Reading the Hugos: Best Novella 2026

 A roundup of this year's novella nominees.

It's Hugo time bay-beeeeeee. I love awards season. There's a lot of reasons for that, but honestly the main one is that it's the time of year when the conversation all aligns and we're discussing the same books as each other, picking at things and having big thoughts about them, and through them into genre and how it's doing at the moment. Delightful!

And so, in the spirit of doing my part, I'm going to chat about one of this year's Hugo categories, one particularly dear to my heart: the novella.

For those not familiar, the novella category looks at science fiction or fantasy stories published or translated into English during the previous calendar year, which specifically are works of fiction of between 17,500 and 40,000 words in length. Still chunky enough to feel like a whole book, but short enough you can binge them in a sitting if you're so inclined, I find novellas such a nicely digestible format, perfectly in between a full novel and short fiction. There's a lot you can do with that, and I am just incredibly fond of it as a format, and so I read a fair few in any given year.

Which alas means that, as in this year, I'm a bit disappointed when the Hugo shortlist isn't representative of the good things out there in the ecosystem. I'll get into the specifics of the books themselves in a minute, but in my view, this is an unfortunately weak shortlist when taken collectively. It draws heavily from a single publisher (Tor, as is often the way) but even when doing so, manages not to represent the best of what they have to offer, because whatever else you might want to say about the situation, Tor does put out a robust and substantial offering of novellas every year from which we can draw. This just... ain't it. I'll come back to that a little more at the end. But first, let's actually talk through the works in question:

The shortlist this year contains:

• The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar (Tordotcom; Arcadia UK) 
• What Stalks the Deep by T. Kingfisher (Nightfire; Titan UK) 
• Cinder House by Freya Marske (Tordotcom; Tor UK) 
• Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz (Tordotcom)
• The Summer War by Naomi Novik (Del Rey US; Del Rey UK) 
• Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite (Tordotcom)

Going from the top, then:

The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar.

This is, for me, unquestionably the best book on the shortlist. I read it almost immediately when it came out, and was delighted to find it showcased El-Mohtar's signature lyrical approach to prose magnificently. Inspired by and loosely retelling the story of The Bonny Swans, there is a strong sense of folk music that underpins the story-logic and stylings, and El-Mohtar has done a lot of good work to do this in a way that feels distinct from just fairytales or mythic retellings: it is emphatically folk music that forms the bedrock. Which of course means there's a lot of horrible to go along with the fantastical. Folk songs are rarely cheery things. The ending is perhaps slightly happier than I might expect from the context, but still feels thoroughly in keeping with the tone.

The whole thing is intensely readable, with an interesting approach to magic (referred to as "grammar" and left delightfully slippery as to its specifics), a believable sisterly relationship, and a fairy-world that has the necessary alien quality to feel truly detached from human things.

My only criticism of it is that, in the year or so since I read it, it has mostly slipped out of my memory, especially in the specifics. It's a book of tone and feeling, and that feeling persists, but the details easily and quickly fuzzed over. Even so, it was excellent, and I think it would be an entirely worthy winner.

What Stalks the Deep by T. Kingfisher (Sworn Soldier #3)

For all that I didn't love What Moves the Dead, the first in the Sworn Soldier series of novellas and a retelling of The Fall of the House of Usher, I will wholeheartedly admit that it was intensely creepy. I don't particularly like creepy, but I salute the success of it there and did not want to read the book at night or in the dark. That feels like a goal well achieved.

What Stalks the Deep... does not achieve that. It has all the ingredients to do so, inspired as it is by an H. P. Lovecraft story (At the Mountains of Madness) with its mysterious cave, inexplicable glowing lights, missing men, horrible noises and so on. And yet, tonally, it feels consistently soft and gentle. I never had any concern that things wouldn't turn out, in some way, alright, more or less. Despite moments that really ought to be terrifying, of the claustophobia of mine tunnels, of suffocation and near death experience... somehow none of it actually manages the emotional payoff of terror, or even a light disquiet. I'd wonder perhaps if this is Kingfisher's typical humour working counter to the aims of the story, but both managed to co-exist in What Moves the Dead, so I find myself at a bit of a loss about it all.

