Gav Reads

Tag: fantasy

  • Sunday Summary: 12th Oct 25 Edition

    Womble from Runalong The Shelves has been doing a weekly “Wombling Along” and highlighting reviews and other articles that caught their attention over the past week.

    Sunday Summary is mostly going to be my personal log of books and bookish things that have caught my attention — and may also serve as a public memory prompt/bookmarking system.

    Halloween is Not Far Away

    And this means that both the British Fantasy Awards and the World Fantasy Awards are soon to be announced.

    The British Fantasy Awards will be presented on Saturday 1st November, in the evening, at the World Fantasy Convention in Brighton.

    And

    The World Fantasy Awards will be presented on Sunday 2nd November, in the afternoon following the banquet, also at the World Fantasy Convention in Brighton.

    I’ve just realised I have three weeks to finish reading my selected shortlists from each!

    I’m confident I’ll manage the novellas — I’ve read three and have two to go. I’m about halfway through the anthology reading. I’m planning to read the novels as a group and continue reviewing the anthologies individually.

    I am reading them in the order in which they are presented in the shortlists, and as a reminder, here they are:

    British Fantasy Awards 2025: Best Anthology

    • Nova Scotia 2, edited by Neil Williamson and Andrew J Wilson – Luna Press Publishing
    • I Want That Twink Obliterated!, edited by Trip Galey, C.L. McCartney, and Robert Berg – Bona Books
    • Fight Like A Girl 2, edited by Roz Clarke and Joanne Hall – Wizard’s Tower Press
    • Heartwood: A Mythago Wood Anthology, edited by Dan Coxon- PS Publishing
    • The Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction (2023), edited by Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki and Chinaza Eziaghighala – Caezik SF & Fantasy
    • Bury Your Gays – An Anthology of Tragic Queer Horror, edited Sofia Ajram – Ghoulish Books

    World Fantasy Awards 2025: Best Novella

    • Crypt of the Moon Spider by Nathan Ballingrud (Tor Nightfire/Titan Books)
    • In the Shadow of Their Dying by Michael F. Fletcher and Anna Smith Spark (Grimdark Magazine)
    • Yoke of Stars by R. B. Lemberg (Tachyon Publications)
    • The Woods All Black by Lee Mandelo (Tordotcom)
    • The Butcher of the Forest by Premee Mohamed (Tordotcom/Titan Books UK)

    I’m taking longer to read Heartwood than I expected. The themes explore similar emotional and mythic territory, though from completely different angles. Despite their varied perspectives, they overlap in meaningful ways, which is slowing my reading pace. That might also be due to the weight of the stories — they demand attention.

    I think it’s going to be my winner. Not because the other anthologies aren’t excellent, but because this is a unique collection, rooted in a powerful myth.

    I thought Crypt of the Moon Spider was going to be my novella winner before reading Yoke of Stars, and now I’m not so sure. Let’s see what the two tree-related stories do for me, as Ryhope Wood has entrances everywhere.

    Back to anthologies — they’ve put me in the mood to read more. I’ve already started The Crawling Moon: Queer Tales of Inescapable Dread, and I’ll have read Heartwood: A Mythago Wood Anthology. So, after the winner has been announced, do I read the other nominees in the World Fantasy Awards Best Anthology category? They are:

    • Heartwood: A Mythago Wood Anthology, ed. Dan Coxon (Drugstore Indian Press)
    • Discontinue If Death Ensues: Tales from the Tipping Point eds. Carol Gyzander & Anna Taborska (Flame Tree Press)
    • Northern Nights ed. Michael Kelly (Undertow Publications)
    • The Dagon Collection, ed. Nate Pedersen (PS Publishing)
    • The Crawling Moon: Queer Tales of Inescapable Dread ed. Dave Ring (Neon Hemlock Press)

    Newsy Things

    Ebooks – Now Available from Bookshop.org

    There is more in the press release, but these are the highlights:

    • For the first time ever, UK indies will be able to sell ebooks to their customers
    • The launch marks Bookshop.org’s fifth anniversary
    • Bookshops will make 100% profit on every ebook they sell
    • A much-awaited alternative to Amazon to buy ebooks, at no extra cost
    • Bookshop.org to launch audiobook sales next year

    I use an iPhone and a Boox Palma (which uses Google Play), and I’ve bought a couple of books to test it out. The whole process was slick and easy—especially with Apple Pay.

