Author: Alex Acks

Happy Tuesday, shipmates! It’s Alex, with some news and books for you… but since there aren’t many new releases today (December is a barren place when it comes to new books), I’m doing something a bit different this week: focusing on standalone novels that were released this year.

(Standalones make really great gifts for people you might be trying to tempt into reading more science fiction. Just saying.)

16 Standalone SFF Novels from 2019

Disclaimer: These are standalones to the best of my knowledge and ability to google. If I’m wrong, mea culpa.

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone – “Two time-traveling agents from warring futures, working their way through the past, begin to exchange letters—and fall in love.”

Pet by Akwaeke Emezi – “How do you save the world from monsters if no one will admit they exist?“

Steel Crow Saga by Paul Krueger – Battle couples, magical animal companions, and snark. (Full disclosure: Paul and I share an agent.)

The Raven Tower by Ann Leckie – The kingdom of Iraden is protected by the god known as the Raven, whose tower conceals a dark history.

Middlegame by Seanan McGuire – Complicated sibling relationships, alchemy, and godhood. The world is in a lot of trouble.

The Deep by Rivers Solomon, et al. – The descendants of pregnant African women who were thrown overboard from slave ships live deep under the ocean, forgetting their traumatic memories by giving them to their historian, Yetu.

Ormeshadow by Priya Sharma – A family drama on a farm seated over Orme, a buried, ancient dragon who dreams of resentment, jealousy, and death.

Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia – A young woman in the jazz age dreams of escaping a life of domestic drudgery until she accidentally frees the Mayan god of death and is handed a life or death quest.

The Sol Majestic by Ferrett Steinmetz – A teen guru who wants to advise the galaxy’s one percenters wins a fabulous free dinner at the Sol Majestic.

Escaping Exodus by Nicky Drayden – Seske, a young woman unexpectedly thrust into the role of leader, must find answers to tremors disturbing the new vacuum-breathing space beast her clan has moved into–while fending off a challenge by her confident, cunning sister.

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow – January, the ward of a wealthy hunter of arcane artifacts, finds a book in his mansion that promises adventures in other worlds and truths about her own.

David Mogo, Godhunter by Suyi Davies Okungbowa – “David Mogo, demigod and godhunter, has one task: capture two of the most powerful gods in the city and deliver them to the wizard gangster Lukmon Ajala.”

The Record Keeper by Agnes Gomillion – In a world brought to ruins by a third world war, Arika Cobane meets a new student who forces her to question her most deeply held beliefs: What does peace matter if innocent lives are lost to maintain it?

Sisters of the Vast Black by Lina Rather – Sisters of the Order of Saint Rita respond to the distress call of a new colony and find themselves caught in a web of politics and corruption that runs through both the central government and the church.

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo – Alex Stern, the only survivor of an unsolved multiple homicide, is offered a too-good-to-be-true deal: a full ride to Yale, and the only price is that she has to monitor the school’s secret societies.

The Future of Another Timeline by Annalee Newitz – Tess, from the future, has dedicated herself to shifting the past to create a safer world in her time, trying to find a way to make her edits stay while she avoids fellow travelers willing to stop her with deadly force.

News and Views

Alix E. Harrow has two new novellas coming.

Wonder Woman 1984 trailer!!!!

Must-read short SFF fiction from November 2019.

Rest in peace, Rene Auberjonois.

Tamora Pierce says Alanna of Trebond is gender fluid.

Vulture makes a brave attempt to answer all our questions about the plot and universe of Cats.

The Parker Solar Probe has found some funky things in the solar wind as it goes close to the Sun.

On Book Riot

Quiz: Which All Systems Red character are you?

Gabriel García Márquez books: A brief look at the master of magical realism

20 of the best Harry Potter earrings

Read Harder: Fairytale retellings by authors of color

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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.

Happy Friday, shipmates! Made it through another week, and we’re crashing solidly into the holiday season. But together, I know we can get through this. It’s Alex, with some news and books for you today.

My unrelated-to-SFF thing of the week is the return of Amy Poehler and Nick Offerman’s show Making It, which is the second most wholesome thing I have ever watched in my life. (The first is, of course, The Great British Bake Off.) If you want to know why I love it, just watch this.

