Two books have I finished lately, and two only.
(Although I’m closing on the final pages of W.H.R. Rivers’ Medicine, Magic and Religion, from the Routledge Classics series: early anthropologists are strangely entertaining, with their “lowly peoples,” “savage man,” and “rude culture.” And by entertaining, I mean, he’s interesting, but I still cringe.)
Deep Down, by Deborah Coates
Deborah Coates, Deep Down. Tor, 2013. ARC courtesy of the publisher.
Coates marries the chill of a proper ghost story to vivid characterisation and deeply-felt landscape. Contemporary fantasy, sequel to Wide Open. Great voice. Although Wide Open was very good, this is better. I strongly recommend both of them.
(Longer review on submission elseweb.)
When We Wake, by Karen Healey
Karen Healey, When We Wake. Little, Brown & Co., 2013. ARC courtesy of the publisher.
Excellent YA meets brilliant science fiction. I am inarticulate in its regard: I am trying, still, to disentangle the things that I admire about it now, as a work of literature that appeals to me as an adult, from the things that should make it work for its target audience, and I think it comes down to voice. Healey really nails voice: her own authorial voice, and the voice of When We Wake‘s protagonist, Tegan.
It appears that the good folks at Galactic Suburbia like the work I’ve been doing in the Tor.com column. Since I appear on the shortlist for their Galactic Suburbia award. (Around minute 30.)
This is baffling, and weird, and altogether marvelously validating.
Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea 
Congratulations! And well deserved, of course.
I dunno about deserved, but the nod is certainly appreciated. *g*
Oh, pshaw. You’re a shining beacon of genre discourse. I shall dedicate a verse to you in my upcoming poetry cycle about the world of SFF blogging.
Do that, and I’ll write you a limerick that doesn’t rhyme:
“There once was a blogger called Stefan
who knew how to blog with his poem on:
when he wrote a sonnet
Nathan Fillion lost his bonnet
and said Thus endeth the lesson.”
(ETA: And doesn’t have any logic, either. Still. Limerick!)