May 22, 2013
Super Bass
Is Gian’s love for the Summer King stronger than his hate?
May 15, 2013
The Button Man and the Murder Tree
An all-new Wild Cards story
May 14, 2013
Shall We Gather
When one world brushes another, asking the right question can be magic…
May 8, 2013
Fire Above, Fire Below
The dragon below our city has died. What is to be done?
Part of what makes Good Omens such a fantastic read is the plethora of referential material that the book offers up in categories ranging from history to art to literature. Here’s a list (though it’s a titan’s feat trying to be comprehensive in this case) of shout-outs this book manages to pack into every crevice, be they sneaky or hammer-worthy on the Obvious Scale.
And reviewed by yours truly.
The Gist, a novelette by Michael Marshall Smith, is the latest offering from Subterranean Press’s limited but honourable catalogue. To say it is by Marshall Smith—or at least, by Marshall Smith alone—is, however, something of a misnomer. Between The Gist’s covers are three novelettes and one novelette: Marshall Smith’s original, translated once into the French by Benoît Domis, translated again (without access to the original text) back into the English by Nicholas Royle. Two further recensions of the first text: three recensions of a single work.
Yes, I’m of the school that holds every translation to be a fresh recension. Every translation contains the translator’s idea of the text as well as the original author’s. If you’ve ever read translations of, say, the Greek classics from the 19th century and then compared them to a modern translation, the otherwise-invisible person of the translator becomes visible.
The power of the Wheel of Time Re-read compels you! Hopefully!
Today’s entry covers Chapter 14 of A Memory of Light, which features unexpected villainesses, unsolicited movie reviews, and surprisingly lethal applications of standard cartoon gags.
Previous re-read entries are here. The Wheel of Time Master Index is here, which has links to news, reviews, interviews, and all manner of information about the Wheel of Time in general. The index for all things specifically related to the final novel in the series, A Memory of Light, is here.
Also, for maximum coolness, the Wheel of Time Re-read is also now available as e-books, from your preferred e-book retailer!
This re-read post, and all posts henceforth, contain spoilers for the entire Wheel of Time series. If you haven’t read, read at your own risk.
And now, the post!
[“Behind every wall, every window. The world behind the world, and we’re smack in the middle.”]
It occurs to me that this year I’ve spent plenty of time on fantasy, while neglecting science fiction. A trend likely to continue until 2014 at least....
So for today, let’s spend a little time redressing the balance, and talk about hard SF by women.
Defining hard science fiction, rather like defining epic fantasy, is a tricksy business. (Or hobbit.) The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction itself acknowledges the potential impossibility of any rigorous definition, concluding only:
“[T]the most important thing about it is, not that it should include real science in any great detail, but that it should respect the scientific spirit; it should seek to provide natural rather than supernatural or transcendental explanations for the events and phenomena it describes.” [Link.]
Hi-ho, Tor.com! Leigh Butler here, of The Wheel of Time Re-read!
As dictated by my accidental semi-cornering of the hilariously specific niche market of Commenter on All Things Wheel of Time, it is my pleasure to bring you a spoiler-free advance review of “River of Souls”, Brandon Sanderson’s (and Robert Jordan’s) contribution to the epic fantasy anthology Unfettered, due out this month.
Pretty cool, eh? Why, yes, yes it is. Click the jump to find out what I thought of the story in particular, and why this anthology is awesome in general. Hooray!
Welcome back to A Read of Ice and Fire! Please join me as I read and react, for the very first time, to George R.R. Martin’s epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire.
Today’s entry is Part 29 of A Storm of Swords, in which we cover Chapter 49 (“Catelyn”) and Chapter 50 (“Arya”).
Previous entries are located in the Index. The only spoilers in the post itself will be for the actual chapters covered and for the chapters previous to them. As for the comments, please note that the Powers That Be have provided you a lovely spoiler thread here on Tor.com. Any spoileriffic discussion should go there, where I won’t see it. Non-spoiler comments go below, in the comments to the post itself.
And now, the post!
This is a novel about a time-travelling serial killer from the 1930s, his victims, the girl who survived him, and a burned-out murder-beat journalist. It’s competently, even excellently, written, makes brilliant use of a non-linear narrative to create and build tension, wears its American Literature influences proudly on its sleeve—
And for me, despite its technical competence, The Shining Girls is ultimately a frustrating mess of a novel, one whose climax falls apart under the weight of nested paradoxes.
