THE LUMINOUS DEAD by Caitlin Starling

A new review over at Tor.com:

[The] setup looks, in a nutshell, like survival horror: Gyre striving to survive in an inimical environment and fighting to maintain her autonomy against a handler who should be on her side.

Fortunately for us, Starling has written a deeper, richer, and more complicated story. The Luminous Dead is a story of two isolated people who have been defined (and who have defined themselves) by traumatic losses in their childhoods as they open up to each other in the darkness of a cave whose depths may prove unsurvivable.

TEMPER by Nicky Drayden

A new review over at Tor.com:

Temper is Nicky Drayden’s second novel. Her first novel, The Prey of Gods, was a weird and inventive thriller that combined fantasy and science fictional elements. Temper is a standalone work in a new setting, one that involves fantasy, religion, and a touch of steampunk SF. This review will contain spoilers, because there’s absolutely no way to talk about even half of this book without them—much less the more interesting half.

Sleeps With Monsters: The Spaceborn Communities of Becky Chambers

A new column over at Tor.com:

I deeply appreciate Chambers’ science fiction, and I really enjoyed this novel. Quiet, kind, character-driven books are wonderfully restful. Delightfully soothing.

MARKSWOMAN by Rati Mehrotra

A new review over at Tor.com. I did not greatly enjoy this book. I rather disliked it, unfortunately.

Markswoman is Rati Mehrotra’s debut novel. It’s also a book I really wish I’d enjoyed, because its big idea—sword-wielding telepathic lady assassins enforce the law while having internal politics that might involve murder!—is the kind of thing that feels like it should be tailor-made to appeal to me. And yet, reading Markswoman felt like a chore, a book that could only be read a couple of pages at a time, because its voice was about as compelling as old cardboard.

 

Books in very brief: Gorey, Carr, Turner

Edward Gorey, The Unstrung Harp; or, Mr Earbrass Writes A Novel.

Because I’d never read it before. It is a delightful thing.

Viola Carr, The Diabolical Miss Hyde. Harper Voyager, 2015. Electronic review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Read for review. It’s pulp, and not particularly good pulp. But it will entertain for an hour.

Marc Turner, When The Heavens Fall. Tor, 2015. Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Read for review. RUN AWAY THIS IS TEDIOUS AND TERRIBLE. ALSO IT HAS UNGRAMMATICAL EARLY MODERN ENGLISH.