In Victorian London, Jane Silverlake is a young woman with a singular talent: she can discern the ‘voices’ of inanimate objects, and can also pass thiIn Victorian London, Jane Silverlake is a young woman with a singular talent: she can discern the ‘voices’ of inanimate objects, and can also pass this ability on to others by touching them. The plot revolves around the disappearance of Jane’s friend Nathan, his involvement in a cult known as the Temple of the Lamb, and Jane’s attempts to find him (with the dubious ‘help’ of their mutual frenemy Madeline). This book is the most similar thing I’ve read to The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters and its sequels; while not exactly steampunk, McOmber’s version of London, filled with obscure folk heroes and festivals, always feels vaguely skewed. I had some problems with The White Forest: the pacing is off, with the story repeatedly gaining momentum and then suddenly grinding to a halt; the plot is definitely overstuffed. Reading it feels a bit like inhaling a cloud of floral perfume. Overall, though, it’s simply so imaginative and ambitious and weird that it won me over. ‘Too much’ in a good way....more
Appliance has a killer concept: through a series of interconnected short stories, it charts the introduction and development of an invention that chanAppliance has a killer concept: through a series of interconnected short stories, it charts the introduction and development of an invention that changes society. In the first story, the ‘appliance’ is a fridge-sized unit that can move a small object a short distance; by the end of the book, it’s a widely-used teleportation system, so prevalent that humans have all but abandoned other modes of transport. I enjoyed how the stories moved through time without pinning down where or when we are, so the context is the reader’s only key to how much the invention has advanced. Yet, despite the innovative approach, it’s all a bit dry and curiously old-fashioned. I couldn’t warm to any of the characters or summon up much interest in their circumstances (and one story that graphically depicts rape is jarring among the generally sterile scenes)....more
Refreshing how little this seems to have aged compared to (some) other SF from the same era. It lost me a bit during the massive infodump sections, buRefreshing how little this seems to have aged compared to (some) other SF from the same era. It lost me a bit during the massive infodump sections, but the story proper is both original and gripping, especially the opening scenes....more
Lambda is the most beautifully crafted, interesting sci-fi I’ve read in a while – this thing is absolutely bursting with ideas. The central idea is thLambda is the most beautifully crafted, interesting sci-fi I’ve read in a while – this thing is absolutely bursting with ideas. The central idea is that ‘lambdas’, aquatic aliens who are genetically human, have become part of human society, albeit controversially. But the plot also encompasses AI assassins, sentient objects and future policing. Our (main) guide to this world is officer Cara Gray, who works first in surveillance, then – when her role is superseded by a quantum processor – as a ‘lambda liaison officer’. (And there are additional layers here too, as we’re aware her narrative has been generated by a program, leading to some very particular turns of phrase and details that reverberate throughout her story.) I could have carried on reading about all this forever: it’s so well-written and comes together so satisfyingly, and every perspective is cleverly developed. With that said, don’t read this book if you’re looking for questions to be answered and loose threads neatly tied up. There’s not much in the way of resolution: this is more a portrait of one idea of a future-world. It’s sometimes funny, sometimes chilling and always feels true.
(3.5) I read Terminal Boredom, the first translated collection of Izumi Suzuki’s work, in 2021, and it became an instant favourite – quite simply one (3.5) I read Terminal Boredom, the first translated collection of Izumi Suzuki’s work, in 2021, and it became an instant favourite – quite simply one of the best short story collections I have ever read. I was excited to read more of her fiction in Hit Parade of Tears. Unfortunately, this book doesn’t quite live up to its predecessor. While the characters have similarly distinct personalities and voices, the pieces collected here are often more successful at capturing a mood than telling a story.
There are recurring details that sometimes make Hit Parade of Tears seem like a particularly idiosyncratic novel-in-stories. The overall vibe is one of 1960s and 70s counterculture, epitomised by political statements and, particularly, music. (This also makes Hit Parade feel more obviously rooted in the time it was written, and much less prescient, than Terminal Boredom.) Another theme concerns characters who live among ordinary people, but believe themselves to be alien in some way – though it’s often unclear whether these beliefs are delusions. In this book we meet people who see visions of the dead, or other worlds; who can remember little of their recent past; who suspect they were born on another planet or have been alive for centuries.