    The app offers lots of control over the reading experience, but there are two things you should know. By default, it:

    • looks terrible
    • overrides the publisher’s settings

    But don’t worry—there’s an easy fix if you have the patience. Try turning on the publisher settings or fiddling with the options until you get it looking the way you want. The initial appearance actually encourages you to change it, and once you do, the text looks stunning.

    So don’t let that put you off. It’s great to have more big-company options for buying ebooks, and I’m sure they’ll improve the app to make it a better out-of-the-box experience.

    Kickstarter #1: I want to see Welsh Heroes Return

    They are Still Here (Maen Nhw Yma O Hyd) will be an anthology of contemporary fantasy tales of resistance and resilience. The threats will be very modern, but the resolution will contain a hint or more of the fantastic.

    This one is live but the all or nothing deadline is:

    Thursday, November 6, 2025 at 9:47 AM GMT (UK local time)

    Back it here.

    Kickstarter #2: A New Trip Galey Novel

    This one is coming in 2026. I loved A Market of Dreams and Destiny, and while I’m waiting on a sequel —which Trip has just confirmed is written and likely out in 2027—I’m excited to get a new novel‑length work in 2026 to fill the gap!

    The Fall of the House of Valenziaga is a high-stakes, science-fantasy family epic. If you love lushly imagined settings, strange magics and impossible sciences, and queer characters that are both smart and sexy, you’ll live for this latest tale from Trip Galey!

    Click here to be notified when the Kickstarter launches.

    THE IGNYTE AWARDS 2025

    The Ignytes seek to celebrate the vibrancy and diversity of the current and future landscapes of science fiction, fantasy, and horror by recognizing incredible feats in storytelling and outstanding efforts toward inclusivity of the genre.

    Hot off the presss is the winners to this year’s awards:

    OUTSTANDING NOVEL: ADULT – For novel-length work (40,000+ words) intended for an adult audience
    Winner: The Sentence – Gautam Bhatia

    OUTSTANDING NOVEL: YOUNG ADULT – For novel-length (40,000+ words) works intended for the young adult audience
    Winner: Heir – Sabaa Tahir

    OUTSTANDING MIDDLE GRADE – For works intended for the middle grade audience
    Winner: The Last Rhee Witch – Jenna Lee-Yun

    OUTSTANDING NOVELLA – For speculative works ranging from 17,500–39,999 words
    Winner: Lost Ark Dreaming – Suyi Okungbowa Davies

    OUTSTANDING NOVELETTE – For speculative works ranging from 7,500–17,499 words
    Winner: We Who Will Not Die – Shingai Njeri Kagunda

    OUTSTANDING SHORT STORY – For speculative works ranging from 2,000–7,499 words
    Winner: We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read – Caroline M. Yoachim

    OUTSTANDING SPECULATIVE POETRY – For excellence in speculative poetry
    Winner: Reliving: Post Trauma of the Lekki Tollgate Massacre – Fasasi Ridwan

    CRITICS AWARD – For reviews and analysis of the field of speculative literature
    Winner: Maya Gittelman

    OUTSTANDING FICTION PODCAST – For excellence in audio performance and production for speculative fiction
    Winner: Podcastle

    OUTSTANDING ARTIST – For contributions in visual speculative storytelling
    Winner: Tran Nguyen

    OUTSTANDING COMICS TEAM – For comics, graphic novels, and sequential storytelling
    Winner: Lunar Boy – Jes and Cin Wibowo

    OUTSTANDING ANTHOLOGY/COLLECTED WORKS – For excellence in curated speculative fiction collections
    Winner: Thyme Travellers: An Anthology of Palestinian Speculative Fiction – Sonia Sulaiman

    OUTSTANDING CREATIVE NONFICTION – For works related to the field of speculative fiction
    Winner: Afro-Centered Futurisms in Our Speculative Fiction – Eugen Bacon, ed.

