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Guest Post: That Thing You Love Doesn’t Always Love You Back by Spencer Ellsworth

‘Til All Are One, Buy All Our Playsets & Toys! I’m just old enough to have been raised on VHS tapes. Every weekend in the 80s, my sisters and I would go to the little video store in our tiny California town, right next to the feed store, to pick something out of the 1$ rental shelf for the weekend. I always picked Transformers: The Animated Movie. This piece of ’80s insanity is a hyper-violent, bonkers-weird, hour-and-a-half toy commercial. Hasbro wanted to clear the 1984-1985 model toys, especially those that weren’t selling well, from toy store shelves and introduce new characters. So the first half-hour of the movie, ahem, transforms the franchise. Unlike the syndicated cartoon, a consequence-free zone of stun guns, the animated movie follows Megatron as he mows down Autobots with gruesome detail, climaxing in the brutal death of Optimus Prime from a gaping stomach wound. Oh sure, these are robots with scratched chassis and cut fuel lines, but they fall and scream and mutilate like the opening scene of Saving Private Ryan.

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Retro Childhood Review: Justice and Her Brothers

Justice flicked her eyes this way and that. All else around the parlor appeared ordinary. The light of sun set the room aglow in corners and on walls. It was an eerie effect, but not something she hadn’t seen before. The house was stifling, as it had been for weeks. But there was nothing odd about sunlight, about heat, at this early hour. Yet, since the summer started, she’d got the notion at times that something deadly strange was going on. When I was considering what book to read for Black History Month, I was once again struck with how inadequate my small library of childhood favorites is in representing any perspective that is not white. Thank goodness for Google. I’m upset with the system that existed in my small, very white town. A system that seems to have excluded voices of color and, indeed, made attempts on numerous occasions to explicitly do so. All of this means that I was never introduced to the exceedingly talented Newbery Medalist author, Virginia Hamilton. I suspect this is not JUST because she is a black woman, but because, at least when it comes to Justice and Her Brothers, one could easily mistake her work for “Not Sci-fi.” This is a mistake that needs immediate rectification because nothing could be further from the truth.

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Book Review: The Binti Trilogy by Nnedi Okorafor

Binti is a prodigy among her people, the Himba, in a mid-future world constructed by author Nnedi Okorafor.  Binti’s desire to go  the finest University in the galaxy breaks all sorts of norms. Binti’s like that, though, breaking norms and boundaries as she finds her way to the University, back home, and what happens thereafter. Binti’s story  is told in Okorafor’s Binti, Binti: Home and the finale of the trilogy, Binti: Masquerade.

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A Book by its Cover – Chuck Wendig #5: The Raptor and the Wren by Miriam Black

After a few entries, popular series can become quite problematic. The author can stick to what works and hit all the same notes that brought success and breed comfortable familiarity. Scores of fans will eat it up, but it risks the series turning formulaic and dull. The author can try to switch things up, reinvent a groundbreaking core, or diverge the story into new characters and territory. But change too much of what the fans hold dear without winning some new hearts, and it could all come crashing down.

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Book Review: THE ART OF STARVING by Sam J. Miller

A few years back I quickly fell in love with the short fiction of Sam J. Miller. Published across a spectrum of electronic genre venues (Shimmer, Apex, Lightspeed, Nightmare, Clarkesworld, Uncanny), Miller also gained recognition in print with “Calved”, originally published in Asimov’s Science Fiction and reprinted in multiple ‘Year’s Best’ anthologies. I’m drawn to Miller’s fiction for several reasons that tie together. Foremost are his characters: strong and unique voices that reflect points of views not frequently explored in genre fiction. Even though these characters may often be very different from myself – with conditions or experiences I’ve never faced – Miller excels at making them universally relatable. His themes focus on the strengths and weaknesses of their basic humanity. Beautiful mixtures of fragility and fortitude, Miller’s characters compel reader empathy and emotion, even if the character’s specific situation is personally unfamiliar to the reader. This character-driven realism gives Miller’s insightful explorations a mainstream, literary tone. Yet, Miller’s stories are firmly in the genre camp. It is this deft balance between literary realism and the uncanny or speculation of SciFi/Fantasy/Horror that I enjoy so much.

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Comics Review: For Your Consideration — Best Graphic Story Hugo Recommendations

Welcome to the latest installment of my comics review column here at Skiffy & Fanty! Every month, I use this space to shine a spotlight on SF&F comics (print comics, graphic novels, and webcomics) that I believe deserve more attention from SF&F readers. This month, the SF&F awards season is upon us, and I’m going to take the opportunity to reach out to those of you nominating for the Hugo Awards to recommend five works that I believe are deserving of your consideration in the Best Graphic Story category. (These reviews may contain spoilers!)

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