Happy Friday, shipmates! It’s Alex, and I am here with an issue full of anthologies for you short story lovers out there. I hope it’s been a safe and peaceful week for all of you, and I hope you have any necessary holiday shopping done because we are past the point in the month where brick and mortar stores are officially scary. Stay safe out there, space pirates, and I’ll see you on Tuesday!
The holidays have arrived, and so has our new paperback level at TBR! If you (or a reader you know) are just over-carrying around bulky hardcovers or are looking for a more budget-friendly option, we’ve got you. Check out all the offerings at mybtro.com/gift, and give personalized reading recommendations customized for any and every reader.
Let’s make the world a better place, together. Here are two places to start: Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund, which provides medical and humanitarian relief to children in the Middle East regardless of nationality, religion, or political affiliation; and Ernesto’s Sanctuary, a cat sanctuary and animal rescue in Syria that is near and dear to my heart.
Bookish Goods
Santa Dragon T-Shirt by IndigoBloomFlowers
It’s pretty simple: sometimes you just want a dragon wearing a Santa hat to celebrate the season, and Etsy delivers. This time, in T-shirt form. Next time, who knows? $23.89
New Releases
The Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction 2022 edited by Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki, Eugen Bacon, and Milton Davis
The previous anthology of this series won a World Fantasy Award, and they’re coming back swinging for their second year, bringing another all around great set of science fiction and fantasy stories from African authors.
The Reinvented Detective edited by Cat Rambo and Jennifer Brozek
This anthology focuses on science fiction detective and true crime stories, exploring how crime, the investigation thereof, and punishment might be changed by technologies like cloning, AI, technologically augmented bodies, and more.
For a more comprehensive list of new releases, check out our New Books newsletter.
Riot Recommendations
Since this is an anthology new release edition of the newsletter, I wanted to keep going on that with two more anthologies…and I wanted to recommend older anthologies that we can thankfully still get our hands on as ebooks.
So Long Been Dreaming: Postcolonial Science Fiction & Fantasy edited by Nalo Hopkinson and Uppinder Mehan
This anthology is filled with original short stories by African, Asian, South Asian, and Aboriginal writers, along with North American and British authors of color, all of them imagining futures of what the world might become after leaving behind the destructive legacy of colonialism.
Women of War edited by Tanya Huff and Alexander Potter
This anthology focuses on strong and well-rounded female main characters fighting like hell from the fantasy battlefield to the distant reaches of space. Editor Tanya Huff was nice enough to let a couple male authors squeak in, but it’s mostly stories about women by women!
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.