The Scifi-punk Bookfeed

Want to walk a mile in someone else's shoes? The Many by Sylvain Neuvel. Published by Rebellion Publishing Thanks to Rebellion and Netgalley for the advance reader copy of this remarkable book! When I was a teenager, I recall intense feelings of wanting to see myself and others through the eyes of other people, especially my family and friends. This remarkable novel explores that feeling. But not just one person, but a whole group of people, virtual strangers. What starts out as a melding of just two or three minds becomes something much greater, a hivemind. How would knowing and seeing and feeling everything through someone else's point of view affect your views, your mind, your beliefs? Inside we all have beautiful parts and ugly parts: desperate, lonely, sad, angry feelings, things we dislike about ourselves; but we also have hope, kindness, love, generosity, the pride of doing something good for others, the self-worth that accompanies accomplishment. Now multiply that by 2,...

Flips The Superhero Story on it's head!  Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots If you need to run a criminal organization, or a heroic organization, you need, simply put, people to do the work. The everyday folks, who keep the lights on, buy, stock, and fix all your stuff, brainiacs to crunch the numbers, balance the sheets, HR and accounting to pay these folks and allow them to have basic healthcare.  And let's face it, who's CEO boss isn't a little bit evil? This is the story of one such small cog in the giant wheels of a supervillains empire who uses the power of data, the stories that unfurl from statistics to fight against evil, or at least against those who are hurting people, lots of innocent bystanders, including herself. I had a blast reading this book; taking this journey along with our heroine from no one of consequence to someone to be reckoned with. Sadly, it doesn't matter if you are a woman with mighty and awesome powers or not, you still have a fight on yo...

  How do you know that chat, voice, or video is really a human or not? Your Behavior Will Be Monitored, by Justin Feinstein. Published by Tachyon  In all the reviews of books I have read, and I read a heap of science fiction, I have never used the word 'prescient' to describe my thoughts on a novel; that is until now. This is foremost a prescient insight into, not a distant future, but a tomorrow that is highly plausible, chilling, but maybe hopeful, if we heed warnings. Indeed a commentary on AI sentience and what it is to be alive. In my day job I work for a company pushing AI into every product, and every tool that employees use. This whole book was relatable in a deeply personal level. I work in tech, I understand introverts and I see the way COVID has affected social competencies. Perhaps this book also quickly befriended me as I work in an office environment, and this was secondarily a satire of office life, but augmented with AI co-workers. I smiled, laughed, and nodded...

A Cinematic Hacker Apocalypse! Zer0es by Chuck Wendig, published August 2015 by Harper Voyager I was hooked right from the start. It had me on the edge of my seat, hurtling forward as the cast of unique but tech savvy young folks are defined and herded up into a secret facility. The author's created still currently relevant ideas about hackers and artificial intelligence. I think too many things are done with the best of intentions but without the foresight or insight as to what effects they will have. That's something I took away from this book, besides the sheer entertainment value! (which is turned up to 11!) ***SPOILER The artificial intelligence plays the nemesis of our protagonists. ***  But our ragtag band of protagonists with big attitudes, and serious hacker skillz don't know what they are dealing with, and they must discover what is behind the madness that is spreading, in which humans are turned into almost zombie-like automatons, and what is the dark influence o...

 Grand Sci-Fi worthy of the Hall of Fame! Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie, published 2013 by Orbit Books How can I begin? This impressive book won the six of the biggest awards in Science Fiction publication in America, Britain and Japan. (Nominated for many more) It is my opinion that winning all the awards was absolutely deserved, and it is deserving of even more.  Welcome to my new favorite galactic empire! I’m a big fan of Dune and Star Wars and such. This book details a fascinating culture of conquerors and the conquered, and hints at rich cultures elsewhere in the galaxy. The moralities are complex and we are not given a simplistic good vs evil. It’s complicated and this universe is more interesting because of it.  Information and backstory is carefully and slowly doled out on a need to know basis, as two different timelines begin the novel, later to converge. Which is why I thought it started slow. I really wasn’t sure I would be happy with this story after the fir...

This Cyberpunk Political Thriller will leave you reeling and thinking! Infomocracy by Malka Older, published June 2016 by Tor.com Books Picture a world where a Google-like corporation has grown so large it IS the entire internet. A world where global video surveillance is pervasive, and many consider innocuous. A world that in order to seek peace most nations have disappeared and micro-democracy has taken hold: the entire globe is fractured into pockets of population who can vote for any ideology that they choose. The lines of division visible only in your feed. Cities still exist but every few blocks the laws and attitudes may change.  This massive corporation is called Information. Information controls not just the Internet but is the arbiter of global politics, sovereign nations have mostly been abandoned for groups of 100k citizens voting for a plethora of global political parties. Each party employs secret agents who “campaign” for voters. There’s deceptions, public misinforma...

