» Reviews of Ted Chiang’s Exhalation by Tom Shippey in Wall Street Journal and by Kevin Canfield in San Francisco Chronicle » Scott Edelman dines with Kaaron Warren

Ninth Step Station, Malka Older, Curtis C. Chen, Jacqueline Koyanagi, & Fran Wilde (Serial Box 978-1-68210-589-4 $13.99, 324pp eb) March 2019. Cover by Christine Barcellona. Ninth Step Station is one of two new science fiction serial offerings from publisher Serial Box this year. (The other is The Vela, starting in March.) Cre­ated by Malka Older and written by Older, Fran Wilde, Curtis C. Chen, & Jacqueline Koyanagi, Ninth Step Station

New print and online issues of Apex, Aphelion, Aurealis, Black Static, Clarkesworld, The Dark, Galaxy’s Edge, Intergalactic Medicine Show, Interzone, Lightspeed, Nightmare, and Uncanny

James Patterson is continuing the Patterson Partnership with Scholastic Book Clubs for a fifth year, this time pledging $1.25 million to libraries in classrooms. He will give 4,000 teachers grants of $250 each (with Scholastic Book Clubs offering matching funds in the form of bonus points) to buy books and other materials for the classroom. He is allocating a quarter of a million dollars for 500 new teachers (those with

Famous Men Who Never Lived, K Chess (Tin House Books 978-1947793248, $24.95, 324pp, hc) March 2019. Over the last couple of years, there’s been a wave of debut authors from outside the field putting a fresh twist on genre staples. In An Unkindness of Ghosts, Rivers Solomon explored slavery, race, and gender on a generation starship; Ling Ma’s Severance employed an apocalyptic killer-flu to critique and satirise late-stage capitalism; and

The April Galactic Philadelphia reading was held April 2, 2019 at their new venue, the Free Library of Philadelphia (Central Branch), with Paul Levinson and Sarah Beth Durst performing. Co-curators Sally Wiener Grotta & Lawrence M. Schoen were in attendance, along with Dena Heilik, head of the fiction department at the library. This story and more like it in the May 2019 issue of Locus. While you are here, please

The Tesla Legacy, K.K. Pérez (Tor Teen 978-1-250-08489-7, $17.99, 368pp, tp) March 2019. K.K. Pérez’s The Tesla Legacy presents a familiar but always compelling premise: what if you are not the person you think you are? In this case, high school senior Lucy thinks she knows herself very well. She’s a former homeschooler now happily ensconced in public school, living just outside New York City, where she pursues an interest

Spectrum 25: The Best In Contemporary Fantastic Art, John Fleskes, ed. (Flesk, 978-1-64041-007-7, $45.00, 304pp, hc) November 2018. Cover by Paul Bonner. Spectrum 25 is up to its usual standard of excel­lent production values and varied, fascinating fantastic artwork from around the globe. Spec­trum honors artists in its respectful reproduction and placement of their work throughout the book. Art is crammed in every inch, including on jacket flaps and endpapers,

Nemma Wollenfang is the recipient of the 2018 Working Class Writers Grant, presented by the Speculative Literature Foundation (SLF). The $1,000 grant is given annually to assist working class, blue-collar, poor, and homeless writers who “have been historically underrepresented in speculative fiction, due to financial barriers which have made it much harder for them to have access to the writing world.” Wollenfang was previously named an honorable mention for the

The Bird King, G. Willow Wilson (Grove Press 978-0-8021-2903-1, $26.00, 416pp, hc) March 2019. G. Willow Wilson seems to be pivoting away from her World Fantasy Award-winning first novel Alif the Unseen, which resonated with many readers, I suspect, because of its shrewd combina­tion of contemporary cyberhacking and ancient magic (a bit like R.A. MacAvoy’s Tea with the Black Dragon a generation ago). That novel was also peppered with sharp

Children of Ruin by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Orbit 978-0316452533, $15.99, 608pp, trade paperback) May 2019. Adrian Tchaikovsky’s opener in this series, Children of Time, snapped up the Clarke Award for its year of publication, and it’s easy to see why. The book combines Stapledonian vistas with intimate human dramas, along with top-notch conceptualizations of an alien civilization. Toss in an Armageddon-extinction scenario, a generation starship, and a half-bonkers AI-posthuman godling, and

Audiobook retailer Audible has en­tered into a settlement with two class action lawsuits, Grant McKee et al. v Audible, Inc. and Eric Weber and Bryan Rees v. Amazon.com, Inc., and Amazon Services LLC, bringing an end to 18 months of legal battles. Audible will issue up to 12 million audiobooks and reimburse as many as 8.4 million customers who incurred overdraft fees when Audible allegedly charged their cards without permission.