For a long time now I have been afraid of Sofia Samatar's fiction. Knowing the effect her poetry has had on me—in Goblin Fruit, in Stone Telling, in Strange Horizons—I have trembled at the thought of allowing her words any deeper purchase on my psyche. Given her ability to incapacitate me with a few well-turned stanzas, what havoc might she wreak with a whole novel?
Through some terrible and wonderful magic, A Stranger in Olondria has anticipated these fears and commented on them. With characteristic wit, poise, and eloquence, Samatar delivers a story about our vulnerability to language and literature, and the simultaneous experience of power and surrender inherent in the acts of writing and reading.
See this hat? This is a Wheel of Time re-reading hat. I Re-read Wheels of Time in this hat.
Today’s entry covers Chapters 12 and 13 of A Memory of Light, in which variously shocking revelations are made, and some of them make a hell of a lot more sense than others.
Previous re-read entries are here. The Wheel of Time Master Index is here, which has links to news, reviews, interviews, and all manner of information about the Wheel of Time in general. The index for all things specifically related to the final novel in the series, A Memory of Light, is here.
I am also thrilled to continue to tell you that the Wheel of Time Re-read is also now available as e-books,from your preferred e-book retailer! How cool is THAT, seriously.
This re-read post, and all posts henceforth, contain spoilers for the entire Wheel of Time series. If you haven’t read, read at your own risk.
And now, the post!
[“I’m sick of not having the courage to be an absolute nobody.”]
Welcome back to A Read of Ice and Fire! Please join me as I read and react, for the very first time, to George R.R. Martin’s epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire.
Today’s entry is Part 28 of A Storm of Swords, in which we cover Chapter 48 (“Jon”).
I decided to only do one chapter today because for one, I’m feeling a bit under the weather, and for another, a little bird has told me that People are saying Chapters 51 and 52 really need to go together. So we’ll do 49 and 50 next week and 51 and 52 the week after that. Okay? Okay!
Previous entries are located in the Index. The only spoilers in the post itself will be for the actual chapters covered and for the chapters previous to them. As for the comments, please note that the Powers That Be have provided you a lovely spoiler thread in the forums here on Tor.com. Any spoileriffic discussion should go there, where I won’t see it. Non-spoiler comments go below, in the comments to the post itself.
And now, the post!
[Next up: giggling at farts and sticking crayons up my nose]
It does not compute that there is not a Wheel of Time Re-read, therefore there is one! Hooray!
Today’s entry covers Chapter 11 of A Memory of Light, in which Egwene almost puts her foot in it, Rand learns about that whole discretion/valor thingy, and Mat really, really, really needs to fire his travel agent.
Previous re-read entries are here. The Wheel of Time Master Index is here, which has links to news, reviews, interviews, and all manner of information about the Wheel of Time in general. The index for all things specifically related to the final novel in the series, A Memory of Light, is here.
I am also thrilled to continue to tell you that the Wheel of Time Re-read is also now available as e-books, from your preferred e-book retailer! How cool is THAT, seriously.
This re-read post, and all posts henceforth, contain spoilers for the entire Wheel of Time series. If you haven’t read, read at your own risk.
And now, the post!
Emilie and the Hollow World is Martha Wells’ thirteenth and latest novel, hot off the presses from Angry Robot/Strange Chemistry. It’s also Wells’ first novel marketed to the YA demographic, and speaking personally, I was interested to see how Wells would approach a different audience.
She doesn’t disappoint.
Emilie, the sixteen-year-old eponymous hero, has run away from home after an argument with her guardians. Her reasons are defensible; her forward planning skills, less so. When her plan to stow away on the steamship Merry Bell to reach her cousin goes awry (a small case of mistaken identity—mistaken for a thief), she finds herself on the wrong ship. The Sovereign has fought off attackers just in time to set out on its own journey, one which will take it out of the world Emilie knows... perhaps forever.
Welcome back to A Read of Ice and Fire! Please join me as I read and react, for the very first time, to George R.R. Martin’s epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire.
Today’s entry is Part 27 of A Storm of Swords, in which we cover Chapters 46 (“Samwell”) and 47 (“Arya”).
Previous entries are located in the Index. The only spoilers in the post itself will be for the actual chapters covered and for the chapters previous to them. As for the comments, please note that the Powers That Be have provided you a lovely spoiler thread in the forums here on Tor.com. Any spoileriffic discussion should go there, where I won’t see it. Non-spoiler comments go below, in the comments to the post itself.
And now, the post!
Ready, set, Re-read! *cannon boom*
Today’s entry covers Chapter 10 of A Memory of Light, in which a mystery is introduced, involuntarily bad decisions are made, and a deeply unfortunate race is begun.
