Tuesday, July 31, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Star Wars: Last Shot by Daniel Jose Older




Star Wars Last Shot is at best a mixed bag.  Released in time for this year's "Solo: A Star Wars Movie," Last Shot is not really a tie-in (there's no connection between it and the movie) but just a new story featuring Han Solo and Lando Calrissian going on an adventure after the original trilogy that has roots in each of their pasts.  As I've said in prior Star Wars reviews, it is tricky for me to review new canon Star Wars books due to my love of the old Star Wars EU (now christened Legends) and the inevitable tendency for me to compare new books to the old.

And indeed, Last Shot called to mind several old Legends stories - the main antagonist's plot brought to mind "The New Rebellion", and Han's mid-life crisis brought to mind "The Last One Standing" (from Tales from the Bounty Hunters).  As with any type of book, odds are the ideas within are not wholly original, and the question is whether or not those ideas as presented in the new book are executed well and whether the book is....well, fun or interesting as a result.  Unfortunately, Last Shot fails in that regard -the package works as a whole barely, but the plot structure is often a bit confusing, a bit silly, and just not the most interesting use of the characters.

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Monday, July 30, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review; Starless by Jacqueline Carey




My thoughts on Starless are kind of hard to explain.  This is an Epic Fantasy novel that very much feels like it should be 2 or 3 novels, but is instead a single self-contained volume.  It's a character story that made me wish it would spend more time on those characters; it's a story filled with plot-intrigue that I wished spent more time on that intrigue; you get the point.  And yet, having read it over two days and then reread it again, I kind of loved all of these parts and found Starless to be a complete package...despite still wishing each individual part of the book could be longer.

Starless is not just an epic fantasy story of a group of individuals chosen by gods to save the world, it's not just a story where a trained warrior joins a court of immortal royals and has to protect his charge from dangerous court intrigue, not just a journey of self-discovery of its hero's sexuality and gender, it is all of these things.  And Carey somehow manages to juggle all of that to come out with a story that not only works, but feels a bit special, and one I would definitely recommend.  It also features an extremely well written genderqueer character among its main characters, which is another reason people should want to read it.

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Sunday, July 29, 2018

Reviewing the 2018 Hugo Awards

As I posted on twitter yesterday, over the past month and a half I've been posting my reviews and rankings of each of the Nominees for the 2018 Hugo Awards, at least for all of the literature categories.  For those of you who are somehow looking at this post and don't know this (How?), the 2018 Hugo Awards are awards for the best in Science Fiction and Fantasy works published in 2017. 

I managed to read nearly all of the nominated works, with the only exceptions being that I only read part of two of the nominees for Best Series (Only the first book of The Stormlight Archive and the first two books of the Memoirs of Lady Trent) and that I didn't read the second book published by Campbell Award nominee Katherine Arden.  Other than that, I'd managed to read everything, and man was I pleased by the quality of the nominees.  It's a really good field, and if you haven't read most of it, it's well worth checking out.

My Reviews and Rankings can be found at the following pages: 

My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for the Award for Best Young Adult SF/F Novel can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for the Campbell Award for Best New Writer can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Short Story can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novelette can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novella can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novel can be found HERE:
My Review/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Series can be found HERE:
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Thursday, July 26, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Tropic of Serpents by Marie Brennan




  The Tropic of Serpents is the second of Marie Brennan's Hugo-Nominated (for Best Series) The Memoirs of Lady Trent, following up from "A Natural History of Dragons" (Review HERE).  This story tells of the second adventure of Isabella, world famous dragon naturalist, to a foreign land to study species of dragons - in this case, she journeys to a fantasy equivalent of some African land.  But of course, the study of dragons is not nearly so simple as simply journeying and observing, and it doesn't take long for Isabella to find herself immersed not just in the local dragon culture, but the culture of the local humans and the politics thereof.

  The Tropic of Serpents is a solid follow up to A Natural History of Dragons, although I'm not sure whether it's better or worse than that (pretty good) first book in the series.  The voice of the older Isabella as the narrator of the story remains very fun (as she retrospectively remarks on the oft-insane actions of her younger self) and the story I think (as a White American mind you) avoids the dangerous tropes that have been badly used in the past when setting stories of Europeans traveling through Africa.  That said, if you didn't like A Natural History of Dragons or found it only okay, you won't feel any differently about this book instead.