Elizabeth Bear, Ancestral Night (Saga 3/19) A thrill­ing space adventure from the Hugo Award-winning author, following salvagers Connla and Haimey Dz (and their cats) from the black hole at the center of the Milky Way to the galactic fringes as they encounter pirates, the corpse of a giant space-dwelling alien, and agents of the galaxy-spanning Synarche. The first in the new White Space series.   Zen Cho, The True Queen

Lightspeed 1/19, 2/19 See the Elephant #4 Future Science Fiction Digest #1 January’s Lightspeed opens with a mythic science fictional novelette by A. Merc Rustad, “With Teeth Unmake the Sun“. It features war between immortal godlike beings, one of whom commands a wolf who can unmake planets, stars, and solar systems. While it is an agent of destruction, it has its own yearnings (and its own very fluid physical identity

The Westchester Library Association (WLA) announced the recipients of the 2017-2018 Anne Izard Storytellers’ Choice Award, given “to highlight and promote distinguished titles published in the field of storytelling.” Titles of genre interest include: Norse Myths, Kevin Crossley-Holland (Candlewick) Norse Mythology, Neil Gaiman (Norton) The Annotated African-American Folktales, Henry Louis Gates, Jr. & Maria Tatar (Liveright) Brave Red, Smart Frog, Emily Jenkins (Candlewick) Crane Girl, Curtis Manley (Shen’s) Daemon Voices,

You’re a wizard! This week’s books include a street magician in post-Katrina New Orleans, Warlock Holmes, and courtesan’s use of forbidden magic. New titles this week are by Bryan Camp, Jack Campbell, G.S. Denning, Cate Glass, Vylar Kaftan, Anna Kashina, and Patrick S. Tomlinson.

The New York Public Library announced its Young Lions Fiction Award finalists, and four of the five are of genre interest: Friday Black, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (Mariner); Freshwater, Akwaeke Emezi (Grove/Atlantic); Severance, Ling Ma (Farrar, Straus, Giroux); and The Third Hotel, Laura van den Berg (Farrar, Straus, Giroux). Graphic novel Sabrina by Nick Drnaso (Drawn and Quarterly) is the fifth finalist. The winner will be announced June 13, 2019. The

Seanan McGuire, That Ain’t Witchcraft (DAW 978-0-7564-1179-4, $7.99, 432pp, pb) March 2019. Cover by Aly Fell. Antimony “Annie” Price’s adventures continue in this eighth volume in the InCryptid series. She and her cryptid friends, still on the road after their harrowing adventures at Lowryland theme park, finally find a safe place to stop for a while in Maine. But this is Stephen King country, where their rental house hides secrets,

While Gods Sleep by L.D. Colter (Tam Lin) won the Colorado Book Award in the Science Fiction/Fantasy category, and Del Toro Moon by Darby Karchut (Owl Hollow) won in the Juvenile Literature category. Winners were announced May 18, 2019 at the Arvada Center for the Arts and Humanities in Arvada CO. For more information, including complete list of winners, see the awards website. While you are here, please take a

Winners for the Tomorrow Prize and Roswell Award for short science fiction have been announced. The five finalists for each had their stories read by celebrity guests during LitFest Pasadena. Tomorrow Prize for short science fiction by LA county high school students: 1st Place: “Night”, Megan Vidovich 2nd Place: “The Song Remains the Same, or, Neon Haze Redux”, Arin Krausz 3rd Place: “Guardian Angel”, Ailun Shi Roswell Award for short

Debuting on print lists this week are titles by Patricia Briggs, Ted Chiang, and Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff.

