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"This Is Going to Be a Lot of Fun": 
Gary Westfahl reviews Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets  
 Sun 23 Jul —
» The Manchester Review: Geoff Ryman has guest-edited Issue 18 with stories by African speculative fiction writers » NY Times Book Review: Terrence Rafferty reviews Victor LaValle’s The Changeling » Ellen Datlow’s photos from KGB July 19th, with Karen Heuler and Genevieve Valentine » Scott Edelman dines with George R.R. Martin Tue 18 Jul —
» Chicago Tribune: Gary K. Wolfe reviews Nina Allan, Christopher Rowe, Michael Poore » Slate: Jacob Brogan: How Reality Crumbles: A timely and troubling new novel ranks among the best works of queer science fiction, about Karin Tidbeck’s Amatka » Harvard Business Review: Why Business Leaders Need to Read More Science Fiction Sat 15 Jul —
» NY Times: N.K. Jemisin reviews K.J. Parker, Nicky Drayden, Brenda Cooper, Steven R. Boyett & Ken Mitchroney » The Verge: Andrew Liptak on One of the greatest science fiction magazines is now available for free online, about Galaxy Magazine Wed 12 Jul —
» Washington Post: Everdeen Mason reviews David Burr Gerrard, Ninni Holmqvist, Nancy Kress » NPR: Octavia Butler: Writing Herself Into The Story, about a Huntington Library exhibit near Pasadena CA Tue 04 Jul —
» David Langford’s Ansible 360 » Salon: Chandler Baker on Is this the future we want?: “How speculative fiction is uniquely suited to help us talk, even across party lines, about our social politics” Thu 15 Jun —
» Slate, Kevin Bankston: Prototyping a Better Tomorrow: How science fiction can help us create a better future » Boing Boing, Cory Doctorow: How science fiction writers’ “design fiction” is playing a greater role in policy debates » Boing Boing, Bruce Sterling, science fiction won’t make the future better » Guardian, Laurie Penny: In science fiction, the future is feminist » Popular Mechanics, Tiffany Kelly: The Best Science Fiction Books of 2017 (So Far), by Robinson, VanderMeer, Doctorow, Hurley, Lafferty, Mastai, Neuvel, and Kessel Sun 04 Jun —
» David Langford’s Ansible 359 » The New Yorker: Jill Lepore on A Golden Age for Dystopian Fiction » NY Times Book Review: Terrence Rafferty on horror, I Know What You’ll Read This Summer, reviewing Philip Fracassi, Bracken MacLeod, Josh Malerman, Giorgio De Maria, Kit Reed » Wall Street Journal: Tom Shippey reviews Kit Reed Mon 29 May —
» The Age: James Bradley reviews Cory Doctorow’s Walkaway » Berkeley radio station KPFA offers archive Octavia Butler 1983 conversation with Richard Wolinksy and Richard A. Lupoff » Scott Edelman’s Eating the Fantastic eats donuts with guests and gobbles glass noodles with William F. Nolan Thu 25 May —
» Slate: Laura Miller on What happens when literary novelists experiment with science fiction » Slate: Cory Doctorow’s I’ve Created a Monster!, excerpted from a new annotated edition of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein Sun 21 May —
» NY Times Book Review: N.K. Jemisin reviews Maurice Broaddus, Gwyneth Jones, Cat Sparks, Cassandra Khaw » Also in NYTBR: Lidia Yuknavitch reviews Neil Gaiman’s audiobook Norse Mythology 
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 Mon 24 Jul 11:18 amFinalists for the 2017 Endeavour Award, given to a novel or single-author collection by a Pacific Northwest writer, were announced:
Waypoint Kanga...
Mon 24 Jul 11:17 amThe 56th Japan Science Fiction Convention has announced the 2017 Seiun Awards winners (the Japanese equivalent to the Hugo Awards), honoring the be...
  
This Week's BestsellersMonday 24 July 2017 | Monitor
Ernest Cline's Ready Player One is #1 today on Amazon.com.
Paul Di Filippo reviews William Browning SpencerSunday 23 July 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Spencer's deadpan, droll, caustic introduction sets the tone for the rest of the book. Despite the variegated bizarro (yet utterly empathizable) characters and exotic settings of these stories, they share similar themes: betrayal of friends, family, self; the death of dreams and ambitions; heartbreak; the futility of artistic striving with its inherent material limits.
"This Is Going to Be a Lot of Fun": A Review of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets
Saturday 22 July 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
For the most part, I found Luc Besson's Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets to be an enjoyable space adventure, deploying consistently dazzling visuals in support of an involving story that never becomes entirely predictable. And while serious issues are intermittently raised, the film is refreshingly unpretentious, in contrast to other recent films, as the director's primary aim was clearly to entertain audiences, not to enlighten or inspire them with portentous bromides. Classics In Reprint: May - JulyFriday 21 July 2017 | Monitor
New editions of Ward Moore's Bring the Jubilee and books by Tanith Lee, Eric North, and Eric Frank Russell, and original collections of stories by Clifford D. Simak and Margaret St. Clair.
Paula Guran reviews Short FictionThursday 20 July 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's May 2017 issue
Fiyah is a new literary magazine dedicated to Black speculative fiction, a spiritual successor to the experimental FIRE!!, an African-American magazine of the Harlem Renaissance that managed only one issue in 1926. Of the six stories in Fiyah #1, four are dark enough to cover here and all are strong. Liz Bourke reviews Seanan McGuireWednesday 19 July 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's June 2017 issue
Down Among the Sticks and Bones has the voice and rhythm of a fairy tale, appropriately enough. It is vividly characterised, as so much of Seanan McGuire's work is, and has the kind of prose that carries you along to find out what happens next. New Books : 18 JulyTuesday 18 July 2017 | Monitor
Susan Casper's Up the Rainbow, David D. Levine's Arabella and the Battle of Venus,
and titles by Demchuk, Gerrard, Haspil, Hudson, Khanna, Taylor, and Turtledove
This Week's BestsellersMonday 17 July 2017 | Monitor
Matt Haig's How to Stop Time is selling well in the UK.
Cory Doctorow: Bugging InSunday 16 July 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's July Issue interview
For me, I live by the aphorism, "fail better, fail faster." To double your success rate, triple your failure rate. What the walkaways figured out how to do is reduce the cost of failure, to make it cheaper to experiment with new ways of succeeding. One of the great bugaboos of the rationalist movement is loss aversion. There is another name for it, "the entitlement effect" ...
The Apes of Wrath: A Review of War for the Planet of the Apes
Saturday 15 July 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Everything about Matt Reeves's War for the Planet of the Apes thankfully suggests a desire to bring its series to an end as a trilogy. True, much of the film simply carries on the apes-versus-humans saga unveiled in the second film, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, but eventually all of the major story lines are concluded in a satisfying manner that precisely lays the groundwork for the transformed world observed in the original Planet of the Apes. Paul Di Filippo reviews Susan CasperFriday 14 July 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
In February of this year, after several long illnesses, we lost Susan Casper. Wife to Gardner Dozois, she was on her own merits so much more, including a talented fiction writer. It is a testament to the high regard in which she was held that this commemorative volume was so quickly assembled and issued. Russell Letson reviews C.J. CherryhThursday 13 July 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's June 2017 issue
Even newcomers might find Convergence an engaging (if occasionally puzzling) read — the parallel depictions of the two protagonists navigating the complexities of their respective societies, each conditioned by a necessarily partial but passionate understanding of the Other, can stand on its own. Paul Di Filippo reviews Christopher BrownWednesday 12 July 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
This debut novel from Chris Brown — many of whose earlier short stories appeared under the byline "Chris Nakashima-Brown" — is a knockout first novel, paradoxically solemn yet exuberant, restrained yet inventive, as attested to by well-deserved encomiums from William Gibson, Bruce Sterling and Cory Doctorow. New Books : 11 JulyTuesday 11 July 2017 | Monitor
Nancy Kress' Tomorrow's Kin, Nina Allan's The Rift, Greg Egan's Dichronauts, Sam J. Miller's The Art of Starving, best-of-year anthology by Ellen Datlow and Gardner Dozois, debut collections by Naomi Kritzer and Christopher Rowe, and titles by Brooks, Brown, Caine, Gray & Herbison, Hearne, Kenyon, Lucas, MacNaughton, Martin, Sniegoski, Stross, and Vaughn
This Week's BestsellersMonday 10 July 2017 | Monitor
Diana Gabaldon's Seven Stones to Stand or Fall and Pittacus Lore's Generation One debut.