News and Views

New York Times Magazine has a profile of Ken Liu, in which he talks about bringing Chinese sci-fi to American readers.

I do believe you need a short story by E. Lily Yu: The Time Invariance of Snow

Here’s a really good article about Indigenous sci-fi: An Old New World

Jeff VanderMeer’s playlist for Dead Astronauts.

NPR interview with Tomi Adeyemi.

An interview with Juliette Wade about Mazes of Power.

James D. Nicoll has advice on how to recover from reader’s block.

More casting for the Wheel of Time TV show.

Wired makes the argument that Ewoks are the most tactically advanced fighting force in Star Wars.

The best Baby Yoda tweet.

Rest in peace, Star Trek writer D.C. Fontana.

JJ Abrams teases some kind of LGBTQ representation in Star Wars (which will definitely not be Finn/Poe). I’ll believe it when I f*****g see it, and if it’s anything like the “representation” we got out of Avengers: End Game, I’ll probably be chucking my popcorn at the screen.

The trailer for No Time to Die is out. I mostly mention this because Lashana Lynch.

A periodic table of rejected element names.

On Book Riot

This week’s SFF Yeah! podcast is about SFF with mysteries in them.

Free Association Friday

I’m currently reading How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States by Daniel Immerwahr, and if you want to learn a lot of absolutely infuriating American history, I cannot recommend it enough. (And unless history curricula have changed a lot in the last–yikes–20 years, there’s going to be a lot of new-to-you information in it, like there was for me.) Colonialism has a… troubled history in SFF to say the least, with works up through today imagining horrors of colonialism being visited on white people, often as a means of coming up with baroque excuses for heinous behavior.

So how about a few anti-colonial and post-colonial SFF books?

First off, if you’re in the mood for some academic reading, Jessica Langer wrote Postcolonialism and Science Fiction (you can read a little excerpt here) and Masoof Ashraf Raja edited an essay collection on The Postnational Fantasy which includes examinations of postcolonialism in the genre. And for shorter reading, Strange Horizons did an excellent Indigenous Futurisms roundtable in 2017.

Nalo Hopkinson and Uppinder Mehan edited a short story anthology that focuses on the stories of people who have historically been “alienated” from the genre: So Long Been Dreaming: Postcolonial Science Ficton & Fantasy. (Another Nalo Hopkinson-edited anthology, New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color, has some massively good postcolonial short stories in it.) There’s also a great anthology of Indegenous science fiction edited by Grace L. Dillon: Walking the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction.

The Gaslight Dogs by Karin Lowachee is at its heart a story about Indigenous people fighting an encroaching empire. The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang draws on the horrors of historical real world colonialism for a gripping story about the seas of blood that surround empires and revenge. The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth J Dickinson is a very anti-colonial novel; it’s about a young girl whose people are colonized, the horrors that ensue, and the revenge that she decides to take because of it. Octavia Butler examines the mark colonialism leaves on people in a lot of her work, but I think perhaps the pinnacle of that examination is her Xenogensis Trilogy, which starts with Dawn.

Zen Cho has called her book Sorcerer to the Crown “post-colonial fluff for book nerds,” though it’s definitely got some meat in it with its examination of the diversity within the British Empire that so often gets papered over in historically-based fiction. The Best of All Possible Worlds by Karen Lord springboards from the post-colonial Caribbean to bring aliens who have lost their homeland and the humans they hope will help them together, with the big question being will the cultures bend with change or break? Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James isn’t so much post-colonial as post-post-colonial (something the author’s said about himself); it’s epic fantasy but not as we know it.

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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.

Happy Tuesday, shipmates! It’s Alex, with some new releases and news for you at the start of another glorious week. Just to give you all a heads up–new releases start getting pretty thin on the ground after this week. Probably because the entire publishing industry basically shuts down for the month of December. (Lucky them.) So for the following weeks I’ll be looking back at this year’s incredible crop of super awesome books.

Speaking of one of those super awesome books, I just started reading Pet by Akwaeke Emezi and oh my goodness. Gorgeous prose–and the main character is a black trans girl. This was my reward for finishing NaNoWriMo, and I chose well!

In case you missed it with all the holiday stuff this week, Lego committed a murder on Twitter. Also, I must share this interview with Jamie Lee Curtis.