Ilana C. Myer was born Ilana Chaya Teitelbaum on January 19, 1981 in Queens NY, and moved to Israel with her family when she was 12 years old. She came back to the US to study English at Queens College in New York while working as a recep­tionist, administrative assistant, and executive assistant. She later returned to Israel, where she started a journalism career and co-founded Middle East environment blog

The Rosewater Insurrection, Tade Thompson (Orbit 978-0-316-44908-3, $15.99, 378pp, tp) March 2019. Tade Thompson’s wildly original first novel Rose­water, with its political savvy, its problematic main character, its inventive notion of alien contact, and its colorful setting of the improvised city of Rosewater – which grew up around an alien dome near Lagos, Nigeria – also seemed to challenge some readers with its shifting timelines and questions of narrative reliability.

The New Visions Award writing contest for YA/middle grade novels and graphic novels by authors of color and indigenous/Native writers is open to submissions through August 31, 2019. The winning submission will receive a $2,000 cash prize and a publishing contract from the Tu Books imprint of Lee & Low Books, and an Honor Award winner will receive $1,000. For details and rules: <www.leean­dlow.com/writers-illustrators/new-visions-award>. While you are here, please take

Permafrost, Alastair Reynolds (Tor.com Pub­lishing 978-125-030356-1, $14.99, 176pp, tp) March 2019. Alastair Reynolds is one of a handful of authors writing science fiction today who can boast of having worked for a space agency as a scientist (as part of the European Space Research and Technology Centre). His long-form fiction has tended towards far-future science fiction, space operas with sprawling future histories and a strong interest in the influence of

The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) announced the winners of the 2018 Nebula Awards during the 53rd Annual Nebula Banquet on Saturday, May 18, 2019 at the Marriott Warner Center, Woodland Hills CA. Novel WINNER: The Calculating Stars, Mary Robinette Kowal (Tor) The Poppy War, R.F. Kuang (Harper Voyager US; Harper Voyager UK) Blackfish City, Sam J. Miller (Ecco; Orbit UK) Spinning Silver, Naomi Novik (Del Rey;

The European Parliament passed the Copyright in the Digital Single Market directive, a unified set of laws governing intellectual property rights in the European Union, by a vote of 348 to 274. The law will not go into effect unless the European Council passes it with a “formal endorsement,” via a simple majority. Once that happens, each country will have to implement the law by 2020. The version passed includes

The winners for the 2018 Analog Analytical Laboratory (AnLab) and Asimov’s Readers’ Awards have been announced. Most are available to read online. Analog Science Fiction and Fact Analytical Laboratory Winners Best Novella WINNER: “The Last Biker Gang“, Wil McCarthy (5-6/18) “Blurred Lives“, Adam-Troy Castro (1-2/18) “A Stab of the Knife“, Adam-Troy Castro (7-8/18) “Harry and the Lewises”, Edward M. Lerner (9-10/18) Best Novelette WINNER: “Ashes of Exploding Suns, Monuments to

Tiamat’s Wrath, James S.A. Corey (Orbit 978-0-316-33287-3, $30.00, 528pp, hc) March 2019. Cover by David Dociu. There is an empire at the center of the eighth (and projected next-to-last) volume of James S.A. Corey’s Expanse sequence. Tiamat’s Wrath continues the story of the Laconian Empire (begun in Persepolis Rising, 2017), founded by a rebel admiral who is ambitious to have all of humankind under his rule and himself immortal. Here

Winners of the Tolkien Society Awards 2019 were announced at the society’s annual dinner on April 6. The awards “recognize excellence in the fields of Tolkien scholarship and fandom, highlight­ing our long-standing charitable objective to ‘seek to educate the public in, and promote research into, the life and works of”‘ J.R.R. Tolkien. The society’s trustees choose the shortlist, with winners chosen by the membership. Best Artwork “Durin’s Crown and the

The annual Rainforest Writers Village retreat, hosted by Patrick Swenson and Fairwood Press, was held at Lake Quinault WA in three sessions: Feb 20-24, Feb 27-March 3, and March 6-10, 2019. For more: <www.rainforestwriters.com>. This report and more like it in the May 2019 issue of Locus. While you are here, please take a moment to support Locus with a one-time or recurring donation. We rely on reader donations to