Note: Though the entire series is in the Hugo Packet, I actually read this as an audiobook, and the reader is very good.  So I recommend for sure the book in that format.
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Tuesday, July 24, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Novella Review: The Tea Master and the Detective by Aliette de Bodard




The Tea Master and the Detective by Aliette de Bodard

The Tea Master and the Detective is a novella in de Bodard's "Xuya" universe, which is a SciFi universe which is heavily influenced by Vietnamese and Chinese cultures as those cultures conquered the world and got into space first.  This is my first Xuya work (I know de Bodard from her Dominions of the Fallen series), and I can say quite clearly that no prior knowledge of the universe is needed to enjoy The Tea Master and the Detective - the only sign that this book is part of the universe is the presence of the Chinese/Viet names and clear influence on society.  And I did enjoy The Tea Master and the Detective quite a bit - the book is advertised as a gender-swapped Sherlock Holmes in the future with a Mind-Ship as her Watson, and it delivers as promised.


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Monday, July 23, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Romancing the Null by Tina Gower



Romancing the Null is the first in Tina Gower's self-published fantasy romance series "The Outlier Prophecies."  I saw the book recommended on twitter (or at least a link to it RTed) by another urban fantasy self-published author, Annie Bellet, whose series (The 20-Sided Sorceress) I greatly enjoy, so I decided to give it a shot, as this book is currently available for FREE on Amazon Kindle.  So, a book recommended by an author I like for free?  That will get a download, if not a read from me.

Unfortunately, while Romancing the Null is the same length as the 20-Sided Sorceress Books (roughly 200 pages), it's not nearly as good, and I wont be continuing the series further despite the other two books being available for a combined 99 cents.  Gower sets up a modern world heavily influenced by the regular presence of the supernatural which certainly could show promise, but well the driving force of this book are the main characters and their relationship and it just....did not work for me.  Couple that with the investigation being rather eh, and it's a miss.  Again, the book is free, so there's no harm in others trying to see if they enjoy it, but for me, it's a pass.

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SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold



The Curse of Chalion is the first work in Lois McMaster Bujold's "World of the Five Gods" (which also features her Penric & Desdemona Novellas).  Despite sharing a world with those Penric novellas, it's a more serious fantasy story - that's not to say there aren't some witty moments and dialogue, but at the same time it works extremely well.  Bujold is a master at creating believable characters with believable dialogue (even if its not as comic here as in some of her other works) and that's shown here as well.

But what makes the Curse of Chalion an excellent fantasy work is how it features a lawful good hero, a noble, honest minded adviser and former warrior in a fantasy world who is easy to root for and not in any way Lawful Stupid.  Ned Stark, our hero is not.  This is a story that is a mix of court intrigue and some magical elements and having a hero who is not a scheming plotter and yet not out of his depth at the same time is a refreshing change, and it makes him extremely easy to root for and makes this book very enjoyable.

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Friday, July 20, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: City of Miracles by Robert Jackson Bennett



City of Miracles is the third and final book in Robert Jackson Bennett's "The Divine Cities" trilogy that began with City of Stairs.  It's honestly a very different book than its two priors, although it's up there for my favorite of the trilogy.  Whereas the first two books were fantastical mysteries/thrillers, with its protagonists trying to figure out what was really happening in time to prevent the oncoming crisis, while remaining largely in the same location, City of Miracles is more like what you would get if you combined Jason Bourne with NK Jemisin's The Kingdom of Gods.  This is an awesome thing, although not quite as awesome as that comparison makes it sound (as I consider TKoG to be one of my favorite books ever, that's not meant to be a criticism).

City of Miracles follows a favorite character from the prior two books, Sigrud Je Harkvaldsson, the Dreyling (think Viking), as he attempts to get revenge for the assassination of the first book's protagonist, Shara Komayd.  Whereas the prior two books featured characters having to solve situations with their minds, Sigrud is (while highly intelligent) much more inclined to solve problems with his fists, knives, or guns.  The result is a more action packed story that ends still on a nicely poignant note to conclude this trilogy nicely.

Note:  While each book in this trilogy has been stand-alone, and it might've been possible to read City of Blades without City of Stairs, it is not advisable to begin the trilogy here, as there are a lot of references to the prior books in this series (and the prior two books are very good, so why would you).