Sam J. Miller: A Better PowerSunday 9 July 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's July Issue interview
I wanted to tell a story about how the power you get from self-harm is much less powerful or sustainable than the power you get from loving yourself, loving the people around you, and acknowledging that you are amazing and you don't need to hurt yourself. You don't need to make yourself look a certain way or act a certain way in order to be amazing. Periodicals: early JulySaturday 8 July 2017 | Monitor
Fantastic Stories of the Imagination's "People of Color Take Over" special issue, and new issues of Abyss & Apex, Apex, Aphelion, Aurealis, Clarkesworld, The Dark, Forever, Galaxy's Edge, GigaNotoSaurus, Intergalactic Medicine Show, Lightspeed, Nightmare, Shimmer, and Uncanny
Locus Bestsellers, JulyFriday 7 July 2017 | Magazine
Bestsellers from specialty bookstores are led by John Scalzi's The Collapsing Empire, Neil Gaiman's American Gods, James S.A. Corey's Leviathan Wakes, and and Chuck Wendig's Star Wars: Aftermath: Life Debt.
Locus Magazine's New & Notable Books, JulyThursday 6 July 2017 | Magazine
July New and Notable books include A. Merc Rustad's So You Want to Be a Robot and titles by Barker, Benford, Czerneda, Danker, Jeter, Kincaid, King & Chizmar, Parker, Scalzi, Valente, and Wells.
Cory Doctorow: Be the First One to Not Do Something that No One Else Has Ever Not Thought of Doing BeforeWednesday 5 July 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's July Issue.
What if a story made the fact of humanity's essential goodness the center of its conflict? What if, after a disaster, everyone wanted to help, but no one could agree on how to do so? New Books : 4 JulyTuesday 4 July 2017 | Monitor
K.J. Parker's Mightier than the Sword and titles by Aaronovitch, Boop, Durst, Kuhn, Leigh, Posey, Price, Snodgrass, Taylor & Nye, Wagner, Wells, and Willett
This Week's BestsellersMonday 3 July 2017 | Monitor
Dean Koontz's The Silent Corner debuts strongly.
Periodicals: late JuneSunday 2 July 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Analog and Asimov's, and June content at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Daily SF, Persistent Visions, Strange Horizons, and Tor.com
July 2017 Table of ContentsSaturday 1 July 2017 | Magazine
The July issue features interviews with Cory Doctorow and Sam J. Miller, a column by Cory Doctorow, complete results of this year's Locus Poll, photos from the Nebula Awards Conference and WisCon, and reviews of short fiction and books by Nina Allan, Kit Reed, Mariana Enriquez, Wendy N. Wagner, Tad Williams, and many others.
Liz Bourke reviews Cassandra KhawThursday 29 June 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's May 2017 issue
Food of the Gods is a mosaic novel, of sorts. It collects three linked novellas by Cassandra Khaw that, together, form a whole arc. At least two of these novellas have already been published as standalone e-books. The first of these is called "Rupert Wong, Cannibal Chef", and if I tell you it really does live up to the title, you've got some idea of the flavour of the novel as a whole. Russell Letson reviews Ian McDonaldWednesday 28 June 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's May 2017 issue
Ian McDonald's Luna: Wolf Moon (the second-act volume in the sequence that opened last year with Luna: New Moon) is instantly recognizably as hard SF: it's set only a century from now, in a future developed from current conditions and built on technologies that we can imagine evolving from today's cutting-edge efforts in AI, medicine, and engineering. New Books : 27 JuneTuesday 27 June 2017 | Monitor
Daryl Gregory's Spoonbenders, Karin Tidbeck's Amatka, and titles by Barnes, Belcher, Dunne, Gabaldon, Hough, Irvine, Lore, Oden, Ryan, Tanaka, West, and Williams
This Week's BestsellersMonday 26 June 2017 | Monitor
The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. by Neal Stephenson & Nicole Galland and The Black Elfstone by Terry Brooks debut.
Paul Di Filippo reviews K.J. Parker and James MorrowSunday 25 June 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Both these novellas offer as much pleasure as books three times their size. Snap them up! Bruce Sterling reviews Cory DoctorowSaturday 24 June 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's June 2017 issue
Walkaway is a real-deal, generically traditional science-fiction novel; it's set in an undated future and it features weird set design, odd costumes, fights, romances, narrow escapes, cool weapons, even zeppelins. This is the best Cory Doctorow book ever. New in Paperback: JuneFriday 23 June 2017 | Monitor
David D. Levine's Arabella of Mars, Sofia Samatar's The Winged Histories, and titles by Black, Durbin, Martinez, and Milán
Gary K. Wolfe reviews Ellen KlagesThursday 22 June 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's May 2017 issue
Like Bradbury, Klages is notable for the clarity and unstrained elegance of her prose, though she never reaches for the self-conscious rhapsodizing that often characterized Bradbury's later work. To the extent that Klages's world is like Bradbury's, it’s for the most part Bradbury without the boys and without the exclamation points. New Books : 20 JuneTuesday 20 June 2017 | Monitor
Theodora Goss's The Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter, James Morrow's The Asylum of Dr. Caligari, and titles by Bishop, Chen, Crowley, Dietz, Gunn, Hieber, Holt, Jones, Koontz, Lam, Nagata, and Turzillo
This Week's BestsellersMonday 19 June 2017 | Monitor
Michael Crichton's Dragon Teeth ranks in the top 5 on four lists.
Cat Sparks: Strange DirectionsSunday 18 June 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's June Issue interview
I didn't set out to write a climate change story, but it is easy to see how I ended up with one. My still-not-finished PhD examines the intersection point of ecocatastrophe science fiction and climate fiction. No way to stop that bleeding over into anything else I'm working on. I can barely keep it out of my conversation. Periodicals: mid-JuneSaturday 17 June 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Apex, Aphelion, Aurealis, Forever, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Mythic Delirium, The New York Review of Science Fiction, and Star*Line
Spotlight on: Scott H. Andrews, Beneath Ceaseless SkiesFriday 16 June 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's June Issue
"Literary adventure fantasy" is my tagline for literary or character-centered fantasy set in other worlds. Much secondary-world fantasy feels focused on the setting or the plot; I like a focus on the characters, for example using Realist approaches like close points-of-view or ambiguous endings — realism in worlds that aren't real. Locus Magazine's Forthcoming Books: Selected Titles through March 2018Thursday 15 June 2017 | Resources
Titles from Locus Magazine's June issue listings of Selected Forthcoming Books by Author are arranged here by month.
Paul Di Filippo reviews Neal Stephenson & Nicole GallandWednesday 14 June 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Just after I had lamented, a few reviews ago, that authors were not inclined nowadays to indulge in old-school, one-on-one collaborations, along comes this giddy, engrossing romp of a novel authored by a team. It's a seamless performance reminiscent of such ancestors as de Camp & Pratt, while still hewing to ultra-modern standards and practices for SF novels with a magical slant. New Books : 13 JuneTuesday 13 June 2017 | Monitor
Yoon Ha Lee's Raven Stratagem, Neal Stephenson & Nicole Galland's The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O., and titles by Anderson, Brooks, Cooper, Corlett, Drayden, Egan, Johnston, Lavalle, McGuire, Saintcrow, Schenck, Schwab, and Smith & Gladstone
This Week's BestsellersMonday 12 June 2017 | Monitor
J.R.R. Tolkien’s Beren and Lúthien debuts.