Smoke & Summons, Charlie N. Holmberg (47North 9781503905436, $24.95, 332pp, hc) February 2019. Charlie Holmberg has carved out a suc­cessful niche as a writer of speedy, fan-pleasing novels in a small constellation of fantasy genres. Smoke & Summons, the first book in the new Numina series, continues her work in the same field: it’s an urban fantasy set against a sooty metropolis, making use of religious corruption, blasphemous magic, de­structive

Ellen Klages’s novel Out of Left Field (Viking) is the winner of the $10,000 Children’s History Book Prize, presented by the New York Historical Society. The award “honors the best children’s historical literature in the United States and encourages authors to continue to create engaging and challenging narratives that provide a window into the past for middle readers and their families.” For more information, see the prize’s website. While you

The Tales of Beedle the Bard, J.K. Rowling, illustrated by Lisbeth Zwerger (Arthur A. Levine 978-1-338-26218-6, $34.99, 159pp, hc) October 2018. Cover by Lisbeth Zwerger An unexpected pairing of author and artist has yielded a big payoff in The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling with illustration by inter­nationally acclaimed illustrator Lisbeth Zwerger. This is surely one of the most impressive tie-in products to the Harry Potter universe

The five judges for the 2019 Philip K. Dick Award have been announced. Works of science fiction published as paperback originals in the US during the year 2019 are eligible for the award. Thomas A. Easton, 84 Commonmwealth Ave, Dedham MA 02026-1425 Karen Heuler, 13 Antler Drive, Sandyston NJ 07826 (until October 31) / 80 Charles Street Apt. 3R, New York NY 10014-6110 (after October 31) Mur Lafferty, 8311 Brier

Uncanny 1-2/19 F&SF 1-2/19 Interzone 1-2/19 Galaxy’s Edge 1/19 Granta Autumn ’18 Uncanny in January-February features a challenging story from Fran Wilde. (The last time I wrote about Wilde’s work I called both stories I covered “challenging.” I am sure I did it on purpose, and I am even surer Wilde does it on purpose.) “A Catalog of Storms” is built around names given to different kinds of storms that

General Strike by Norman Spinrad (Self-published 978-1091528574, $7.00, 61pp, trade paperback) March 2019. Outside the Gates by Molly Gloss (Saga Press 978-1534414983, $24.99, 128pp, trade paperback) January 2019. Too Fat to Go to the Moon by Rob McCleary (Zero Books 978-1785352317, $13.95, 160pp, trade paperback) April 2019. More Walls Broken by Tim Powers (Subterranean 978-1596068865, $25.00, 136pp, trade paperback) February 2019. The widespread interest in—and production of—novellas continues apace. Large

Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU) has announced a new retreat, Camp Writerhaven, for writers of all genres. Two sessions are offered from June 20-23 and July 14-20, 2019 to be held at the Rockvale Writers Colony in College Grove TN. Craft classes taught by award-winning writers are available during both sessions. For more information, or to apply, see the MTSU website or contact mtsuwrite@mtsu.edu. While you are here, please take

Shortlists for several Society of Authors (SoA) fiction awards have been announced, including titles and authors of genre interest. Betty Trask Prize and Awards The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock, Imogen Hermes Gower (Harvill Secker) Sweet Fruit, Sour Land, Rebecca Ley (Sandstone) The Water Cure, Sophie Mackintosh (Hamish Hamilton) The Betty Trask Prize and Awards gives £26,250 “for a first novel by a writer under 35” and is judged this year

Winners for the This Is Horror Awards 2018 have been announced: Novel of the Year WINNER: The Rust Maidens, Gwendolyn Kiste (Journalstone) Runner-up: The Cabin at the End of the World, Paul Tremblay (Morrow) Coyote Songs, Gabino Iglesias (Broken River) The Hunger, Alma Katsu (Putnam) The Listener, Robert R. McCammon (Cemetery Dance) Novella of the Year WINNER: The Writhing Skies, Betty Rocksteady (Perpetual Motion Machine) Runner-up: At the End of the Day