    THE EMBER AWARD – For unsung contributions to genre
    Winner: Sonia Sulaiman

    THE COMMUNITY AWARD – For outstanding efforts in service of inclusion and equitable practice in genre
    Winner: Authors Against Book Bans

    Out This Week in the UK – ish

    (I need to do better at this as this is a last minute list category)

    • Itch! by Gemma Amor
    • Good Boy by Neil McRobert
    • The Possession of Alba Díaz by Isabel Cañas
    • The Night That Finds Us All by John Hornor Jacobs
    • All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles
    • You’ve Found Oliver by Dustin Thao

    Books That Others have Tempted Me With:

    I List My Favourites Reads Since 2022

    Do you ever get the feeling that you don’t read enough? I had that earlier in the week, so I wrote up a list of my favourites going back to 2022. It turned out to be a longer list than I expected:

    1. Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk trans. Antonia Lloyd-Jones
    2. Auntie Mame by Patrick Dennis trans. by Anne Milano Appel
    3. Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany
    4. ‘salem’s Lot by Stephen King
    5. The Old Woman With the Knife by Gu Byeong-mo trans. Chi-Young Kim –
    6. The Salvagers Trilogy by Alex White
    7. Magic For Liars by Sarah Gailey
    8. Alien: The Cold Forge by Alex White
    9. Siblings by Brigitte Reimann trans. Lucy Jones
    10. Death of a Bookseller by Alice Slater
    11. Broken Light by Joanne Harris
    12. What Abigail Did That Summer (Rivers of London #5.3) by Ben Aaronovitch
    13. The Indranan War by K.B. Wagers
    14. What Moves the Dead (Sworn Soldier #1) by T. Kingfisher
    15. What Feasts at Night (Sworn Soldier #2) by T. Kingfisher
    16. The Living and the Rest by José Eduardo Agualusa
    17. The Bandit Queens by Parini Shroff
    18. A Market of Dreams and Destiny by Trip Galey
    19. The Colony by Audrey Magee
    20. When Among Crows by Veronica Roth
    21. Starling House by Alix E. Harrow
    22. Calypso by Oliver K.
    23. Lake of Darkness by Adam Roberts
    24. The Drowned Woods by Emily Lloyd-Jones
    25. Rubicon by J.S. Dewes
    26. Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto tr. Megan Backus
    27. The Black Cloud by Fred Hoyle
    28. August Kitko and the Mechas from Space (The Starmetal Symphony #1) by Alex White
    29. The Undetectables (The Undetectables Series #1) by Courtney Smyth –
    30. The Stars Too Fondly by Emily Hamilton
    31. Goodnight Tokyo by Atsuhiro Yoshida tr. Haydn Trowell –
    32. Diavola by Jennifer Marie Thorne –
    33. The Last Hour Between Worlds (The Echo Archives #1) by Melissa Caruso
    34. The Grimoire Grammar School Parent Teacher Association by Caitlin Rozakis
    35. Crypt of the Moon Spider by Nathan Ballingrud
    36. All Systems Red (The Murderbot Diaries #1) by Martha Wells
    37. Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries #2) by Martha Wells

    I feel better about myself after seeing this, I’m not gonna lie.

    Outro

    Well, that turned out to be a much longer post than I expected.

    Maybe, next week, I’ll get back to my bookmarks.

    Until then — happy reading!

