…For many reasons, I rarely give up on fantasy debuts, especially ones by authors from my hometown San Diego, but Sword of Fire and Sea by Erin Hoffman just didn’t have what it takes to keep me reading past the midway point - and even making it that far was a struggle… Erin Hoffman is a video game designer as well as an author, and it’s hard ( Read more... )

The Clockwork Rocket, which is the first volume in Greg Egan’s brand new hard science fiction trilogy Orthogonal, is a book with three different but equally important focal points. On the one hand, it’s the story of a young woman who also happens to be a very alien alien. On the other, it’s a novel about a planet-a very alien planet-on the cusp ( Read more... )

One of 2009’s most pleasant surprises was Diving into the Wreck, a short but excellent SF novel by Kristine Kathryn Rusch about Boss, a specialist in the exploration of derelict spaceships… In City of Ruins, the excellent follow-up to Diving into the Wreck, Boss runs a much larger operation and has become more of a manager than an explorer ( Read more... )

The Magicians by Lev Grossman is one of the most frequently reviewed fantasy novels of the last few years, which isn’t surprising because the author is a well known writer (and book reviewer) for TIME Magazine, and the book was very effectively hyped as “Harry Potter with college age students.” The end result of all of this is that ( Read more... )

The Shadow Men is the fourth book in Christopher Golden and Tim Lebbon’s THE HIDDEN CITIES series. If (like me) you’re not familiar with the previous books, it may be good to know that all four books can be read as standalone novels that share a common premise but (as far as I know) no major characters or plot elements. In the series’ ( Read more... )

With every new book in the WARS OF LIGHT AND SHADOW series by Janny Wurts, it gets harder and harder to write a review without either including massive spoilers for previous volumes or simply repeating the praise already heaped on it in earlier reviews. There are only so many variations on “gorgeous prose,” “intricate world-building ( Read more... )

The Nebula Awards are one of the great institutions in science fiction and fantasy. Each year since 1965, the members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) have voted for the Best Novel, Novella, Novelette, and Short Story in SF and fantasy. Compiling a list of the nominees and winners for all those years would get ( Read more... )

… As a novel, Green is a mixed bag. There’s much to like here, and it isn’t hard to see why some readers raved about this book… Unfortunately a strong main character and lovely prose weren’t enough to make this novel work for me… I truly enjoyed the first 150 pages or so, but after a strong start, Green completely fell apart, to the point ( Read more... )

Peter S. Beagle will probably always be best known for The Last Unicorn, the 1968 fantasy novel many consider his masterpiece, but the author has assembled a long and impressive bibliography since this perennial classic, including several excellent short story collections. The most recent of these is Sleight of Hand, recently released ( Read more... )

News coverage of military conflicts changed forever when journalists were allowed to travel along with combat units and report right from the front line, providing dramatic real life images of what life is like for soldiers and civilians in a war zone. Dan Abnett effectively takes this concept of the “embedded reporter” into futuristic ( Read more... )