The loss of the horror does not really seem to come with the addition of much else though, which leaves the story feeling oddly insubstantial. Shortly after I put it down, I described it as having "passed frictionless through my brain", which I hold even more true the more time passes. The writing, the wry self-deprecating humour at oneself and society, remains distinctively in Kingfisher's voice, making it a very easy, pleasant read. There's just not much else to hang your hat on, alas. 

Cinder House by Freya Marske

This is the first of the two fairytale-style stories proper, though I would group them along with The River Has Roots into a loose theme. Folk song and fairytale do share a fair bit of thematic ground. This one is, like The River Has Roots, a retelling of a specific story: Cinderella, in this case. However, it's a rather more vicious version than the one we might be used to. Especially because Cinderella - Ella - dies at the beginning of the story.

Marske remakes the fairytale into the afterlife of Ella's furious ghost, having to co-exist with her stepmother and stepsisters after the murder of her father. In this reimagining, the magic of the house absorbs her at the point of death, allowing her to become a sort of ghostly embodiment of its magic, visible only to those who live there and, initially, bound by its confines. The original themes of the Cinderella story remain, as do some of the critical plot beats (including the ball), but they are remade by coming in the wake of the worst already happening. To some extent, the stepmother has won, and so the stakes, what winning might look like, what revenge might mean, are remade too.

Marske also adds a little depth of characterisation to the stepmother (who now has her motives, though they don't exculpate her) and to the dead father, as well as granting a little more agency to one of the step-daughters, and critically makes the prince a character in his own right, rather than the embodiment of the freedom Ella craves. And the ending is more complex (and queerer) than one might imagine.

That being said, it does not truly escape the risk of all fairytale retellings. It's got a twist of difference to it, but it's still stuck telling us a story we already know. And I don't think, ultimately, the twist is enough to convince me it was worth the retelling. The changes amplify much of the original themes, but don't really change them. It's relatively well done, but I don't think exemplary.

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

I did not like this book. I did not like it at all. It's also one of the kind of books that does not bear up under the lingering scrutiny I tend to direct at awards nominees: the more I think about it, the more it falls apart, even on its key themes and ideas. It is, and here I am using this word again, incredibly insubstantial.

The story follows a group of robots waking up in a shop in California, having been turned off by the shop owners (who have disappeared). The bots, mostly, really need to be working - they have debts to pay, of various sorts - and so, in the absence of the existing restaurant, they decide to set up their own and just hope no one notices that it's not human run. It is fairly obvious from the outset that this will work, and that this is meant to be a relatively cosy story of community and success.

There are, however, a number of problems to grapple with, and one in particular that underlies them all. The world of the story is an independent California, after a mostly unexplored war with the rest of the United States. The area seems to be deprived and war ravaged, with people having to work hard to barely survive. This feels like a really substantial setting, right? A lot to be done with that, possibly some hard hitting critique of the real world? But that doesn't materialise. Problems, even the problems that result from this larger world state, are easily resolved. This includes, at one point, a robot who is haunted by traumatic memories of the war, and the death of his close comrades being told by another robot (a friend) to maybe move his traumatic memories to long term storage rather than immediate memory. This... does not feel to me like a meaningful engagement with that emotional journey.

Newitz keeps trying to set up problems or themes with bigger, thornier stakes... but then never commits to them in that same spirit. Everything is, ultimately, relatively easy, in a way that just does not work with those stakes. It's a story at war with its own tonal choices, with clunky writing to boot, and I think just completely unsuccessful because of it.

The Summer War by Naomi Novik

Another fairytale book! This one, however, is not so much a retelling as a story in the style of fairytales: think something like T. Kingfisher's Nettle and Bone, where the elements are often familiar but not the whole.

