Book Review: SOFT APOCALYPSES by Lucy A. Snyder
Soft is a particularly ironic description for this collection of short fiction by Lucy A. Snyder. Brutal. Grisly. Unflinching. These are all words that are easier to associate with the dark nature of her stories. Indeed, a cover blurb by Seanan McGuire states that Snyder’s work “attacks the page with the raw, manic intensity of an early Sam Raimi.”
Logic of Empire: Robert Jackson Bennett’s City of Stairs and Beyond
With superior power, technology, and a will to conquer, an empire uses that technological advantage to reach out and dominate/subjugate much of the world. The wealth of the world is plundered and bent to the service and the coffers of that empire. No dominance lasts forever, however, and the subjugated peoples learn how to fight back, to drive the invaders out of their lands, to regain independence. More so, as the wheel turns and the empire falls into eclipse and collapse, the formerly subjugated find that they have the geopolitical upper hand over their former colonial masters. This sounds awfully like the history of our world from the 19th century heyday of European Colonialism to the ‘rise of the rest’ and the relative decline of Western power happening right now, doesn’t it? City of Stairs, Robert Jackson Bennett’s first turn into secondary world fiction, tackles these concerns in a secondary world context.
Book Review: Last God Standing
Lando Calrissian Darnell Cooper is a standup comic in Chicago. He has a lovely girlfriend, Surabhi, and two feuding separated parents; he’s just trying to be like one of us. Lando, however, is also the decanted incarnation of the retired god Yahweh, the God of Christians, Jews, Muslims and Mormons. What is God trying to do being a stand-up comic in Chicago? Trying to make a living at being an ex-God, that is. Power abhors a vacuum, however, and Lando’s mostly deactivated status as a deity means that the rest of the retired and supplanted gods out there can smell blood in the water. A chance to get back on top, perhaps? Or just eliminate the God of the Hebrews and re-establish the old order. Worse, there are hints that a new power, a new God for the age, might be looking to eliminate the competition and the old regime — to wit, Lando. And all Lando wants to do is find the right time and moment to propose to his girlfriend. Oh, and to kill them on stage.
Book Review: The Silk Map, A Gaunt and Bone Novel, by Chris Willrich
Come, come, sit by the hearth here with me. This fine traveler’s compound doesn’t get much traffic this time of the year. The snows are threatening to close the passes to the west of us. You *are* going home to the West, of course. How did I know? No, no I am no sorcerer or magic user. I don’t need such things. The color of your skin, similar to mine. The cut of your clothes. The manner of your speech, when you bargained with the innkeeper for food, drink and a room. The load of porcelain and jade you are carrying, as evidenced by the small white jade ring you have kept for yourself and are wearing on your left hand. The manner of your shoes. I notice these things, I’m a storyteller. I notice details. And, as you see, the common room here is relatively empty. I find that my skills are best honed when I practice them, and I’ve not been able to ply my trade. I’d like to tell you a story. No, I wouldn’t say no to you buying me another cup of wine, you are very kind. Now, I heard this story from a storyteller named Chris, of the family of Willrich. A fine man, Chris. He tells tales of a poet and a deathless thief, Persimmon Gaunt and Imago Bone, a married couple, who adventure across the world. You’ve heard of them already, perhaps? Their adventure against the sorcerer Spawnsworth, maybe? The story I want to tell you on this cold night, though, is about their adventure on a Silk Road very much like this one. It begins in the western part of Qiangguo…
Book Review: Nice Dragons Finish Last by Rachel Aaron
Julius Heartstriker has a problem. Several, actually. He’s a dragon from a powerful and fecund dragon clan on a near-future Earth where the Magic Has Returned. Dragons are not trusted at all and are often actively hunted — for good reason — by anyone and anything else. But it gets worse. Julius is not the heartless and ambitiously machiavellian dragon his brothers and sisters are, much to the disappointment of Mother. He’d rather play World of Warcraft. So when Julius gets booted from the dragon’s lair to the center of magical activity on Earth — the ruins of Detroit — and trapped into his human form with a one month time limit to prove himself, Julius is under the gun to adapt or die. But a mage on the run from Las Vegas with secrets of her own might be as much the answer to his problems as he is to hers. Especially given given the rogue spirits, other dragons and the rest of the magical nastiness the former Motor City can throw at them. Oh, and some high powered mobsters following Marci from Sin City… Do Nice Dragons Finish Last? If Julius is not careful, he’ll just be finished.
Book Review: Through the Woods by Emily Carroll
The back cover of Through the Woods claims that it contains five mysterious, spine-tingling stories. Sure, I thought, but really it’s not going to be that scary, right? I expected to feel the small frisson that comes with reading ghost stories and the visual delight of paging through some cool looking art. Pleasant, simple, fun. A nice summer read. So I put it in my bag and took it to Vermont. Vermont, in case you were wondering, is full of woods. Let me properly set the scene here: we’d gone for a weekend to get away from all the hustle and bustle of work and city life. We had not packed our laptops, we did not bring our phone chargers, and each of us brought exactly one book to read (Moss’ was the excellent Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein, which I had already read). During the day, we stopped to meet friends for lunch in New Hampshire, and then hiked for four and a half hours in the green mountains, getting back to our car right as the sun was beginning to set. We checked into our hotel, The Vermont Inn, which was lovely and remote, and the sort of independent old inn that has lots of creaky charm in the stairs and floorboards. We ate a lovely dinner in the inn’s restaurant, followed by a delicious dessert cocktail — which tasted like a maple milkshake — in the inn’s bar. We soaked in the inn’s hot tub under the stars. And then we went upstairs, and read our books. Before bed.