The best story in the book is ‘The Covenant’, in which two misanthropic girls decide to to make a ‘sacrifice’ together; it’s alive with well-developed characters, an original plot and a vivid sense of cynicism. I really liked ‘Softly, As In a Morning Sunrise’ too: a proper sci-fi story about a crew scouring a planet for strange animals, it has the most solid plot and is also really funny. ‘Hey, It’s a Love Psychedelic!’ combines strong cultural context with an intriguing time-travel twist, although it ends abruptly (a repeating problem). I loved the atmosphere in ‘Memory of Water’ – its sense of despair, details like the 3D art experience; it felt closest to what I was expecting from the stories in this collection.
I initially thought ‘My Guy’ was an odd choice to open the book. Although it begins promisingly, and the narrator’s voice is immediately distinct, the narrative is choppy and difficult to follow. But perhaps it’s an appropriate first story after all – emblematic of the problems the weaker stories share. ‘I’ll Never Forget’, for example, is a sequel to the story ‘Forgotten’ from Terminal Boredom, but is far less successful; disjointed in a way that makes its events confusing.
A trio of stories – ‘Full of Malice’, ‘After Everything’ and ‘The Walker’ – seem to be connected, sharing a common thread about a woman searching for her younger brother. They also operate according to a kind of dream-logic where absurd incidents pass without comment, reminding me of Leonora Carrington’s surrealist fiction. ‘The Walker’ is relatively strong as a strange, brief standalone story. ‘Full of Malice’, apparently one of the author’s earliest works, is very short yet still lacks clarity, and could have been left out (if not, I suppose, for its connection to the others).
I enjoyed this new selection... but some of the stories in Hit Parade of Tears made me wonder whether those in Terminal Boredom represented the absolute apex of the author’s work, with the remainder inevitably being less impressive. There is no doubt that Terminal Boredom is the superior collection. If you haven’t read Izumi Suzuki before, start there.
I received an advance review copy of Hit Parade of Tears from the publisher through NetGalley....more
(3.5) Thoughtful sci-fi about a scientist and an android investigating octopus communities (and the legend of a sea monster) around a privatised archi(3.5) Thoughtful sci-fi about a scientist and an android investigating octopus communities (and the legend of a sea monster) around a privatised archipelago. Lots of discussion of consciousness, communication, intelligence, how they ought to be defined and what they mean. How do we decide whether a robot is conscious? How might humans communicate with an intelligent non-human race? Can technology ever solve the problem of loneliness? I have to admit that nothing here, for me, quite matched up to the thrilling opening chapter, and two subplots – one about a hacker, one about an enslaved worker on an automated fishing vessel – never quite seem to reach their full potential. Still, I really enjoyed the main story, which unfolds slowly, with plenty of room for reflection. I also loved the extracts from two pop-science books ostensibly written by characters within the book.
Thin Air meets Event Horizon is my quick pitch for Nicholas Binge’s second novel, a mind-bending, reality-splitting adventure in which a reluctant sciThin Air meets Event Horizon is my quick pitch for Nicholas Binge’s second novel, a mind-bending, reality-splitting adventure in which a reluctant scientist joins a crew climbing an impossible mountain. I was surprised by how different this is from the author’s debut, the excellent Professor Everywhere; it’s significantly more high-octane and much more ambitious in scope, with forays into horror territory that lean towards the bloody.
Physicist Harold Tunmore is missing for almost 30 years before his brother discovers him living, anonymously, in a psychiatric hospital. His story is told via a cache of letters written by Harold to his niece. These chart a mission he claims to have been a part of: in 1991, he was (so he says) one of a group put together to scale and research an immense mountain that materialised out of nowhere in the middle of the ocean. It’s a place where people are not themselves and time appears altered – and the further the team go, the weirder things get. Ascension is packed with dramatic scenes and eerie dialogue that give it a particularly cinematic feel. I especially loved how Binge developed the character of Jet (who gets all the best lines). Yet it also has room for contemplative, even philosophical moments and a solid backstory for Harold. A wonderfully wild ride that’s a cut above your average sci-fi blockbuster.
