Little (Grrl) Lost by Charles de Lint
reviewed by Steven H Silver
T.J. is a fourteen-year-old whose family has had to sell their farm, and T.J.'s horse, and move to the
city. The city is a foreign place to T.J. who maintains her sanity by texting with her friend Julie. Even that bond is
threatened, however, when Elizabeth comes into T.J.'s life.
Elizabeth is a Little, an eighteen-inch-tall girl whose family lives in the walls of the house T.J.'s family has
bought. Just as T.J. feels her parents don't understand what she's going through, Elizabeth also feels separated from
her parents, who don't realize she's grown up.
Undertow by Elizabeth Bear
reviewed by Alma A. Hromic
The author does an extraordinary job of juggling a dozen balls -- political mayhem, exotic tech, ethical dilemmas,
probability magic, cultural milieu, social interactions between both HUMAN friends, enemies and rivals and ALIEN ones. She
creates a beautifully coherent world, and exhibits the true storyteller's gift of creating truly alien aliens -- because
she understands humans so well.
Precious Dragon by Liz Williams
reviewed by Rich Horton
In the third of a series of fantasy/SF/detective novels, the story involves a young chorus boy who makes money on the
side as a rent boy. Someone who hires him has a nastier desire -- they send him magically to hell. This attracts the
attention of Inspector Chen of the Singapore Three police force and his colleague Zhu Irzh, a demon from Hell, but at
first they can't do much -- missing rent boys, alas, are only too common. But Chen and Irzh have another assignment -- they
are sent to Hell on a bureaucratic tour of sorts, complete with a companion: a warrior woman of Heaven.
The Intruders by Michael Marshall
reviewed by Nathan Brazil
Jack and Amy Whalen, a former policeman turned writer, and his wife who works in advertising, are living the quiet
life tucked away in small town America. Until Gary Fisher, an old high school friend of Jack's, turns up with circumstantial evidence which
suggests Amy might have a connection to the Anderson murders. Running parallel with this is the story of
nine-year-old Madison, a girl who goes missing while walking on a deserted beach. Madison is suffering
from odd blackouts, during which she cannot remember her actions. Inside her head she senses another presence, and it is
this entity, an older adult mind, which directs her relentlessly toward an unknown destination.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season Eight: #1-4 by Joss Whedon and George Jeanty
reviewed by David Newbert
Dark Horse published several dozen Buffy comics beginning in 1998, not too many of them very good. The quality
of the art varied wildly, and the writing was often flat and uninspired. Though it had enthusiasm to spare, it was missing
the guiding hands of Whedon and the talented men and women who wrote and produced the television show through seven mostly
excellent seasons on two different networks.
No such problem exists for this new series.
The Year's Best Science Fiction: by Author
compiled by Rodger Turner
In 1984, Gardner Dozois gathered together what he thought was the best short science fiction of the previous year. He
scrutinized as many of the magazines, collections and anthologies published in 1983 that he could get his hands on and
chose those which he felt best represented the science fiction field. Jim Frenkel published it as part of his Bluejay
Books line (for three years) and it has been produced every year since then (by St. Martins's Press).
Splinter by Adam Roberts
reviewed by Martin Lewis
"I have not read Jules Verne's Hector Servadac. That's not particularly remarkable; I've not read Ŕ La Recherche Du Temps
Perdu or Les Particules Elémentaires or any number of other works of French literature. The reason for mentioning this is
that Splinter is a sort of riposte to Hector Servadac (published in English as Off on a Comet), a novel Adam
Roberts freely admits is 'not one of Verne's well known titles.'"
|
|
New Amsterdam by Elizabeth Bear
reviewed by Nathan Brazil
This book is presented as a series of loosely connected novellas, centred around the crime solving adventures of
Lady Abigail Irene Garrett, and Sebastian de Ulloa. Garrett is a flint hard, caustic tongued, forensic sorceress, and de Ulloa is a
thousand year-old wampyr, something like a bisexual Hercule Poirot. Beginning separately, but eventually combining talents and
causes, the pair make their unique way through six stories, set at the turn of the 20th century. But this is a world in which
sorcery is an every day fact of life.
TWOC by Graham Joyce
reviewed by Matthew Hughes
TWOC is British police shorthand for Taken Without Owner's Consent, and it's what British juveniles get charged with when they are
nicked behind the wheel of somebody else car that they've stolen for a joyride. It's what sixteen-year-old Matt was done for
after being involved in the taking of a silver-grey Ferrari Testarossa that wound up unhappily for all concerned.
Space Boy by Orson Scott Card
reviewed by Steven H Silver
Todd is a thirteen-year-old boy who yearns to slip the surly
bonds of Earth and explore the vastness of space. Unfortunately, Todd is intelligent enough to understand that he doesn't have
enough aptitude in math or the physical requirements to become an astronaut. Instead he spends his days as a typical teenager.
Life doesn't begin to get strange for him until the day that he sees a dwarf appear from thin air in his backyard.
New Arrivals
compiled by Neil Walsh
The most recent stack of books to arrive on the doorstep of the SF Site offices has quite a few exciting treats, including the latest from William Gibson, Stephen Baxter, Kelley Armstrong, and Terry Brooks, as well as a first novel from Christopher Barzak, a good selection of genre magazines, plus advance copies of forthcoming books from Stephen Donaldson and Terry Pratchett, and much more besides.
Fairy Tales for Writers by Lawrence Schimel
reviewed by Amal El-Mohtar
This is a clever book, and a cute book, and one can chuckle a lot while reading it. It's nothing less or more
than what it purports to be: fairy tales for writers, mixed up into verse. The author takes fairy tales like Cinderella and Snow White
and uses them as templates for various experiences modern-day writers live: the workshops, the rejections, the rewrites, the
sales (and, ahem, the reviews).
Babylon 5.1
TV reviews by Rick Norwood
September is a busy month for television watchers. There is a lot to see. Whether any of it is worth seeing remains
to be seen. Best bet: Heroes.
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said by Philip K. Dick
reviewed by Rich Horton
Jason Taverner is a successful pop singer (more in the Frank Sinatra mode than in any plausible 70s mode), and also the host of a very successful TV variety
show. He lives in the US in 1988, in a future where almost all black people have either been killed or sterilized. There are
flying cars, but otherwise the milieu is somewhat seedy and not too different from our real 1974. He believes himself to be
a "six," one of a group of genetically enhanced individuals. Then one day Jason Taverner is erased from existence.
|
