There is a moment in Premee Mohamed’s brilliant novella, These Lifeless Things, when the narrator, an anthropologist exploring a post-apocalyptic landscape, says in frustration with her “hard” science colleagues that there is more than one way of knowing. That gets to the heart of this absorbing narrative. She has found a treasure in the ruins […]
Far from the Light of Heaven by Tade Thompson – A Review
In Far from the Light of Heaven, Tade Thompson, author of the Wormwood Trilogy, constructs a fine murder mystery on board a colony space ship in methodical detail. Step by step he introduces characters and settings, with just enough detail to bring each person to life and give each of their worlds its full reality. […]
Inhibitor Phase by Alastair Reynolds – A Review
Alastair Reynolds brings us back to the Revelation Space universe with the magnificent Inhibitor Phase. It’s a story about sacrifice, redemption, rebirth and basic human bonds of friendship, love and loyalty that builds to a powerful conclusion. Now, a confession here. When I started reading science fiction seriously almost 20 years ago, Alastair Reynolds and […]
Shards of Earth by Adrian Tchaikovsky – A Review
Adrian Tchaikovsky has an immense imagination, and the scope of Shards of Earth gives it vast space. Literally vast since the novel and its strange crew of salvagers moves from one planetary system to another through the terrifying bent space-time depths known as unspace in what seem to be moments. But those moments are pure […]
And What Can We Offer You Tonight by Premee Mohamed – A Review
Premee Mohamed’s And What Can We Offer You Tonight is a tightly written novella about a story of rebellion from oppression focused on the inner struggle from the invisible chains of psychic servitude. And What Can We Offer You Tonight, narrated by Jewel, a courtesan at the high-end House of Bicchieri, begins with one of […]
Machine (White Space 2) by Elizabeth Bear
There’s nothing like a scary family illness (fortunately all over with now) to take my mind far from blogging for a couple of weeks, and there’s nothing like a compelling Elizabeth Bear novel like Machine to bring me right back. Machine is the second White Space novel, following Ancestral Night, set in the Synarche universe, […]