  • Sunday Summary: 5th Oct 25 Edition

    Womble from Runalong The Shelves has been doing a “Wombling Along” post for the last few weeks, highlighting reviews and other articles that caught their attention over the past week.

    This is mostly going to be about books and book-ish things that have come to my attention — and possibly serve as my own public bookmarking system.

    We all understand that acquiring books to read later and actually reading books are two entirely separate hobbies, don’t we? Good.

    Here is a curated selection from my recent acquisitions, starting with ebooks — some of which were irresistible deals priced between £1.99 and 99p:

    1. Victorian Psycho by Virgina Felto
    2. A Ghost Hunter’s Guide to Solving a Murder by F.H. Petford
    3. An Academy for Liars by Alexis Henderson
    4. Coffin Moon by Keith Rosson 
    5. Model Home by Rivers Solomon
    6. The Scholar and the Last Faerie Door by H.G. Parry 
    7. Artificial Wisdom by Thomas R. Weaver
    8. What Stalks the Deep by T. Kingfisher
    9. How to Defeat a Demon King in Ten Easy Steps by Andrew Rowe
    10. Reignclowd Palace by Phillipa Rice
    11. Cold Eternity by S.A Barnes 

    And now the physical books…

    1. All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles
    2. Once Was Willem by M. R. Carey
    3. The Healing Season of Pottery by Yeon Somin
    4. The Autumn Springs Retirement Home Massacre by Philip Fracassi
    5. House Of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
    6. To Clutch a Razor (Curse Bearer #2) by Veronica Roth
    7. Carrion Crow by Heather Parry
    8. Play Nice by Rachel Harrison
    9. The Most Unusual Haunting of Edgar Lovejoy by Roan Parrish
    10. The Haunting of William Thorn by Ben Alderson
    11. Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

    Have you read any of these, or are there any you’d like to read?

    2025 Lammy Award Winners have been announced.

    The 2025 Lammy Award winners have been announced!

    Selected by a panel of 80 literary professionals, the winners were chosen from over 1,300 book submissions representing more than 300 publishers.

    For over 30 years, Lambda Literary has championed LGBTQ books and authors. We believe that lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer literature is essential to preserving our culture — and that LGBTQ lives are affirmed when our stories are written, published, and read.

    Fiction and poetry

    • Bisexual Fiction: How to Fall in Love in a Time of Unnameable Disaster by Muriel Leung
    • Gay Fiction: Henry Henry by Allen Bratton
    • Lesbian Fiction: The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden
    • Transgender Fiction: Firebugs by Nino Bulling
    • Bisexual Poetry: Interrogation Records
    • Gay Poetry: How to Kill a Goat and Other Monsters by Saúl Hernández
    • Lesbian Poetry: Song of My Softening by Omotara James
    • Transgender Poetry: Girl Work by Zefyr Lisowski
    • LGBTQ+ Poetry: Cowboy Park by Eduardo Martínez-Leyva
    • LGBTQ+ Speculative Fiction: Metal From Heaven by August Clarke 

    Nonfiction and memoir

    • Bisexual Nonfiction: You’re Embarrassing Yourself by Desiree Akhavan
    • Gay Memoir/Biography: Radiant: The Life and Line of Keith Haring by Brad Gooch
    • Lesbian Memoir/Biography: My Withered Legs and Other Essays by Sandra Gail Lambert
    • Transgender Nonfiction: Pretty by KB Brookins
    • LGBTQ+ Nonfiction: The Other Olympians by Michael Waters 

    That’s a lot of books — and there’s more, since each category also has a shortlist.

    I do want to share the LGBTQ+ Speculative Fiction one:

    • Metal From Heaven by August Clarke (Erewhon)
    • The Palace of Eros by Caro De Robertis (Primero Sueño)
    • Markless by C.G. Malburi (Levine Querido)
    • The Sunforge by Sascha Stronach (Saga)
    • Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle (Tor)

    The good news for UK readers like myself is that Solaris will be publshing Metal From Heaven at the end of the month — and should be available in any good (or even not-so-good) bookstore.