John Kessel: Over the MoonSunday 11 June 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's June Issue interview
I'm very happy to have The Moon and the Other out. In this book I wanted to make the scientific extrapolation as plausible as I could, and do social speculation, and get deeply into the characters — tell a novel of manners, two love stories set in a made-up society — and have political intrigues and family drama and even something of a thriller plot. Paul Di Filippo reviews Gregory BenfordSaturday 10 June 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
From his wonted haunts in the intergalactic realms of space, Gregory Benford has come down to Earth — a venue he has not totally neglected in the past, given such seminal and well-received quasi-naturalistic works as Timescape — to produce a counterfactual novel in the manner of Harry Turtledove. Spotlight on: Heather Shaw, Persistent VisionsFriday 9 June 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's June Issue
As I say in my guidelines, I'm looking for "stories that include a diverse cast of characters, that challenge conventional assumptions regarding race, relationships, gender, neurodiversity, disability, and sexuality in thought-provoking, exciting new ways..." Kameron Hurley: Story Isn't Just "Stuff Happens"Thursday 8 June 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's June Issue.
Just because we have read stories doesn't mean we intrinsically know how to write them, the same way that simply having a dog isn't going to teach you how to better understand them. Locus Bestsellers, JuneWednesday 7 June 2017 | Magazine
Bestsellers from specialty bookstores are led by Patricia Briggs' Silence Fallen, Seanan McGuire's Magic for Nothing, V.E. Schwab's A Darker Shade of Magic, and Chuck Wendig's Star Wars: Aftermath: Empire's End.
New Books : 6 JuneTuesday 6 June 2017 | Monitor
Catherynne M. Valente'a The Refrigerator Monologues, K.W. Jeter's Grim Expectations, a memoir by Frank M. Robinson, and titles by Afsharirad, Chandler & Mullenax, Conroy & Dunn, de Castell, DuBois, Gilligan, Green, Huff, Jensen, Kadrey, Korpon, Tolkien, and Wells
This Week's BestsellersMonday 5 June 2017 | Monitor
Cassandra Clare's Lord of Shadows and Michael Crichton's Dragon Teeth debut strongly.
Periodicals: early JuneSunday 4 June 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Clarkesworld, GigaNotoSaurus, Lightspeed, and Nightmare
A Working Model for Superhero Films: A Review of Wonder Woman
Saturday 3 June 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Without a doubt, Patty Jenkins's Wonder Woman is the very best of the recent "DC Extended Universe" superhero films — yet the praise doesn't mean as much as it should, inasmuch as its undistinguished precursors — Man of Steel, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Suicide Squad — set the bar very low, to put it mildly. Locus Magazine's New & Notable Books, JuneFriday 2 June 2017 | Magazine
June New and Notable books include Weinberg Tales and titles by Adams, Brennan, Clarke, Doctorow, Hobb, Johnson, Kiernan, Klages, Kushner, Murad & Shurin, and VanderMeer
June 2017 Table of ContentsThursday 1 June 2017 | Magazine
The June issue features interviews with John Kessel and Cat Sparks, a column by Kameron Hurley, spotlights on Scott H. Andrews and Heather Shaw, lists of forthcoming books through March 2018, and reviews of short fiction and books by Daryl Gregory, Dave Duncan, C.J. Cherryh, Ellen Datlow, Cory Doctorow, and many others.
Periodicals: late MayWednesday 31 May 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Black Static, Interzone, and Into the Ruins, plus May content at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Daily Science Fiction, Strange Horizons, and Tor.com
New Books : 30 MayTuesday 30 May 2017 | Monitor
Kit Reed's Mormama and titles by Andrews, Black, Brennan, and Hough
This Week's BestsellersMonday 29 May 2017 | Monitor
Stephen King & Richard Chizmar's Gwendy's Button Box debuts on four lists.
Gary K. Wolfe reviews Claire NorthSunday 28 May 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's April 2017 issue
With its fragmented structure and occasionally self-consciously meditative prose, The End of the Day might puzzle some who enjoyed the thriller plotting of The Sudden Appearance of Hope, but at its best it reaffirms the passion and ambition that have made North such a consistently intriguing writer. Comments from the 2017 Locus Poll and SurveySaturday 27 May 2017 | Magazine
Here are comments, presented anonymously, submitted by voters in this year's Locus Poll and Survey. Results of the poll will be published in the magazine's July issue; survey results will appear in August issue.
Adrienne Martini reviews Robert Charles WilsonFriday 26 May 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's April 2017 issue
The past, it has been said, is another country. If you're August Kemp in Robert Charles Wilson's Last Year, that other country is one you can monetize. Stefan Dziemianowicz reviews Powers of DarknessThursday 25 May 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's April 2017 issue
Question: When is Bram Stoker's Dracula not Bram Stoker's Dracula? Answer: When it's Makt Myrkranna, a book whose title translates from the Icelandic as Powers of Darkness and which, in the early twentieth century, was published as the Icelandic-language edition of Stoker's vampire classic. New Books : 23 MayTuesday 23 May 2017 | Monitor
Michael Crichton's Dragon Teeth, Stephen King & Richard Chizmar's Gwendy's Button Box, and titles by Baldwin, Clare, Gailey, and Higgins
This Week's BestsellersMonday 22 May 2017 | Monitor
Robin Hobb's Assassin's Fate and Sherrilyn Kenyon's Deadmen Walking debut; Amazon.com debuts "Amazon Charts"
Periodicals: mid-MaySunday 21 May 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Aphelion, Aurealis, and The Dark
Contractual Obligations: A Review of Alien: Covenant
Saturday 20 May 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Unquestionably, Alien: Covenant fulfills its contractual obligations: so, if you have been longing to watch scene after scene of lunging aliens latching on the faces of intended victims and gruesomely slaughtering every one of them, this film represents the answer to your prayers. The very open question is whether anyone without that fervent yearning will want to sit through two hours and three minutes of this otherwise lamentable movie. Faren Miller reviews Brian StaveleyFriday 19 May 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's April 2017 issue
Over the course of killings and adventures, Skullsworn explores deeper issues — love and death, humanity and Other — without becoming ponderously profound... Stavely pulls it all off with style. Gary K. Wolfe reviews John KesselThursday 18 May 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's April 2017 issue
The Moon and the Other brilliantly balances character, social commentary, and hard SF in a novel of surprising density and depth of feeling. Paul Di Filippo reviews Robert Jackson BennettWednesday 17 May 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
The rest of the book is a hurdle across many venues, a cat-and-mouse game in which Sigrud and his allies have to stay one step ahead of Nokov to frustrate his plans for world domination. Finished pretty much with any fresh worldbuilding — that activity was executed sufficiently in the first two books — Bennett can now use his well-established venues and cultures as stagesets for incredible action. New Books : 16 MayTuesday 16 May 2017 | Monitor
Nebula Awards Showcase 2017, edited by Julie E. Czerneda, and titles by Campbell, Golden, MacLeod, Rossi, Smale, Turner, and Wallace
This Week's BestsellersMonday 15 May 2017 | Monitor
Sarah J. Maas' A Court of Wings and Ruin debuts prominently on two lists.
Ellen Klages: Magic in the MixSunday 14 May 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's May Issue interview
I love short stories. Imagine holding a small carved bowl, its weight and shape and size a perfect fit for two cupped hands. The grain of the wood flows with the bowl's curves. The interplay of light and dark pleases the eye. The texture is silken against your skin. You turn it, admiring the craft, the artistry, and the detail. "It’s lovely," you say, handing it back to its creator. Then you say, "Now when are you going to make something real, like furniture?" New in Paperback: MaySaturday 13 May 2017 | Monitor
Guy Gavriel Kay's Children of Earth and Sky, Blake Crouch's Dark Matter, Neil Gaiman's The View from the Cheap Streets, and titles by Andrews, Bear, Coe, DeLillo, Green, Lockwood, Maas, Niven & Barnes, and Ryan
Paul Di Filippo reviews Bud SparhawkFriday 12 May 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Sparhawk offers us unflashy, solid tales which nonetheless often extend SF's remit. He never neglects either real technological novums nor humanistic story-telling values. He does not privilege message over entertainment, nor vice versa, but rather tries to keep both in balance. And in the end, he's all about the art and the history and traditions of the genre, not self-aggrandizing grandstanding. Gary K. Wolfe reviews Elizabeth HandThursday 11 May 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's March 2017 issue
PM Press's ongoing series of chapbook miscellanies of "outspoken authors" — basically appetizer-size collections of fiction, non-fiction, and interviews — can at their best convey a sense of meeting an old radical friend in a bar, sharing a few memories, and catching up on things. Elizabeth Hand's Fire, the series' 18th volume, offers a cross-section of Hand's work as both author and critic. Paul Di Filippo reviews Eric Flint & Mike ResnickWednesday 10 May 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Flint and Resnick deliver an outstanding, madcap, goofball adventure, with plenty of surprises and not a dull moment. If you want some points of comparison, I would adduce Ron Goulart, Keith Laumer, James Schmitz and — a fellow who has unfortunately dropped off the publishing map — that master of surreal japes, Philip Palmer. New Books : 9 MayTuesday 9 May 2017 | Monitor
Gregory Benford's The Berlin Project, Ellen Klages' Wicked Wonders, and titles by Hardinge, Hobb, Kenyon, Khaw, Kroese, Rustad, and White
This Week's BestsellersMonday 8 May 2017 | Monitor
Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale ranks #1 on two paperback lists.
