Category: Science Fiction

Dark Age (Red Rising Saga #5) by Pierce Brown

With a book titled Dark Age in a futuristic series that consciously bases itself on Roman history, you know the contents are going to be pretty grim. Our hero from the start, Darrow of Lykos, is fighting a losing campaign on Mercury against the treacherous Gold-elevating Society led by the depraved Atalantia au Grimmus. His …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/08/12/dark-age-red-rising-saga-5-by-pierce-brown/

The Last Emperox by John Scalzi

The Last Emperox

How does a human civilization react to news of its possible impending collapse, with the only option for survival a major upheaval touching every person in it and changing its power structure entirely? That’s the overriding question of John Scalzi’s Interdependency series. The Last Emperox is the third and concluding part of the story, following …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/08/08/the-last-emperox-by-john-scalzi/

Alpha Omega by Nicholas Bowling

At about the 70% mark, I realized that Alpha Omega could slot very easily into the universe of The Matrix, serving as an entirely convincing origin story, so to speak, of that cyberpunk dystopia. The comparisons drawn between this book and Ernest Clines’ Ready Player One are poor: Mr Clines’ novel is a Spielbergian adventure …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/08/06/alpha-omega-by-nicholas-bowling/

The Light Brigade by Kameron Hurley

A searing, devastating indictment of both unquestioning loyalty and the corporate interests that use up workers in order to profit shareholders, extrapolated to their grimmest reality, Kameron Hurley’s The Light Brigade is both gripping and timely in this endless year of 2020. Our narrator, Dietz, grew up in the slums of Sao Paulo, eking a …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/21/the-light-brigade-by-kameron-hurley/

Gideon the Ninth (The Locked Tomb #1) by Tamsyn Muir

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

Several of my reactions upon completing this book, in no particular order: “Do I really need to read the other Hugo finalists when this may be the best book I’ve ever read ever?” “Oh gosh, I’d love to play in an RPG of this. I wonder what dice and stats system this would run best …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/20/gideon-the-ninth-the-locked-tomb-1-by-tamsyn-muir/

The City in the Middle of the Night by Charlie Jane Anders

I’ve read a bunch of Charlie Jane Anders’ short fiction and never understood why it was so popular. I figured reading something long form would help clarify this situation and it did, but not in the way I wanted. Here’s my problem with the writing of hers I’ve read so far: there are few interiors. …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/16/the-city-in-the-middle-of-the-night-by-charlie-jane-anders/

This Is How You Lose The Time War by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

I’m rating this book quite highly even as I found myself oddly detached from it, so I’m chalking this down to a me-problem and not to any fault of the book itself. Okay, maybe there’s a pacing issue once we discover who the seeker is: I get that the authors didn’t want to retread stuff, …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/08/this-is-how-you-lose-the-time-war-by-amal-el-mohtar-max-gladstone/

A Memory Called Empire (Teixcalaan #1) by Arkady Martine

So on the one hand, a tale of courtly intrigue in the dazzling court of a foreign empire as seen through the eyes of a vulnerable young ambassador from a much poorer nation. In space! Based on Aztec-Byzantine history and practices instead of your standard Western Europe-Asian influences! Mahit Dzmare is from Lsel Station (modeled …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/03/a-memory-called-empire-teixcalaan-1-by-arkady-martine/

Catfishing on CatNet (CatNet #1) by Naomi Kritzer

This novel ends on a cliffhanger and I desperately want to know what happens next! Catfishing On CatNet, despite the unwieldy title and weirdly muddy cover, is a cute, deft YA sci-fi thriller set in a near future where CatNet is a sort of social connection site whose members are broken out into groups called …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/02/catfishing-on-catnet-catnet-1-by-naomi-kritzer/

Dragon Pearl by Yoon Ha Lee

When it comes to children’s books, for me, my most important criteria for judging a volume’s worth lies in whether or not I would give it to my kids to read. The answer in this case is a resounding yes, even as I found it less entertaining for myself due to the same lack of …

Continue reading

Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/01/dragon-pearl-by-yoon-ha-lee/