Of course, you totally should read those books first anyhow, so get on that already.....

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Tuesday, October 15, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: A Choir of Lies by Alexandra Rowland




A Choir of Lies is the follow up to Alexandra Rowland's 2018 novel, A Conspiracy of Truths, but it's very much a stand alone novel.  That said, it's very much a follow up to the first novel, a response to how that book treated the power of storytelling.  For those who missed Conspiracy, it's the tale of a traveling storyteller who only goes by the title "Chant", who finds himself accused of false charges and responds by using stories told to political leaders to change the situation in the country to great - and powerful - effect.  It was somewhat a satire of the silliness of people in power and somewhat a tale of the power of how the right words can change everything.  I liked it a bit, although I found the book itself let down by having the stories themselves not be particularly interesting.

A Choir of Lies responds to that first book by asking questions of the responsibilities of those telling stories, especially given the devastation they can cause.  Two Chants appear - Ylfing, the first Chant's apprentice from the last book and who narrates this tale, and a woman who goes by Madame Chant, who provides footnotes and responses to his comments.  Their dialogue and overall story provides a fascinating look at not only the different arts of storytelling, but also a pretty interesting look at the responsibilities and codes that can come with those arts.  The result is probably better than the first book - although the use of a real world event as a clear inspiration for much of the plot of this book didn't work for me, as it was really distracting as I was always waiting for the implications of that even to drop, as they inevitably had to.  Still, well worth a read.


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Monday, October 14, 2019

Fantasy Novella Review: Minor Mage by T Kingfisher




Minor Mage by T. Kingfisher

Minor Mage is the latest novella by "T Kingfisher", the pen name for SF/F author Ursula Vernon's non-children's work.  Which is an interesting point in and of itself, because the author herself has raised questions online about whether or not Minor Mage is or is not a children's work.  I lean towards it being acceptable for middle-grade and beyond audiences personally, with the story featuring a child protagonist, a talking armadillo.....and also a whole bunch of talk of murder and eating of people.  So yeah, it could go either way I guess.

Regardless, like much of Vernon/Kingfisher's work, it's really really fun and witty, with the characters being easy to root for, and the situations they get into fun to see play out and resolved.  The story is on the long side for a novella (I'd be unsurprised if it has too many words to qualify for a novella per Hugo/Nebula guidelines), but moves at a really easy pace and I finished it in a single day.  It's not anything essential to read, like some novellas this year - and it's been a hell of a year for novellas - but fun short works are great to have, and Minor Mage is pretty damn fun.


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SciFi/Fantasy Novella Review: A Long Day in Lychford by Paul Cornell




A Long Day in Lychford by Paul Cornell

 A Long Day in Lychford is the third novella in Paul Cornell's Witches of Lychford series.  I've enjoyed this novella series quite a bit, and really enjoyed the second novella quite a good bit.  For those new to the series, it features a trio of women -  an elderly witch, her apprentice skeptic, and a young woman newly hired as the town's vicar - facing off against magical beings from other worlds trying to invade a quaint english town (Lychford, of course).  The novellas aren't particularly long, but the first two managed to end in satisfying self-contained ways.  By contrast, this third novella differs from its predecessors in a few ways, including the fact that is seemingly not self-contained and has a clear cliffhanger and unresolved plot arcs, making it my least favorite of the trio in my opinion.

Note: As usual with this series, I've been listening to this in audiobook format.  For some strange reason, each novella in this series has had a different narrator, but the first two narrators were at least somewhat close in the voices they used for each of the three main characters.  Not so this novella, which for some reason gives Lizzie a voice that sounded to me like an elderly woman, making it hard to tell her and Judith (the actual elderly woman) apart, and sounded nothing like Lizzie in either of the earlier two novellas.  It's very disorienting.  