New Releases

Dead Astronauts by Jeff Vandermeer – A nameless city that lives in the shadow of the all-powerful Company becomes the nexus between humans and non-humans, and their interactions will determine the fate of not just that Earth, but all possible Earths.

Malorie: A Bird Box Novel by Josh Malerman – A novel about Malorie, heroine of Bird Box, facing her world and its dangers head on this time.

A Very Scalzi Christmas by John Scalzi – A collection of Christmas-themed short pieces, with three new short stories!

This Will Kill That by Danielle K Roux – In a city brought low by plague and monsters and ghosts, Rin Morana must take her place as leader of the Green faction after the deaths of her parents. While dealing with her complicated releationship to her rival, Amaya, Rin finds herself in the company of the one person in the city who still remembers the plague–and may be the key to a brutal past that still haunts the survivors.

A Dragon for William by Julie E Czerneda – Werfol is a truthseer, someone who can tell if others are lying. After returning home from staying with his uncle, he finds his family in disgrace and facing an uncertain future. To cheer himself up, he begins to write stories about a prince named William, who befriends a young dragon. But as Werfol’s fear and anger grow, his stories seem to encroach on reality…

 

News and Views

Naomi Kritzer has published her annual guide to Gifts for People You Hate.

Essay of the week: Space Aging: Where Are the Galactic Grandmas?

John Boyega has a very important question for Oscar Isaac.

Billy Dee Williams is a national treasure and must be protected at all costs.

Instant Pot now has a Star Wars collection.

I have to share this absolutely gorgeous short story with you: This Is How

A livetweet of reading the worst Hugo winning book of all time.

James D. Nicoll has a list of 5 overlooked classics for the occasion of Frederik Pohl’s 100th birthday.

There’s a Kabuki version of Star Wars and you can see it on Youtube.

This review of Never Surrender has made me even more determined to watch this documentary.

A ranking of robot Santas.

An astronaut played Amazing Grace on the bagpipes on the ISS.

On Book Riot

A Beginner’s Guide to Chinese Science Fiction

This week’s SFF Yeah! has some short fiction to help you get to your 2019 reading goal finish line.

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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.

Happy truncated week, USian shipmates! It’s Alex, with news and books to take you into the weekend. If you want to have a good cry today, I must share this four tweet thread that’s a comic about black cats and how good they are.

News and Views

An interview with Margaret Atwood about “The Decade The Handmaid’s Tale came to life.”

Cover reveal for Nnedi Okorafor’s new book.

There’s going to be an official cookbook for Destiny.

Lavie Tidhar and Silvia Moreno-Garcia pick their best science fiction and fantasy of 2019.

If you, like me, have lost track of how many adaptations are in the works, Tor.com has attempted a definitive list.

Max Gladstone wrote Wizard School Dropouts, an interactive web series you can now play (watch?)

io9 has an animated Game of Thrones history.

Padmeé Amidala, Queen of Empty Space.

Amal El-Mohtar on Frozen 2. Abigail Nussbaum also has some thoughts.

Advice on DIY geeky holiday gifts for this year.

I am extremely geeked about this surface map of Titan.

On Book Riot

20 Must-Read Time Travel Books

9 Solid Gold YA Fantasy Books from 2019

8 Books About Mortals in Fantasy Worlds

Star Wars Episode IX Reading Challenge

Free Association Friday: Books I’m Thankful For

There have been a lot of good books this year. SO MANY OF THEM. I’m humbled by the storytellers we walk among right now, and grateful to be able to read their work. There’s still a long, long way to go when it comes to parity in publishing–and the amazing books we’re getting right now tell us that it’s a fight worth having, as slow and grinding and frustrating as it is at times.

So, the eight books I am most thankful for this year:

Realm of Ash by Tasha Suri. I loved Empire of Sand for its gorgeous prose and amazing Disaster Heteros, and the second book delivers more of what I loved… while engaging with the complex question of what “after” is like in a culture where marriage is the end for women.

Steel Crow Saga by Paul Krueger. It’s a bananapants anime-esque universe with Totally Not Pokémon and battle partners. I need more books like this in my life. (Full disclosure: I share an agent with Paul.)