I received an advance review copy of Ascension from the publisher through NetGalley....more
(3.5) Hmm, big mixed feelings about this one. I loved the world it created, and honestly felt the vagueness (of the setting, of the nature of the ‘gra(3.5) Hmm, big mixed feelings about this one. I loved the world it created, and honestly felt the vagueness (of the setting, of the nature of the ‘grand jeu’) only added to the magic. I loved the detail: this is an evocative, nostalgic text. But I guessed the twist almost immediately – it feels like Collins wants you to, though I’m not sure why, because the narrative then carries on doing that annoying thing where we’re extremely close to a character’s thoughts yet they have to think in circles around something that’s being obscured from the reader, which takes all the tension out of the story. The ‘I hate this person! but... do I actually like them? no, it cannot be’ of both romantic threads seemed endless, and particularly unlikely for intelligent adults, no matter how guarded. I also hated the ‘rat’ chapters and would gladly have cut that whole pointless plotline out of the book. I sound negative here, but I liked the way it felt overall: cosy and so perfect for this time of year, a warm blanket of a book. A hot chocolate with brandy. A big cushion with stars embroidered on it...more
(4.5) The first thing I want to say about this is that it has a much stronger supernatural element than I expected, and if I’d known that I would, pro(4.5) The first thing I want to say about this is that it has a much stronger supernatural element than I expected, and if I’d known that I would, probably, have found and read it much earlier (I don’t feel like the blurb makes it clear at all!) The second thing is that I absolutely loved it. Build Your House Around My Body – an inappropriately twee title, if you ask me – is a wide-ranging novel of love, hate, family legacy and folklore that reminded me of Ghostwritten and The Kingdoms. It’s loosely organised around the disappearance of a young Vietnamese woman, Winnie, from Saigon in 2011, but flicks back and forth between different times and places, alighting on a group of linked characters who include Winnie’s boyfriend and his brother, but also a ghost extermination crew in the 1980s, a pair of French settlers in the 1940s, etc. Kupersmith has that gift of being able to swiftly breathe life into each and every character, and in particular I adored her empathetic portrait of lonely, displaced Winnie and her misadventures at Achievement! International Language Academy. This is a story that’s equally strong on character and plot; suggestions of magic/horror and unexpected connections make it endlessly exciting and surprising. It’s pretty long, but I would have been more than happy to keep reading about this world. One of those books I will be recommending to people in real life as well as online – Violet Kupersmith has a new fan in me.
There are some types of short horror story I could read for the rest of my life without getting bored. There are other brands of horror I’d cross the There are some types of short horror story I could read for the rest of my life without getting bored. There are other brands of horror I’d cross the metaphorical street to avoid. Horror anthologies are often a mixture of the two, and can therefore be tricky to review. Then again, if the stories in an anthology are too similar to one another, that can also be an issue; an editorial hand is important. Isolation is an extremely varied collection, expertly curated so that all flavours of horror are represented. It’s fair to say that some of them just weren’t to my taste at all (hence no rating for the book as a whole), but there are as many different interpretations of the theme of ‘isolation’ here as any reader could hope for – I was impressed by the lack of cliche.
Personal highlights for me included: • ‘Friends for Life’ by Mark Morris: lockdown folk horror with characters I truly cared about – brilliant! Of all the stories, I’ll remember the atmosphere of this one most vividly. • ‘Alone is a Long Time’ by Michael Marshall Smith: a cursed object in the collection of an elderly recluse spells disaster for a light-fingered carer. A classic creepy tale, told in effective style. • ‘Letters to a Young Psychopath’ by Nina Allan: I read this twice – once before I’d even looked at the rest of the book, and once after I had read all the other stories. It’s the tale of a serial killer who sees his job in the police force as ‘a methadone for murder’, and I’m biased because of how much I adore Allan’s writing, but it really IS great. • ‘Jaunt’ by Ken Liu: an excellent sci-fi story about what happens when ‘telepresence robots’ revolutionise the tourism industry. There’s so much potential in the premise that I feel like this could easily be expanded to novel length.
(3.5) The Moonday Letters possesses a certain hypnotic quality that held my attention even though, when I come to write down my thoughts, I find I hav(3.5) The Moonday Letters possesses a certain hypnotic quality that held my attention even though, when I come to write down my thoughts, I find I have equal amounts criticism and praise:
The good: the worldbuilding is excellent. I was endlessly fascinated by this universe – one in which the whole solar system has been colonised. When a setting like this is described well, it’s magical, and Itäranta does it very well. I loved reading about how the narrator became a healer and her early travels with her teacher, Vivian.
The bad: I struggled with the narrator’s tone, which often feels quite patronising. The ‘love story’ is devoid of warmth and passion, and the concept of the ‘Moonday House’ just annoyed me. Finally, it’s an obvious point, but this narrative doesn’t read like letters/a notebook written by one person for another to read.
While a very different type of narrative, The Moonday Letters was a similar reading experience to a book I read shortly before it, Tess Gunty’s The Rabbit Hutch – in both cases, I think it’s fair to say I admired and appreciated the books more than I personally liked them. But at its best, the story reminded me of Aliya Whiteley’s Greensmith, one of my favourite sci-fi novels. I valued the slow pace, the beautifully described settings; after a while I even came to appreciate the calmness in the narrator’s detachment.