    Good News About Two Lovely People

    ONE: Let’s start with a book that’s been years in the making—one I had the privilege of beta reading twice. Both times, it made me cry.

    What’s it called, and who wrote it?

    Everything Not Saved by N. M. J. Coveney.

    What’s it about?

    It’s a debut Queer YA novel that blends the emotional power of video games and the magic of young love with elements of horror and the supernatural.

    You can pick up a signed limited edition from Gay’s the Word, or order physical and ebook editions from any good bookshop.

    I hope you’ll grab a copy.

    TWO: Historian Sacha Coward has a new publisher—Manchester University Press! That means Queer As Folklore: The Hidden Queer History Of Myths And Monsters is returning to shelves in December 2025.

    ‘Queer as Folklore’ takes readers across centuries and continents to reveal the unsung heroes and villains of storytelling, magic and fantasy. Featuring images from archives, galleries and museums around the world, each chapter investigates the queer history of different mythic and folkloric characters, both old and new. Leaving no headstone unturned, Sacha Coward will take you on a wild ride through the night from ancient Greece to the main stage of RuPaul’s Drag Race, visiting cross-dressing pirates, radical fairies and the graves of the ‘queerly departed’ along the way.

    I’m going to buy another copy, because the original publisher—despite securing crowdfunding and the book becoming a Sunday Times bestseller—didn’t fully pay out the royalties owed to him. I’m also more than happy to gift a few copies!

    It’s been a bit of a busy reading week

    I’ve made some progress on The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater (I’m reading the hardback, so it limits when and where I can read); I listened to more of The Devils by Joe Abercrombie, but not as much as I would like; I got a good chunk of Heartwood: A Mythago Wood Anthology read, but I did get thrown by the novella by John Langan, as I was reading the ebook and didn’t know that I’d made a longer-reaching commitment and thought it was a bit slow (it was ultimately excellent). I also started and finished a reread of Crypt of the Moon Spider, and now I’m reading In the Shadow of Their Dying by Michael R. Fletcher & Anna Smith Spark.

    And if you’re curious this my The StoryGraph reading round-up for September.

    “The StoryGraph reading wrap-up summary for @gavreads, September 2025. Four books read, totaling 1,352 pages, with an average rating of 4.5 stars. Highest-rated titles: The Grimoire of Grave Fates by Caitlin Rozakis and The Last Hour Between Worlds by Melissa Caruso, both at 4.5 stars. All books were fiction, spanning science fiction, fantasy, and LGBTQIA+ sub-genres. Average book length: 357 pages; average time to finish: 15 days. Compared to August: books unchanged, pages up 11%. Formats: 75% digital, 25% print. Layout includes charts and icons visualizing stats.”

    I do need to revisit and share some of my bookmarked items—like the 116 genre books being published this month—but I’ve run out of Sunday. Maybe next week?

  • Sunday Summary: 28th Sept 25 Edition

    Womble from Runalong The Shelves has been doing a “Wombling Along” post for the last few weeks, highlighting reviews and other articles that caught their attention over the past week.

    This is mostly going to be about books and book-ish things that have come to my attention — and possibly serve as my own public bookmarking system.

    Let’s start with this stack of… I’m genuinely not sure what to call it… books?

    A stack of books that contains: 1. Direct Descendant – Tanya Huff 2. Valid – Chris Bergeron 3. Seascape – Benjamin Wood 4. The Undead Complex – Courtney Smyth 5. The Two Lies of Faven Sythe – Megan E. O’Keefe 6. Of Monsters and Mainframes – Barbara Truelove 7. The Incandescent – Emily Tesh 8. Isabella Nagg and the Pot of Basil – Oliver Darkshire 9. A Song of Legends Lost – M.H. Ayinde 10. A Granite Silence – Nina Allan 11. Hammajang Luck – Makana Yamamoto 12. The Starving Saints – Caitlin Starling 13. Zofia Nowak’s Book of Superhero Detecting – Piotr Cieplak 14. The Listeners – Maggie Stiefvater

    It was inspired by Roseanna Pendlebury

    Thinking about the things I would love to have read by the end of the year, and pulling together a few piles to drawn from as an aspirational to do list.I will not read all of these. I mean, I possibly theoretically could. But I doubt it. They're just the ones I really want to get in, if I can.