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Wednesday, July 18, 2018

Reviewing the 2018 Hugo Nominees: Best Series

Hugo Award voting opened last month and continues through the end of July.  For those of you new to the Science Fiction/Fantasy genre, the Hugo Award is one of the most prominent awards for works in the genre, with the Award being given based upon voting by those who have paid for at least a Supporting Membership in this year's WorldCon.  As I did last year, I'm going to be posting reviews/my-picks for the award in the various categories I feel qualified in, but feel free to chime in with your own thoughts in the comments.  As I mentioned in my Hugo Packet post, all of the short fiction nominees are available in the Hugo Packet, though many of these pieces are also available for free online already - if they are, I will link those stories in the post.

My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for the Award for Best Young Adult SF/F Novel can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for the Campbell Award for Best New Writer can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Short Story can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novelette can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novella can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novel can be found HERE:

Best Series is in its first official year as an official category on the Hugo Ballot, after a trial run last year (in which Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga won the award).  Incredibly, most of the series' nominated are included in this year's Hugo Packet in full!  I'd managed to read the entirety of two of the nominated series (The Books of the Raksura, which I nominated myself, and inCryptid) prior to the nominations being announced, and had read parts of two of the other four series.  Since the nominations were announced, I've managed to read at least two books in each series other than The Stormlight Archive, whose first book is as long as two of the other books in any of the other series (or more).

Best Series.....is a flawed category that I think needs greater exploration by Hugo Administrators in the future, because what exactly corresponds to a series?  In the six nominated series alone, there are two series which could arguably be considered either parts of one larger series and one series which could be considered the equivalent of lumping two separate series together.  I'll go into this more in depth below, but it's a problem I think should be considered in the future.

Let's get into it after the Jump:


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Tuesday, July 17, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: City of Blades by Robert Jackson Bennett




  The Second in Robert Jackson Bennett's "The Divine Cities" trilogy, City of Blades follows up on its predecessor (City of Stairs) by moving to another formerly "Divine" city a few years later and shifting the main protagonist to an ancillary character from the first book: General Turyin Mulaghesh (pictured on the author's blog here).  Once again, we find our protagonist investigating a mystery that suggests the seemingly dead Gods might not be so dead after all, but this time instead of a guile heroine, we follow a woman with PTSD way out of her depth as she tries to make up for her dark past.

  The result is a good book, but easily the weakest of the trilogy.  Mulaghesh is an excellent character, but isn't quite as good at carrying the book as Shara (who merely cameos here) did in Book 1, and several side characters are simply more interesting.  The book does contain the most interesting ending of the trilogy, but overall lacks the impact of its predecessor or successor.

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Monday, July 16, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett




 City of Stairs is the first of Robert Jackson Bennett's "The Divine Cities" trilogy, a trilogy of stand-alone fantasy novels (although they build upon each other) about a world in which the enslaved colony land (essentially a fantasy version of India) of a continent ruled by 6 gods (or rather here, "Divines") struck back, and eliminated those gods to establish a fragile but new global hegemony, with the enslaved now ruling the former conquerors.  The trilogy was nominated for the Best Series Hugo and was included in full in the Hugo Packet...and it's well worth the nomination.

This first novel introduces us to this world, which bears shades of NK Jemisin's Inheritance Trilogy and Max Gladstone's Craft Sequence but is very different from either (the series lacks Inheritance's focus on love and the Craft Sequence's analogies for economics/law), as well as series heroine Ashara "Shara" Komayd.  And man is she a fantastic heroine - incredibly clever and driven, curious yet feeling duty bound - she's one of the best guile heroes I've encountered in my reading and she makes this book really really good.

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Thursday, July 12, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Trail of Lighting (The Sixth World, Book 1) by Rebecca Roanhorse



  Trail of Lightning is the first novel in a new series created by Campbell-Award Nominated author Rebecca Roanhorse, who is undoubtedly the favorite to win the Hugo Award for Best Short Story this year (and has already taken home the Nebula).  A post-apocalyptic fantasy series based upon Native American mythology (Yes, Roanhorse is Native), Trail of Lightning is naturally different from the standard post-apocalyptic fare in its worldbuilding and characters, and for the most part it's an excellent start to a new series, with the second book coming out next year.

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Wednesday, July 11, 2018

Reviewing the 2018 Hugo Nominees: Best Novel

Hugo Award voting opened last month and continues through the end of July.  For those of you new to the Science Fiction/Fantasy genre, the Hugo Award is one of the most prominent awards for works in the genre, with the Award being given based upon voting by those who have paid for at least a Supporting Membership in this year's WorldCon.  As I did last year, I'm going to be posting reviews/my-picks for the award in the various categories I feel qualified in, but feel free to chime in with your own thoughts in the comments.  As I mentioned in my Hugo Packet post, all of the short fiction nominees are available in the Hugo Packet, though many of these pieces are also available for free online already - if they are, I will link those stories in the post.