In this one, a young daughter of a duke, Celia's beloved brother Argent decides to leave their family home. In her upset, not understanding his reasons, she awakens an as-yet-undiscovered magical talent and curses him to a life without love. He leaves her, becoming a questing knight, and she is left with her guilt, her father's abandonment of his duties at the loss of his favoured son, and the other brother (Roric) she's never really liked.

To save Argent, she must work with Roric, developing a relationship she never gave much notice, and learning more about the world, her family and their history than she realised in the meantime. And, of course, discovering a much bigger threat from the fairy people whose border lies alongside their realm.

While the story of this may be an original one, it nonetheless feels awfully familiar while reading. The plot unfolds very much in expected directions and to expected ends, and without anything about it that really feels... itself. Novik's previous fairytale-type stories, especially Uprooted, have a distinctive voice and setting that stands them apart from the well-worn elements of their creation. The Summer War... less so. It doesn't help that the characterisations, predominantly viewed through the eyes of the main character, are often incredibly flat or weirdly patchy (even including Celia's own internal life). By turns, Celia is both a naive pubescent girl and an accomplished schemer, through only her own wit and the writing of a few letters. A story could make something of that, dig into the complexity of growing up, the changing shape of one's own mind and abilities. But it is not this story. It felt, more than anything, rushed, and the whole thing relies far more on tone and vibes than creating something that feels a coherent whole, with genuine concerns to explore.

Novik certainly captures the feel of fairytale in this story, but none of the pieces quite fit together nicely enough when looked at closely. Especially on a ballot with multiple other fairytale stories, this one feels rather disappointing.

Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite (Dorothy Gentleman #1)

Not a fairytale or a retelling! Murder by Memory is the opening volume in the Dorothy Gentleman series, in which an old lady solves murders on a generation ship while talking about knitting and fussing about her nephew.

As a fan of series like Miss Marple, I was entirely in favour of the premise of this story. And indeed, at the beginning, was pretty on board with the execution. Dorothy wakes up in someone else's body, and has to figure out why the sentient ship has awoken her from digital slumber, let alone put her in the wrong body while doing so, without alerting anyone to the situation. The ship leads her to the dead body it needs her to investigate, and she begins her enquiries, telling us about the ship, its inhabitants and its technologies along the way. Great!

There are two problems, however. The first, and far more troubling, one is simply to do with the pacing. Murder by Memory is relatively short by novella standards, and the majority of the length of it feels like setup. And then, rather suddenly at somewhere around 90%, it switches into resolution mode. There's no sense of a comfortable middle of the story, and between the strange structure and the brevity, I ended up feeling slightly short-changed. I was wondering where the rest had gone to; had I lost a forty page chunk somewhere? But no. It also means there are rather more dangling threads than I would like or expect from this sort of story, even knowing there will be sequels.

The other problem, and possibly something that will be solved by the sequels, is the oddness of the worldbuilding. There's a glimpse into the ship and the people, and they're enough to make me wonder what, why, how would something futuristic end up so retro feeling, but not enough to bed that in and make it feel plausible. It's not really answers I crave, more a sense that this world... well, makes sense.

It's a nice idea, a concept I am very easily enticed into reading, but there's a lot wrong with how it goes about it, by the end.

Final thoughts:

With the exception of The River Has Roots, which is a very well-written novella with a strong prose voice and sense of direction to the story, much of the rest of this shortlist is disappointing in some way. There are structural or tonal issues with most of the entries, plots that don't match up to their premises, conflicting emotional journeys and some janky writing choices in parts. Some years, I look at the novella shortlist and, for all I might wish it otherwise because they're not my favourites, I can at least see why they're someone's favourites. Books with big ideas or engaging plots or fascinating worlds, funny or scary or enticing, or just odd in the compelling way unusual things are. For want of a better word, this shortlist feels quite safe, quite quiet, quite middle-of-the-road (and, incidentally, rather homogenous). There's not much daring or doing. And so I struggle to see quite why someone would pick some of these and say "yes, this is the best that 2025 has to offer", even had I not read a single other novella for the year. And so, I finish this with bafflement. I really just do not get it.

