Alien Clay provides further evidence of Adrian Tchaikovsky’s unparalleled and unfathomable imagination. A master storyteller and world builder, Tchaikovsky delivers another fascinating speculative vision of an alien ecology, that is innovative and immersive.
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Review: Womb City by Tlotlo Tsamaase
Synopsis “A fearless novel that probes ideas of surveillance, misogyny and class. . . . Tsamaase brilliantly tackles ideas of motherhood and autonomy.” —New York Times Book Review This genre-bending Afrofuturist horror novel blends The Handmaid’s Tale and The School for Good Mothers with Get Out in an adrenaline-packed, cyberpunk body-hopping ghost story exploring motherhood, memory, and a woman’s right to […]
Review: Your Shadow Half Remains by Sunny Moraine
Synopsis The Last of Us meets Bird Box in Sunny Moraine’s Your Shadow Half Remains, a post-apocalyptic tale where eye contact causes people to spiral into a deadly, violent rage. ONE LOOK CAN KILL. Riley has not seen a single human face in longer than she can reckon. No faces, no eyes. Not if you want to survive. But […]
Review: The Never-Ending End of the World by Ann Christy
Synopsis Coco Wells hasn’t seen another living person since she was a teenager. All of Manhattan is reliving the same few seconds, minutes, or hours on a loop… and they have been for years. Everything looks normal from a distance, but up close it’s a nightmare. Coco is a survivor. She scavenges for food, reads, […]
Review: The Tusks of Extinction by Ray Nayler
Synopsis When you bring back a long-extinct species, there’s more to success than the DNA. Moscow has resurrected the mammoth. But someone must teach them how to be mammoths, or they are doomed to die out again. Dr. Damira Khismatullina, an expert in elephant behavior, was brutally murdered trying to defend the world’s last elephants from the […]
Review: Down Below Beyond by T. A. Bruno
Synopsis Lodespace is a collection of worlds dominated by the Fessenog Fleet trade empire. Thanks to the Voyalten portals, alien civilizations from all over the universe can gather for glorious trade. For the wealthy, there has never been a more lucrative circle. But the Fleet is hiding something from its investors. A secret that, if […]
Review: The Broken Sword by Poul Anderson
Synopsis Thor broke the sword Tyrfing to save the roots of Yggdrasil, the tree that binds earth, heaven and hell. Now the elves need the weapon for their war against the trolls. Only Scafloc, a human kidnapped and raised by elves, can hope to persuade Bolverk the ice-giant to make Tyrfing whole again. But Scafloc […]
Review: The Key to Reality by F. Ted Atchley, III
Synopsis: An Elite Cybersecurity Analyst. A Desperate Rebellion’s Best Hope. Brandon thought the assignment was just another standard security assessment. Wrong. As he peels back the layers of a deepening conspiracy, he discovers everything he thought he knew about his reality is a lie. And he’s the only one who can save it. Exiles from another […]
Review: Cage of Souls by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Cage of Souls is a captivating work of speculative fiction of the highest order. A standalone that felt like an entire series in scope and imagination. Adrian Tchaikovsky’s world building and storytelling is off the charts in this outrageously entertaining story.
Review: Before The Devil Knows You’re Here by Autumn Krause
The best way I can think to summarize this book would be to say that Krause writes up an atmospheric homage to a mixed cultural background and the memory of a person dear to her, depicting a different, darker, and more folk gothic side to early 19th century americana. Bringing to life that solid and vivid mix of folk tales and myth that were also paired with the Christian overtones informing the 1800s American short story. Think Washington Irving’s The Devil and Tom Walker but add more monsters and a gutsy young woman willing to do anything for her family.
Review: World Running Down by Al Hess
There’s a huge amount of love in this book. WRD was meant to be a palette cleanser for me in the all-you-can-eat buffet of space opera sci-fi out there at the moment but it shone as a wonderful book in its own right.