The Locus Bestsellers for May include top titles Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James, Burn Bright by Patricia Briggs, The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin, and Star Wars: Last Shot by Daniel José Older. HARDCOVERS Months on list Last month 1) Black Leopard, Red Wolf, Marlon James (Riverhead) 1 – 2) Binti: The Complete Trilogy, Nnedi Okorafor (DAW) 1 – 3) How Long ’til Black Future Month?, N.K. Jemisin

Jim C. Hines, Terminal Uprising (DAW 978-0-7564-1277-7, $26.00, 324pp, hc) February 2019. Cover by Daniel Dos Santos. Marion “Mops” Adamopoulos and her Hygiene and Sanitation Services team take their stolen ship, the EMCS Pufferfish, on a mission to Earth in this second book in the Janitors of the Post-Apocalypse series. In this future, the humans of Earth have all been reduced to zombie-like ferals, but some, like Mops and her

The African Speculative Fiction Society (ASFS) has announced the shortlist for the 2019 Nommo Awards. All titles “are speculative fiction, were published in calendar year 2018, and are thought to be by Africans as defined by the ASFS and Nommo Awards Guidelines. ” Best Novel Children of Blood and Bone, Tomi Adeyemi (Henry Holt) Knucklebone, Nechama Brodie (Pan Macmillan) A Spy in Time, Imraan Coovadia (Rare Bird) The Strange, Masha

The Lesson, Cadwell Turnbull (Blackstone 978-1-5385-8464-4 $26.99, 272pp, hc) June 2019. Although I could be wrong, I think The Lesson, Cadwell Turnbull’s debut novel, is an allegory for white interference in Black cultures, whether in Africa, America, or the Caribbean. I’m cautious of assigning this idea from inside my white skin, because I could be making a deeply insulting assumption. But if I am wrong, I’m listening to anyone who

Find your favorite animal in these new SFF books: dragons, trufflepigs, snake-haired gorgons, a trickster coyote, and a cyberpunk hero named Lion. New titles this week are by Sarah Beth Durst, Fernando Flores, W. Michael Gear, Paula Guran, Guy Gavriel Kay, Dean Koontz, Steven Kotler, Ambelina & Ezekial Kwaymullina, Una McCormack, Eliot Peper, Max Porter, Karen Russell, and Adrian Tchaikovsky.

Luna: Moon Rising, Ian McDonald (Tor 978-0765391476, $29.99, 368pp, hc) March 2019. I’ve long advocated to anyone who’ll listen (generally myself in the shower) that books in a trilogy or multi-volume series need to begin with a recap of the previous novel. The expectation that I’ll either remember the many plot threads and character arcs or reread the previous instalments is wishful thinking given my sketchy middle-aged memory and the

The Horror Writers Association (HWA) has announced the winners of the 2018 Bram Stoker Awards: Superior Achievement in a Novel WINNER: The Cabin at the End of the World, Paul Tremblay (Morrow) The Hunger, Alma Katsu (Putnam) Glimpse, Jonathan Maberry (St. Martin’s) Unbury Carol, Josh Malerman (Del Rey) Dracul, Dacre Stoker & J.D. Barker (Putnam) Superior Achievement in a First Novel WINNER: The Rust Maidens, Gwendolyn Kiste (Trepidatio) What Should

Voting has opened for the 2021 Worldcon site selection, with ballots available on the Dublin 2019 — An Irish Worldcon website. Voting is open to Full Attending, Young Adult, First Worldcon, or Supporting members of Dublin 2019 who have paid the voting fee (€40/$45). Only paper ballots will be accepted. There is only one qualifying bid on the ballot, DC in 2021, to be held at the Marriott Wardman Park

Finalists for the 2019 Ignotus Awards (the Spanish equivalent of the Hugo Awards), honoring the best works published in Spain last year, have been announced. Novela extranjera (Foreign Novel) El largo viaje a un pequeño planeta iracundo [The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet], Becky Chambers (Insólita) El portal de los obeliscos [The Obelisk Gate], N.K. Jemesin (Nova) El visitante [The Outsider], Stephen King (Plaza & Janés) Bellas durmientes