    — Roseanna Pendlebury (@chloroformtea.bsky.social) 2025-09-22T12:44:56.787Z

    and then Niall Harrison

    Right then, excluding review copies, here's my pile of aspiration/despair.

    — Niall Harrison (@niallharrison.bsky.social) 2025-09-22T18:31:44.781Z

    I badged mine as “the stack of books it would be nice to have read by the end of the year.” I added three caveats:

    But since I’ve made the pile with the intention of prompting myself to read them, I’ve started with The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater. One chapter in, I’m intrigued—but also wondering why I haven’t heard much about it from others.

    I haven’t reviewed my recent reads:

    • The Last Hour Between Worlds (The Echo Archives #1) by Melissa Caruso [2024]
    • Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries #2) by Martha Wells [2017]
    • The Grimoire Grammar School Parent Teacher Association by Caitlin Rozakis [2025]

    If I get the time, a joint review of The Last Hour Between Worlds and The Grimoire Grammar School Parent Teacher Association might be fun. Both are excellent, and both explore parenting in a fantasy setting—though in very different ways. Each had great twists and turns, and both had me emotionally gripped. I highly recommend them.

    And if you’re looking for something cosy in an SF setting, The Murderbot Diaries is turning into just that. Nice to see that Martha Wells has the adventures of Murderbot well under control.

    It’s October this week. The clock is ticking to get my reading in before the World Fantasy Convention 2025 announces the various award winners. I’m seriously going to need to weave in some novellas alongside the anthologies.

    The issue I’m having with Heartwood is that all the stories centre on the mythos at the heart of the wood—and speeding through them would do them a disservice.

    I’m sure I’ll figure something out.

    The dive into my BookTok bookmarks is going to have to wait until next week.

    This week’s Wombling along contains:

    • A review of Network Effect by Martha Wells, which I’m going to avoid until I’ve got to it myself.
    • A takedown of The End of the World As We Know It: New Tales of Stephen King’s The Stand. I read the last paragraph, as I still hope to finish The Stand and then read the anthology.
    • More praise for Uncertain Sons and Other Stories by Thomas Ha
    • An older, very serious discussion on the absolute canon to read
    • And so much more!

    Next week, I may wade into “what’s a reviewer for?”—as that was today’s hot topic on Bluesky.

    Until then, Happy Reading!

  • BFA25 Review: Fight Like A Girl 2 edited by Roz Clarke and Joanne Hall

    This is the third review from my challenge to read the 2025 British Fantasy Award Best Anthology category.

    In the introduction, Charlotte Bond writes:

    Whatever your taste, whatever you’re looking for, in these pages, you will learn one thing: how to fight like a girl.

    And I did — though I also found a few stories that weren’t to my taste, which is a shame. With fewer stories than the other anthologies I’ve read so far, the weaker ones stand out a little more — but never mind, there are still some standout tales here.

    K T Davies’s The Seamstress, the Hound, the Cook, and her Brother surprised me the most using a triptych to follow a crime through different eyes. Having seen the situation build from competing viewpoints, the shifting perspectives give the reader deeper insight into the final scene.

    Shifts in perspective are definitely a theme.

    One perspective I enjoyed — though I felt a little cheated by — was in A Human Response by Dolly Garland. Here a women’s body is replaced, and she finds herself trapped. Slowly, she pieces together what happens to her. The character is supposed to be without emotion, yet she has emotional reactions, which feels jarring. It also fades to black at a key moment in the ending, which I think robbed the character of the agency Garland had built up.

