Happy Friday, shipmates! It’s Alex, with a couple more new releases for you, and some solidarity-with-labor-flavored SFF for you to check out. I might have missed May Day this year, but seeing the WGA stand up for its writers and with SAG-AFTRA voting to authorize a strike as well, I’ve never been more proud to be a member of a union. Solidarity, me hearties. Stay safe out there, have a great weekend, and I’ll see you on Tuesday!
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Let’s make the world a better place, together. Here’s somewhere to start: Entertainment Community Fund, which supports entertainment workers impacted by the strikes.
Bookish Goods
Solidaritree Pin by TheArtOrchardByLucy
A very cool design that goes with the theme of solidarity this week…and you know how I love an enamel pin. I also love this description of the design: “The trunk of the tree is a fist of solidarity. The roots represent the intersecting causes of oppression, whilst the branches represent the solutions: the coming together of different marginalised groups, and their allies, to form a beautiful and powerful whole.” $15
New Releases
The Library of Broken Worlds by Alaya Dawn Johnson
The Library is the peacekeeper of three systems, its ever-shifting tunnels the home of the gods. Freida is the daughter of one of these gods, and she will be called on to unearth a terrible secret long-buried after she decides to help both a Tierran boy who wants to save his people and a disciple from a persecuted religion while their systems stand at the brink of war.
Relentless Melt by Jeremy P. Bushnell
Artie Quick is an ambitious and very inquisitive young woman in Boston who wants to be a detective. Unfortunately for her, it’s 1909, so she must disguise herself as a man to pursue her studies into Criminal Investigation, paying for it by being a department store salesgirl by day. Before her course of study is even finished, she’s ready to put her knowledge into practice and goes hunting for a mystery with her friend Theodore, who is studying magic. Together, they end up on the trail of a series of violent abductions, which will test their investigative and occult skills.
For a more comprehensive list of new releases, check out our New Books newsletter.
Riot Recommendations
With the WGA on strike (solidarity!) and SAG-AFTRA voting to authorize a strike themselves, I wanted to highlight some science fiction that touches on solidarity and labor issues! There’s a lot more than you’d think, though not nearly enough, in my opinion.
The Wall by Gautam Bhatia
For the last two thousand years, the city of Sumer has been entirely enclosed by a wall, through which nothing leaves and nothing enters. Mithila is a young woman who hungers for new experiences in a place where any deviation from the rules is punished brutally. And she will try to cross the wall, though every power in the city will try to stop her — because breaking the rules will cause civilization to collapse, they say. This book leads into The Horizon, which follows an agricultural workers’ union that is trying to address the inequity of the society of Sumer.
The Keeper’s Six by Kate Elliott
Esther hasn’t been to the Beyond, the space between the worlds, since the Concilium banned her and her six-person traveling party for a decade. But when she discovers her adult son has been taken, she and her Hex are the only ones who can rescue him, ban be damned. Esther is basically a union organizer — and her union are the municipal workers who work under a dragon.
See you, space pirates. If you’d like to know more about my secret plans to dominate the seas and skies, you can catch me over at my personal site.