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POSTED BY: Roseanna Pendlebury, the humble servant of a very loud cat. @chloroformtea.bsky.social

Microreview [book]: A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

The Scholomance's potential is squandered in the dead angles of its worldbuilding.

Sometimes, books are very easy to talk about, and reviews write themselves: things are great (or maybe not great, but still notable), and I am very excited to point them out! Other books are not easy to talk about, and when that happens it's usually a failure to connect: a book that was probably fine, but which left me without much that I'm desperate to convey about it, and looking for the right words to describe the experience is a more active challenge. And then... then you get books like A Deadly Education, Naomi Novik's latest offering. This book is hard to talk about because, wow, where do I start.

Well, let's start with the basics. A Deadly Education is set in a magic school with the horror dialled up to eleven: set in the Scholomance, a school which annually scoops up a mostly-preselected group of magical teens from around the world and dumps them in an educational facility mostly located in a void dimension (which, in turn, is located in the UK, because where else would a magic boarding school be??). There appears to be a fully fledged, functioning society beyond the walls of this magic school, but we only catch glimpses of it through flashback, because for four years the students of the scholomance are locked in without adults, holidays or even any school supplies that aren't either brought in through freshers or provided at the whims of the school's magical replenishment. This is because in this version of our world, magical kids are walking magnets for various magical monstrosities which view them as soft, tasty targets to devour. The school is supposed to protect them from this fate, but monsters are nothing if not persistent, and every year only a fraction of the top class gets the opportunity to graduate, and an even smaller percentage makes it through graduation, because graduation (you guessed it) involves even more monsters.

The reader is guided through this nightmare scenario - in a lot of descriptive first person prose - by El Higgins, a Junior year student (sure, this international magical boarding school in the UK has an internal structure based on the US high school system, why wouldn't it) who is fighting an uphill battle not just to stay alive against the monsters, but to do it alone, while trying to control a magical aptitude that wants to push her towards being mana-sucking evil sorceress with an arsenal of destructive spells. El hasn't made any friends during her stay at the Scholomance so far, but she's biding her time for a big magical gesture that will make everyone around her pay attention and ask her to join their team for graduation, maybe even getting her into a wealthy, protected magical enclave in the process. Complicating this plan for survival is Orion Lake, her year's big superstar, whose own affinity means that he's saved an impressive proportion of his own year from being snacked on by monsters before graduation. That's great news for everyone who hasn't been a monster snack, but bad news for the class about to graduate, who are facing an unusually busy and hungry graduation "ceremony" when they leave the school.

El is a rather dense and self-sabotaging protagonist, so when Orion starts showing an interest in her - first as a suspect in another student's murder, but then as, shock horror, an actual friend - she decides this is terrible, actually, and spends a lot of time trying to shake him off. But it's too late: Orion's interest in her gets El noticed by the wider student body (especially the students of the elite New York enclave to which Orion belongs) and also pushes her to start thinking about choosing her own friends, notably artificer Aadhya and dark-mage-gone-clean Liu. Readers who are wondering if maybe this is the book where Novik will push these interesting female relationships into the foreground over having the day saved by heterosexual attraction: sorry, nope. El's chosen friendships do play an important role, but they're ultimately second fiddle to her relationship with Orion and the plots surrounding that, and it's El and Orion - from among the main cast, at least - who end up saving the day.