Paul Tremblay: AftermathSunday 7 May 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's May Issue interview
That's why the emotional lives of characters in books are so interesting to me. I want to know why people react in certain ways to different situations, and what decisions they're going to make after that. In the best horror stories, the horror happens somewhere in the middle. The interesting part for me is the aftermath: "What are people going to do now?" Periodicals: early MaySaturday 6 May 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Apex, Clarkesworld, Forever, Galaxy's Edge, GigaNotoSaurus, Lightspeed, Nightmare, Shimmer, and Uncanny
Locus Bestsellers, MayFriday 5 May 2017 | Magazine
Bestsellers from specialty bookstores are led by V.E. Schwab's A Conjuring of Light, Patricia Briggs' Fire Touched, Ted Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others, and Claudia Gray's Star Wars: Bloodline.
Locus Magazine's New & Notable Books, MayThursday 4 May 2017 | Magazine
May New and Notable books include Ian McDonald's Luna: Wolf Moon and titles by Armstrong, Asher, Britain, Chokshi, Kessel, Lafferty, Matthews, Moon, Robinson, Scalzi, and Silverberg
Cory Doctorow: Weaponized NarrativeWednesday 3 May 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's May Issue.
Walkaway is a utopian disaster novel. It's a novel about people doing right for one another under conditions of adversity. It's a deliberate, tactical rebuttal of the science fiction stories (including my own) that resort to the easy, lazy trope of having civilization erupt into violence, rape, and chaos the minute that technology fails. New Books : 2 MayTuesday 2 May 2017 | Monitor
Sharon Lee & Steve Miller's 20th Liaden novel The Gathering Edge, and titles by Bennett, Bennis, Carey, Danker, Douglas, Flint & Resnick, Gaiman & Srinivasan, Hoyt, Hunter, Koch, Kushner, Maas, McLean, Meadows, Ochse, Patel, Rhodes, Wells, and Zahn
This Week's BestsellersMonday 1 May 2017 | Monitor
Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale rises in the rankings.
May 2017 Table of ContentsMonday 1 May 2017 | Magazine
The May issue features interviews with Ellen Klages and Paul Tremblay, a column by Cory Doctorow, coverage of the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts and other conventions, and reviews of short fiction and books by Jonathan Strahan, Jeff VanderMeer, Ian McDonald, Clive Barker, Marie Brennan, and many others.
Online Periodicals: late AprilSunday 30 April 2017 | Monitor
April posts at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Daily SF, Fireside, Persistent Visions, Strange Horizons, and Tor.com
Print Periodicals: late AprilSaturday 29 April 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Analog, Asimov's, and Black Static
Gary K. Wolfe reviews Kim Stanley RobinsonFriday 28 April 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's March 2017 issue
In contrast to the Dos Passos expansiveness of 2312 and despite its panoramic title, New York 2140 is a comparatively intimate tale of a handful of representative characters whose paths cross in various ways in a New York defiantly rebuilding after two separate "pulses" have left sea levels something like 50 feet higher than they are now. Classics In Reprint: AprilThursday 27 April 2017 | Monitor
The first volumes of The Best of Gordon R. Dickson and Seabury Quinn's The Complete Tales of Jules de Grandin, and titles by Jeter, Lee, and Niven & Pournelle
Paul Di Filippo reviews Poul AndersonWednesday 26 April 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
The date range is almost identical to that of the selections in The Best of Gordon R. Dickson: Volume 1 that I reviewed earlier this month. And right up front, I believe we can make an important distinction along these lines. Poul Anderson was simply the better and more influential and consequential writer of the pair... New Books : 25 AprilTuesday 25 April 2017 | Monitor
Jeff VanderMeer's Borne, Cory Doctorow's Walkaway, and titles by Brennan, Broaddus, Honeywell, Maberry, and Staveley
This Week's BestsellersMonday 24 April 2017 | Monitor
Timothy Zahn's Star Wars: Thrawn ranks #2 at New York Times and Publishers Weekly
Paul Di Filippo reviews Allen SteeleSunday 23 April 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
After being more or less defunct for decades, this seems to be Captain Future's time to be reborn. The Captain's retro yet timeless virtues — both the hero's personal creed and the narrative stylings — are arguably congruent with cultural trends today toward a desired and desirable return to basics and old verities with a useful revisioning. Adrienne Martini reviews Elan MastaiSaturday 22 April 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
This is a science fiction love story that is by turns funny and wistful and smart, while remaining fully invested in how being human feels. Paul Di Filippo reviews Gordon R. DicksonFriday 21 April 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Dickson began publishing professionally in 1950, and this first volume of his Best Stories chronicles the years 1954 through 1964 — with one important exception. Editor Hank Davis has wisely and temptingly kicked off the collection with "Love Song," the piece that Dickson sold to Harlan Ellison for Last Dangerous Visions, and which has been unseen since. New in Paperback: March - AprilThursday 20 April 2017 | Monitor
Charlie Jane Anders' All the Birds in the Sky, Stephen King's End of Watch, Thomas Olde Heuvelt's HEX, Anna Smaill's The Chimes, and titles by Armstrong, Bauers, Belcher, Campbell, Cherryh, Martinez, Riggs, Seay, and Stewart.
Spotlight on: Rovina Cai, ArtistWednesday 19 April 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's April Issue
I've just wrapped up illustrating a picture book! It's called Tintinnabula, and is written by Australian SF/F writer Margo Lanagan. One of my favourite things about illustration is getting to delve into a writer's "world," and it has been a delight to explore Margo's. New Books : 18 AprilTuesday 18 April 2017 | Monitor
Jonathan Strahan's The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of the Year Volume Eleven, Sofia Samatar's Tender: Stories, John Joseph Adams' Cosmic Powers, and titles by Armstrong, Carr, Clark, Golden, James, Johnson, Kent, Shea, and Wolf
This Week's BestsellersMonday 17 April 2017 | Monitor
Omar El Akkad's American War debuts on three lists.
20 Years of Locus OnlineMonday 17 April 2017 | About the Website
Locus Online debuted 20 years ago today. Here's a look back at the history of the site, a selection of featured posts, and a gallery of homepage image captures that illustrate the development of the site as web standards evolved over the years.
