Sci-Fi

Review: DEATHFIRE by Nick Kyme (Black Library)

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KymeN-HH32-DeathfireThe surviving Salamanders search for purpose and hope

Vulkan lies in state beneath the Fortress of Hera, and yet many of his sons still refuse to believe that he is truly dead. After a seemingly miraculous rescue by the Ultramarines, Artellus Numeon, once captain of the Pyre Guard, urges the other Salamanders on Macragge to leave Imperium Secundus and return their primarch’s body to the home world of Nocturne — there to be reborn in the flames of Mount Deathfire. But Numeon grapples endlessly with his doubts and fears for the future of the Legion, while their foes seek to carve out new destinies of their own…

It feels like a very long time since I last read a Horus Heresy novel. I used to read them as soon as they were released, but I seem to have taken a bit of a break. So, I decided to catch up, and ended up reading the last four novels in a couple of weeks. For the main, it was great to be reading back in that setting. Deathfire, the sequel to Vulkan Lives moves the Salamanders’ story forwards, eventually bringing the shattered legion some hope. It is not, however, an easy journey… Continue reading →

Review: SLEEPING GIANTS by Sylvain Neuvel (Del Rey/ Michael Joseph)

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NeuvelS-SleepingGiantsUSAn interesting start to a new series

Deadwood, USA. A girl sneaks out just before dark to ride her new bike. Suddenly, the ground disappears beneath her. Waking up at the bottom of a deep pit, she sees an emergency rescue team above her. The people looking down see something far stranger…

“We always look forward. We never look back.”

That girl grows up to be Dr. Rose Franklyn, a brilliant scientist and the leading world expert on what she discovered. An enormous, ornate hand made of an exceptionally rare metal, which predates all human civilisation on the continent. 

“But this thing … it’s different. It challenges us. It rewrites history.”

An object whose origins and purpose are perhaps the greatest mystery humanity has ever faced. Solving the secret of where it came from — and how many more parts may be out there — could change life as we know it.

“It dares us to question what we know about ourselves.”

But what if we were meant to find it? And what happens when this vast, global puzzle is complete…?

“About everything.”

I had very high hopes for Neuvel’s Sleeping Giants. It sounded really interesting and, as an epistolary novel, I was certainly intrigued to see how the author built the story. For the main, it is very well-written and interesting. That being said, the story flagged a bit towards the end, despite being the start of a new series. Continue reading →

Upcoming: COLLAPSING EMPIRE by John Scalzi (Tor)

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ScalziJ-CollapsingEmpire

There is a new stand-alone sci-fi novel coming from John Scalzi early next year: The Collapsing Empire. It sounds rather interesting, too:

Humanity moves away from Earth, into space, and in time forgets our homeworld. It creates a new empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos ensures no one human outpost can survive without the others. It’s a safeguard against interstellar war – and a way of controlling the empire’s rulers. This future of faster-than-light travel is possible due to a huge discovery – the Flow. This is an extra-dimensional field which can transport us to other worlds. And while this field is eternal, like a river, it does change its course.

It now seems the Flow is moving, which could isolate every human world in space forever. So three individuals will make a last attempt to find a solution. A scientist, a starship captain and the Empress of the Interdependency will see what, if anything, can be salvaged. For an interstellar empire is on the brink of collapse.

Due to be published by Tor Books in the US and UK in March 2017.

Interview with BRIAN EVENSON

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EvensonB-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Brian Evenson?

I’m a writer who grew you in the American West, mostly in Utah, but who has lived all over the place in the US as well as in France, Switzerland, and briefly in Mexico. My writing often has one foot in what people think of as literature and one foot happily in genre. I was raised Mormon, but was pressured out of that religion (and out of my first teaching job at a Mormon university, BYU) because of the nature of my first book, Altman’s Tongue, and am very happily non-religious now.

