50 of the Best

Fri 20 Aug 2021 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Posted by: Gavin

We’re delighted to see Sofia Samatar’s two Olondria novels included in NPR’s big fun list — how many have you read?

We Asked, You Answered: Your 50 Favorite Sci-Fi And Fantasy Books Of The Past Decade

In Olondria, you can smell the ocean wind coming off the page, soldiers ride birds, angels haunt humans, and written dreams are terribly dangerous. “Have you ever seen something so beautiful that you’d be content to just sit and watch the light around it change for a whole day because every passing moment reveals even more unbearable loveliness and transforms you in ways you can’t articulate?” asks judge Amal El-Mohtar. “You will if you read these books.”

Which reminds me it was also on a big list last year:  Time Magazine 100 Best Fantasy Books of All Time

“This slowly-unraveling, exquisitely-detailed novel made the poet Sofia Samatar a World Fantasy Award winner and a Nebula Award finalist. It follows Jevick, a young writer who is obsessed with the fantastical, distant world of Olondria, where his father is a merchant. But when Jevick is called there after he inherits the family business, he becomes haunted by a ghost—and is unwittingly pulled into Olondria’s power struggle. The novel unfolds in waves of A Game of Thrones-level twists, all while its fantastical world-building pulls from South Asian, Middle Eastern and African cultures to offer a welcome departure from Eurocentric fantasy.”