Synopsis Two years after a devastating defeat in the decades-long Spore War, the island nation of Hōppon and its capital city of Neo Kinoko are occupied by invading Coprinian forces. Its fungal citizens are in dire straits, wracked by food shortages, poverty, and an influx of war refugees. Even worse, the corrupt occupiers exploit their […]
Murder Mystery
Review: (Arc) The Hallows Novel by H.L Tinsley
Synopsis The Hallow serum was once sacred to the Auld Bloods. Used to gain access to their lost ancestral powers, now it is regulated and administered by the powerful Providence Company. Evolved from the echelons of the Auld Church, the company exists to maintain the balance between faith, science and politics. But keeping the peace […]
Review: Chaos Terminal (The Midsolar Murders #2) by Mur Lafferty
Everything that was fun and entertaining was still as amusing and fulfilling in this second entry, with Lafferty’s sharp wit and humor shining as expected. The pop-culture references remained on point and the homages to Agatha Christie continued. Getting to reunite with all of the characters aboard the sentient station Eternity felt like revisiting old friends that you’d almost forgotten how much they can amuse and entertain you
Review: Agravain’s Escape (The Return of King Arthur #2) by Jacob Sannox
Synopsis It is 2021, and Sir Agravain’s nemesis, Malagant, is back.But Agravain, who hunted the Dread Knight during the 18th and 19th centuries, is now serving a prison sentence. Nimue, a mysterious student of Merlin, seeks King Arthur to offer him a choice.Arthur can settle into the normal life he yearns, abandoning his estranged knight. […]
Review: 36 Streets by T.R. Napper
This book is everything I want from cyberpunk. I want morally grey characters. I want a dystopian world. I want mind-bending tech. I want to question what is real. I want the story to ask the difficult questions. I want everything that 36 Streets delivered – a challenging and rewarding story.
Review: The Death I Gave Him by Em X. Liu
The Death I Gave Him has a great hook and, like a cyborg Agatha Christie, Em X Liu presents a sombre Sci Fi STEM mystery. Dare I say … STEMpunk?
The Diamond Device (Accidental Capers, 1) by M. H. Thaung
This is a review in conjunction with the 2023 Self Published Science Fiction Contest (SPSFC2 for short!) The Diamond Device is one of six semi-finalist that the judging team, Team Escapist, is reviewing as they seek a finalist to move forward in the competition. Synopsis After diamond power promises to replace steam, an unemployed labourer […]
Review: The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older
Synopsis On a remote, gas-wreathed outpost of a human colony on Jupiter, a man goes missing. The enigmatic Investigator Mossa follows his trail to Valdegeld, home to the colony’s erudite university — and Mossa’s former girlfriend, a scholar of Earth’s pre-collapse ecosystems. Pleiti has dedicated her research and her career to aiding the larger effort […]
Review: Wormhole by Keith Brooke and Eric Brown
Synopsis An eighty-year-old cold case murder investigation stretches across light years, and could risk the future of humanity’s new home. Gordon Kemp is a detective working in the cold case department in London. Usually he works on cases closed ten, twenty-five years earlier. Now, however, he has been assigned a murder investigation closed, unsolved, over […]
Review: Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff
Summary: Jane Charlotte has been arrested for murder. She tells police that she is a member of a secret organization devoted to fighting evil; her division is called the Department for the Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons – “Bad Monkeys” for short. This confession earns Jane a trip to the jail’s psychiatric wing, where a […]
Review: Stormblood (Book #1 of The Common) by Jeremy Szal
Synopsis Vakov Fukusawa used to be a Reaper: an elite soldier fighting for Harmony against the brutal, invading Harvester empire. Harmony made him elite by injecting him, and thousands of other Reapers, with the DNA of an extinct alien race to make him stronger, faster, and more aggressive. And it worked. At a cost . […]
Book Tour and Review: Judge Anderson: Shamballa by Alan Grant and Arthur Ranson
Being part of Anderson’s journey through a series of related one-shots was enchanting. Space adventures, the Devil himself, and a mutant gorilla are just some of the things that Shamballa has to offer. And none of them disappoint.