Dark Heaven

I managed to track down one more Nebula reading: “Dark Heaven”, by Gregory Benford, which is collected in The Year’s Best Science Fiction 25th Annual Collection edited by Gardner Dozois. Like most of the others, it’s a pretty good story.

Nebula 2008 scorecard

I wasn’t even close. I wasn’t surprised that none of my favorites won, but I guessed only 1 out of 4 right of the Nebula winners. Oh, well. It’s just a game, and I’m not even a player. Someday, someday.
Here. Have a another tulip.

Nebula 2008 Roundup

Much like last year I didn’t manage to read all the Nebula nominee. Not for lack of trying. I was able to lay hold of all the novels, but several of the anthologies weren’t to be found in the library. Maybe there’s less room in the budget to buy obscure small press collections. While I [...]

Dangerous Space

I’m not all that into music but “Dangerous Space,” by  Kelly Eskridge won me over by plugging me into what’s like for people who are. Mars is a brilliant “sound guy” who seems supremely confident and competent, untouchable save for one vulnerability–music. In the perfect little divey bar, the opening band, Noir, goes on [...]

Powers

It’s dangerous to come in at the third novel of a series. You might get bogged down in recaps. You might get dumped into the middle and left totally confused. Powers, by Ursula K. Le Guin, opens at a new begining. Gavir, a young slave in the household of Arcamand, looks forward to becoming a [...]

Little Brother

In Little Brother, by Cory Doctorow, Marcus Yallow is a smartass who delights in playing Harajuku Fun Madness and in evading the security at his high school. He and his friends are caught in the post-bombing sweep after a terrorist attack on San Francisco. After a harrowing interrogation, Marcus is set loose. Though he knows [...]

The Space Time Pool

I liked the opening of “The Space Time Pool,” by Catherine Asaro. It seemed a lovely setting, the Great Smoky Mountains covered with rhododendrons in flower and cicadas buzzing on a fine day in June. A lovely place for Janelle to go for a walk to celebrate getting a her math degree from MIT. Considering [...]

The Political Prisoner

In a moody story of an internal spy caught in the sweep of a coup, “The Political Prisoner,” by Charles Coleman Finlay is so dominated by betrayals, interrogations, and imprisonment, it’s easy to lose track of the setting: a planet where the terraforming is going slower than hoped and religion seems to be the main [...]

Baby Doll

The introduction to “Baby Doll,” by Johanna Sinisalo gives you an intriguing overview of the Finnish heritage in science fiction and fantasy.  Then it curtly informs you that this story is dystopian SF about children losing their childhood and dumps you into sexhell.

Pride and Prometheus

In a double pastiche of Jane Austen and Mary Shelley, John Kessel’s “Pride and Prometheus” introduces Mary Bennett to Viktor Frankenstein. Being a tortured romantic hero,  Viktor fits neatly into Mary’s world, seeming at first merely to be a moody, intelligent young man who is unaccountably intrigued by what Mary’s interest in natural philosophy. But [...]