May 10 2026
In its 152 pages of main text, A Scandal in Königsberg gives readers a study in religious weirdness, jealousies within small-city elites, the hazards of mixing church and state, bureaucracies and their tendencies towards compromise regardless of facts, and finally the unknowability of some parts of history. Conversely, it is a testimony to what can …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2026/05/10/a-scandal-in-konigsberg-by-christopher-clark/
Apr 19 2026
Translated from the Russian by Robert Chandler and Elizabeth Chandler Once again, I have finished a Platonov novel and I am left with the question of where to even begin. Chevengur is horrifying, and hilarious. It is surreal, and realistic; it is a blistering attack on Bolshevism, and full of characters asserting the correctness of …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2026/04/19/chevengur-by-andrey-platonov/
Apr 13 2026
Hello, dear readers! Today we have an excerpt from a thrilling novel that reads like it could have been ripped from tomorrow’s headlines! In his debut novel The Counterfeit, historian and national security intelligence veteran Ralph DeFalco depicts a disturbingly plausible near future in which China has won a Pacific War against the United States …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2026/04/13/the-counterfeit-by-ralph-defalco-excerpt/
Oct 07 2025
Hello, readers! Today we have a scene-setting excerpt for you from Heather Ogden’s debut Young Adult dystopian novel, The Betrayal. This first book of the The Lies We Fear series centers on Angelette Arabella, the seventeen year-old daughter of the most powerful man in Libertis, a megalopolis large enough to be considered a nation. From …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/10/07/the-betrayal-by-heather-ogden-excerpt/
Oct 05 2025
Where Miklos Banffy spends nearly 1500 pages of his Transylvanian Trilogy chronicling the life of Hungarian nobility across their half of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, in The Confusions of Young Törless, Robert Musil compresses much of the experience of the Austrian half into less than a tenth of that in a tale of life in a …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/10/05/die-verwirrungen-des-zoglings-torless-by-robert-musil/
Aug 12 2025
Hello, readers! Today we have an excerpt from a thrilling work of speculative fiction that falls under the cli(mate change)-fi heading, as a near-future scavenger finds herself embroiled in the murder of a powerful corporate figure. Triss Mackey is flying just under the radar, exploiting a government loophole that lets her live quietly aboard her …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/08/12/salvagia-by-tim-chawaga-excerpt/
Jul 24 2025
Ooh, look, a standalone graphic novel from one of my favorite creative teams! And, interestingly, an object lesson in how to write a book that doesn’t explain everything yet still manages to feel both satisfying and complete, which I’ll delve into more later on in this review. This is also my first review of the …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/07/24/we-called-them-giants-by-kieron-gillen-stephanie-hans-clayton-cowles/
Jul 20 2025
Officially, I’m taking a break from reading for the Hugo Awards this year. I’ve found participating in the Hugo process as a reader and voter wonderfully rewarding, not least because it has introduced me to authors I would have completely missed otherwise, but I’m also a conscientious voter, and that means I try to read …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/07/20/hugo-awards-2025-best-short-story/
Jul 15 2025
So it’s weird sometimes, when I’m trying to review the first book in a series where a large part of the plot revolves around a mystery. There’s a very delicate balance that authors have to hit in order to make the book feel both satisfying for the reader and like we really need to read …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/07/15/hourglass-by-barbara-mazzi/
Jan 13 2025
w Russ Wootton on letters. Okay, so about forty pages or so in, I was like, “Wait, is this an interpretation of Ultraman?!” Or a reboot or a retelling or what have you: I’m not familiar enough with the Ultraman property to say. So the very first thing I did after finishing this shocking and …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/01/13/ultramega-vol-1-by-james-harren-dave-stewart/
Al Singh
Doug Merrill
Doreen Sheridan
Emily Lauer
John Pitzel
Lars N. Goldschlager
Laura Eilers
Professor X
Robert Maedgen
Sylvere Ap Leanan
The Shire