The Italian Conference of Fantasy and Science Fiction (Italcon) announced winners for the 2019 Premio Italia on May 4, 2019, during Vaporosamente 10 held in Turin, Italy. International SF Novel Ares Express, Ian McDonald (Zone 42) Science Fiction Novel Naila di mondo9, Dario Tonani (Mondadori) Fantasy Novel Il diario dell’estinzione, Maico Morellini (Watson Edizioni) Series Odissea Digital Fantascienza, various authors (Delos Digital) Anthology Next-Stream: Visioni di realtà contigue, Giulia Abbate

Finalists for the Tomorrow Prize and Roswell Award for short science fiction have been announced. The five finalists for each, and winners of two special awards, will have their stories read by celebrity guests during LitFest Pasadena. The finalists for the Tomorrow Prize for short science fiction by LA county high school students are “Wick of Adolescence”, Nicholas Kouchnerov “The Song Remains the Same”, Arin Krausz “Guardian Angel”, Ailun Shi

What’s a genre, anyway? Some have very firm, rigid rules, and deviation is so easy that it’s easier to say what isn’t part of the genre than what is. The dictionary definition states that genres have socially agreed upon conventions, developed over time (this is why, for example, the goalposts of science fiction and urban fantasy are forever moving). Well, we know when something isn’t part of a genre. HEA (short for “happily

Ian McEwan’s Machines Like Me (Doubleday) debuts on one more list, but drops on others.

Gwendolyn Willow Wilson was born August 31, 1982 in Longbranch NJ and grew up in Colorado. She attended Boston University, where she studied history with a focus on the Mid­dle East. After graduation, she taught at an English-language school in Cairo for a semester, then be­gan working there as a journalist, writing primarily about the Middle East. Her journalism has appeared in Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times Magazine, and

Dragon Pearl, Yoon Ha Lee (Disney Hyperion 978-136801335-2, $16.99, 310pp, tp) January 2019. Cover by Vivienne To. In the latest title from the Rick Riordan Presents imprint, Korean-American author Yoon Ha Lee transports traditional Korean animal folklore to space in an interplanetary adventure with all the thrills, spills, and surprises that younger teens could want. Dragon Pearl is a bit like the vintage “Perils of Pauline” serials (without the female

New issues of Star*Line, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Daily Science Fiction, Strange Horizons, and Tor.com

The Science Fiction Fanzine Reader: Focal Points 1930-1960, edited by Luis Ortiz (Nonstop Press 978-1933065670, $30.00, 406pp, tp) February 2019. Luis Ortiz is editor and publisher at NonStop Press, which had its origins many years ago as NonStop magazine. He has compiled several valuable studies of various artists of the fantastic — Lee Brown Coye, Ed Emshwiller. Jack Gaughan — and brought us such goodies as the two-volume assemblage of

Fairwood Press is taking over publication of the Jack Cady Col­lection, gathering the complete works of the late Jack Cady (1932-2004), a project begun in 2014 by Resurrection House and Underland Press. They produced seven titles in the series, which will be reissued by Fairwood with new ISBNs, and the remaining titles will appear in “the next few years.” The collected works will include all Cady’s novels, essays, and short

The Pleasant Profession of Robert A. Heinlein, Farah Mendlesohn (Unbound 978-1-78352-678-9, £25.00, 480pp, hc) March 2019. In The New Biographical Dictionary of Film, the critic David Thomson arrives at “a major but very difficult realization” about Cary Grant: As well as being a leading box-office draw for some thirty years, the epitome of the man-about-town… as well as being the retired actor, still handsome executive of a perfume company –

Saga Press, launched in 2015 as an imprint of the Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division, is now an imprint of the Gallery Publishing Group, effective March 20, 2019. Editorial director Joe Monti and senior editor Navah Wolfe remain with the imprint, and now report to Gallery senior vice-president and publisher Jennifer Bergstrom. Bergstrom explained that despite starting in the children’s division, Saga “has always acquired and published for a

The Ruin of Kings, Jenn Lyons (Tor 978-125-031638-7, $24.99, 560pp, hc) February 2019. One of the delightful conceits of Jenn Lyons’s debut – a much-hyped epic fantasy that almost lives all the way up the extravagant heights of its advance buzz – is that it is presented as an after-action report, a “full accounting of the events that led up to the Burning of the Capital” compiled by a man