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Friday, October 11, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Gideon the Ninth by Tasmyn Muir




Gideon the Ninth got as much hype and promotion in advance of release of nearly any SciFi/Fantasy book I've been likely to read this year.  From advertisements to glowing endorsements from reviewers/writers I pay attention to, it's hard to think of a book I had on my "to read" list longer that wasn't from a series or writer I already knew and loved.  And well, it had a hell of a simple description: Lesbian Necromancers in Space!  Hard to resist that tagline.

And the result is very very good and nearly worth all the hype.  The story is incredibly fun, essentially a SF/F locked room mystery of sorts with all of the characters either being necromancers of various flavors or swordsmen/swordswomen bodyguards.  And the main character, our narrator Gideon Nav, is really fun to read - a wisecracking lesbian swordsman way out of her depth amongst people far more powerful and more comfortable than she is, with some serious issues.  The book's only serious issue is a setting that isn't quite sketched out well enough to give certain plot points the oomph they need, but otherwise the magic system, the characters, and the plot provide a really great ride for a reader.


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Thursday, October 10, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Escaping Exodus by Nicky Drayden



Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on October 15, 2019 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

 Escaping Exodus is the third novel from author Nicky Drayden - after 2017's The Prey of Gods (Reviewed Here) and 2018's Temper (Reviewed Here).  Both books were incredibly ambitious, filled with tons of ideas, and I really enjoyed The Prey of Gods even if I didn't quite love Temper nearly as much.  I've said before on this blog and I'll say it again - I much prefer books that take chances to ones that are conservative, so when I saw Drayden's third novel available for request on Netgalley, I requested it pretty quickly, knowing it was unlikely to be anything like conservative.  And unsurprisingly, Escaping Exodus is another book filled to the brim with ideas and concepts that it tries to explore throughout.

More surprisingly is the fact that Escaping Exodus is significantly shorter than Drayden's prior novels, which already had issues fitting in enough room to explore their ideas - and that problem rears its head again here.  The book features a far our scifi setting, with themes of discrimination based upon gender and class, about identity and personhood, about coexistence and leadership, not to mention themes of love across all these things....and there just isn't enough room to either fit it all or really explore much of it in satisfying ways.  Drayden's first two books were also somewhat kinds of a mess, but there was at least one or more threads and character arcs that managed to work despite it all - with Escaping Exodus, it all feels way too truncated, with the book ending just as it becomes clear where some of the events were all going.  I really hope that the next Drayden book goes up in page count rather than down, because it's a problem for Escaping Exodus, which often feels like its relying too much on cut material to work.


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Monday, October 7, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Null Set by S.L. Huang



Null Set is the second in S.L. Huang's Cas Russell series (after her "Zero Sum Game" - reviewed here), her sci-fi action thriller series featuring her mathematical genius Cas Russell.  As I mentioned in my prior review, the series was originally self-published and is now being republished by Tor with substantial edits - for example, this book was originally the fourth book in the series, and has now been substantially rewritten to serve as the second book.  My elibrary actually has a copy of the self-published second novel, and it was mad tempting to me to pick that up even though its continuity wasn't going to match anymore.  Which should tell you how much I was looking forward to this novel.

And Null Set does not disappoint, as it keeps the breakneck pace of its thriller predecessor, with excellent characters and a plot that features some pretty fantastic situations for our heroine and crew to deal with.  Even better, it takes a plot element from the first book - a really interesting moral dilemma - and explores it in even greater length through the plot in a really interesting way, and adds further depth to that element.  So yeah, I really love this series and can't wait for the third book (originally meant to be book 5) coming out next year.  And I may actually pick up the old book 2.....

Spoilers for Zero Sum Game follow, beware:

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Friday, October 4, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Tigerman by Nick Harkaway



Nick Harkaway's "Gnomon" was one of my favorite books of last year, which says something because that book was in a genre (cyberpunk) that I don't really love that much.  Somehow Harkaway took a setup that could easily have felt overwhelming and result in a bunch of half-baked characters in service of an idea-filled plot and made everything - the characters, the ideas, the twists - work near perfectly.  So I naturally made a note to check out the rest of Harkaway's bibliography, especially after others suggested I do the same.