Storm of Locusts by Rebecca Roanhorse. I am admittedly not a huge fan of urban fantasy, but I have no problem making an exception for Rebecca Roanhorse’s books because they’re so rich and so different. I read the whole thing in one sitting, which is a major accomplishment for me because being an adult sucks big time.

Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia. It’s so rare to find fantasy set in Mexico, particularly not modern Mexico. (And, let’s be honest, particularly not “racist horror fantasy a squalid pit of drugs and gangs” Mexico.) It’s a book about having dreams bigger than the life you lead. And it’s got a human teaching a not-human to be less of a dick, and I’m a total sucker for that.

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine. This is probably the most complex and multilayered book I read all year. It interrogates that particular feeling of longing for a culture that you can never actually be part of. It’s about loving and hating something at the same time, and how seeing flaws honestly is an act of courage and love. And also about cultures eagerly eating their own, sacrificing what should not be sacrificed to promulgate an ideal that has become hopelessly corrupted. (Full disclosure: I share an agent with Arkady.)

Riverland by Fran Wilde. Fran always writes absolutely gorgeous prose that she fills with strong and haunting imagery, and this book is no exception. It’s a book of dreams and nightmares, some waking, and some sleeping. And it’s an emotionally tough book, about coping with abuse and trying to do the right thing when life itself is already frightening and difficult and nothing is safe.

Middlegame by Seanan McGuire. Look, I love time loop stories more than anything, and I don’t see nearly enough of them in print as opposed to on the screen. But this is one of the most innovative time loop stories I’ve ever read, plus it’s got an incredibly complicated sibling relationship, and makes no bones about how being “gifted” can be incredibly difficult for children–especially girls.

The Ascent to Godhood by JY Yang. I love the entire series that this book is the capstone of; it’s a wildly creative world and I’ve never been able to predict a thing about the story, the characters, or where they’re going. I’m indescribably grateful to be in a world where someone who could dream up the Tensorate exists and is writing. (Full disclosure: I share an agent with JY.)

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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.

Happy Tuesday, shipmates! It’s Alex, bringing you best wishes and a slightly different newsletter for this week to come. May all those in the US of A find the fortitude to survive the amount of turkey and fixins we’re about to have placed before us, and if you’re in retail I’m sending you all the good energy I can for Friday.

That’s right, it’s Thanksgiving week! And since there aren’t a whole lot of new releases for this week, I thought we’d get a jump on holiday gift giving with a look at some cool, wearable sci-fi and fantasy novel merch.

From Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler: We are a harvest of survivors. The only t-shirt badass enough to make it onto this list. $25

You can get work coveralls that let you feel like a character on The Expanse. Pretty reasonable for a ready-made cosplay item. $100

This infinity scarf inspired by Erin Morgenstern’s The Night Circus is just unfairly gorgeous. $48

From Gail Carriger’s Finishing School series, there’s this adorable pendant of Bumbersnoot the mechanical dog, which works for a bracelet or a necklace… or annything else you can hang a pendant off of. $37

A bracelet with one of my favorite little quotes from Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey: All knowledge is worth having. $18

Barking spiders! Here’s a pendant with perhaps the best SFF exclamation ever, from Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld. $16

The the main characters from Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clark, named on earrings. $10

A gorgeous charm of the Eolian Pipes from The Kingkiller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss. (The seller has versions of this as a necklace, cufflinks, a pin, and more.) $37

These earrings were inspired by Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children series, specifically the land of Confection featured in Beneath the Sugar Sky. $11

From Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo: No Mourners, No Funerals enamel pin. $9

Bonus Not-Wearable-But-Still-Wantable Section!

I saw these and you must see them to because they are beautiful.

From N.K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy, “Alabaster Madonna.” My heart is just breaking. $8

A bright, yet ethereal watercolor red versus blue print for This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone. $16

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.

Happy Friday to my favorite space pirates! I hope you have some great weekend plans. (I’ve got a D&D game coming, so not even the final slog of NaNoWriMo can dampen my mood. And by the way, if you’re on that slog–drink some water, take a screen break, YOU GOT THIS.) Here’s Alex with some news for your Friday and some books about teams of badass women. And appropriately enough… y’all. This is definitely fantasy, because reality can’t be this perfect: Mel and Sue, former GBBO hosts, play professional assassins in a new movie called Hitmen.

