Alastair Reynolds has produced a fine, fast-paced thriller in Machine Vendetta, the third, and apparently final novel in the Prefect Dreyfus Emergencies series. The series, set in the Revelation Space universe, specifically the Glitter Band of ten thousand habitats orbiting Yellowstone, began in 2007 with The Prefect, now called Aurora Rising. We had to wait […]
The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler
I was late coming to Ray Nayler’s The Mountain in the Sea, partly because it seemed too Earth-bound a story, partly because I thought it might be too much a novel of ideas, cut off from the flesh-and-blood characters that make a story work. My impressions were completely wrong. The Mountain in the Sea is […]
Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh
Emily Tesh set herself a difficult task in Some Desperate Glory. Present the reader with a young protagonist raised in a militaristic society who is all about duty, war-breeding, xenophobia, homophobia and worse, then draw her through enough world-shattering experiences to make her interesting, flaws and all, from start to finish. And Tesh hits the […]
Robotic Ambitions Kickstarter from Apex
Apex Book Company will begin a Kickstarter campaign on February 21st to raise funds for a new anthology, Robotic Ambitions. I don’t usually join in campaigns like this, but Apex is an important institution in the SFF world. I’d like to help make this book possible — I have to add that I have no […]
Excession by Iain M. Banks – A Culture Novel
Well, it’s a new year – and good wishes all around! After a mentally tired December when I wrote little, I relaxed while getting to know the work of Roger Zelazny – and re-reading Iain M. Banks’ Excession, the fifth of his Culture books. Some people suggest starting with other novels set in this universe […]
Neuromancer by William Gibson – A Review for #SciFiMonth
Like any great novel that does something really new, William Gibson’s Neuromancer, can be hard to get into. And it still feels new, at least to me, almost forty years after its publication, despite the fact that cyberpunk has become so common a sub-genre. Neuromancer is so uniquely itself that it’s hard to make the […]