Tor.com will be publishing your new novella, The Warren, later this year. It looks rather interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

It’s a book told from the perspective of a solitary person within a ruined structure who has had other personalities loaded into his head as a way of preserving them as the mechanical systems of the structure begin to expire. The man character is trying to figure out who he is, whether he and his kind are likely to die out, and whether he is in fact human after all. I think the audience starts to figure things out along with him, sharing his journey and maybe understanding some things that he just can’t. Continue reading →

Guest Post: “Travel in Both Directions” by Malka Older

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OlderM-AuthorPicInfomocracy takes place across 17 different locations, only one of them in the United States. This is largely a function of the fact that, as someone who worked or consulted for international organizations for years, that was what my life was like. Over one ten month period in 2011-2012, I went to eleven different countries – three of them twice. So it made sense to me, while I was writing, that activists, anarchists, and political operatives working on a global election would have a similar itinerary. Continue reading →

Review: THE SUDDEN APPEARANCE OF HOPE by Claire North (Orbit)

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NorthC-SuddenAppearanceOfHopeUKAn intriguing novel about identity and isolation, thieves and scary tech…

My name is Hope Arden, and you won’t know who I am. But we’ve met before — a thousand times.

It started when I was sixteen years old. 

A father forgetting to drive me to school. A mother setting the table for three, not four. A friend who looks at me and sees a stranger.

No matter what I do, the words I say, the crimes I commit, you will never remember who I am.

That makes my life difficult. It also makes me dangerous.

Long-time readers will know that Claire North is one of my favourite authors. With each new novel (and novella, because we have to include the linked Gamehouse trilogy), North takes reading on a riveting journey of unexpected and thought-provoking directions. The Sudden Appearance of Hope is no exception, with one of the most intriguing characters I’ve read in a while. Well, maybe since North’s previous novel… I enjoyed this a lot. Continue reading →

Interview with YOON HA LEE

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LeeYH-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Yoon Ha Lee?

I live in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, with my family and a cat with the personality of an unusually submissive marshmallow. My twelve-year-old daughter would like you to know that I have a twelve-year-old daughter.

She also wants to let you know that I write genocidal science fiction. Her term, not mine. Maybe I had better set her up with some computer games or a book and get her away from me…

Solaris are publishing your new novel, Ninefox Gambit, in June. It looks rather fascinating: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

Ninefox Gambit is about a disgraced captain, Kel Cheris, who allies with a brilliant undead tactician, Shuos Jedao, to defend one of her nation’s star fortresses. The good news: Jedao has never lost a battle, and he may be the only one capable of cracking the fortress’s defenses. Continue reading →

Guest Post: “Coming Back — On Alien Races and Space Adventures” by Jamie Sawyer

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SawyerJ-AuthorPicMy debut novel, Artefact, was released in February 2016. It is book one of The Lazarus War, and the story continues with Legion, released in the UK and US on 26th May 2016.

The Lazarus War is a series focusing on a far-future space war. The Alliance – the nominal “good guys” of the series  – are locked in an apparently endless conflict with the Krell – a bio-mechanical alien race. But in the universe of The Lazarus War, soldiers never really die: they remotely-operate clone bodies (called “simulants”). That means that if a veteran soldier dies, he retains his experience and knowledge, and can simply “reset” to a new body. Pretty handy, given the situations many of these soldiers find themselves in… Continue reading →

Interview with ROBERT KROESE

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KroeseR-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Robert Kroese?

I relate strongly to a character in my Mercury books, Ederatz. Ederatz is an angel who has been assigned by the Heavenly bureaucracy to observe and report on human civilization. That’s me: an oddball from another plane of existence doing my best to make sense of humanity.

Your new novel, The Big Sheep, will be published by St. Martin’s Press in June. It looks rather interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

I describe The Big Sheep as “Sherlock meets Blade Runner.” The book is near future scifi mystery that centers on a brilliant but unconventional detective’s search for a genetically altered sheep that’s on the loose in Los Angeles. And yes, it’s (hopefully) as bizarre and unpredictable as it sounds. Continue reading →

Upcoming: THE WARREN by Brian Evenson (Tor.com)

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EvensonB-WarrenI’m in the process of organizing an interview with Brian Evenson (he seems a very nice fellow), and today Tor.com happened to unveil the cover for his upcoming novella, The Warren. It’s pretty cool, and the story sounds very promising, too. Here’s the synopsis:

X doesn’t have a name. He thought he had one — or many — but that might be the result of the failing memories of the personalities imprinted within him. Or maybe he really is called X.

He’s also not as human as he believes himself to be.

But when he discovers the existence of another — above ground, outside the protection of the Warren — X must learn what it means to be human, or face the destruction of their two species.

The Warren is due to be published by Tor.com on September 20th, 2016. For more on Brian’s work, be sure to check out his website, and follow him on Goodreads. Brian is also the author of Immobility, published by Tor Books.