News and Views

Michael Moorcock’s Elric books have been optioned for TV.

The Mary Sue interviews author Chuck Wendig about apples. Just apples.

New book coming from E. Lily Yu in Fall 2020!

Interview with N.K. Jemisin about Afrofuturism and her Green Lantern.

The Expanse is circling back to bookshelves via The Art and Making of The Expanse

The Dragon Awards have opened for 2020 nominations.

This year’s Goodreads choice awards are in their final round. You’ve got until December 2 to vote.

You can read an excerpt from Chana Porter’s new novel The Seep, coming to shelves in January 2020.

I try not to go too overboard with TV stuff but Y’ALL KEVIN CONROY PLAYING BATMAN IN LIVE ACTION.

An early draft of Kevin Shinik’s YA Star Wars novel, Force Collector, accidentally contained major spoilers for The Rise of Skywalker.

More casting announcements for BBC’s The Watch, including Anna Chancellor as Lord Vetinari. I am here for this.

Well, this is gross: Emilia Clarke says she’s been pressured to do nude scenes so she ‘won’t disappoint Game of Thrones fans.’

Modern fan cultures (like Trekkies) arguably have their roots in… Jane Austen fans?

Amazing pictures of starling murmurations.

Here’s two 400-year-old warships wrecked at the bottom of a channel in Sweden if you need any writing inspiration today.

On Book Riot

This week’s SFF Yeah! podcast is about SFF for gift-giving.

28 of the greatest Wheel of Time quotes

16 authors like Neil Gaiman

Rioters share surprising secrets: The Harry Potter Confessions

Free Association Friday

For my birthday last week, I saw Charlie’s Angels because it looked like fun. The trailers did not prepare me for just how girl-power-banana-pants-spy-fy-playfulness I was getting… plus Kristen Stewart’s character checking out at least two other women over the course of the movie. It makes me very sad that it’s not getting the love it deserves… just like Terminator: Dark Fate.

I want more badass ladies teaming up and doing action and spy things. I want all of them! And in honor of the two lady team-up movies, here’s six more with teams of badass ladies:

Heroine Complex by Sarah Kuhn gives us Evie and Aveda. Aveda’s a superheroine and Evie’s her assistant. And then one day, Evie has to impersonate Aveda for a night… and discovers she’s a superheroine too. There’s plenty of ladies teaming up and being amazing in the series.

Steel Crow Saga by Paul Krueger has Lee and Xiulan, a would-be detective and her criminal companion fighting to change the regime of the Shang Empire, and they kick a lot of ass in the process.

The Tiger’s Daughter by K. Arsenault Rivera has the ultimate lovers, O Shizuka and Barsalayaa Shefali, divine empress and her infamous warrior, who may well be goddesses in their own right. Together, they fight to push back the demons that threaten to overrun their lands.

The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter by Theodora Goss features a team-up of the women hidden in no-longer-under-copyright stories like The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde… which gives us Mary Jekyll, the main character of the first book. Friendship, mystery, mayhem, and the absolute delight of spotting familiar literary figures abounds.

A Study in Honor by Claire O’Dell gives us a Holmes and Watson who are queer black women in a near-future Washington, DC. As you might expect, they form an unbreakable personal bond and solve some mysteries.

Etiquette and Espionage by Gail Carriger is about a finishing school where young ladies go to learn some darker skills as well… like espionage. Lady friendships! Spies! Manners! Four unexpected things that one can do with a fan!

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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.

Happy Tuesday, shipmates! It’s Alex, and I’ve got some news and new books to share with you. With the holidays bearing down on us, the usual herd of new releases is starting to get a bit thin–thankfully, there’s still plenty to look forward to this week! What I’m looking forward to most this week is this upcoming Great Performances of Much Ado About Nothing. Like we all needed another reason to love PBS.

New Releases
…and Other Disasters by Malka Older – A collection of poetry and short stories that examines otherness, kindness, and compassion, from the author of Infomocracy.

