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A Practical Guide to Conquering the World, K.J. Parker (Orbit 978-0316498616, $17.99, 384pp, tp), January 2022.

A Practical Guide to Conquering the World winds up the Siege trilogy K.J. Parker started with Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City. While that first book and the second, How to Rule an Empire and Get Away with It, were amusing and engaging on their own terms, the third installment ...Read More

The Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction, Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki, ed. (Jembefola Press, $6.99, eb) September 2021. Cover by Maria Spada.

Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki. You’ll want to remember the name because if the recent past is anything to go by, then you’ll be coming across it often, very often. Ever since he burst on the scene – with a Nommo Award for his 2018 story “The Witching Hour” – he’s ...Read More

A Few Last Words for the Late Immortals, Michael Bishop (Fairwood Press 978-1933846125, trade paperback, 250pp, $17.99) November 2021.

Fairwood Press has become the classy home to many of Michael Bishop’s fine books from his large and exciting backlist. They have now issued a dozen of his titles, all extensively revised by the author. But this latest compilation is something very different, a brand-new assemblage of poetry and flash ...Read More

The Second Shooter, Nick Mamatas (Solaris 978-1-78108-926-2, $14.00, 400pp, tp) Novem­ber 2021.

Having skewered everything from late-stage capitalism to America’s political and cultural malaise in his last novel, Sabbath, Nick Mama­tas boldly turns his attention to the intractable issue of gun violence and mass shootings with his highly entertaining follow-up, The Second Shooter.

The story centres on journalist and hack-for-hire Mike Karras as he travels across America ...Read More

God of Mercy, Okezie Nwọka (Astra House 97801-66260-0-838, $27.00, 304pp, hc) Novem­ber 2021.

Content warning: child abuse.

Supreme beings, elders, and ancestors clash in Okezie Nwọka’s God of Mercy, a decolonized, magical realist novel about a young girl named Ijeọma who can fly. Uncertain if her power is a curse or a blessing from feuding gods, a cast of bitter family members, sage elders, and violent pastors attempt ...Read More

Bad Witch Burning, Jessica Lewis (Delacorte 978-0-593-17738-9, 352pp, $17.99, hc) August 2021.

“I’m painting Will’s nails when she asks me to talk to her dead grandma.” Jessica Lewis opens her debut young adult fantasy Bad Witch Burning with a killer hook that, once you have finished the novel, you realize is packed with worldbuilding tidbits. Katrell is our protagonist, and she can communicate with the dead. When she’s not ...Read More

Lit Hub has announced its 48-title list of the best books of 2021. Titles and authors of genre interest follow.

• Detransition, Baby, Torrey Peters (One World)
• The Dangers of Smoking in Bed, Mariana Enriquez (Hogarth)
• The Vixen, Francine Prose (Harper)
• Light Perpetual, Francis Spufford (Scribner)
• The Scapegoat, Sara Davis (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• Dear Senthuran, Akwaeke Emezi (Riverhead)
• The Wrong End of the Telescope

Tusla City-County Library’s African-American Resource Center and the Tusla Library Trust have named Walter Mosley as the winner of the 2022 Sankofa Freedom Award.

The Sankofa Freedom Award is given to “a nationally acclaimed individual who has dedicated his or her life to educating and improving the greater African-American community.” It includes a $10,000 prize and an engraved medallion. The award will be presented in a ceremony on February 12, ...Read More

Penguin Random House, Amazon, and a number of authors including Sylvia Day, RL Stine, Stuart Woods, and John Grisham, have been awarded a total of $7.8 million after suing Ukrainian ebook pirate site Kiss Library.

They sued the site after copyrighted works were made available at discounted prices without permission, and without the publishers or authors receiving payment for the sales.

The judge said, “Given the extent of the piracy ...Read More

Nature’s Warnings: Classic Stories of Eco-Science Fiction, edited by Mike Ashley (British Library Publishing ‎ ‎ 978-0712353571, trade paperback, 320pp, $16.95) November 2021.

Being an anthologist is much like being a party host. If you have excellent taste in people (or stories) and know a lot of interesting people (or stories) and can instinctively or cleverly create harmonious or synergistic or even antagonistic assemblages of people (or stories), you ...Read More

Dream Foundry, a “non-profit dedicated to bolstering the careers of nascent professionals working with the speculative arts,” has announced the winners of its 2021 writing contest.

Writing Contest

Buzzfeed has announced its 22-title list of the best books of 2021. Titles and authors of genre interest follow.

For the full list of Buzzfeed‘s recommendations, see their post.

While you are here, please take a moment to support ...Read More

Mercury Boys, Chandra Prasad (Soho Teen 978-1-64129-265-8, $18.99, 360pp, hc) August 2021.

When Saskia Brown persuades her friend Lila to let her “borrow” a daguerreotype from the library archive where she works, neither girl can imagine that the old photograph will be a vehicle for time travel, romance, and a near-death experience. The twist in Chandra Prasad’s Mercury Boys is that the nightly adventures in the past are not ...Read More

Noor, Nnedi Okorafor (DAW 978-0756416096, $23.99, 224pp, hc) November 2021.

