NPR’s Books We Love (formerly Book Concierge) has an extensive list of Best Books in an assortment of categories, including It’s All Geek to Me and Young Adult, with hundreds of titles recommended by “NPR staff and trusted critics.” The Sci Fi, Fantasy & Speculative Fiction category includes titles by leading authors like Charlie Jane Anders, Becky Chambers, Fonda Lee, Rivers Solomon, Cadwell Turnbull, Jeff VanderMeer, and many others.
For ...Read More
Paladin’s Hope, T. Kingfisher (Red Wombat Studio 978-1-61450-551-8, $34.95, 270pp, hc) October 2021.
Paladin’s Hope is the third book in T. Kingfisher’s (AKA Ursula Vernon’s) Saint of Steel series. Like Paladin’s Grace and Paladin’s Strength before it, Paladin’s Hope is a fantasy romance at its core. There are gods and clerics and gnoles set against a medieval-esque city and countryside. The two main characters are destined for each ...Read More
This Thing Between Us, Gus Moreno (MCD x FSG Originals 978-0-37453-923-8, $17.00, 272pp, tp) October 2021.
I’ve never owned an Amazon Alexa. I do have a Google Nest sitting beside the TV, but other than my daughter asking the device to play songs from The Greatest Showman soundtrack, the family rarely engages with it. I am, however, aware that both the Alexa and the Nest are always listening, ...Read More
White Smoke, Tiffany D. Jackson (Katherine Tegen Books 978-0063029095, $18.99, 384pp, hc) September 2021.
After her public collapse and a stint in rehab, Marigold, a Black high school track star, is finally getting a second chance. When her artist mom gets a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a residency that comes with a free house, Mari, her mother, brother, step-father, and step-sister move from coastal California to a rundown Midwestern town. ...Read More
Shards of Earth: The Final Architecture Book One, Adrian Tchaikovsky (Tor 978-1-5290-5188-9, $28.00, 549 pp, hc) August 2021. Cover by Steve Stone.
Once upon a time I used the term “recombinant SF” to describe stories that whipped multiple ideas and themes and gadgets and speculations and story-patterns into busy, complicated, surprising concoctions: a Chinese AI emperor and Tibetan yak-wranglers on a terraformed Mars; a moon-size ancient alien and clone-soldiers ...Read More
Invisible Sun, Charles Stross (Tor 978-1-250-80709-0, $27.99, 285 pp, hc) September 2021. Cover by Neil Lang.
Partway into Charles Stross’s Invisible Sun, a harried intelligence/security chief says, ‘‘We’ve got a lot of balls in the air,’’ a condition that might apply as well to a number of his fellow characters and to Stross himself in his authorial role. This ninth and final entry in what is now called ...Read More
A Lesson in Vengeance, Victoria Lee (Delacorte Press 978-0-593-30584-3, $18.99, 384pp, hc) August 2021. Cover by Maggie Enterrios.
From start to startling finish, Victoria Lee’s A Lesson in Vengeance is a dream novel for fans of dark academia. Felicity Morrow has returned to the Dalloway School after receiving intense counseling following the previous year’s tragic death of her classmate/girlfriend, Alex. She will now be back in their former dorm, ...Read More
Kirkus has announced its list of the eight best science fiction and fantasy books of 2021:
The winners of the 2021 Ditmar Awards for Australian SF were announced November 20, 2021 in an online ceremony.
Best Novel
The Achievement & Assessment Institute (AAI) at the University of Kansas has announced the creation of the Ad Astra Center for Science Fiction and the Speculative Imagination, headed by director Chris McKitterick.
The center “brings writers, readers, scholars, educators, and fans of speculative fiction together to study and create work that changes the world.” It will initally offer
interdisciplinary workshops, masterclasses, courses, seminars, and other opportunities, using speculative fiction ...Read More
The Nommo Awards, honoring the best in African SF, will be presented at Discon III, the 79th World Science Fiction Convention, to be held December 15-19, 2021 in Washington DC. Sheree Renée Thomas will be master of ceremonies. She says,
The Asociación Española de Fantasía, Ciencia Ficción y Terror (AEFCFT) has announced the Winners for the 2021 Ignotus Awards (the Spanish equivalent of the Hugo Awards).
Novela extranjera (Foreign Novel)
The Future Worlds Prize for Fantasy and Science Fiction Writers of Colour, formerly the Gollancz and Rivers of London BAME SFF Award, has announced its eight-title shortlist
The Hood, Lavie Tidhar (Head of Zeus 978-1-838-93131-5, £18.99, 448pp, hc) October 2021.