And I'm glad I did, because Tigerman is pretty phenomenal.  The book is a "superhero" origin story that may remind people of Unbreakable, yet is far more interesting - the book also is a major satire (and an oft hilarious one at that) of the global politics of colonialism and and the postcolonial global order.  It also features an incredibly well built cast of characters, as well as a main character who is really damn great as he struggles with his own fears and hopes in a world that seems doomed.

Note:  I read this as an audiobook and I HIGHLY recommend the book in this format, as the reader does an excellent job with all of the voices and accents - even to the point of when a character with one accent is doing an imitation of another character with a different accent.  The reader is tremendous, and really enhances the reading experience, so yeah, worth your time if you're looking for an audiobook for sure.

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Thursday, October 3, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Tell the Wind and Fire by Sarah Rees Brennan




Tell the Wind and Fire is a modern fantasy* YA take on A Tale of Two Cities (by Charles Dickens) by YA Fantasy author Sarah Rees Brennan.  In what may surprise you, I've never actually read A Tale of Two Cities, so this review will not be able tot address how this works as an adaptation.  However, I've been a fan of Brennan's ever since I read her utterly fantastic "In Other Lands" and then moved on to her Demon's Lexicon series, so I definitely was excited to give this a try despite my lack of background.

*I've said this before, but I define "Modern Fantasy" as a story taking place in a modern-esque setting with fantastical elements as compared to "Urban Fantasy" which also takes place in a modern world but one in which fantastical elements and creatures from fantasy stories are commonplace throughout - so most usually magical creatures and the like are present either openly or secretly but in such frequency to be a major part of the setting.  It's a definition of the subgenres that's really without meaning but I don't think "urban fantasy" gives the right impression for this book.

And as a stand-alone book, adaptation issues aside, Tell the Wind and Fire is a really strong book with a fascinating lead character and excellent setting that I'd definitely recommend.  The book suffers from occasional overwriting and an early info-dump, but these issues are only mildly annoying, and the depth that's built into the characters and setting from beginning to its very strong ending is impressive to say the least.

Note:  I read this as an audiobook, and the reader is excellent, especially at differentiating the voices and tones between several characters who are essentially identical twins.


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Wednesday, October 2, 2019

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Outside by Ada Hoffmann




The Outside is a Science Fiction novel that takes on a lot of ideas over the course of its story, from humanity's governance and restriction by large deadly AIs, treated explicitly as gods, to the existence of Lovecraftian beings from outside, whose existence is feared and kept hidden by those AI gods.  I feel like I'm repeating myself a lot on this topic lately, but Lovecraftian fiction is not really something I have a great interest in in general, but there has been a lot of really good work in this sub-genre lately (frequently using the mythos to present themes in opposition to Lovecraft's own horrible views).  Still, The Outside was a book I kept seeing recommended by writers I enjoy, so I reserved it from the library to see how I'd feel about it.

And yeah, The Outside is pretty impressive and imaginative, with a fascinating world and characters to go along with a plot that twists and turns and uses every bit of its genre trappings - the AI Gods, the lovecraftian Outside - in interesting and well executed ways.  I'm not sure if I'd say it's a book I absolutely loved, but I can see how others would feel that way, and I burned through the book in two days - and probably could've finished in one if I tried, which is a good sign of how well it reads.  Definitely worth a shot for anyone looking for new and different scifi.

Of note, the book features both a protagonist and an antagonist on the autism spectrum, which has fairly big implications for how both characters interact with other people and how they see the world.  I think this is done rather well, but I don't have the background necessary to truly judge this, so I won't be going much further about it in the review.  Other reviewers I've seen who seem to have the background seem to also think this is done well, for what that's worth.  
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