This book has been strongly criticised for its handling of race, and particularly one thoughtless (by the author's own admission) and racist passage involving Black hair. Beyond this, there's been a range of reactions, both positive and negative, from reviewers of colour reacting to the broader setting and how the international setting of the Scholomance is handled. As a white reviewer, it's not my place at all to pass judgement on the points raised, but there's no escaping the fact that El's world is a mix of the kind of diversity you get on Captain Planet or the Star Trek bridge, with students from every continent and culture apparently converging in this corner of Void!Britain and slotting into a mostly homogenised school culture. Language is a big part of spellcasting, and most students, El included, have a curriculum focused on learning as many languages as possible in order to cast spells in them. There's also a very obvious but unremarked upon prevalence of white characters in the key positions of power (the New York and London enclaves) that El finds herself butting heads with. El herself is mixed race, but was raised by a white British mother and rejected by her Indian relatives due to her magical affinity. There's nothing inherently problematic about that - characters of colour shouldn't have to justify themselves with some threshold of cultural performance to exist, and there are plenty of mixed race and diaspora people who grow up without strong cultural connections to some or all of their heritage. But it's impossible to ignore the fact that real world prejudices and inequalities do appear all around this worldbuilding, even if the setting is supposed to be divorced from that context. 

As a reader, my reaction to those prejudices being replicated in an ostensibly representative text is to look to whether I trust the author to be doing something intentional and therefore potentially worthwhile: is this book trying to say something, or am I just experiencing the author's dead angles replicated on the page? Passages like the description of locs, or another moment where El identifies a language worksheet as being "modern" Arabic because it has cartoon depictions of terrorist acts on it, make it really hard to interpret A Deadly Education as doing anything but the former. And, sure, there's a lot of books and authors out there doing worse things, and caring a lot less - and in many ways, it's A Deadly Education's commitment to trying to imagine a genuinely diverse, international magic school that makes its dead angles so obvious - but that doesn't make the failings here less disappointing, especially as this is a book that had resources for sensitivity reading.

Frankly, this kind of thing leaves me tired. The Scholomance is an interesting take on a trope that still has great potential, but I don't want to read about societies of international sorcerers, and their special magic schools in a story that expects white wizards of the US and UK to be the centre of power within that international system. It doesn't help that, despite enjoying her previous work, there are other elements in the kinds of stories Novik seems to want to write that are exhausting to me too: I am tired of having interesting relationships between women dangled in front of me and then pushed aside for heterosexual pairings that are at best "meh" and at worst super creepy, and I'm tired of stories that subvert their subgenres on the surface while still being tied to the same patriarchal nonsense as their predecessors. A Deadly Education is, in many ways, an enjoyable book: a bit grim, a little slow to start, and very invested in its explanations, but ultimately a lot of fun. But as a multiple award winner and nominee, I think Novik's work asks to be held to higher standards than that, and this is a book that falls short in a number of unfortunate ways.

The Math

Baseline Score: 7/10

Bonuses: +1 El is an entertaining, if dense, narrator to follow around the Scholomance, and her relationships with Aadyha and Liu are fun to watch

Penalties: -2 racist slip-ups and apparent unconscious biases make it hard to trust where this is going; -1 I simply did not ask for another Naomi Novik book where the main character gets into a heterosexual romance with the embodiment of the patriarchy

Nerd Coefficient: 5/10

POSTED BY: Adri, Nerds of a Feather co-editor, is a semi-aquatic migratory mammal most often found in the UK. She has many opinions about SFF books, and is also partial to gaming, baking, interacting with dogs, and Asian-style karaoke. Find her on Twitter at @adrijjy

Reference: Novik, Naomi. A Deadly Education (Del Rey, 2020)

New Books Spotlight

Welcome to another edition of the New Books Spotlight, where each month or so we curate a selection of 6 new and forthcoming books we find notable, interesting, and intriguing. It gives us the opportunity to shine a brief spotlight on some stuff we're itching to get our hands on.

What are you looking forward to? Anything you want to argue with us about?

 

Abercrombie, Joe. The Trouble With Peace [Orbit]
Publisher's Description

A fragile peace gives way to conspiracy, betrayal, and rebellion in this sequel to the New York Times bestselling A Little Hatred from epic fantasy master Joe Abercrombie.

Peace is just another kind of battlefield . . .

Savine dan Glokta, once Adua’s most powerful investor, finds her judgement, fortune and reputation in tatters. But she still has all her ambitions, and no scruple will be permitted to stand in her way.