Previous re-read entries are here. The Wheel of Time Master Index is here, which has links to news, reviews, interviews, and all manner of information about the Wheel of Time in general. The index for all things specifically related to the final novel in the series, A Memory of Light, is here.
I am also thrilled to continue to tell you that the Wheel of Time Re-read is also now available as e-books, from your preferred e-book retailer! How cool is THAT, seriously.
This re-read post, and all posts henceforth, contain spoilers for the entire Wheel of Time series. If you haven’t read, read at your own risk.
And now, the post!
There are two ways I can go about writing this instalment of our Martha Wells focus....
...No, wait, there’s really only one way. Because I cannot pretend to be anything other than utterly in love with Wells’ Wheel of the Infinite, her fourth novel. Originally published in 2000, by Eos (HarperCollins), I first read it in some dim, misty far-away past... possibly in my second year in college, so not really that long ago. I don’t remember having such a strong positive reaction on my first reading, which explains why this is the only the first time I’ve reread it since. Perhaps, like many things, it improves with time.
Salaam and good evening to you, worthy Tor.commers! I am now (mostly) recovered from my venture into the delightful crazy that is JordanCon, and now I am bound to tell you all about it. Whoo!
This year I was privileged to be the Toastmaster of JordanCon V, otherwise known as Tar Vacon, and it was pretty much one of the coolest experiences I have ever had in this fandom. And I’ve had some pretty damn cool experiences in this fandom before this, so give that statement the weight it deserves, people.
And of course, no Wheel of Time convention would be complete without me yammering on at length about it, so if you’re just DYING to find out how cool my weekend was (and your Internet connection can handle stupid amounts of pictures) please do click the link for more!
Florian gestured in exasperation. “It’s like you’re two people. One of them is a flighty artist, and I like her. The other one is bloody-minded and ruthless and finds scary things funny, and I’m not sure I like her very much; but whenever we’re about to die, she’s the one who gets all three of us through it alive.” She pressed her lips together, then asked seriously, “Which one are you? I’d really like to know.” [p379]
We first meet Tremaine Valiarde in Wells’ The Wizard Hunters at nine o’clock at night, in a library, while she’s trying to find a way to kill herself “that would bring in a verdict of natural causes in court.” Tremaine is the daughter of Nicholas Valiarde, who starred in The Death of the Necromancer. This is the same Ile-Rien of The Element of Fire, but centuries later, and now it is menaced by a powerful, seemingly-unstoppable enemy. The Gardier came, it appears, from nowhere, with no intention but conquest: the war has been going on for the last three years and the Rienish are on the verge of being overrun. Tremaine is summoned out of her library by the sorcerer Gerard, because she possesses a magical sphere—made for her by her Uncle Aristide as a child’s plaything—that may be the key to Ile-Rien’s last chance to hold off the enemy. Dropped—in some cases literally—headfirst into danger, her stubborn, ruthless, and above all loyal streak drives the other characters forward, time and time again.
Greetings to Tor.com from the wilds of Atlanta, where JordanCon Five is full steam ahead! As Toastmaster this year, I am currently running around like a chicken with its head cut off, but I wanted to pop in and give y’all one very important piece of news.
Which is: my Tor.com Re-read commenters are AWESOME.
Click the jump to see why!
The real question, once the Empire was defeated, once Luke had been cloned and the clone was killed and he’d said no to the Dark Side of the Force for good, once Leia married Han and had managed to find time to have kids, was always going to be—but what about the Jedi Order? Wasn’t that supposed to get rebuilt at some point?
Enter Jedi Search. Because, you know, you’ve got the find the potential Jedi first.
[But first, a detour into those infamous spice mines of Kessel…]
Oh, joy! The white smoke over your monitor indicates that a new Wheel of Time post has been selected!
(Or, that you need to get a new computer.)
Today’s entry covers Chapters 8 and 9 of A Memory of Light, in which we discuss Papal marriage rites, amazing daredevil feats of DOING THINGS WHILE PREGNANT RUN AWAAAAAY, and who would win in a game of 13x13 Chicken.
Previous re-read entries are here. The Wheel of Time Master Index is here, which has links to news, reviews, interviews, and all manner of information about the Wheel of Time in general. The index for all things specifically related to the final novel in the series, A Memory of Light, is here.
I am also thrilled to continue to tell you that the Wheel of Time Re-read is also now available as e-books, from your preferred e-book retailer! How cool is THAT, seriously.
This re-read post, and all posts henceforth, contain spoilers for the entire Wheel of Time series. If you haven’t read, read at your own risk.
And now, the post!