I almost feel I must have missed something in my reading of this book – whatever it was trying to say or show seemed terribly muddled, verging on offeI almost feel I must have missed something in my reading of this book – whatever it was trying to say or show seemed terribly muddled, verging on offensive. I only finished it because I was holding on to a sliver of hope for a satisfying ending, ideally involving (view spoiler)[the protracted and very painful death of the odious David, but no such luck, infuriatingly (hide spoiler)]. I loved Greensmith and think about it often; I perhaps should have chosen a more recent novel by Whiteley (I had no idea this was a republished earlier work until reading other reviews after finishing it). I will still read more from her....more
Solid horror novella with a good idea at its heart: a virus that makes the infected unable to see the world as it really is, so that about half the poSolid horror novella with a good idea at its heart: a virus that makes the infected unable to see the world as it really is, so that about half the population effectively fall prey to the delusion that there’s a zombie apocalypse going on. (Or do they?) In the aftermath, Spence – one of the ‘cured’ at a rehab facility – is persuaded to break out by a new arrival who wants to track down her former friend/lover. With this new adventure juxtaposed with flashbacks to Spence’s time in the devastated world pre-cure (and gradual realisation that all is not as it seems), it reads like a combination of ‘Dogsbody’, the werewolf-virus story from Devlin’s collection You Will Grow Into Them, and They Live. I was hoping for more of the enigmatic weirdness of Devlin’s best stories (such as ‘Songs Like They Used to Play’), but the style is more commercial than that. Also, even for a novella, it’s very short, which doesn’t allow a lot of room for character development or backstory. An entertaining quick read that might’ve worked better had its premise been expanded further.
I received an advance review copy of And Then I Woke Up from the publisher through Edelweiss.
Newly arrived in the UK from Hong Kong, Chloe Chan quickly finds herself disillusioned with life at a British university; she’d envisioned ‘intellectuNewly arrived in the UK from Hong Kong, Chloe Chan quickly finds herself disillusioned with life at a British university; she’d envisioned ‘intellectuals sat in armchairs by a fireplace, debating the minutiae of academia’, but her peers are more interested in binge drinking and skipping lectures. Things change radically, and seemingly for the better, when she starts working for Professor Roland Crannus. Reclusive and mysterious, Crannus is a near-mythical figure on campus – hero-worshipped by some, though no one quite seems to know what he does. It quickly becomes clear that his work is very unorthodox indeed. Whether she likes it or not, Chloe’s along for the ride, which means she attracts the attention of her mentor’s enemies too...
Professor Everywhere is framed as a memoir written by Chloe about her experiences with Crannus. Ten years after something referred to as ‘the Pimlico incident’, he’s become even more of a legend – reviled and revered in equal measure – and she feels it’s time to share her story. I liked and felt interested in Chloe almost from her first words; we’re straight into the tale of her time at university in the opening chapter, and the things we learn about her tell us so much about who she is. I immediately wanted to get to know her.
What worked best for me about this book is something that perhaps should have worked against it: its world feels so small, so cosy. I realise that this might sound to some like a real flaw in a story that involves characters stepping between worlds and contemplating the existence of countless realities. All I can say is that I loved it. I felt I had been given access to a self-contained environment that I could step back into simply by opening the book, and that seems to me perfectly apt for its themes.
Professor Everywhere is often at its weakest when it switches focus from the theoretical/scientific to the emotional. Chloe’s ill-advised entanglement with her admirer James is well-drawn, and there’s a moment of revelation that lands with real shock, specifically because it highlights certain characters’ lack of empathy. However, the supposedly significant romance between Chloe and Sarah feels like the story’s main flaw. Perhaps it’s simply that I found it difficult to believe in a new relationship between two 18-year-olds as a great love story, especially amid such an ambitious plot. It says something about how much I enjoyed the rest that I wasn’t deterred from loving the book as a whole. Even its shortcomings only made it more charming to me.
Speculative fiction about multiple worlds that also has a captivating academic setting and a narrator I felt attached to almost instantly... This was a book I’d always wanted to read without knowing it existed. I’m glad I found it.