For heroes like Leo dan Brock and Stour Nightfall, only happy with swords drawn, peace is an ordeal to end as soon as possible. But grievances must be nursed, power seized, and allies gathered first, while Rikke must master the power of the Long Eye . . . before it kills her.

Unrest worms into every layer of society. The Breakers still lurk in the shadows, plotting to free the common man from his shackles, while noblemen bicker for their own advantage. Orso struggles to find a safe path through the maze of knives that is politics, only for his enemies, and his debts, to multiply.

The old ways are swept aside, and the old leaders with them, but those who would seize the reins of power will find no alliance, no friendship, and no peace lasts forever.

Why We Want It: When I spotlighted Abercrombie's previous novel A Little Hatred, I noted "A Little Hatred may be an understatement. I expect a lot of hatred and a lot of violence and told in a way that only Abercrombie can." I was right. Once again I expect the title to be an understatement. There likely will be trouble with peace, but there will also be a lot of hatred and violence. Abercrombie is as good as he ever was. I can't wait.

Clarke, Susanna. Piranesi [Bloomsbury]
Publisher's Description

The long-awaited return from the author of the multi-million copy bestselling Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

Piranesi lives in the House.
Perhaps he always has.

In his notebooks, day after day, he makes a clear and careful record of its wonders: the labyrinth of halls, the thousands upon thousands of statues, the tides that thunder up staircases, the clouds that move in slow procession through the upper halls.

On Tuesdays and Fridays Piranesi sees his friend, the Other. At other times he brings tributes of food and waterlilies to the Dead. But mostly, he is alone.

Messages begin to appear, scratched out in chalk on the pavements. There is someone new in the House. But who are they and what do they want? Are they a friend or do they bring destruction and madness as the Other claims?

Lost texts must be found; secrets must be uncovered. The world that Piranesi thought he knew is becoming strange and dangerous.

The Beauty of the House is immeasurable; its Kindness infinite

Why We Want It: Clarke's previous (and debut) novel, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell won the Hugo Award for Best Novel and I've been intimidated to read that thousand page foot noted door stopper ever since (I'll read it one day, I promise) - but that makes Piranesi a significant novel this year and something to pay attention to. As an added bonus, Piranesi is under 300 pages.

Ford, John M. The Dragon Waiting [Tor Essentials]
Publisher's Description

“The best mingling of history with historical magic that I have ever seen.”—Gene Wolfe

In a snowbound inn high in the Alps, four people meet who will alter fate.

A noble Byzantine mercenary . . .

A female Florentine physician . . .

An ageless Welsh wizard . . .

And Sforza, the uncanny duke.

Together they will wage an intrigue-filled campaign against the might of Byzantium to secure the English throne for Richard, Duke of Gloucester—and make him Richard III.

Available for the first time in nearly two decades, with a new introduction by New York Times-bestselling author Scott Lynch, The Dragon Waiting is a masterpiece of blood and magic.

“Had [John M. Ford] taken The Dragon Waiting and written a sequence of five books based in that world, with that power, he would’ve been George R.R. Martin.” —Neil Gaiman

Why We Want It: I wonder how many readers today have heard of John M. Ford. I never would have, except that there were two years I attended Fourth Street Fantasy Convention and Ford was often mentioned. They knew him, personally, and they spoke of Ford and his work reverently and with love. He was only 49 when he passed, which is staggeringly young. Long out of print, Tor will be republishing all of Ford's novels, starting with The Dragon Waiting - his most notable work.

Hairston, Andrea. Master of Poisons [Tor.com Publishing]
Publisher's Description

Award-winning author Andrea Hairston weaves together African folktales and postcolonial literature into unforgettable fantasy in Master of Poisons

The world is changing. Poison desert eats good farmland. Once-sweet water turns foul. The wind blows sand and sadness across the Empire. To get caught in a storm is death. To live and do nothing is death. There is magic in the world, but good conjure is hard to find.

Djola, righthand man and spymaster of the lord of the Arkhysian Empire, is desperately trying to save his adopted homeland, even in exile.