Kinuko Y. Craft: Light & ShadowSunday 16 April 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's April Issue interview
One of the benefits I get from doing covers is, I get to read. The main thing I like about what I do is that I'm away from reality and the real world where I live, in a make believe one — a land of someone else's imagination — as long as the project lasts. I need that to survive. Periodicals: mid-AprilSaturday 15 April 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Aurealis, Intergalactic Medicine Show, Interzone, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, The New York Review of Science Fiction, and Perihelion
Spotlight on: Jeffrey Alan Love, ArtistFriday 14 April 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's April Issue
My first job in SF/F, I think, was working for Irene Gallo for Tor.com, an absolutely wonderful website which has revolutionized short fiction and art in the SF/F field. I couldn't have asked for a better first job. Gary K. Wolfe reviews Kameron HurleyThursday 13 April 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
While the raw template may be space opera, The Stars Are Legion draws enthusiastically and effectively on a number of mythological and horror traditions as well. Spotlight on: Paul Lewin, ArtistWednesday 12 April 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's April Issue
Coming from the perspective of a fine artist, there are only a handful of cover projects that I've been involved with over the years. Without a doubt, though, the most interesting one has been with Seven Stories Press and the reissuing of Octavia Butler's books Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents. New Books : 11 AprilTuesday 11 April 2017 | Monitor
Allen Steele's Avengers of the Moon, Elizabeth Moon's Cold Welcome, Gwyneth Jones' Proof of Concept, and titles by Anderson, Beal, Durst, Farland, Maberry, Mason, Pollock, Smith, and Smythe
This Week's BestsellersMonday 10 April 2017 | Monitor
Laini Taylor's Strange the Dreamer debuts on two lists.
Kameron Hurley: How to Write a Book in a MonthSunday 9 April 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's April Issue.
We all want to learn how to write books faster. The pace of the news cycle today has heated up to such an extent that for those of us who aren't in the 1% of writers, if we don't come out with a book a year, it feels like the world has forgotten us amid the buzz of ever more intensifying world horror. Periodicals: early AprilSaturday 8 April 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Abyss & Apex, Apex, Aphelion, Clarkesworld, The Dark, Forever, GigaNotoSaurus, Lightspeed, and Nightmare
Russell Letson reviews Ken MacLeodFriday 7 April 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
Ken MacLeod's new trilogy-in-progress bears the overall title The Corporation Wars, with US print editions of the first two volumes, Dissidence and Insurgence, appearing just a month apart late in 2016. (The third, Emergence, is due out later this year.) The story is told from a variety of viewpoints and features a mixture of motifs: the post-human condition, interstellar colonization, and space combat, along with familiar MacLeodian discussions about political systems and revolution. Locus Bestsellers, AprilThursday 6 April 2017 | Magazine
Bestsellers from specialty bookstores are led by James S.A. Corey's Babylon's Ashes, Neil Gaiman's American Gods, Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle, and Alexander Freed's Rogue One.
Liz Bourke reviews Charles StrossWednesday 5 April 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
Empire Games is the start of a new trilogy, set in the world of his Merchant Princes novels (six books, now released as three omnibus editions), but several years on from the nuclear events that punctuated those novels. New Books : 4 AprilTuesday 4 April 2017 | Monitor
John Kessel's The Moon and the Other, Omar El Akkad's American War, Aliette de Bodard's The House of Binding Thorns, Neil Clarke's The Best Science Fiction of the Year, Volume Two, and titles by Cherryh, Dolkart, Emrys, Flint & Barber, Jacka, Jennings, Lawrence, Lee, Matthews, Neuvel, North, O'Keefe, Priest, and Yatsuhashi
This Week's BestsellersMonday 3 April 2017 | Monitor
John Scalzi's The Collapsing Empire debuts on two lists.
Locus Magazine's New & Notable Books, AprilSunday 2 April 2017 | Magazine
April New and Notable books include Edmund Gordon's The Invention of Angela Carter: A Biography, George Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo, and titles by Bledsoe, Carey, Donnelly, Nix, Palmer, Pratt, Rosetti & Rayyan, Schwab, and Spinrad.
Back to the Retrofuture, Version 2.0: A Review of Ghost in the Shell
Saturday 1 April 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Ghost in the Shell is most definitely a film worth seeing, and no one who buys a ticket will feel cheated afterwards; they may especially appreciate the film, as I did, as an unusually artful rendering of all the things that people used to worry about in the 1980s. Still, like me, they may also conclude that the film just wasn’t their cup of tea. April 2017 Table of ContentsSaturday 1 April 2017 | Magazine
The April issue features an interview with Kinuko Y. Craft and spotlights of artists Paul Lewin, Jeffrey Alan Love, and Rovina Cai, an obituary and appreciations for Susan Casper, a column by Kameron Hurley, a report on SF in Portugal, and reviews of short fiction and books by John Kessel, Brian Staveley, Robert Charles Wilson, Alex Wells, and many others.
Periodicals: late MarchFriday 31 March 2017 | Monitor
Fourth issue of new quarterly 'zine Into the Ruins, and March issues and content at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Daily SF, Fireside, Persistent Visions, Strange Horizons, Terraform, and Tor.com
Liz Bourke reviews Lara Elena DonnellyThursday 30 March 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's March 2017 issue
Amberlough isn't a cheerful book, but it has an amazing voice. Its spy-thriller twists and ever-growing tension combine to provide an extraordinarily entertaining ride. And I have to say: if this is her debut? I can't wait to see what Donnelly does next. John Langan reviews Silvia Moreno-GarciaWednesday 29 March 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's March 2017 issue
With Certain Dark Things, Silvia Moreno-Garcia demonstrates that there is always more to be done with familiar figures such as the vampire, and that in the hands of a talented writer, the creatures can rise to new (un)life. New Books : 28 MarchTuesday 28 March 2017 | Monitor
Ian McDonald's Luna: Wolf Moon and titles by Eves, McDermott, Sapkowski, Taylor, and Westerfeld
This Week's BestsellersMonday 27 March 2017 | Monitor
A new edition of Rowling's Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Kim Stanley Robinson's New York 2140, and Andrzej Sapowski's The Lady of the Lake debut.
Classics In Reprint: MarchSunday 26 March 2017 | Monitor
The seventh volume of Collected Short Works of Poul Anderson, a 50th-anniversary edition of Ira Levin's Rosemary's Baby, and new editions of novels by Richard Bowes and Tanith Lee
Mutiny of the Unknown Alien Slime: A Review of Life
Saturday 25 March 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
From one perspective, Life represents yet another example of a recent Hollywood trend that I find heartening — a renewed interest in realistic depictions of humanity's probable future in space. ... Regrettably, however, Life ultimately becomes a conventional, and sometimes silly, horror film. Russell Letson reviews Cory DoctorowFriday 24 March 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's March 2017 issue
For all of its engagement with What's Happenin' Now, Baby, Walkaway feels like good old-fashioned science fiction: part thrill-ride, part warning, part all-night political wrangle with your really smart college roommate. Gary K. Wolfe reviews Cat SparksThursday 23 March 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's March 2017 issue
[Her] fine first novel Lotus Blue, set in a far future Australian wasteland, is as evocative of Terry Dowling's Rynosseros stories, with their neat sandships, or even of David R. Bunch's surreal Moderan stories, as it is of George Miller's monster truck rallies. Paul Di Filippo reviews Caitlín R. KiernanWednesday 22 March 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
The heterogeneous tales assembled in this collection display Kiernan's large but tightly interlocked range of interests. Outsiders, art, the elements, transcendence, sex, love, failure, responsibility. New Books : 21 MarchTuesday 21 March 2017 | Monitor
John Scalzi's The Collapsing Empire, Mishell Baker's Phantom Pains, and titles by Allan, Asher, Clarke, Cornell, Fujii, Lebbon, Strickland & Miller, and Weis & Krammes
This Week's BestsellersMonday 20 March 2017 | Monitor
Patricia Briggs' Silence Fallen, Mohsin Hamid's Exit West, and Anne Bishop's Etched in Bone debut.
Paul Di Filippo reviews Kim Stanley RobinsonSunday 19 March 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
This book is amiable, humorous, good-natured, optimistic, in love with the quotidian and with the crazy quilt adaptive existence that life under stress assumes. Robinson gives us a host of fascinating, interlocking plots, and some of them have global resonance. Periodicals: mid-MarchSaturday 18 March 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Apex, Aphelion, The New York Review of Science Fiction, Perihelion, and Uncanny
New in Paperback: February - MarchFriday 17 March 2017 | Monitor
Robert J. Sawyer's Quantum Night, Allen Steele's Arkwright, and titles by Abercrombie, Brennan, Das, Lawrence, Locke, Oyeyemi, Staveley, Straub, Tremblay, and Valente
Adrienne Martini reviews Carrie VaughnThursday 16 March 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
Carrie Vaughn's Martians Abroad clearly shares DNA with Heinlein's juveniles, and is, the author states, and homage to Podkayne of Mars. Paul Di Filippo reviews Paul La FargeThursday 15 March 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Put most simplistically, it's a novel examining the friendship between H. P. Lovecraft and his teenage pal, Robert Barlow, who became HPL's literary executor. But it's also much more than that, as we shall see. New Books : 14 MarchTuesday 14 March 2017 | Monitor
Kim Stanley Robinson's New York 2140 and titles by Fletcher, Helmreich, Knaak, Murad & Shurin, Neumeier, Newman, and Xue
This Week's BestsellersMonday 13 March 2017 | Monitor
Kristen Britain's Firebrand debuts; George Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo and Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology rank #1 or #2 on four lists.
