Ghost Talkers Mary Robinette Kowal Tor Books Release Date: August 16, 2016 ISBN 978-0-7653-7825-5 Mary Robinette Kowal is the absolute queen of historical speculative fiction. First, in her Glamourist Histories series, she invokes Regency England but with a twist – her England includes an elegant magic, known as “glamour”, which allows a practitioner to reach [….]
LitStack Review: The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins
Published on :The Library at Mount Char Scott Hawkins Crown Publishers Release Date: June 16, 2015 ISBN 978-0-553-41860-6 When doing research for this review, I was gladdened to read that Scott Hawkins, the author of The Library at Mount Char, likes to do such ordinary and mundane (in a good way) things such as woodworking, computer programming, [….]
Flash Review – Defenders by Will McIntosh
Published on :Defenders Will McIntosh Orbit Books Release Date: May 13, 2014 ISBN 978-0-316-21776-7 Sometimes, after reading so much literary fiction, so much esoteric literature, so much finesse and its various accoutrements, a gal just has to have a helping of good old fashion military science fiction. Alien invasion! Plucky resistance! Mankind battling for survival! Will McIntosh’s [….]
LitStack Review: ‘God’s War’ by Kameron Hurley
Published on :God’s War Kameron Hurley Night Shade Books Publication Date: February 1, 2011 ISBN 978-1-58780-214-7 They say “the third time’s the charm”. I can’t speak as to the verity of that statement, but it took me three tries before I was finally able to make my way through Kameron Hurley’s dark speculative fiction novel God’s War, [….]
LitStack Review: Hild by Nicola Griffith
Published on :Hild Nicola Griffith Farrar, Straus and Giroux First Edition: November 12, 2013 ISBN 978-0-374-28087-1 Seventh century Britain: a time when men’s ambitions were larger than their means, when life was simple and hard and brutal. There was beauty, too, but it rarely lasted. Illiterate kings warred, scheming religions undermined each other, people survived and died. [….]
LitStack Review: A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
Published on :A Tale for the Time Being Ruth Ozeki Penguin Books Release Date: December 31, 2013 ISBN: 978-0-670-02663-0 It’s both easy and difficult to describe Ruth Ozeki’s contemporary novel, A Tale for the Time Being. It’s easy to give a simple synopsis: when a tin lunchbox containing a Japanese schoolgirl’s diary from years earlier washes up [….]
Bunker Hill: A City, A Siege, A Revolution by Nathaniel Philbrick
Published on :Bunker Hill: A City, A Siege, A Revolution Nathaniel Philbrick Viking First Edition: April 30, 2013 ISBN 978-0-670-02544-2 Non-fiction, historical books aren’t supposed to be this good. They aren’t supposed to be fluid and entertaining. They are supposed to be full of footnotes and impeccable, dry explication abounding with names and dates and events. Yet [….]
Gimbling in the Wabe – Love’s Labour’s Revisited
Published on :Last November, I reviewed an amazing book about an amazing occurrence in an amazing place. The name of the book is Shakespeare in Kabul, co-authored by Stephen Landrigan and Qais Akbar Omar. Ever since I read the book, it has simmered in my mind and heart. With LitStack featuring William Shakespeare as its Author of [….]