The Lights Go Out in Lychford by Paul Cornell – Other realities are impinging upon the village of Lychford, nibbling away at its rapidy crumbling borders. The locals who would normally deal with this issue–the wise woman, the priest, and the owner of the magic shop–are having major problems of their own. And then a stranger shows up in town and says she can fix it all, for free. But free wishes always come with a hidden cost…

Catfishing on CatNet by Naomi Kritzer – A near-future thriller about Steph, a teen whose online home is a social media site secretly moderated by a sentient AI called CheshireCat who truly loves cat pictures. When a threat from Steph’s past catches up to her and the sentient AI’s presence is exposed, Steph and her IRL and online friends must work together to save CheshireCat.

Wake, Siren: Ovid Resung by Nina MacLaughlin – A retelling of the myths of Ovid’s Metamorphosis from the perspective of the women and monsters who seduce and survive violence.

Blood Heir by Amélie Wen Zhao – The crown princess of the Cyrillian Empire, Ana, hides a deadly secret – she has Affinity blood in her veins, in a land where Affinites and their world-controlling gifts are reviled. When her father the Emperor is murdered, Ana is framed as his killer and must go on the run. Her only chance is to solve the mystery of his death… and her only ally might be a dangerous crime lord.

News and Views

Saladin Ahmed (author of Throne of the Crescent Moon) talks about the work he’s doing at Marvel with Miles Morales and Ms. Marvel.

Audible Original The Other Animals is out and includes a story from Ken Liu.

NASA renames Kuiper Belt object Ultima Thule to Arrokoth, which means “sky” in Powhatan/Algonquian.

Jason Heller wrote an excellent review of Queen of the Conquered.

Better science fiction through real science.

After Isaac Butler noted the disappearance of John M. Ford’s work, Patrick Nielsen Hayden announced that Tor will be bringing all of his fiction back into print.

Anthony Mackie on becoming Captain America.

Barnes & Noble let go of all its freelancers who were working on the SFF and YA blogs, which is sad news for all of us who like hearing about books!

I never stop loving what a giant nerd Adam Savage is.

10 Things You (Probably) Didn’t Know About C.S. Lewis.

Black Spire Outpost, which has featured prominently in the current Star Wars tie-ins, has an official cookbook now.

Writers on the Wheel of Time Amazon series already appear to be working on the second season.

The many adaptations of the The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

Hayabusa-2 is on its way home.

On Book Riot

How Trauma Bonds Drive the Broken Earth Trilogy

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.

Happy Friday, shipmates! We survived the week–or maybe it’s just my ghost writing this to you. It’s possible, right? This is Alex, with some Friday news and a few book recommendations to take you into the weekend. But before we start, it’s not SFF, yet I feel compelled to share Jennifer Nettles’s very pointed CMA red carpet look.

News and Views

For N.K. Jemisin, world-building is a lesson in oppression. And you can watch her full Wired25 session at the link. (Also, I just have to plug How Long ‘Til Black Future Month.)

You can read an excerpt from Malka Older’s …and Other Disasters.

I found this piece about Samuel R. Delaney’s Babel-17 really interesting: Language, Warfare, and the Brain as a Computer

Machine of Death the anthology has become a… game?

How did I not now about Young People Read Old SFF before now?

Netflix has renewed The Witcher for a second season.

The version of A New Hope on Disney+ has yet another version of Han versus Greedo.

Amazon has ordered an adaptation of William Gibson’s novel The Peripheral.

An interview with the director of the Doctor Sleep adaptation, about finding hope in bleak stories.

The silver-backed chevrotain, thought to be extinct, has been spotted in Vietnam. It looks like something straight out of the Eocene to me.

On Book Riot

This week’s SFF Yeah! is about roadtrip-ready audiobooks.

PREACH! Why Leia has always been the main character of Star Wars to me.

Matching Book Quotes to Each Hogwarts House

And related: 18 adorable Harry Potter pajamas for the whole family

Also: 50+ of the most magical DIY Harry Potter crafts

What is a Warlock? And other types of magic users.

Free Association Friday

We’re officially halfway through November… which if you’re like me and you did something terrible in a previous life, means you should be around 25,000 words on your National Novel Writing Month project. I feel like we all deserve a book-themed pick-me-up and encouragement—and those not doing the word count slog might want a book recommendation or two—so let’s look at three SFF novels that started their lives as messy, ugly, NaNoWriMo babies.

