Rating: 4 of 5 A collection of five novellas, Bone Swans exceeded my expectations. I’ll admit to not being the right reader for “Life on the Sun” and “Martyr’s Gem.” And “The Big Bah-Ha” had clowns, need I say more? But I absolutely lost my mind when I finished “How the Milkmaid Struck a Bargain […]
science fiction genre
Halfway Down the Stairs by Gary A. Braunbeck
Rating: 4 of 5 Synopsis: “Climb halfway down the stairs with Bram Stoker Award-Winning author Gary A. Braunbeck, into worlds that occupy the spaces between “here” and “there,” where office workers become little more than scrolls of code and an ordinary man discovers that he has to help reassemble the missing face of God; from […]
Some Possible Solutions by Helen Phillips
Rating: 4 of 5 Synopsis: “In a spine-tingling new collection, the “unique” (NPR) and “wickedly funny” (New York Times) Helen Phillips offers an idiosyncratic series of “what-ifs” about our fragile human condition…What if your perfect hermaphrodite match existed on another planet? What if you could suddenly see through everybody’s skin to their organs? What if […]
All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders
Rating: 4.5 of 5 All the Birds in the Sky was the first 2016 release I absolutely did not want to put down until I was finished. It was so weird, in that brilliant way I always hope to find in a new-to-me author’s work. The seamless blending of magic and science, the absolutely believable […]
The Well’s End by Seth Fishman
Rating: 3 of 5 Fast-paced science fiction best suited for ages 11-17. I found the teens in this book rather boring and mostly interchangeable with one another. The virus was only moderately scary which might have to do with the fact that it’s not given much face time. But the weakest element of the story […]