    In In More Trouble Than She’s Worth? by Cheryl Morgan, the narrator lacks agency, but her perspective offers some great observations. For example:

    I like the chrome in the sick bay, but am not convinced by the white. My crew have odd taste at times. I, by the way, am Sagaris, an Artemis Class cruiser of the Queen’s Amazon Navy, General Thomys commanding.

    And

    I got him though, didn’t I?, I thought proudly to myself. You can’t scrag a target without wobbling a few crew stomachs. A little non-fatal discomfort does the little ones good.

    In this tale, the crew picks up some very precious cargo. Morgan uses the situation to explore how women can be both mothers and fighters — and how that differs from their enemies. This one made me cry.

    The arrogance of men was explored by directly and successfully by both Gaie Sebold and Juliet E. McKenna.

    In Ambition’s Engine, Sebold takes us to high society, where a newly appointed Chief Defender of the Dominion’s Transport hatches a plan to get more from a train ride than he was commissioned for. Sebold packs in commentary about war, colonialism, and the arrogance of powerful men.

    With Civil War, McKenna examines the impact of a change in monarch when the King has no male heir. She explores the options available to the court and the guilds. This was a like watching a royal game of chess and I didn’t see final the move until it was too late. Very cleverly done.

    In the introduction Roz Clarke and Joanne Hall suggest:

    ‘…perhaps now we can look beyond a direct kick back against the idea that women can’t fight, and start to reintegrate more traditionally acceptable forms of feminine power with that warrior archetype.’

    And they’ve proved with this collection that fighting and feminine power take many forms — from the bloody, to the subtle, to the fearless — with motivations that defy the ‘warrior archetype’.

    If you don’t need convincing that women can fight, this collection is for you. There are some excellent stories here.

    And if you do need some persuasion, this collection is also for you — though you might end up a little more paranoid than before, as not all fights are direct confrontations or fairly fought.

    Anthology Details

    Title: Fight Like a Girl – Volume 2
    Editors: Roz Clarke, Joanne Hall
    Publisher: Wizard’s Tower Press
    Publication Date: Autumn 2024
    ISBN (Paperback): 9781913892845
    ISBN (EPUB): 9781913892852
    ISBN (MOBI): 9781913892869
    Format: Paperback, EPUB, MOBI

  • Challenge: Award Reading x 2

    Based on my last post on DNF’ing, this is probably unwise, but I’ve been thinking about setting myself the challenge of reading a shortlist or at least a category from an award’s shortlist.

    This idea was fuelled by the FOMO from seeing all the discussions around this year’s ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD. 

    Out of this year’s shortlist, I’ve read two, DNF’d two, heard very interesting things about one I’ve not read, and not heard a lot about the other unread one:

    • Annie Bot by Sierra Greer – see a spoiler-filled thoughts here
    • Private Rites by Julia Armfield – To Be Read
    • The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley – DNF’d
    • Extremophile by Ian Green – DNF’d
    • Service Model by Adrian Tchaikovsky – Read
    • Thirteen Ways to Kill Lulabelle Rock by Maud Woolf – To Be Read

    Whilst this was all bubbling away in my brain, another two award shortlists were announced:

    1. British Fantasy Awards 2025
    2. World Fantasy Awards 2025

    I floated the idea on Bluesky of reading and reviewing the BFA Best Anthology category, and I’ve publically committed to doing that before the announcement at the end of October, which will be done as part of the World Fantasy Convention.