My number one choice has to be The Night Circus by Erin Morganstern. It’s a gorgeous, atmospheric book with a fascinating, subtle plot that involves a very aesthetically lush circus. And it started out as an atmospheric book without much of a plot at all, according to the author. She started in one NaNo, and then worked on the book again over the next two, added 50K words to the circus each time before carving it into some kind of shape. Sometimes it takes a lot of revisions, a lot of added words, and several years of work, but it’s worth it in the end.

The Beautiful Land by Alan Averill is a fast-paced part-scifi part-horror book about a man stealing a time machine to save the life of the woman he’s loved since they were in school together—with the twist being that he invented the time machine in the first place and he has to steal it from a company that’s using it to alter history. Trying to belt out a novel in 30 days demands a breakneck writing pace, and that can make for a fast-paced book, too. Alan did a Q&A for NaNoWriMo.

And of course we all bow down before Marissa Meyer, who basically wrote all three of the novels for the Lunar Chronicles during one single NaNoWriMo. She was trying to win a contest… and the fact that she didn’t win the contest with like 150k of words that was a trilogy of books is literally making me sweat as I sit here and type this. As with The Night Circus, Cinder and its two sequels required a lot of post-November work, but they’re out there in the world now and doing pretty darn good for themselves.

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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.

Happy Tuesday, space pirates! It’s Alex, with some new releases for you to peruse and some news items of potential interest. And as a follow-up from the previous newsletter, I must present to you the best sports photo ever taken. Enjoy!

New Releases

Realm of Ash by Tasha Suri – With the Ambhan Empire crumbling around her, recently widowed Arwa decides to walk into the Realm of Ash in an attempt to save the royal family she’s pledged service to. She is joined by a disgraced prince, Zahir, a wielder of forbidden magic. But the Realm of Ash exacts a steep price, and Arwa and Zahir must face difficult, fundamental questions–like if the Empire deserves to be saved at all.

The Menace from Farside by Ian McDonald – A pair of unlikely sisters who make even unlikelier allies set off to find the first footprint on the Moon–even if the Moon seems determined to kill them before they get there.

Queen of the Conquered by Kacen Callender – The childless king of the people who colonized the islands of Hans Lollik declares he will choose his successor from among the eligible noble families. The only surviving daughter of the native nobles of the islands uses her secret ability to read and control minds to put herself in the running. But she isn’t the only one using underhanded tactics–and her opponents are happy to commit murder to get what they want.

And one week late, but: A Long Time Ago in a Cutting Room Far, Far Away by Paul Hirsch – The film editor of Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back offers a scene-by-scene look at how the movies got put together and the decisions behind them.

The Pursuit of William Abbey by Claire North – William Abbey is young and naive when he witnesses the horrific lynching of a Zulu boy by white colonists. Because he did nothing to stop this crime, he is cursed; the dead boy’s shadow will follow him at a steady pace, and every time it catches up to him, the person he loves most will die.

Flamebringer by Elle Katharine White – The sworn enemy of the house Daired is back from the dead, possessed by a ghast and commanding a force of monsters bent on destruction. Aliza and Alastair Daired, and their dragon, must fight through blizzards and haunted forests to get back to their home… where the less tangible dangers of political intrigue await them as well.

The Impossible Contract by K.A. Doore – Thana seizes her chance for a top-tier contract without hesitation, a death order against a foreign ambassador. But it turns out she isn’t the only one after his life–there’s a horde of undead after him, and things only get uglier and stranger from there.

Dead Moon Rising by Caitlin Sangster – The good news is that Sev has finally found a cure for the deadly Sleeping Sickness, which will allow her to save the world from Dr. Yang. The bad news is, Dr. Yang has trapped Sev in endless sleep as well–and her only chance of being saved is in the hands of people who have been fighting each other for years.

News and Views

Ready to start off your day with a good cry? Billie Lourd on Becoming the Keeper of Princess Leia

Tade Thompson (author of Rosewater) on the books that made him… (In which he notes, rightly, that Victor Frankenstein was a dick.)

A profile of author Maurice Broaddus, who brought us Pimp My Airship.

Rian Johnson: “If someone is responding to diversity negatively, fuck ’em.”