Jane Yolen: Accidental NovelistSunday 12 March 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's March Issue interview
Children's books and young-adult books and fantasy have this in common: the best are written like poems. They have metaphor, they have astonishing lyrical prose, and they work on multiple levels. They are a gateway drug to beautiful literature, and shouldn't be dismissed.
Bungle in the Jungle: A Review of Kong: Skull Island
Saturday 11 March 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Kong: Skull Island actually begins quite promisingly, as we are introduced to a diverse and generally appealing cast of characters, and they gather together to journey to the mysterious Skull Island and confront the enormous, and initially hostile, King Kong. ... Unfortunately, the film devolves into an iterative, and increasingly unpleasant, series of variations on the two basic set pieces observed in all giant monster movies: humans vs. monster, and monster vs. monster. Locus Magazine's Forthcoming Books: Selected Titles through December 2017Friday 10 March 2017 | Resources
Titles from Locus Magazine's March issue listings of Selected Forthcoming Books by Author are arranged here by month.
Locus Bestsellers, MarchThursday 9 March 2017 | Magazine
Bestsellers from specialty bookstores are led by James S.A. Corey's Babylon's Ashes, Patrick Rothfuss' The Name of the Wind, Ted Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others, and James Luceno's Star Wars: Catalyst.
Gary K. Wolfe reviews Ken LiuWednesday 8 March 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
The Wall of Storms is a far more complex and rewarding novel than The Grace of Kings — unusual for the middle book in a series, and equally unusual is that it can be appreciated largely as a standalone. New Books : 7 MarchTuesday 7 March 2017 | Monitor
Paul La Farge's The Night Ocean, Ada Palmer's Seven Surrenders, Jaroslav Kalfar's Spaceman of Bohemia, Cat Sparks' Lotus Blue, and titles by Bailey & Schmidt, Bishop, Bledsoe, Briggs, Butler, Christopher, Claycomb, Fortune, Hamilton, Henderson, Maresca, McClellan, McGuire, Rieder, and Wells
Langan reviews Pinborough: They Say a Girl Died Here OnceMonday 6 March 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's March 2017 issue
The family at the heart of They Say a Girl Died Here Once, Sarah Pinborough's excellent new novel, is in retreat. Three years prior to the book's opening, Anna, its teenaged protagonist, was slipped a date-rape drug at a party.... This Week's BestsellersMonday 6 March 2017 | Monitor
V.E. Schwab's A Conjuring of Light and Chuck Wendig's Empire's End: Aftermath debut; George Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo and Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology rank #1 and #2 on three lists.
John Joseph Adams: The Stars His DestinationSunday 5 March 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's March Issue interview
Having read The Stars My Destination, I went on a quest to find more books like it, and ultimately that's what led to me becoming an editor — to driving myself to find things that would challenge me as a reader and change the way I read. Periodicals: early MarchSaturday 4 March 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Aurealis, Clarkesworld, Forever, Galaxy's Edge, GigaNotoSaurus, Lightspeed, Mythis Delirium, Nightmare, and Shimmer
Locus Magazine's New & Notable Books, MarchFriday 3 March 2017 | Magazine
March New and Notable books include Mur Lafferty's Six Wakes and titles by Bond, Brust & White, Datlow, Delany, Dyer, Hand, Matthews, McGuire, Okorafor, Stross, and Vaughn
Cory Doctorow: The Jubilee: Fill Your BootsThursday 2 March 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's March Issue.
Technology hints at another model, one that hybridizes the pre-industrial rhythms of work and play and the super-modern ability to use computers to solve otherwise transcendentally hard logistics and coordination problems. March 2017 Table of ContentsWednesday 1 March 2017 | Magazine
The March issue features interviews with Jane Yolen and John Joseph Adams, listings of forthcoming books through December 2017, a column by Cory Doctorow, an obituary with appreciations for Edward Bryant, and reviews of short fiction and books by Kim Stanley Robinson, Cory Doctorow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Lara Elena Donnelly, Henry Kuttner, Shaun Tan, and many others.
New Books : 28 FebruaryTuesday 28 February 2017 | Monitor
Rob Latham's Science Fiction Criticism: An Anthology of Essential Writings, the US edition of Alastair Reynolds' Revenger, and titles by Britain, Broaddus, Dawidziak, Hoover, Kadrey, Kiernan, Lewis, Marr, Martinez, Millet, Nix, Skovron, and Wendig
This Week's BestsellersMonday 27 February 2017 | Monitor
George Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo debuts at #1 on three lists; Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology is #2 on the same three lists.
Periodicals: late FebruarySunday 26 February 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Analog and Asimov's (its 40th-anniversary issue), and February content at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Daily SF, Strange Horizons, and Tor.com
Classics In Reprint: FebruarySaturday 25 February 2017 | Monitor
New editions of books by William Gibson, K.W. Jeter, Philip Francis Nowlan, and Michael Swanwick
Liz Bourke reviews BookburnersFriday 24 February 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
Bookburners Season 1 might top 200,000 words, but it reaches that total in 16 novelette-to-short-novella-length episodes. Structurally, then, it's a lot more like a television show than a serial novel — as it's intended to be. A supernatural copshow/caper/spies and intrigue television show, with added complicated team dynamics. Rich Horton reviews Short FictionThursday 23 February 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's January 2017 issue
F&SF for November/December features a rare and welcome appearance from Gardner Dozois, whose fame as an editor should not cause us to forget how good his fiction is... Faren Miller reviews S. Jae-JonesWednesday 22 February 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's February 2017 issue
Historically, "The Earl-King" (Der Erlkönig), "Unfinished Symphony", the title piece, and more are works by Franz Schubert. Jae-Jones plays her own games by reimagining and recasting him as the heroine's young violin-virtuoso brother (not a composer in his own right), while still invoking the full passion of the time when Baroque gave way to early Romantic — and the world changed. New Books : 21 FebruaryTuesday 21 February 2017 | Monitor
Meg Elison's The Book of Etta, Michael Tolkin's NK3, and titles by Dayton, Dornbusch, Eames, Hogan, Lyons, Schwab, and Sharp
This Week's BestsellersMonday 20 February 2017 | Monitor
Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology rank #1 on two print lists.
Gary K. Wolfe reviews Nnedi OkoraforSunday 19 February 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's January 2017 issue
Binti: Home opens about a year after that earlier story began as a quiet coming-of-age story, turned suddenly into a survival adventure, and ended with Binti playing a key role in a kind of revolution. Periodicals: mid-FebruarySaturday 18 February 2017 | Monitor
New issues of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Apex, Aphelion, Aurealis, Forever, Intergalactic Medicine Show, Mothership Zeta, and Perihelion
Paul Di Filippo reviews Elan MastaiThursday 16 February 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
The first thing to note is that although Mastai might very well have been raised outside strict genre borders, he exhibits a playful fluency with, and is creatively savvy about, all the genre appurtenances and furniture. His does not make a single misstep with his speculations or language. Paul Di Filippo reviews Richard KadreyWednesday 15 February 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Lastly, and possibly the biggest attraction of the book, is the sheer language. Like S. J. Perelman writing for the Marx Brothers, combined with Raymond Chandler's propensity for over-the-top similes and metaphors, Kadrey's language pops off the page, whether as dialogue or description. New Books : 14 FebruaryTuesday 14 February 2017 | Monitor
Peter S. Beagle's In Calabria, Steve Erickson's Shadowbahn, George Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo, and titles by Brodsky, Carey, Danielewski, Duncan, Hand, James, Jordan, Tem, and Wells
This Week's BestsellersMonday 13 February 2017 | Monitor
Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology ranks high on all three Amazon lists.
