Sponsored by ECW Press and The Amber Garden by Cynthea Masson.
The final installment in The Alchemists’ Council trilogy sees eternal conflicts between the Council and Rebel Branches escalate. Secrets about time-travel manipulation are revealed, uncomfortable truths about alchemical children are discovered, and a controversial solution to save the dimension is put forward.
Happy Friday, my fellow social distancers! I have it on good authority that we should keep at least 8 books (laid end-to-end, not stacked) away from others at all times. It’s Alex, with some news and a little bookish free association to take you into the weekend.
A thing that made me smile: the only acceptable way for grandma to come down with the sickness.
News and Views
Excited about N.K. Jemisin’s The City We Became? Join in the Spoiler Book Club Discussion on March 28!
ConZealand has decided it will be the first WorldCon to be virtual, as a solution to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. While it’s sad if you were planning to use this as an excuse to see New Zealand, this could make the World Science Fiction Convention much more accessible internationally!
The Aurealis Awards have announced the finalists!
The Thirteenth Doctor has an important message for you. There’s also a short story you can read about her over at the BBC.
K.M. Szpara on being a quitter.
Patrick Stewart has more sonnets for you. Also, if you want to watch Picard and don’t have CBS All Access, he’s got you covered there, too. What a good.
You can watch Cixin Liu’s The Three Body Problem adapted as a Minecraft-esque animated series.
If the Witcher had a black cat…
The Winchester Mystery House is offering virtual tours.
Astronaut Scott Kelly has some advice about isolation.
On Book Riot
Happening Right Now: The Harry Potter Alliance is Hosting a Virtual Con
Pennsylvania Library Creates a Hogwarts Digital Escape Room
We’re doing a couple giveaways of Barnes and Noble gift cards: $50 and $250!
Free Association Friday: Silver Friday
March 27 of 1980 became known as “Silver Thursday” when the three Hunt brothers tried to corner the market in silver and apparently really hecked things up into a panic for everyone. So here’s five books I found that have Silver in the title and absolutely nothing else to do with perturbing the futures market–but everything to do with a good story.
On the Silver Globe by Jerzy Żuławski, translated by S. Goar – Starting off with some Polish science fiction! This is the first of Żuławski’s Lunar Trilogy (written between 1901 and 1911) and tells the story, in the form of a diary, of a crew of human astronauts who found a colony on the Moon after they are stranded.
Silver Metal Lover by Tanith Lee – Jane is a shallow, pampered child of privilege on an Earth that’s been radically remade by natural disasters, with wealth and class disparities only deepened. Then she meets a robot minstrel who captures her heart, and she follows him into the worst slums of her city, consumed by a love that borders on madness.
Inside a Silver Box by Walter Mosley – A horrific tragedy brings two people together, and they are united by the powers of the mysterious Silver Box. The most powerful and destructive tool in the universe, the Silver Box has its own designs, and will use or destroy humanity if that means escape from its former master and the aliens known as the Laz.
Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh – A scholar goes into the woods, looking for answers regarding the myth of the Green Man, and finds far more than he bargained. Per my housemate, this book is “extremely gay.”
Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik – Miryem is the daughter of a money lender who is very bad at asking for his money back; tired of her family being poor and mistreated, she takes over collecting and soon gains a reputation for being able to turn silver into gold. Unfortunately, this gets the attention of the King of the Staryk, leader of a race of icy fey that are encroaching on the kingdom with ever longer winters. Miryem must use all of her cleverness and heart to find a way to save herself, and not one but two kingdoms.
See you, space pirates. You can find all of the books recommended in this newsletter on a handy Goodreads shelf. 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.