My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for the Award for Best Young Adult SF/F Novel can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for the Campbell Award for Best New Writer can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Short Story can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novelette can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novella can be found HERE:

Best Novel is the most prominent award of the Hugo Awards* and usually gets the most votes.  For the second straight year, I'd managed to read all but one of the nominees before they were announced (hipster bragging alert....again), although this year's ballot was a lot more surprising - only two of the Hugo nominees for example also made the Nebula shortlist, and only two of the nominees made my own short list (and not the same two).   There are definitely some deserving candidates on the list despite the surprise.

Let's get into it after the Jump:

*Best Series actually had one more (yes 1) vote for the category last year, but as that's a newer category, I won't call it as prominent just yet.  I hope to have a post on the Best Series nominees next week, but I want to at least have read 1-2 works of each series before I start that post, so it's a bit more difficult.  
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Tuesday, July 10, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Heroine's Journey (Heroine Complex #3) by Sarah Kuhn




Sarah Kuhn's Heroine Complex series has been one of my favorite new finds of 2018 (A review of Book 1, Heroine Complex, can be found Here and a review of Book 2, Heroine Worship, can be found Here).  The series is an absolute joy - featuring Asian American Heroines with superpowers, trying to fight off both demon attacks on San Francisco as well as their own anxieties/insecurities, along with some really steamy romances in each book.  Kuhn was nominated this year for the Campbell Award for her work on the first two books in the series, and the third book in the series, Heroine's Journey (which just came out on July 3), continues her absolutely winning trend.

Heroine's Journey shifts the focus of the story to our third major character with superpowers, Bea Tanaka, the sister to Book 1's protagonist Evie Tanaka, who has the power to project her emotional state into other people's minds (and possibly more).  Whereas the second book in the series, Heroine Worship, very much followed a very similar (to a predictable decree) formula to the first book, Heroine's Journey follows a much less predictable path.  But it contains the same winning charms as the first two books - a lovable protagonist struggling through her own personal anxieties as she tries to be the best she can be, witty dialogue and funny situations (the porcelain unicorns being fought on the cover?  Yeah that's a real scene), and some solid romance and great sex scenes (best in the series in my opinion).  It's a real winner.

Note: You could very easily start this series with this book and skip the prior two I would think, but this book's beginning absolutely spoils Book 1 (Heroine Complex) and mildly spoils Book 2 (Heroine Worship), so I'd start with those books first to get full enjoyment out of the series.  Note that this is not a trilogy - Kuhn has contracted for at least 3 more books plus a novella, to my great joy.


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Monday, July 9, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Queen of Sorrow by Sarah Beth Durst



  The Queen of Sorrow is the third book in Sarah Beth Durst's Queens of Renthia trilogy - a dark fantasy series that I have enjoyed a good bit (My review of Book 1, The Queen of Blood, can be found HERE and my review of Book 2, The Reluctant Queen can be found HERE).  The series is set in a fantasy world in which elemental spirits are responsible for the growth of things in the world.  The only problem is that those spirits want to kill human beings as much as they want to grow the land and if left unchecked will do just that.  The only thing that keeps humans alive are the Queens of each of the five countries, who have the ability to command the spirits of their countries and to keep them from doing harm.  But the result is an unstable equilibrium where the slightest change - such as a Queen losing power or worse, dying, could result in catastrophe.

  If the above didn't make it clear, the first two books were often very very dark, although this was true more of the first book than the second.  They were also filled with interesting characters and surprising plots, which made me look forward quite a bit to this concluding volume.  But The Queen of Sorrow is merely solid and doesn't quite live up to the standards of its predecessors - the characters remain excellent, but the plot becomes surprisingly predictable.  It's a book that serves as a nice ending for what has come before, but the means of getting there just doesn't live up to the prior setup.

Mild Spoilers for the prior books follow after the jump:


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Thursday, July 5, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan




A Natural History of Dragons is the first in Marie Brennan's series: The Memoirs of Lady Trent, which finished this year with its fifth book and is now nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Series.  All five books are in the Hugo Voters Packet, although I actually listened to this book as an audiobook (which was quality) taken out from my Hoopla library, so you get the entire series as a free benefit of your $50 Hugo Voting membership.  And based upon this book, I definitely will be continuing with this series, as I enjoyed it quite a bit, so I'm really happy about its inclusion in the Hugo Packet.

