Melinda Snodgrass

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More books

I am distressingly ill. There are a distressing large number of deadlines around about. There is also a distressingly large quantity of books, and none of them are the next lot of C.J. Cherryh’s FOREIGNER series, or the next book by Laurie R. King, which is all I really want to read right now… sadly.

Books, with tolerant sleepy cat.

Books, with tolerant sleepy cat.

Victor Milan’s THE DINOSAUR LORDS, D.B. Jackson’s DEAD MAN’S REACH, Melinda Snodgrass’s EDGE OF DAWN, John Scalzi’s THE END OF ALL THINGS, Dan Wells’ THE DEVIL’S ONLY FRIEND, Kieran Shea’s KOKO TAKES A HOLIDAY, and Barry Cunliffe’s epic BY STEPPE, DESERT, AND OCEAN: THE MAKING OF EURASIA.

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Books in brief: more books I didn’t finish

Melinda Snodgrass, The Edge of Reason. Tor, 2014. Copy courtesy of the publisher.

I wanted to read this — and its two sequels, The Edge of Ruin and The Edge of Dawn — for Sleeps With Monsters. The prose is strong, the characterisation interesting (one of the main characters is a bisexual cop)… and halfway through I realised I had absolutely no tolerance for the worldbuilding. It turns out I have as little patience for “all religion is a front for the forces of evil!” as I have for “atheism is a tool of the devil!”

It sort of sticks in my teeth.

Alex Marshall, A Crown for Cold Silver. Orbit, 2015. Copy courtesy of the publisher.

I wanted to like this. I know a bunch of people who really enjoyed it. But I appear to have something of an ongoing argument with epic fantasy — I appear to need it not be grim, or to not have very many POV characters in order to enjoy it. I got to about page 100. And then I had to admit to myself that I couldn’t give a shit what happened to anyone mentioned in the text: I either sincerely disliked them, found them tedious, or both.

Like Ken Liu’s The Grace of Kings, I think this will be a good book — even an important one — for people who aren’t me. But at least this year, it’s really not my cup of tea.

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Books arrived!

"This is my chair, human. I don't care what you put on it."

“This is my chair, human. I don’t care what you put on it.”

Courtesy of the magnificent folks at Tor.com, more books for me to talk about in my column have arrived. That’s Melinda Snodgrass’s EDGE OF RUIN and EDGE OF REASON, Mary Robinette Kowal’s VALOUR AND VANITY and OF NOBLE FAMILY, Alex Bledsoe’s LONG BLACK CURL, and Fran Wilde’s excellent UPDRAFT.

You might notice that the picture also contains a smiling villain. The cat insists the chair is his. I had to work around him.

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Recently arrived review copies

Four here

Four here

That’s Liu Cixin’s THE DARK FOREST, trans. Joel Martinsen; Seth Dickinson’s THE TRAITOR BARU CORMORANT; Melinda Snodgrass’s EDGE OF REASON; and Greg van Eekhout’s DRAGON COAST, all courtesy of Tor Books in one way or another –

And four here.

And four here.

– and P.N. Elrod’s THE HANGED MAN, Cathy Clamp’s FORBIDDEN, N.K. Jemisin’s THE FIFTH SEASON and Kit Reed’s WHERE, courtesy of Tor Books and Orbit Books.