Aug 25 2020
What a stunningly awful book. I picked it up thinking I’d enjoy the thought experiment: what if George Washington had accepted the title of King after wresting American independence away from Britain? According to Katharine McGee, this would have dampened the global thirst for revolution, accelerated the abolition of slavery, and paved the way for …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/08/25/american-royals-american-royals-1-by-katharine-mcgee/
Jul 28 2020
I need P Djeli Clark to write me some meaty 300+ page books! He’s definitely doing great things with shorter works: 2019’s The Haunting Of Tram Car 015 felt fully realized despite its brevity, and I can only imagine that this year’s Ring Shout will only showcase his increasing command of the novella form. Unfortunately, …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/07/28/the-black-gods-drums-by-p-djeli-clark-2/
Jun 28 2020
Pacing, and the parts of the story not told, shape The Fated Sky the second book in Mary Robinette Kowal’s Lady Astronauts series. The Calculating Stars ended with Elma York, the series’ first-person narrator, on her way to the moon. By the beginning of The Fated Sky, there is a colony on the moon with …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/06/28/the-fated-sky-by-mary-robinette-kowal/
May 29 2020
Now this is more like it! John Hornor Jacobs concludes his trilogy of cowboys and Romans with style and panache, picking up the pace, tightening the narrative, and never losing the joy of pulpy adventure even as he delivers more complex characters and greater depth in this alternate world. As Infernal Machines begins, longtime partners …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/05/29/infernal-machines-by-john-hornor-jacobs/
May 11 2020
Ah, if only, if only. I’ve enjoyed enough romance novels to be able to differentiate between the wonderful modern-day version and the traditional version described by Sir Walter Scott, and only sometimes do the twain meet in ways more convincing than mere bad plotting. It’s bittersweet to feel that this charming tale of the First …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/05/11/red-white-royal-blue-by-casey-mcquiston/
Apr 18 2020
A Second Chance, the third book in Jodi Taylor’s series about the time-traveling historians of St Mary’s Institute, shows signs of settling in for a set of tales that is going to continue. Taylor dials the pace back just a bit from madcap to merely rapid, she’s willing to develop the settings the historians visit …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/04/18/a-second-chance-by-jodi-taylor/
Apr 13 2020
Come for the Alan Turing fanfic! Stay for the… um. Oh, dear. I knew going into this that it would be terrible, but I hadn’t realized exactly how terrible till I finished this utter nonsense of a 21st century novel. Ordinarily, I like to just review a book without taking into consideration anything the author …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/04/13/machines-like-me-by-ian-mcewan/
Feb 26 2020
Foreign Devils continues the cowboys and Romans mashup started in The Incorruptibles, a story that will conclude in Infernal Machines. I am very glad that I don’t have to wait for John Hornor Jacobs to write the third volume, because boy howdy is Foreign Devils a middle book. As the Ruman Empire strides through its …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/02/26/foreign-devils-by-john-hornor-jacobs/
Nov 30 2019
A Symphony of Echoes is every bit as fun as Just One Damned Thing After Another, the first book chronicling the adventures of the historians of St Mary’s Institute, who definitely do not travel through time. No indeed, they investigate major historical events in contemporary time. Which is how the first quarter of the book …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2019/11/30/a-symphony-of-echoes-by-jodi-taylor/
Nov 18 2019
I love it when the second book in a series is better than its predecessor. And make no mistake, this is not a standalone novel, despite the odd lack of signalling otherwise. You’d be doing yourself a disservice if you didn’t start with Nick Setchfield’s The War In The Dark, which sets the scene for …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2019/11/18/the-spider-dance-by-nick-setchfield/
Al Singh
Doug Merrill
Doreen Sheridan
Emily Lauer
John Pitzel
Lars N. Goldschlager
Laura Eilers
Professor X
Robert Maedgen
Sylvere Ap Leanan
The Shire