Feb 202017
 
100 word review: Rupert Wong and the Ends of the Earth, by Cassandra Khaw

Poor, poor Rupert keeps dying. After managing to wriggle his cannibal chef’s hat out from under the thumb of the Kindly Ones, Ao Qin, and all the supernatural spirits in Kuala Lumpur, Rupert’s got a new mission: London – the Greek gods he’s on loan to are hungry and there’s a dearth of good cannibal […]

Feb 082017
 
100 word review: The Stars are Legion, by Kameron Hurley

Kameron Hurley’s all-female universe of tentacled worlds and the cycle of life is absolutely and utterly insane. I read the entire thing torn between “what the hell is going on here” and “I’m really enjoying whatever it is”.  Zan wakes up, a warrior without a memory, given conflicting information from those who insist they are […]

Feb 062017
 
100 word review: Rupert Wong, Cannibal Chef by Cassandra Khaw

Poor Rupert Wong is in it deep: his Boss has him by the short-and-keeps-you-in-hell, the Dragon King can’t be denied, and he just keeps on dying. It’s a difficult life, caught between the powers that be in Kuala Lumpur. Khaw’s book takes on a world where pantheons live side by side – without comfort – […]

Feb 022017
 
100 word review: Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee

This is my favourite read from 2016, hands down. Lee has created the most inventive space opera universe… imaginable. The Hexarchate is an empire who can alter the laws of reality by enforcing belief on a population: altering the calendar. The Hexarchate is brutal, and its six factions don’t even trust each other. A calendrical […]

Jan 302017
 
100 word review: At the End of the Day, by Claire North

  Cat Webb/Claire North is angry – a good thing. She’s written this book that’s a little bit about everything – the end of the world, the world going to shit, our fears and hopes and dreams, and not a little kidnapping. This book is a serious level up from Webb/North. It’s a little abstract, […]

Jan 272017
 
100 word review: The Sudden Appearance of Hope, by Claire North

What would you do if you were forgotten, fading from everyone’s memory – your parents, friends, lovers? You’d become a thief, of course, and do pretty much whatever you want. The external trappings of the world give you nothing and you give nothing back to them. It would take something significant to get your attention […]

Jan 262017
 
100 word review: A Closed and Common Orbit, by Becky Chambers

  A Closed and Common Orbit is a love letter to anyone who’s ever felt awkward, out of place, didn’t know what to say, or didn’t feel quite human. Chambers weaves two parallel stories, twenty years apart, into a gripping, wonderful story posing the questions (and daring you to answer differently) what it means to […]

Jan 232017
 
100 word review: Certain Dark Things, by Silvia Moreno-García

Moreno-García has done something amazing: She’s made vampires interesting again, and in 2017 no less. She blends myth and legend from vampires across a range of cultures with commentary on race, class, and mental illness inside of modern Mexico DF. This is a creepy tale of a young man living on the streets after suffering […]

Dec 312016
 
2016: a bin lorry on fire (but)

Do you ever wonder when reading history how people felt at critical times – the English Civil War, the tensions leading up to the Great War, or the local citizens watching Perry sail into Edo harbour? Foreshadowing? Doom? Gloom? Or were people caught up in the day-to-day. I’m a bit afraid that we’re currently finding […]

 Posted by at 02:24
Aug 292016
 
100 word review: The Gracekeepers, by Kirsty Logan

In a drowned world, there are the landlockers – living on the few bits of land remaining – and the damplings, surviving completely at sea. They meet, from time to time, in tidal zones. Callanish is a Gracekeeper – she buries the dead under the water and tends the birds who sing them to their […]