This is a great (and oddly specific) list of SFF stories set in department stores.

And a short story from Yoon Ha Lee: The Second-Last Client

There’s a teaser out for The Magicians season 5.

Coming in spring 2021: She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan

Mini cheetah robots!

Fashion designer Giorgia Lupi has created a wearable tribute to Ada Lovelace, Rachel Carson, and Mae Jemisen using data visualization.

If you got some weird text messages out of the blue on the 7th, this might be why.

On Book Riot

40 Terry Pratchett Quotes for every situation.

Getting ready for your next marathon read? Heres 10 queer YA series to check out.

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.

Happy Friday, shipmates, and strength to those doing NaNoWriMo! Don’t forget to drink some water and sleep. It’s Alex, with some news for you, and a few fun (I promise, even if I mention taxes) books! Also, you must listen to Kevin Harlan narrating a black cat on the football field, because this is truly the best thing I’ve heard all week. I move that whenceforth, all amusing cat activity be given a sporting event-style play-by-play. And while you’re listening to things, you should also definitely give your time to this version of Let It Go… in Klingon.

Department of Shame on Me

Because I somehow managed to not include two new releases that deserved to be on the list.

Star Wars: Resistance Reborn by Rebecca Roanhorse – If you’ve been wondering what happened after the end of The Last Jedi to get us to Rise of Skywalker, this book is here to answer all of your questions.

Girls & Ghosts by Annie Michaud – A haunting collection of five short stories of the angry dead and resilient living.

News and Views

This has been a week of many good essays. Allow me to share a few to start off with:

• Cory Doctorow wants you to know Jeannette Ng Was Right: John W. Campbell Was a Fascist
• Alexandra Erin on The Science, Fiction, and Fantasy of Genre
• James D. Nicoll, with glorious snideness, on Science Fiction vs. Fantasy: The Choice Is Clear

Here’s some short fiction recommendations from stories published in October.

Nnedi Okorafor defines Africanfuturism.

So there’s a movie based on HP Lovecraft’s The Color Out of Space and it involves both Nic Cage and Tommy Chong. I felt you needed to know this.

Mark Hamill watching his original Star Wars audition.

A new His Dark Materials trailer for the rest of the first season.

I mentioned in the previous newsletter that Tamora Pierce’s Tortall series has been optioned for TV–and here’s a list of moments from the books that would be great on screen that I 100% agree with.

More cookies in space news! The package has been launched!

On Book Riot

This week’s SFF Yeah! podcast is about shapeshifters!

Cover Reveal and Excerpt: B*Witch by Paige McKenzie and Nancy Ohlin

10 YA Fairy Books for Fans of Holly Black

Free Association Friday

I live in one of the states in the good ol’ US of A that had a local election this past Tuesday. All I will say about this, since I know you don’t want to hear me ranting about state politics, is that I’m grumpy, and I’m thinking about taxes and how important they are. So you know what? Here are some books that think taxes (and state finances, and trade) are pretty darn important too.

My immediate go-to on this topic is The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson. Which is a dark and complicated and very meaty book, in which some of the most utterly intense action and intrigue revolves around monetary policy. It’s really good.

Tales of Nevèrÿon by Samuel R. Delaney explores the changes to a culture when it is “civilized” by money and slavery. It’s a fantasy where the biggest act of world-altering sorcery is going from concrete trade to the much more abstract use of coins. (And if you find his world and his themes interesting, there’s three more volumes in the series to be had.)

Not so much taxes but very much about economics and trade, there’s Neptune’s Brood by Charles Stross, which is about manners, banking, and a massive scam on the galactic futures market. Hostile Takeover by Susan Schwartz also has plots within financial plots and scams within scams, in a much more corporate framework, with a badass financial analyst for a main character.

Taking a step back into the broader view of just economic systems, I have to mention The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin, which deals with the broad evolution of economic ideas and how they migrate through cultures. It’s also just a darn good book in general.

Lastly, just for fun: Spice and Wolf by Isuna Hasekura starts off a light novel series where the main character is a traveling trader who accidentally picks up a wolf goddess as a companion. It’s definitely not as heavily into monetary policy (and it’s also not the best translated work I’ve ever read, to be honest), but it’s cute as heck.

 

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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.