“We’re living in a time of walls,” said filmmaker Alex Rivera when introducing Sleep Dealer at the start of the 43rd Williamson Lectureship April 4-6, 2019 in Portales NM. “It’s a global obsession. How do we tell stories in such a world? In my film, I try to cross the consciousness of walls by looking at them, through them, and beyond them.” Trans-border fantasies and nightmares were timely subjects for

Meg Elison hosted the launch of Parallel Lit, her new East Bay reading series, April 12, 2019 at Paulista in Oakland CA. Authors Rebecca Gomez-Farrell, Tim Pratt, Caroline Ratajski, and Juliette Wade read from their work before being interviewed by Elison and taking audience questions. This story and more like it in the May 2019 issue of Locus. While you are here, please take a moment to support Locus with

Tor.com 1/14/19, 1/16/19 Clarkesworld 1/19 Strange Horizons 1/19, 2/19 Beneath Ceaseless Skies #270 After a hiatus in December, Tor.com returns in strength with a pair of stories by two great authors. “The Last Voyage of Skidbladnir” by Karin Tidbeck (her first new story in a while) gives us living starships who inhabit skyscrapers like hermit-crab shells. Saga is a crewmember on the ship Skidbladnir when it needs to move to

The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition, Ursula K. Le Guin, illustrated by Charles Vess (Saga 9-781481-4655-88, $59.99, 993pp, hc) October 2018. Cover by Charles Vess. The Books of Earthsea is a staggering achieve­ment, the first time the entire Earthsea cycle has appeared together in one illustrated omnibus. Saga has expended lavish production efforts on this statement-making book celebrating the late Ursula K. Le Guin’s beloved Earthsea stories. Encompassing

Finder, Suzanne Palmer (DAW 978-0-7564-1510-5, $26, 400pp, hardcover) April 2019. The tropes and tools and furnishings of hardcore classical science fiction, as established and refined over the past hundred years or so, have proven remarkably durable, productive and adaptable. Humans colonizing the galaxy via FTL ships; robots and AIs; aliens; heroes and villains of operatic dimensions; new sciences and technologies; cosmic vistas. The apparatus and favored narrative strategies of such

Finalists for the 2019 Neukom Institute Literary Arts Awards for Speculative Fiction have been announced: Open Category Blackfish City, Sam J. Miller (Ecco) The Night Market, Jonathan Moore (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) Plum Rains, Andromeda Romano-Lax (Soho) Theory of Bastards, Audrey Schulman (Europa Editions) Red Clocks, Leni Zumas (Little, Brown) Debut Category Terra Nullius, Claire G. Coleman (Small Beer) Severance, Ling Ma (Farrar, Straus, Giroux) Infomocracy, Malka Older (Tor.com Publishing) Alien

The City in the Middle of the Night, Charlie Jane Anders (Tor 978-0-7653-7996-2, $26.99, 368pp, hc) February 2019. After the popularity of her Nebula Award-winning first novel All the Birds in the Sky, we could hardly blame Charlie Jane Anders for being tempted to double down on the goodnatured, geek-friendly genre sandwich of that novel, which cheerfully piled together ele­ments of SF, fantasy, and rom-com in a tale that finally

Winners of the 2019 Indies Choice Awards were announced by the American Booksellers Association (ABA) and include several titles of genre interest: Adult Fiction Book of the Year Circe, Madeline Miller (Little, Brown) Audiobook of the Year Circe, Madeline Miller, read by Perdita Weeks (Hachette Audio) Young Adult Book of the Year The Poet X, Elizabeth Acevedo (HarperTeen) Winners were selected by vote of independent booksellers nationwide and will be

» The New Yorker: Science Fiction Doesn’t Have to Be Dystopian; Joyce Carol Oates reviews Ted Chiang’s Exhalation » Guardian: Jim Al-Khalili: Top 10 end-of-the-world novels – from Ballard to Pratchett with other titles by Crichton, Niven & Pournelle, Baxter, Brin, Sawyer, Mandel, Vonnegut, and Jones » MIchael Dirda: Book World: Beyond George R.R. Martin: A critic’s pick of science fiction and fantasy reviewing Sladek, Ortiz, Langan, and others »