As vibrant and inventive as her settings are, Nnedi Okorafor’s most consistent theme may simply be the discovery of unexpect­ed inner powers. Zahrah the Windseeker finds that her dreadlocks give her the power to levitate and fly; Ejii in The Shadow Speaker learns she can hear at great distances and even read minds; On­yesonwu in Who Fears Death? not ...Read More

Discon III chair Mary Robinette Kowal has posted an apology regarding the controversial sponsorship of the Hugo Awards red carpet event by Raytheon Intelligence and Space, a division of weapons manufacturer Raytheon Technologies.

The statement reads:

I am Mary Robinette Kowal, and I was the chair for DisCon III. I take full responsibility for accepting Raytheon Intelligence and Space as a sponsor, and I apologize for doing so.

The decision ...Read More

Shoggoths in Traffic and Other Stories, Tobias S. Buckell (Fairwood Press ‎ 978-1933846187, trade paperback, 328pp, $17.99) November 2021.

The twentieth anniversary of Tobias Buckell’s first story appearance, “The Fish Merchant,” in Science Fiction Age for March 2000 (making him one of editor Scott Edelman’s many insightful launches), has come and gone without much ado, although by rights it should have been celebrated widely. For Buckell has become a ...Read More

Walter Goodwater, The Liar of Red Valley (Solaris 978-1-78108-911-8, $24.99, 359pp, hc) September 2021.

Red Valley, a dying town in rural California, pro­vides the colorful backdrop for this twisted dark fantasy novel. Sadie lives an outsider’s life as the daughter of the town’s Liar, but then her mother dies. Suddenly, Sadie learns she has to be the Liar, only her mother never told her how to take people’s lies, the ...Read More

Penguin Random House published their latest annual report on their workplace demographics, tracking their efforts to improve diversity. The majority of employees in both office and warehouse jobs are still white (74% and 75%), but 52% of new hires in 2021 are BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color). That’s an increase from 43% the year before. 17% of new hires were of Asian descent (up from 9.9%), 14% were ...Read More

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has announced their Scholars’ Best Books of 2021. The list includes titles and authors of genre interest, such as Colm Tóibín for The Magician (Scribner) and V.E. Schwab’s The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue (Tor).

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) has released a list of the best Canadian middle-grade and YA books of 2021. Titles of genre interest include Nafiza Azad’s The Wild Ones (Margaret K. McElderry), Wab Kinew’s Walking in Two Worlds (Penguin Teen), The Bones of Ruin by Sarah Raughley (Margaret K. McElderry), Liselle Sambury’s Blood Like Magic (Margaret K. McElderry), Children of the Fox by Kevin Sands (Viking BFYR), and Iron Widow ...Read More

The New York Public Library (NYPL), the Brooklyn Public Library, and the Queen’s Public Library have each released lists of their most checked out books of 2021. Many titles of genre interest ranked high in the lists, including Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Mexican Gothic (Del Rey), Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro (Knopf), and Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library (Viking). There are lists for young adult, breakout lists by borough, a ...Read More

This Weightless World, Adam Soto (Astra House 978-1-66260-063-0, $27.00, 320pp, hc) November 2021.

Recently, on The Writer and the Critic podcast, Kirstyn McDermott and I spoke glowingly about Olga Ravn’s The Employees: A Workplace Novel of the 22nd Century (longlisted for this year’s International Booker Prize). During the discussion, I pas­sionately argued (some might say ranted) that mainstream genre publishers no longer seemed interested in publishing radical science-fiction; that ...Read More

DisCon III has sent out an updated tracking email for positive COVID-19 attendees, as well as tips for fellow attendees, including suggestions to test five to seven days after the convention, and to wear a mask indoors in public for two weeks, or until testing negative.

There are now five people who have reported positive test results. The first was reported on Friday, and was a “false positive.” The next ...Read More

Embracer Group, a Swedish video game company, has acquired Dark Horse Comics, an independent comic publishing house. Dark Horse founder Mike Richardson, and Dark Horse COO Neil Hankerson will continue to direct Dark Horse operations, and there are currently no plans to restructure.

Richardson says of the acquisition:

I can’t express the excitement I feel as Dark Horse moves into this new chapter in our history. The synergies that exist ...Read More

The 18 winning titles for the PEN Translates awards have been announced, including the following titles of genre interest:

• House Arrest, Hasan Alizadeh, translated by Kayvan Tahmasebian and Rebecca Ruth Gould (Arc Publications)
• The Gospel According to the New World by Maryse Condé, translated by Richard Philcox (World Editions)
• Fairy Tales Are For Everyone, translated by Anna Bentley (HarperCollins)

With support from Arts Council England, the award helps ...Read More

The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) has announced Colin Coyle as the winner of the 2021 Kevin O’Donnell, Jr. Service to SFWA Award. The award is presented to “a volunteer of SFWA who best exemplifies the ideal of service to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.”

SFWA President Jeffe Kennedy remarks:

Summarizing all the ways that Colin has served SFWA feels almost impossible. He’s been ...Read More