Alastair Reynolds: Expanding UniverseSunday 12 February 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's February Issue interview
The other seed of Revenger came from when I really fell in love with science fiction, around the time I was 16. That's when I was absolutely besotted with Larry Niven and the Known Space stories... New in Paperback: January - FebruarySaturday 11 February 2017 | Monitor
Ada Palmer's Too Like the Lightning and titles by Bishop, Briggs, Carriger, Harris, Hines, Jones, Kadrey, Lyris, McAuley, McIntosh, Neuvel, North, Pratchett & Baxter, and Sullivan
Faren Miller reviews Laura EveFriday 10 February 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's January 2017 issue
What is myth for the new millennium? In The Graces, Laure Eve confronts what's left of the old with something that might take its place (no galactic empires required). Paul Di Filippo reviews Norman SpinradThursday 9 February 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Spinrad revels in the juicy, sleazy, all-too-human Machiavellian machinations of all the parties, the rebels and the establishment alike. His ability to chart thrust and counter-thrust is akin to that of some television political strategist following the twists and turns of national affairs. Kameron Hurley: If You Want to Level Up, Get Back to the BasicsWednesday 8 February 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's February Issue.
There are few things, for me, that are as equally depressing and energizing as reading a really great book. Great books are why I got into this business in the first place, which is why I'm often so shocked when I hear from other professional writers that they don't read anymore. New Books : 7 FebruaryTuesday 7 February 2017 | Monitor
Samuel R. Delany's journals In Search of Silence, Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology, Kameron Hurley's The Stars Are Legion, Norman Spinrad's The People's Police, and titles by Ambrose, Beaulieu, Blackmoore, Clarke, Datlow, Donnelly, Fischl, Gannon, Harrison, Isaacson, Jae-Jones, Mastai, Sagara, Savory, Spencer, Taylor, and Wallace
This Week's BestsellersMonday 6 February 2017 | Monitor
Terry Goodkind's Death's Mistress and Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology debut; Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale is #1 this morning at Amazon.com; Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four is #1 at USA Today and Washington Post.
Periodicals: early FebruarySunday 5 February 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Clarkesworld, The Dark, Fireside, GigaNotoSaurus, Lightspeed, Mythic Delirium, The New York Review of Science Fiction, Nightmare, and Persistent Visions
The Boy Who Fell to Earth: A Review of The Space Between Us
Saturday 4 February 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Like a NASA rocket slowly rising from the surface, The Space Between Us takes a long time to achieve escape velocity and soar through space; however, if you can endure one of the most boring opening sequences in any film I can recall, and about an hour of trite melodramatic sequences interspersed with inauthentic personal drama, its last thirty minutes are actually quite enjoyable, even moving. Locus Bestsellers, FebruaryFriday 3 February 2017 | Magazine
Bestsellers from specialty bookstores are led by Brent Weeks' The Blood Mirror, Neil Gaiman's American Gods, Ted Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others, and R.A. Salvatore's Forgotten Realms: Homecoming Book III: Hero
Locus Magazine's New & Notable Books, FebruaryThursday 2 February 2017 | Magazine
February New and Notable books include Karen Lord's anthology New Worlds, Old Ways: Speculative Tales from the Caribbean and titles by Arden, Bear, Dellamonica & Berman, Dellamonica, Dennard, Gemmell, Gilman, Heller & Viola, Littlewood, MacLeod, and Pinborough.
February 2017 Table of ContentsWednesday 1 February 2017 | Magazine
The February issue features an interview with Alastair Reynolds and the annual Year in Review with essays by Gary K. Wolfe, Paul Kincaid, Geoff Ryman, Gardner Dozois, and many others; the Locus Recommended Reading List, the Locus Poll and Survey ballot, a column by Kameron Hurley, and reviews of short fiction and books by Kameron Hurley, S. Jae-Jones, Ian McDonald, Ken MacLeod, and many others.
New Books : 31 JanuaryTuesday 31 January 2017 | Monitor
Nnedi Okorafor's Binti: Home, Thoraiya Dyer's debut novel Crossroads of Canopy, Mur Lafferty's Six Wakes, and titles by Aaronovitch, Gladstone, Goodman, Goodwin, and Shearin
This Week's BestsellersMonday 30 January 2017 | Monitor
Titles by Veronica Roth and Karen Marie Moning debut; George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four has been #1 on Amazon.com most of the past week; other dystopian titles by Atwood, Bradbury, Huxley, Lewis, and Orwell also rank on Amazon lists.
Spotlight on: Kelly Abbott, Great Jones StreetSunday 29 January 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's January Issue
Great Jones Street is the Netflix of Fiction. We mean that seriously, as both a business model and a battle cry. We feature short fiction. We curate. We package it nicely into a great user experience. Periodicals: late JanuarySaturday 28 January 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Black Static and Interzone, and January posts at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Daily Science Fiction, Strange Horizons, and Tor.com
Gary K. Wolfe reviews Ellen KlagesFriday 27 January 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's January 2017 issue
Passing Strange may be the most fully developed and richly detailed of all of Klages's stories for adults, but it never feels like it needs to be a longer novel... Classics In Reprint: JanuaryThursday 26 January 2017 | Monitor
New editions of books by Lois McMaster Bujold, David G. Hartwell, William Hope Hodgson, Keith Laumer, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Clark Ashton Smith, and an anthology of short fiction from Hank Davis
Liz Bourke reviews Wesley ChuWednesday 25 January 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's December 2016 issue
The Rise of Io is a messy, scrappy, and yet incredibly fun science fiction thriller with extra body-snatching (more like body-sharing) aliens. New Books : 24 JanuaryTuesday 24 January 2017 | Monitor
Stephen Baxter's Wells sequel The Massacre of Mankind, Ellen Klages' Passing Strange, Tom Toner's The Weight of the World, and titles by Brust & White, Crilley, Goodkind, Kemp, Newman, and Price
This Week's BestsellersMonday 23 January 2017 | Monitor
Susan Dennard's YA fantasy Windwitch debuts on two lists; George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four ranks #6 this morning on Amazon.com
Spotlight on: Ellen Kushner, TremontaineSunday 22 January 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's January Issue
The other writers have made it more real. The world is already a great big stewpot of periods, books, and cities I love. But I've only explored certain corners of it. A real world is vast and full of complexities and contradictions. Periodicals: mid-JanuarySaturday 21 January 2017 | Monitor
New issues of The Dark, Fantastic Stories of the Imagination, MOSF Journal of Science Fiction, and Perihelion
Adrienne Martini reviews Bob ProehlFriday 20 January 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's December 2016 issue
I thought I knew what Bob Proehl's A Hundred Thousand Worlds would be about before I even cracked the spine. It's about comic book conventions, the blurbs on the back said... New in Paperback: JanuaryThursday 19 January 2017 | Monitor
Joe Hill's The Fireman, Dexter Palmer's Version Control, and titles by Asher, Bara, Dennard, Hemstreet, Kadrey, Marshall, Sanderson, and Schwab
Paul Di Filippo reviews David Brin & Stephen W. PottsWednesday 18 January 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
David Brin's The Transparent Society (1998) surveyed the new technology that is driving us towards more and more disclosure, and drew fresh new conclusions about the issues. Now, still cogitating on the ramifications of these issues, and displaying admirable tenacity and dedication to the cause, Brin offers an anthology of fiction on the topic, featuring a stellar lineup of contributors. New Books : 17 JanuaryTuesday 17 January 2017 | Monitor
Charles Stross' Empire Games, Neil Clarke's anthology Galactic Empires, and titles by Germain, Graham & Land, McDermott, Moning, Roth, Vaughn, and White
This Week's BestsellersMonday 16 January 2017 | Monitor
Cixin Liu's The Three-Body Problem ranks #53 on Amazon.com this morning, after Obama plugs it in today's NYT
Blake Charlton: Forward & BackwardSunday 15 January 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's January Issue interview
You'd think failing kindergarten would be difficult to do, but I did it rather spectacularly. ... The book went around the class, and soon after that my parents got called in. My teacher said, 'When Blake had the book, he held it upside down when he read from it.' Paul Di Filippo reviews Gordon EklundSaturday 14 January 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Few occasions give more pleasure to a reader than witnessing the unexpected return to print of a long-silent author who once had a rewarding, admirable career. This time around, the satisfaction derives from the appearance of Cosmic Fusion, by Gordon Eklund. Gary K. Wolfe reviews Emmi ItärantaFriday 13 January 2017 | Reviews
From Locus Magazine's December 2016 issue
The Weaver, published earlier this year in England under the far more evocative title The City of Woven Streets, is the second novel from the Finnish writer Emmi Itäranta, whose post-apocalyptic SF novel The Memory of Water deservedly gained attention a couple of years ago, largely because of her evocative, lyrical prose (she apparently writes simultaneously in Finnish and English). That prose serves her well in The Weaver... Locus Bestsellers, JanuaryThursday 12 January 2017 | Magazine
Bestsellers from specialty bookstores are led by Brent Weeks' The Blood Mirror, Neil Gaiman's American Gods, N.K. Jemisin's The Fifth Season, and Alan Dean Foster's Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Paul Di Filippo reviews Henry KuttnerWednesday 11 January 2017 | Reviews
Special to Locus Online
Nearly seven hundred pages of fiction by Kuttner from the short span of 1937 to 1940 finds the Golden Age Master even more deft and wide-ranging than in that first volume, Terror in the House... The sure hand and clever wit that would be fully on display under John Campbell's Golden Age guidance appear in stronger and more lasting flashes here. New Books : 10 JanuaryTuesday 10 January 2017 | Monitor
David Brin & Stephen W. Potts' Chasing Shadows: Visions of Our Coming Transparent World and titles by Arden, Cogman, Dennard, Gilman, Liggett, and McGuire
This Week's BestsellersMonday 9 January 2017 | Monitor
Whitehead's The Underground Railroad and Chabon's Moonglow each ranks #1.