The general idea of the series is that, as the title suggests, it's a five book memoir of Isabella, Lady Trent, who is well known at the time of writing for her experiences as a Dragon Naturalist, despite living in a fantasy world reminiscent in part of Victorian England, despite all the gender dynamics that implies.  This book tells the story of Isabella's childhood, marriage, and her first adventure to discover the traits of dragons.  And the result is a story told in a really fun voice (older Isabella looking back at her younger self is really fun) in a very different world with some solid characters, a surprising plot, and well....dragons.

Note: The Audiobook which I "read" this book as is very well done, so I definitely recommend reading the book in that format.  

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Wednesday, July 4, 2018

Reviewing the 2018 Hugo Award Nominees: The Award for Best Young Adult Science Fiction or Fantasy Novel

Hugo Award voting opened last month and continues through the end of July.  For those of you new to the Science Fiction/Fantasy genre, the Hugo Award is one of the most prominent awards for works in the genre, with the Award being given based upon voting by those who have paid for at least a Supporting Membership in this year's WorldCon.  As I did last year, I'm going to be posting reviews/my-picks for the award in the various categories I feel qualified in, but feel free to chime in with your own thoughts in the comments.  As I mentioned in my Hugo Packet post, all of the short fiction nominees are available in the Hugo Packet, though many of these pieces are also available for free online already - if they are, I will link those stories in the post.

My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for the Campbell Award for Best New Writer can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Short Story can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novelette can be found HERE:
My Reviews/Rankings of the Nominees for Best Novella can be found HERE:

This is the first year for an award for Best Young Adult Genre Novel on the ballot and it's a good one.  Annoyingly the award this year doesn't have a name (it's not a Hugo* technically) but it will have one next year, but regardless, there's five incredibly good candidates for the award out of six nominees here, and the book I have fifth won the equivalent award (the Norton Award) at the Nebulas.  The Young Adult Novel is a flourishing industry these days, and genre YA works are only becoming more and more common, making this award a welcome addition to the Hugo Award Ceremony, and this ballot does it incredible credit.

It should be noted though that the "Young Adult" designation encompasses a wide variety of books for a wide variety of age groups, making these books hard to compare.  So on this ballot, we have two books I'd consider for more mature readers, one for younger (think early middle school) readers, and three that fall somewhere in between.

*From what I understand, the reason the Campbell and this award aren't considered "Hugos" is because each Hugo Nominee should only be eligible to win one category, whereas nominees for this award can also win the nominee for Best Novel, although none are nominated for both awards this year*


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Tuesday, July 3, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Novella Review: Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries #2) by Martha Wells



Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries #2) by Martha Wells:

Artificial Condition is the second novella (of four planned) in Martha Wells' "The Murderbot Diaries", which began with last year's "All Systems Red." (Review Here).  I've been looking forward to it a lot, given that All Systems Red is my pick for this year's Hugo for Best Novella (and won the Nebula).  And the novella mostly doesn't disappoint and is well worth your time.  The story continues right immediately (more or less) from the ending of All Systems Red, so you can't start the series with this novella, but well...you should read All Systems Red anyhow.


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Monday, July 2, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor




Akata Warrior is the sequel to Nnedi Okorafor's 2011 Nigerian-Inspired YA novel, Akata Witch (Review Here).  Featuring an Albino African American girl in Nigeria and her friends, as she discovers she has magical powers and belongs to the group known as Leopard People, the first book is advertised on Amazon as the "Nigerian Harry Potter."  But while you can see where that comparison comes from, these books are very much their own thing, generally for the better.

Akata Warrior begins about a year plus after Akata Witch, and begins with a quick 9 page recap of the setting and story so far (done in an incredibly cute way), so you can begin the series with this book if you want....but I'd still suggest otherwise as the nine pages isn't really a great substitute for the character development and story of the prior book, which this book does rely upon.  Still, either way, it's an often utterly charming YA fantasy book from a setting that is obviously very different from the usual European or American inspired settings of these books.  It's not perfect and won't be my choice for the (Not-A-)Hugo Award for Best YA SF/F Novel of 2017 - for which it is nominated - but it is a worthy nominee for that award.

 
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