    Infographic of the shortlisted titles: Nova Scotia 2, edited by Neil Williamson and Andrew J Wilson – Luna Press Publishing I Want That Twink Obliterated!, edited by Trip Galey, C.L. McCartney, and Robert Berg – Bona Books Fight Like A Girl 2, edited by Roz Clarke and Joanne Hall – Wizard’s Tower Press Heartwood: A Mythago Wood Anthology, edited by Dan Coxon- PS Publishing The Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction (2023), edited by Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki and Chinaza Eziaghighala – Caezik SF & Fantasy Bury Your Gays – An Anthology of Tragic Queer Horror, edited Sofia Ajram – Ghoulish Books Jurors: Kristen Platt, Steven French, Ariana Weldon, Stuart Conover, Jacqui Greaves

    The only thing is that I don’t think I’ve reviewed an anthology before, so I asked the experts. Runalong Womble gave me a great template:

    • How is the theme developed or explored throughout the anthology?
    • Does the mix of stories work effectively together?
    • Which stories stood out to you, and why?

    Thanks Womble.

    The World Fantasy Awards also take place during the World Fantasy Convention, and as I am planning on attending, I thought I’d also read and review of one of the WFA shortlists. This time, I’m going for the novellas:

    • Crypt of the Moon Spider by Nathan Ballingrud (Tor Nightfire/Titan Books)
    • In the Shadow of Their Dying by Michael F. Fletcher and Anna Smith Spark (Grimdark Magazine)
    • Yoke of Stars by R. B. Lemberg (Tachyon Publications)
    • The Woods All Black by Lee Mandelo (Tordotcom)
    • The Butcher of the Forest by Premee Mohamed (Tordotcom/Titan Books UK)

    That’ll keep me busy from now until October.

    I say busy. I do plan on completing the Clarke Award reading of Private Rites by Julia Armfield and Thirteen Ways to Kill Lulabelle Rock by Maud Woolf. And the TBR pile is overflowing, and I need to get it down.

    Are you planning on reading any shortlists from these two awards? If so, which ones?

  • [Contains Spoilers] What was the Point of The Lightspeed Trilogy? 

    Niall Harrison’s review in Locus magazine does provide answers.

    Beyond The Light Horizon

    However, I was unsatisfied with the ending. This feeling wasn’t helped by my e-reader telling me that there was 12% left. It ended on the first of what I was hoping were several post-script chapters. And I was promoted to post this on Bluesky: 

    I have just finished [Beyond the Light Horizon], and I feel like I have been cheated out of chapters at the end. Hmmmm.

    Have I forgotten that one of Science Fiction’s roles is to look at the big questions, and it uses a story wrapper to do that? 

    From my reaction to this work, it seems I have. Niall hasn’t taken much more away from the trilogy than I did.

    In a nutshell, an AI called ‘Iskander’ is a predictive AI that can anticipate your needs and set things in motion so they happen at the right time. Think of it as wanting to go out and finding you don’t have to wait for a taxi because it is already outside.  

    What it sets in motion in the trilogy is the discovery of Faster Than Light Travel, which results in a submarine/spaceship being built in Scotland. This then causes a chain reaction to open the world’s eyes to a deep conspiracy in which FTL has been a worldwide secret project.

    On reflection, this series is tackling a lot of big ideas: 

    • there are at least three versions of AI supporting/controlling the three main human geopolitical alliances 
    • the way the countries have aligned themselves
    • the socioeconomic impacts of those allegiances
    • the impact of climate change, either natural or manmade 
    • experimentation with evolution (and seeding/sharing flora and fauna) across different planets 

    After planting the seeds, MacLeod leaves it up to the reader to decide what happens next. And I think he does his story and audience a disservice here. Partly because he places his main character, Grant, back in a box and back on his original rails. And partly because there doesn’t seem to be anybody to take up the mantle. 

    Sure. Treaties are reinforced by force. New economic ties are arranged for between world trade are established but in the flashforward postscript those aren’t addressed for their impact or how integration between the Earth factions, and the other worlds they’ve colonised are working out – and more importantly for me if those other world inhabitants have been to Earth to establish themselves there.

    But overall, the grounding of Grant popped a bubble; it felt like the author didn’t want Grant to grow or change despite the extraordinary things he’d be instrumental in initiating.