Mary Robinette Kowal: The Familiar & the StrangeSunday 8 January 2017 | Perspectives
Excerpts from Locus Magazine's January Issue interview
It wasn't really until I started to get into the novel that I buckled down and did some more research and realized how much perceived knowledge I had about the First World War was completely wrong and very American-centric. You watch these war movies, and it's all about the men at the battlefront. I did not realize at all how heavily involved women were in the First World War, and how directly tied it was to suffrage. Electronic Periodicals: early JanuarySaturday 7 January 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Abyss & Apex, Apex, Aurealis, Clarkesworld, Galaxy's Edge, GigaNotoSaurus, Intergalactic Medicine Show, Kaleidotrope, Lightspeed, Mythic Delirium, Nightmare, Shimmer, and Uncanny
Print Periodicals: JanuaryFriday 6 January 2017 | Monitor
New issues of Analog and Asimov's, both now bi-monthly; Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Locus Magazine's New & Notable Books, JanuaryThursday 5 January 2017 | Magazine
January New and Notable books include Richard A. Lupoff's Where Memory Hides: A Writer's Life and titles by Beukes, Chabon, Corey, Duchamp, Ellis, Kuttner, MacLeod, Milford, Sanderson, Shusterman, Sterling, Strahan, Kai Ashante Wilson, and Robert Charles Wilson.
Cory Doctorow: It's Time to Short Surveillance and Go Long on FreedomWednesday 4 January 2017 | Perspectives
From Locus Magazine's January Issue.
Let's say for the sake of argument that you voted for Donald Trump and you're ecstatic that he's taking the White House. New Books : 3 JanuaryTuesday 3 January 2017 | Monitor
A study of American SF films, and titles by Bara, Bedford, Buettner, Flint, Forstchen, Hendee & Hendee, McKinley, Modesitt, Moore, Older, Pratchett, Scalzi, Scull, Jen Williams, and Tad Williams
This Week's BestsellersMonday 2 January 2017 | Monitor
The novelization Rogue One: A Star Wars Story debuts on two lists.
January 2017 Table of ContentsSunday 1 January 2017 | Magazine
The January issue features interviews with Mary Robinette Kowal and Blake Charlton, a column by Cory Doctorow, spotlights on Ellen Kushner and Kelly Abbott, and reviews of short fiction and books by Colson Whitehead, Laure Eve, Ben Aaronovitch, Ellen Klages, Jonathan Strahan and many others.
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 Locus seeks Interns • Digital Editions available 
Wed 05 JulThe main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you?re allowed to do whatever you like. (That may be a rule for life as well as for writing. But it?s definitely true for writing.) So write your story as it needs to be written. Write it honestly, and tell it as ...
Scott Westerfeld Guest Post–“Sisters and Family in Spill Zone”
Thu 04 MaySpill Zone is about what we’re left with after our family is destroyed.
It’s about two sisters, Addison and Lexa, who’ve lost their parents and hometown in an event called the Spill. The older sister, Addison, is left with the task of raising and providing for Lexa, which is in some ways like try...
 Mon 24 Jul:
2017 AnLab runners-up
Mon 24 Jul:
Campbell and Sturgeon 2nd and 3rd place results
Mon 24 Jul:
2017 Rhysling, Cordwainer winners
 Locus Science Fiction Foundation A nonprofit organization dedicated to the promotion and preservation of science fiction, fantasy, and horror 
Donations to the Locus Science Fiction Foundation and Locus Magazine are welcome via PayPal:  Previous Issues 
— June 2017 — John Kessel Cat Sparks Kameron Hurley 
— May 2017 — Ellen Klages Paul Tremblay Cory Doctorow 
— April 2017 — Kinuko Y. Craft Paul Lewin, Jeffrey Alan Love, and Rovina Cai Kameron Hurley 
— March 2017 — Jane Yolen John Joseph Adams Cory Doctorow 
— February 2017 — Alastair Reynolds Kameron Hurley Recommended Reading Locus Poll & Survey Ballot 
— January 2017 — Mary Robinette Kowal Blake Charlton Cory Doctorow Ellen Kushner • Kelly Abbott 
— December 2016 — Eric Flint • Thomas Olde Heuvelt Kameron Hurley • Brooks Peck 
— November 2016 — Pat Cadigan • Cat Rambo Cory Doctorow 
— October 2016 — Connie Willis • Nisi Shawl Kameron Hurley 
— September 2016 — Charles Stross • Eleanor Arnason Cory Doctorow Forthcoming Books 
— August 2016 — Nancy Kress • David D. Levine Kameron Hurley 
— July 2016 — Peter Straub • Joe Hill Cory Doctorow — June 2016 — 
Ellen Datlow • Terri Windling Kameron Hurley Forthcoming Books — May 2016 — 
Guy Gavriel Kay • Molly Tanzer Cory Doctorow — April 2016 — 
Paolo Bacigalupi • Tim Pratt Kameron Hurley — March 2016 — 
Lisa Goldstein Cory Doctorow Forthcoming Books Fran Wilde
Back Issues  Locus Magazineis published in San Leandro, CA, by editor-in-chief Liza Groen Trombi and a staff of editors, including Kirsten Gong-Wong, Francesca Myman, Carolyn Cushman, and Tim Pratt.
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Locus Onlineis published in Oakland, CA, by editor and webmaster Mark R. Kelly, with News posts by the Locus Office staff in San Leandro and Roundtable posts edited and compiled by Alvaro Zinos-AmaroScience Fiction Awards Database(superseding the The Locus Index to Science Fiction Awards), compiled by Mark R. Kelly, includes listings, indexes, summaries, and statistics on over 100 SF, fantasy, and horror awards from 1949 to presentThe Locus Index to Science Fictioncompiled by William Contento, indexes books and magazines seen by Locus Magazine, by title, author, and contents.Annual updates posted free online. Combined Index published on CD ROM. Indexes to Magazines, Crime Fiction, Mystery Fiction, etc., also available. |
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