Aliya Whiteley, The Arrival of Missives, Unsung Stories, 2016.
I started reading with a groan: The Arrival of Missives uses a first person narrator who is a naive and arrogant teenager in love with her teacher. My amount of patience for fictional teenagers is extremely limited and I was thinking that this was turning into a disaster by page 15. So how was I supposed to know that, upon reaching the end of this short scifi novel, some 80 pages further, I'd be standing up on my sofa, elated and the fist raised?
2 Comments
Oliver Langmead, Metronome, Unsung Stories, 2017.
"And then he woke up and it was all just a dream..." is probably the most pointless and infuriating sentence I can read. Except that it's the premise of Metronome, by Oliver Langmead and that, far from being pointless and infuriating, it leads to a poetical and gripping fantasy tale. To keep it short: it's made of awesome... Helen Oyeyemi, White is for Witching, Pan McMillan, 2009.
I was grabbed from the first page. By the second page, I knew I would review it. At the third page, I was tweeting "Wow". By the fourth page I wasn't doing anything else but reading because I was too engrossed in the book. Nick Wood, Azanian Bridges, NewCon Press, 2016.
Set in a current South Africa that still enforces Apartheid, Azanian Bridges is, despite some flaws, a striking read with hints of Brazil. Though most political uchronias tend to give a sense of relief (as in "Thank goodness it didn't turn out that way!") with a slight warning for times ahead, it almost feels as if this very topical scifi novel arrived slightly too late for our world's current state of affairs... Connie Willis, Crosstalk, Gollancz, 2016.
As much as possible, I try not to review twice the same author, except in the Collections. There are so many writers worth being discovered and if I did, I'd probably spend my time reviewing some of my favourites in a loop: Pratchett, Stross, McMaster Bujold, Willis... Oops! "Do you, at least, have a good reason for reviewing Willis again?" will you ask with a stern look. Yes: my reason is that we all need a laugh and a feel good story right now and that's what Crosstalk provides aplenty... Indra Das, The Devourers, Del Rey, 2016.
Here was The Devourers, popping up on a few of "Best of scifi 2016" lists. I'm always wary of those lists on which I often find the latest thing everyone raves about and that I barely managed to finish. Only one way to find out: I picked it up, started reading... argh, no, werewolves! Is it going to be Twilight all over again? But I kept on reading and I loved it. (And it's definitely not Twilight!) Emma Newman,
"Why two covers?" are you asking, "You never put two covers even if it's a series." Thank you for being so observant a regular reader (or if it's the first time you come here, welcome). Planetfall and After Atlas are both set in the same universe. They are both tied by one event: a ship called Atlas leaving Earth with humans aboard. But they can both be read as stand alone novels, you could even read just one and not the other. On the other hand, reading both as a diptych will certainly illuminate the stories more... Tade Thompson, Rosewater, Apex Publications, 2016.
New edition: Orbit, 2018. Aliens arrived on Earth and... "Wait!" will you tell me, "I've already read this. Like, a thousand times! Not to mention countless formulaic American movies... Why would I read it?" Because it's far removed from your typical "Aliens arrived on Earth" story and so well written that it'd be a real pity not to read it... Art by Joshua Mays.
"Science-fiction is a white "menochrome": it's a genre written by white men for white men and in which characters are white men." Erm... No, really, no. So here are ten novels, chosen subjectively and by chronological order, that will get you on your way to discover that there are much more than just these ten novels and that scifi and fantasy is a genre as diverse as our planet's population... Iain Pears, Arcadia, Faber & Faber, 2015.
Last month, I was writing: "The 2016 Arthur C. Clarke Award will be chosen between Adrian Tchaikovsky and Nnedi Okorafor." That was before reading Arcadia by Iain Pears which is also shortlisted... Nnedi Okorafor, The Book of Phoenix, Hodder & Stoughton, 2015.
Phoenix is an abomination. This is how she defines herself. She was born three years ago but looks like she's 40. The Big Eye scientists who created her have her under lock inside Tower 7, among other abominations, in New-York. She reads a lot. She falls in love with Saeed. She has a friend, Mmuo. But she also finds out why she's called Phoenix and which strange abilities the scientists have put inside her DNA... M. R. Carey, The Girl with all the gifts, Orbit, 2014.
I really really really don't like zombies. Not at all. So no, I've never watched and will never watch The Walking Dead, 28 Days later, Shaun of the Dead nor any of Romero's films. But I didn't know when I picked the book that it would be a zombie story. And by the time I realised it, I was already gripped by the story... Adrian Tchaikovsky, Children of Time, Tor, 2015.
In the future, humanity is divided because of projects that aim to terraform uninhabitable planets, and then to introduce animal species whose evolution will be guided by a nanovirus. Dr Avrana Kern is about to finalise one of these projects with a population of apes. But right when she's about to press the button for the final launch, one of her team, who secretely adheres to the faction opposing the projects, destroys the orbital station in which they all are. It's only the first terrorist action of a war that will decimate humanity... Connie Willis, To Say nothing of the dog, Bantam Spectra, 1997.
When someone tells me they don't like reading science-fiction but would like to give it another try anyway, To Say nothing of the dog is the book I always recommend. It's also one of my all times favourites... Emily St John Mandel, Station Eleven, Picador, 2014.
It all begins an evening in Toronto. A man goes to see King Lear with his girlfriend. A famous actor plays Lear but during the madness scene he collapses on stage. The man, who has medical training rushes to the stage to help but the famous actor dies. He goes out of the theatre. It's night, everyone is gone, his girlfriend didn't wait for him. He starts walking back home when he receives a call on his mobile from one of his friend who works in a hospital. He tells him to stock on food and to lock himself in his flat: a pandemic is spreading... Jane Rogers, The testament of Jessie Lamb, Cannongate Books, 2012.
Reading The testament of Jessie Lamb was quite an experience: the teenager I was and who still exists in a corner of my head and the adult that I am were spending their time arguing about the book. Graham Joyce, The Silent Land, Gollancz, 2011.
If you're looking for a beautiful and poetic novel about the human condition, that creates literary magic out of the mundane, and that also happens to be fantasy, I have just the thing for you. |
All reviews are spoiler free unless explicitly stated otherwise.
I only review stories I have liked even if my opinion may be nuanced. It doesn't apply for the "Novels published before 1978" series of blog posts. Comments are closed, having neither time nor the inclination to moderate them. |