Jun 12 2022
Elder Race offers an extended meditation on Clarke’s Third Law, some thoughts on cultural contamination that are not new but are important to Adrian Tchaikovsky’s characters, all wrapped up in a fast-paced adventure of swords and sufficiently advanced technology. The novella is set on Sophos 4, a planet colonized by humans during the first interstellar …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/06/12/elder-race-by-adrian-tchaikovsky/
Jun 11 2022
Forbidden love between two princesses. Forbidden not because they are both women, but because they are princesses, and relations between their two states are tense and unequal. Thanh is a princess of Bình Hải, in the south, nominally superior to its northern neighbor but falling back in relative power because of the neighbor’s greater access …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/06/11/fireheart-tiger-by-aliette-de-bodard/
Jun 09 2022
Myth, starfaring bots, near-future Nigeria, fell fae, artistic immortals and the magic of the mind all feature in the 2022 Hugo finalists in the category of Best Novelette. “Bots of the Lost Ark” by Suzanne Palmer sets its story on a large interstellar ship that just barely survived an encounter with hostile aliens and is …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/06/09/hugo-awards-2022-best-novelette/
Jun 04 2022
In my fourth time as a Hugo voter, I can see that while I like formal experiments in fiction and am glad to find them as finalists on the ballot, they don’t rise to the very top of my preference list. I’m not sure if that’s because the attention needed — both author’s and mine …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/06/04/hugo-awards-2022-best-short-story/
Jun 03 2022
When this won a Goodreads Award a while back, I tried to give it a go on Webtoons where it was originally published, but found myself bouncing off of the format — or lack thereof, tbh. I like my visuals to fit a single consistent page so I’m not scrolling back and forth to try …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/06/03/lore-olympus-volume-one-by-rachel-smythe/
Jun 02 2022
Hugo packets are out, hurray, and I have till August to read everything! Having already consumed and voted for the nominees in the Best Dramatic Presentation: Long Form category and reviewed the first in the Graphic Story category, it’s time to look at the Short Stories, which I’ll discuss here alphabetically by title. Links are …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/06/02/hugo-awards-2022-best-short-story-nominee/
May 31 2022
Wow, has this series grown on me! As with last year, I selected this title first of the Hugo nominees for Graphic Novel in hopes of getting it out of the way, but was pleasantly surprised to find that it actually does keep getting better from volume to volume. As always, an overwhelming amount happens …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/05/31/monstress-vol-6-the-vow-by-marjorie-m-liu-sana-takeda/
May 17 2022
Hurray, only one more book to read and I’ll finally be done with the 2020 Hugos, glargh! So this was an interesting novel. Good, but I can see why I never hear of it outside of this nomination, even as plugged in as I generally am to publishing and particularly genre circles. The Vanished Birds …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/05/17/the-vanished-birds-by-simon-jimenez/
May 04 2022
To be perfectly honest, I’m a little peeved that The Suicide Squad wasn’t nominated this year. It was by far the best superhero movie of 2021, even before launching the excellent Peacemaker series. Given what won last year’s award tho, I suppose I shouldn’t be so surprised that my tastes differ so greatly from the …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/05/04/hugo-awards-2022-best-dramatic-presentation-long-form-nominees/
May 03 2022
By reading the Murderbot series all out of order (2-5-6-1-3, with 4 lined up to read soon) I’ve not experienced its coming to terms with its freedom or its engagement with other non-humans as a story of continuous progress. On the other hand, knowing a bit more about where Murderbot is headed — including its …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/05/03/rogue-protocol-by-martha-wells/
Al Singh
Doug Merrill
Doreen Sheridan
John Pitzel
Lars N. Goldschlager
Laura Eilers
Professor X
Robert Maedgen
Sylvere Ap Leanan
The Shire