Tides of the Titans, Thoraiya Dyer (Tor 978-0-7653-8598-7, $19.99, 320pp, tp) January 2019. The first book in Thoraiya Dyer’s unusual fantasy series, Crossroads of Canopy, took place primarily in Canopy, the highest of three levels of a titanic forest filled with gods and their servants. The second book, Echoes of Under­storey, took place primarily at the middle level, Understorey. It stands to reason that her third book, Tides of the

17 new books include snakeskin clones, a road trip across a parallel dimension, a fence in NYC separating the Westside from Eastside, and a shapeshifting coyote car mechanic! New titles this week are by W.M. Akers, Neal Asher, Patricia Briggs, Ted Chiang, Larry Correia & Kacey Ezell, P.C. Hodgell, Danielle L. Jensen, Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff, Tim Major, Jack McDevitt, Seanan McGuire, Rudy Rucker, S.M. Stirling, Erika Swyler, David

The Odyssey Writing Workshop has announced recipients of several of its scholarships available for students attending in 2019. Kyle de Waal won The Miskatonic Scholarship, funded by George R.R. Martin, which covers full tuition, textbook, and housing, and is awarded to a promising new writer of Lovecraftian cosmic horror. De Waal was chosen by a panel of judges which includes Ti Mikkel and Carrie Vaughn. A. Humphrey Lanham was awarded

The shortlist for the 33rd Arthur C. Clarke Award has been announced: Semiosis , Sue Burke (HarperVoyager) Revenant Gun, Yoon Ha Lee (Solaris) Frankenstein in Baghdad,  Ahmed Saadawi (Oneworld) The Electric State, Simon Stålenhag (Simon & Schuster) Rosewater, Tade Thompson (Orbit) The Loosening Skin, Aliya Whiteley (Unsung Stories) Judges for 2019 are Kris Black, Rhian Drinkwater, Kari Maund, Chris Pak, and Andrew Wallace, with Andrew M. Butler serving as the non-voting

Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) has announced the results of its election for open Board of Directors positions. President Mary Robinette Kowal Secretary Curtis Chen Directors-at-Large Andy Duncan Jeffe Kennedy Sarah Pinsker Three positions for director-at-large were available. Additionally, Tobias Buckell will replace Lawrence Schoen, who earlier resigned. The election committee consisted of Kate Baker, Maurice Broaddus, Laura Anne Gilman, Cat Rambo, and Fran Wilde (chair). For

The Overstory by Richard Powers (Norton) and All the Names They Used for God by Anjali Sachdeva (Spiegel & Grau) are among the seven finalists for the 2019 Chautauqua Prize, given “to honor the author for a significant contribution to the literary arts.” The winner will be announced in late May 2019 and will receive $7,500 and “all travel and expenses for a one-week summer residency” at the Chautauqua Institution

The Locus Science Fiction Foundation has announced the top ten finalists in each category of the 2019 Locus Awards. Tickets are available now. Winners will be announced during the Locus Awards Weekend in Seattle WA, June 28-30, 2019; Connie Willis will MC the awards ceremony. Additional weekend events include author readings; a kickoff Clarion West party honoring first week instructor Elizabeth Hand, Clarion West supporters, awards weekend ticket holders, and

A Memory Called Empire, Arkady Martine (Tor 978-1-250-18643-0, $25.99, 462pp, hc) March 2019. Cover by Jaime Jones. The byline on the cover of A Memory Called Empire, Arkady Martine, is the pen name of Dr. AnnaLinden Weller, a scholar of, among other things, the history of the Byzantine Empire. That is appropriate, since this first novel is all about the byzantine politics of an interstellar empire, as seen by a

The Man Who Walked Through Cracks: The Collected Short Fiction, Volume Five, R.A. Lafferty (Centipede Press 978-1613472026, $75, 360pp, hardcover) March 2019. I last checked in with this essential series upon the release of Volume Three, reviewed at this very locale. All my praise, issued then, for sheer production values — and all my quibbles about the limited availability of such a fine series — still obtain, as does my

The winners of the 2019 Fan Activity Achievement Awards (FAAns) were honored at the Corflu 36 Awards Ceremony, May 2-5, 2019, at the Cambria Hotels & Suites in Rockville MD.