Check out this Space Opera in all its majesty! To Sleep in a Sea of Stars by Christopher Paolini, Published September 2020 by TOR Books This massive book is Space Opera in all its Space Opera trope glory! This is my first Paolini book, I say that to inform other readers of my ignorance of Mr. Paolini's style previous to this book. But I was engaged and the action keeps coming fast and furious. Like a certain classic Space Opera, the story is loaded with religious / mystical overtones and certain characters sole purpose seems to be to spout mysterious phrases and encourage our protagonist with popular philosophy. Our protagonist along with a motley band of smugglers set forth on an epic quest to save the galaxy, by means of finding an object of great power. Our reluctant heroes are pulled along via alien visions and pushed into fulfilling an enormous destiny. Humankind face a possible extinction-level threat, and only one person can save them! This is not fully a "chosen one...

 Sci-Fi Trilogy's Massive Conclusion! Light of Impossible Stars by Gareth L. Powell, published February 2020 by Titan Books This is Powell's action packed and stunning conclusion to the Embers of War trilogy, a space adventure epic in scope and vision. According to Wikipedia, a "Space Opera" is charaterized by: " space  warfare, melodramatic adventure, interplanetary battles, chivalric romance and risk-taking."  The Embers of War trilogy may share some similarities with that definition: space warfare, interplanetary battles, risk-taking, for example. The adventure is, I would say, quite intense and grounded in realistic choices and emotions. Powell writes excellent and deeply felt characters, and does not shy away from tragedy or the death of viewpoint characters amidst terrible conflict. But melodramatic? No. Also, the few bits of romance sprinkled lightly in these books I would not classify as chivalric, but modern. So is it Space Opera. No, it's bet...

Blockbuster Thrillride You Won't Want to Put Down! Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel  Published 2016 by Del Rey Books     I've never read anything quite like this, at least not written in this style. The back cover of the paperback promised "a page-turner of the highest order", and "a sheer blast from start to finish."     I can only agree outstandingly with those statements! This book grabs you and takes you on an incredible ride even though most of the action happens as interviews or phone calls. It's amazing how gripping the action was in an interview room when things being described are so incredible! The writing and the format are so easy and fast to read, I tore through this book faster than I've any other book in the past couple of years!     This is the story of almost-first contact and the social and political ramifications of that incident rippling across the globe. It features a very scientific approach to giant mecha robots, and I am ha...

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue StarWars : The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, Rise of Skywalker from Lucasfilm SPOILERS: Yes. During the production of The Force Awakens the hype train was full steam ahead and I was riding on it! Writer/director JJ Abrams spoke of wanting to give something good to the existing fans, but also wanting to create a 'new mythology' for a new generation of Star Wars fans for whom this new trilogy would be their first experience and have ownership of it. I respected this approach and it excited me. I wanted something new and fresh in the Star Wars universe, that would take the galaxy far, far away in new directions, which would be thrilling for old fans like me and capture the imagination of new young fans.  I grew up with the original trilogy. My dad took us to stand in lines that wrapped around the blocks to watch the movies when I was seven to ten years old. I watched those original trilogy movies so many ti...

Robust, whirlwind adventure that will give you feels, make you laugh, and long for more! Network Effect by Martha Wells (Murderbot Diaries #5) published May 2020 by Tor.com Books Please forgive me for the cliche, but it feels apropos for this book: Like a fine wine that improves with age, The Murderbot Diaries just keep getting better the more Martha Wells writes it. This book, Network Effect, is the first full length novel in the series and continues the trend of growing and improving with age! We finally get the space (no pun intended) to flesh out a bit more of the human clients (friends? no it would not admit to that) Murderbot takes care of. The fallout from the first four books is having effects on everyone. Then the plot brilliantly goes from bad to much worse, and continues to escalate! Murderbot does his level best to muddle through the confusion while dealing with the most mammoth of difficulties, emotions, while trying not to simply kill everything. With clients in constant...

A potent and powerful warning for today and tomorrow! Attack Surface by Cory Doctorow, coming from Tor Books in October 2020 I received an advance copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review. I’m not going to recap all the plot points of this book, blurbs exist for a reason. I am going to express my opinions on the story, the writing, and the message.  Attack Surface is potent and powerful in its message and extremely timely given current world events. This book will scare the crap out of you, in a good way, because it’s meant to wake you up. To make you think about the ways technology is being used and manipulated, to use and manipulate people. A very plausible and frightening warning of where this world could be a few weeks from now.  But I also had some real problems with this book: I found it very frustrating to read until I was in the last 25%. Basically, when the author stopped jumping backwards in time to earlier parts of the main characters life, and stu...