I really liked this thoughtful, panoramic sci-fi novel. Revolving around a pandemic – but written before the advent of Covid-19 – it’s told as a serieI really liked this thoughtful, panoramic sci-fi novel. Revolving around a pandemic – but written before the advent of Covid-19 – it’s told as a series of interconnected stories taking place between the 2030s and the early 22nd century. Among the most memorable characters we meet are an out-of-work comedian who lands a job at the ‘City of Laughter’, an amusement park where dying children can have one last day of fun before they’re euthanised; a scientist whose research brings him into contact with a talking pig (this chapter is far more moving than you might think); and a doctor working at a ‘forensic body farm’ who falls in love with a terminal patient. The stricken Earth is so well-drawn, so palpable, that I didn’t want to move away from it (there’s some space travel stuff that I wasn’t quite as keen on, not because anything’s wrong with it but because I wanted to stay among the survivors). Definitely a novel that bears comparison the work of David Mitchell, especially Cloud Atlas.
I received an advance review copy of How High We Go in the Dark from the publisher through NetGalley.
The opening story in Cursed Bunny is about a woman who spends her life being followed by a malformed head that emerges from her toilet. Read it and yoThe opening story in Cursed Bunny is about a woman who spends her life being followed by a malformed head that emerges from her toilet. Read it and you’ll know how you’re likely to feel about this book. Bora Chung’s stories are simultaneously bleak and bizarre, often crueller than expected and topped off with a healthy dose of surrealism, as if Ottessa Moshfegh’s Homesick For Another World had been spliced with Junji Ito manga. The style varies wildly: ‘Goodbye, My Love’, a tale of AI gone awry, wouldn’t be out of place in an Alexander Weinstein collection; ‘Ruler of the Winds and Sands’ reads like a forgotten fairytale; ‘Reunion’, less outlandish than the others, is a subdued story of ghosts and twisted love set in Poland. I really liked the title story (man curses business rival via a rabbit-shaped lamp) and ‘Home Sweet Home’ (young couple buy a very unlucky building); I was less keen on ‘The Frozen Finger’, which affects an action- and dialogue-driven style that is only partly successful. But it might be ‘Scars’, a hauntingly grim fantasy, that will prove most memorable. Anyone who loved Cursed Bunny would likely get a lot out of Kristen Roupenian’s You Know You Want This, and vice versa.
I know four stars seems like an unequivocal ‘I really liked it’ rating, but I’m actually pretty conflicted about parts of this! On the one hand, I wasI know four stars seems like an unequivocal ‘I really liked it’ rating, but I’m actually pretty conflicted about parts of this! On the one hand, I was fully immersed and I put the book down feeling satisfied: her little character sketches are sublime, the writing is so great at the sentence level, I loved every evocative glimpse we got of the future-world (although it niggled at me a bit that language apparently doesn’t change at all between now and the 25th century). But I really kept getting taken out of the 2203 plotline, which is arguably the most prominent, by the fact that the character of Olive is obviously (and it seems openly) an author self-insert. The book tour stuff is uninteresting, the family stuff is schmaltzy and uncharacteristically thin, and I’m not anti-Novels About the Pandemic but I didn’t think this really brought anything to the table in that regard. I would have liked to read a much longer book about Gaspery and Edwin, characters I came to love even within the small amount of space they’re allotted. So yes, it’s a very good novel and I’d still very much recommend it, but the rating ignores the dissatisfaction I felt after finishing it, and I did think it was left wanting in comparison to The Candy House (mentioning this because both are hotly-anticipated books, due to be published in April, that revisit characters from a previous bestseller, so I can’t help seeing them as a pair). I keep thinking I need to reread Sea of Tranquility to really get the measure of it but I wonder how much of that is just me wishing there’d been more of the parts of the story I wanted to read? Hmm.
I received an advance review copy of Sea of Tranquility from the publisher through Edelweiss.
A therapist tells the story of her most memorable client, ‘Y____’, through notes, transcriptions, emails, etc. At first, when he explains his situatioA therapist tells the story of her most memorable client, ‘Y____’, through notes, transcriptions, emails, etc. At first, when he explains his situation – he has access to ‘cloaking’ technology that renders him virtually invisible; he uses it to spend extended periods of time spying on people who live alone – she believes him delusional, a fantasist. Over time, however, she becomes convinced he is telling the truth, and then she develops an obsession with him that threatens to consume her marriage and career. Aside from a dramatic climax near the end, The Visible Man is a mostly playful novel with some surprisingly incisive things to say about identity and isolation. I was pleasantly carried along by the momentum of the plot. Y____ is written very well as a man who is obnoxious and pretentious but also sometimes comes out with things that have the power to make you sit there, wide-eyed, going ‘omg yes!!!’ just like Victoria does. I could have happily read many more of Y____’s accounts of his observees.