OMG, this book made me SO HAPPY. I’ll freely admit that I avoided reading it because I didn’t enjoy G Willow Wilson’s Alif The Unseen, and I wasn’t interested in being disappointed once more by well-meaning reviews who give questionable issues a pass because diversity. But Ms Marvel Vol I was so terrific that I …
Tag: Fantasy
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/06/04/ms-marvel-vol-1-no-normal-by-g-willow-wilson-adrian-alphona/
May 28 2017
Amberlough by Lara Elena Donnelly
As far as fantasy novels go, this has a great setting and characters (with one exception that I’ll get to in a minute) and above all atmosphere. Essentially an alternate world take on Weimar Berlin before the fascists’ rise to power, it depicts life lived on a razor’s age, hedonism in the maw of societal …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/28/amberlough-by-lara-elena-donnelly/
May 26 2017
Carpe Jugulum by Terry Pratchett
Somewhere I had read that Maskerade was the last Discworld book featuring the Lancre witches. Worse, I believed it, so I was both a little surprised and a lot pleased to pick up Carpe Jugulum and find that they were back. Pratchett dispensed with the traditional opening — “When shall we three meet again?” — …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/26/carpe-jugulum-by-terry-pratchett/
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/20/the-tomato-thief-by-ursula-vernon/
May 10 2017
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
The Fifth Season is a very bleak book. It is riveting, engrossing, engaging, compelling, thought-provoking, and more, but it is also very, very bleak. When I was finished, I picked up a slim Soviet-German comedy (not an oxymoron!) by way of lightening the mood. The Fifth Season begins with a mother still tending the body …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/10/the-fifth-season-by-n-k-jemisin/
May 08 2017
All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders
One of the things I particularly liked about All the Birds in the Sky is how Charlie Jane Anders chose to break up the story. It’s a two-sided, save-the-world story, and all of the basics are there: interesting leads, good counterparts, quick pacing, fun dialog, and so forth. She’s strong enough on the essentials even …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/08/all-the-birds-in-the-sky-by-charlie-jane-anders/
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/07/the-city-born-great-by-n-k-jemisin/
May 02 2017
Deathless (Leningrad Diptych #1) by Catherynne M. Valente
There’s no denying that this is a beautifully written book. Catherynne M Valente takes Russian and Slavic folktales and melds them with Russian, particularly Leningrad, history of the early 20th century. Her descriptions of falling in love and of the secret languages and compromises of marriage make for compelling, wholly believable and empathetic reading. And …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/02/deathless-leningrad-diptych-1-by-catherynne-m-valente/
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/05/01/tales-of-the-squee/
Apr 26 2017
The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe by Kij Johnson
“And I must of course acknowledge Lovecraft’s The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. I first read it at ten, thrilled and terrified, and uncomfortable with the racism but not yet aware that the total absence of women was also problematic. This story is my adult self returning to a thing I loved as a child and …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2017/04/26/the-dream-quest-of-vellitt-boe-by-kij-johnson/