Multiple Award nominated, must read sci-fi thriller! Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty, from Orbit Books, published January 2017 This is a locked room murder mystery in space among the six crew members of a colony ship headed to a new world. But one of them is a murderer. They awake to find their previous clone bodies murdered, the ship off course and the ship's computer intelligence offline. As the story progresses on the ship, as each crew member works through mounting tension, we are taken into the backstory of each crew member which deepens the characters and simultaneously makes each of them seem a more likely suspect. Each crew member is a criminal in one fashion or another, and they all have a common link! By far, the most fun and exciting and engrossing book I read in 2018. Its extremely well thought out and kept me on the edge of my seat, turning pages rapidly! This book is just so much fun to read, keeps you guessing to the end and kept the tension ratcheted. This is a...

A lighthearted fun adventure for young teens or tweens. I Have A Hunch by Jeremy DeCoursey, Self-Published, out November 2019 This is a quite charming, young teen mystery that sometimes occasionally becomes a little silly. (Which the author freely acknowledges) Our heroine visits her eminently famous, private detective Uncle as a summer job. Her uncle then gets hired to solve a murder, and Alice, our protagonist, is swept along investigating the site, interviewing witnesses, all of whom seem suspicious. Eventually even running afoul of the murderer and having to try to apprehend the killer while not becoming the next victims! But all is brought to a happy conclusion. Running in the background is another more curious mystery, one that is not resolved in this book but appears to be setup to run throughout a series, of which this is the first book. There are many classic Holmesian tropes in play here: Alice's uncle is the brilliant detective, Alice is a Watsonish every-pe...

Epic Space Opera, Big Action, Big Thrills Embers of War by Gareth L. Powell from Titan Books I admit to binging on space opera's lately: Last year I went through Ann Leckie's Ancilliary Justice trilogy, which was so incredible it reenergized my passion for space opera, (I do plan on reviewing here soon!) The Prefect by Alastair Reynolds, an absolute nail biter with fascinating concepts, and Unconquerable Sun by Kate Elliott was breathless entertainment and intrigue on a grand cinematic scope. Now that Mr. Powell's full Embers of War trilogy is released and on my bookshelf, I plan on tearing through them with all speed. His first book, Embers of War, sets the bar high and did an excellent job drawing me in and establishing the pace quickly! Mr. Powell did a nice job handling the difficult emotions of regret over past deeds and the harm you cause the world, or universe in this case. I also greatly enjoyed his take on space ship AI and their origins and how that affe...

Unexpected, masterfully crafted, original epic fantasy. Updraft by Fran Wilde, published September 2015 by TOR Books A wholly original world, unlike anything I’ve read before! I would classify this superb novel as technically an epic fantasy, but in a world without magic, with shades of steampunk technology, a conspiracy that rocked me to the core, and a mystery that drove me to devour this book as fast as I could. I say epic fantasy because of it's scope, but not geographically as most epic fantasies are: making arduous journeys across continents to fulfill terrible fates, or find fabled lost quarry, battling with their enemies, their own fears and against nature itself. And I love that about epic fantasy. But this story stays isolated geographically into a large city in the sky whose very existence itself, and the question of why there are no other cities like this, is part of the very deep mystery. As the beginning of a series, do not expect the answers to many of th...

Admittedly I am a big fan of Hank’s YouTube series and podcast. An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green from Dutton Books Couldn’t put this book down! Devoured it in practically one day, and that’s saying something as I am a slow reader, something I wish to change about myself. Hank wrote an exciting, witty, and insightful book about first contact and the deceptive power of fame. A book of first contact (perhaps) approached in a way I’ve never read before. He made me feel strongly for the characters, I really admired how in just a few pages we got to understand, relate to and empathize with Andy and April, especially informing the reader of their personalities through some quick dialog which to me felt authentic. The plot unraveling was handled quite well, it was watching a train wreck in slow motion while the main character made more and more self-destructive choices, but I could not look away. But also the mysteries and the puzzles kept me going and wanting to se...

I won an ARC of this book from TOR.com, and I couldn’t be happier I did! Thank you TOR Books! Unconquerable Sun by Kate Elliott, due out from TOR Books July 2020 I’ll admit, this book caught me off guard. It started by introducing a cast of aristocrats and palace intrigue, and slowly built up a wide set of characters cutting a swath across many economic classes in a galactic empire. It was slowly building the world, and I loved the world-building and the mysteries that began to take shape, so it kept me reading... until something literally blows up! Then the rocket boosters hard burn and the story accelerates with g-forces so intense it hurt to put the book down! I couldn’t stop myself, I was so quickly invested in these bickering characters and this crazy story! I was fully caught up in the riptide as the tension continued to ratchet up, betrayal and political machinations unfolded and reformed over again! The pace doesn’t relent to the end, and the intrigues deepen a...