Lavie Tidhar’s ambitious four-novel revisiting of British mythology – which he calls the Anti-Matter of Britain – began with last year’s By Force Alone, a cheerfully anarchic and thoroughly entertaining assault on Arthuriana, and now, with The Hood, it moves forward a few centuries to the 12th-century era of Robin Hood legends. But while ...Read More
Dangerous Visions and New Worlds: Radical Science Fiction 1950 to 1985, Andrew Nette & Iain McIntyre, eds. (PM Press 978-1-62963-883-6, $59.95, 224pp, hc) October 2021.
I’m a child of the cyberpunk generation. One of the first genre novels that left an impression on me was William Gibson’s Neuromancer (even if I didn’t entirely understand it). It wasn’t until my late twenties, when I started attending the monthly meetings of ...Read More
Indigo has announced its top-10 list of the best books of 2021. Titles and authors of genre interest include:
For more information, including the complete list, see the Indigo website.
While you are here, please
The National Pastime 2021 Edition
Alternate Plains, Darren Ridgley & Adam Petrash, eds. (Great Plains Publications) October 2021.
The Adventure of the Golden Woman, Cynthia Ward (Aqueduct Press) September 2021.
Here’s an unexpected source of some SF: the 2021 issue of The National Pastime, published by the Society for American Baseball Research. This issue is about “the future according to baseball,” and it’s edited by Cecilia M. Tan ...Read More
Winners of the National Book Awards (NBA) in the Fiction and Young People’s Literature categories were announced November 17, 2021 in a virtual ceremony.
Hell of a Book by Jason Mott (Dutton) won the Fiction category, and Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo (Dutton Books for Young Readers) won the Young People’s Literature category.
Winners for non-fiction, translated literature, and poetry were also announced.
A total of ...Read More
The Washington Post has published a piece on the best SF, fantasy, and horror of 2021, selected by writers Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Lavie Tidhar. Books mentioned include:
The Board of Directors of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America and newly named Grand Master Mercedes Lackey have responded to the issue of earlier comments made by Lackey about writing trans characters. SFWA sent a statement to their membership on November 17, 2021, that reads:
After we announced Mercedes Lackey as SFWA’s next Grand Master on 11/4, stances that Ms. Lackey had taken on writing trans characters ...Read More
Tor.com 8/4/21, 8/18/21, 8/25/21 Fiyah Summer ’21 Clarkesworld 8/21
To start off this month, I’d like to highlight two stories that use abstract mathematics in interesting ways. The August Clarkesworld features “The Serpentine Band” by Congyun ‘Mu Ming’ Gu (translated by Tian Huang) which tips over into novella territory at 18,500 words. It is a beautiful story of a bureaucrat in historical China. We learn about the life ...Read More
The Mabati-Cornell Kiswahili Prize for African Literature has announced the 10-title shortlist for the Nyabola Prize. The award recognizes science fiction written in the Kiswahili language by authors age 18-35. The finalists are:
The Complete Short Fiction of Peter Straub: Volume 1: Stories, Peter Straub (Borderlands Press, $120.00, 477pp, hc) October 2021.
The Complete Short Fiction of Peter Straub: Volume 2: Novellas, Peter Straub (Borderlands Press, $120.00, 477pp, hc) October 2021.
Whenever Peter Straub’s name shows up on social media or in critical discussions of horror, it’s increasingly accompanied by encomiums like “icon” or “living legend” (he even has an award ...Read More
Weird Tales and Blackstone Publishing have announced a major new partnership, with Blackstone planning to publish 50 new books in five years under the banner “Weird Tales Presents.”
Titles will include “original novels and anthologies, compilations, and more, penned by some of the biggest names in horror and dark fiction, while also introducing new voices,” with print, e-book, and audiobook editions planned. Blackstone will also distribute the digital and audio ...Read More
Amazon has published its yearly array of lists to promote the best books of 2021, with editors’ selections in various categories. Titles and authors of genre interest follow, in ranked order.
Science Fiction and Fantasy
The Horror Writers Association (HWA) has announced author Jennifer McMahon as StokerCon2022’s sixth guest of honor, joining previously announced guests Ernest Roscoe Dickerson A.S.C., Gemma Files, Brian Keene, John Edward Lawson, and Sheree Renée Thomas.
StokerCon2022 will be held May 12-15, 2022 in Denver CO
For more see their website.
While you are here, please take a moment to support Locus with a one-time or recurring donation. We rely on ...Read More
Kirkus has announced its list of the 12 best books of 2021. Titles and authors of genre interest include:
For more information, including the complete list, see the Kirkus website.
While you are here, please