Awa, a young woman training to be a powerful griot, tests the limits of her knowledge and comes into her own in a world of sorcery, floating cities, kindly beasts, and uncertain men.

Awash in the rhythms of folklore and storytelling and rich with Hairston's characteristic lush prose, Master of Poisons is epic fantasy that will bleed your mind with its turns of phrase and leave you aching for the world it burns into being.

Why We Want It: I've been circling around Hairston's work for a number of years now and even though I should have read Mindscape or Will Do Magic for Small Change years ago, there is no better time to correct my lapse and read Master of Poisons than right now.

McGuire, Seanan. A Killing Frost [DAW]
Publisher's Description

When October is informed that Simon Torquill—legally her father, due to Faerie’s archaic marriage traditions—must be invited to her wedding or risk the ceremony throwing the Kingdom in the Mists into political turmoil, she finds herself setting out on a quest she was not yet prepared to undertake for the sake of her future…. and the man who represents her family’s past.

Why We Want It: Readers of the Feather who have paid any attention to what I write about will know of my established love of Seanan McGuire's novels. A Killing Frost isn't the place to start with Seanan McGuire, it is too tied into the previous novels, but longtime fans of her October Daye series will be ready for this. I know I was. Seanan McGuire delivers.

Novik, Naomi. A Deadly Education [Del Rey]
Publisher's Description

From the New York Times bestselling author of Uprooted and Spinning Silver comes the story of an unwilling dark sorceress who is destined to rewrite the rules of magic.

“The dark school of magic I’ve been waiting for.” Katherine Arden, author of Winternight Trilogy

I decided that Orion Lake needed to die after the second time he saved my life.

Everyone loves Orion Lake. Everyone else, that is. Far as I’m concerned, he can keep his flashy combat magic to himself. I’m not joining his pack of adoring fans.

I don’t need help surviving the Scholomance, even if they do. Forget the hordes of monsters and cursed artifacts, I’m probably the most dangerous thing in the place. Just give me a chance and I’ll level mountains and kill untold millions, make myself the dark queen of the world.

At least, that’s what the world expects me to do. Most of the other students in here would be delighted if Orion killed me like one more evil thing that’s crawled out of the drains. Sometimes I think they want me to turn into the evil witch they assume I am. The school itself certainly does.

But the Scholomance isn’t getting what it wants from me. And neither is Orion Lake. I may not be anyone’s idea of the shining hero, but I’m going to make it out of this place alive, and I’m not going to slaughter thousands to do it, either.

Although I’m giving serious consideration to just one.

With flawless mastery, Naomi Novik creates a heroine for the ages—a character so sharply realized and so richly nuanced that she will live on in hearts and minds for generations to come.

Why We Want It: After making her mark with the nine Temeraire novels, Novik really broke out with Uprooted and Spinning Silver. Though there is always something classist about magic schools, there is also an appeal - and Novik's darker take on the concept is something I want to read. Naomi Novik is a master storyteller who has only gotten better and we can't wait to see what she does with magic schools.

POSTED BY: Joe Sherry - Co-editor of Nerds of a Feather, 4x Hugo Award Finalist for Best Fanzine. Minnesotan. He / Him.

Reading the Hugos: Novel

Welcome to the first article in our Reading the Hugos series, 2019 edition! I often joke that the Hugo Award Season is eternal and that is only half of a joke because there is only a small breath between the announcement of the winners in August and the end of the year when we start thinking about what the best books of the year may have been, and that leads directly into submitting our nominating ballots and the cycle begins anew.

Today we are going to take a look at the six finalists for Best Novel. This year three of the finalists were on my nominating ballot and I had named The Calculating Stars my top novel of 2018.  This is also a rare year in which I have already read all of the novels on the ballot before the finalists were announced, which is awfully convenient for me to put together my own Hugo ballot.

In a sense, this year's Hugo race is wide open because after N.K. Jemisin's Best Novel trifecta, she does not have a novel on the ballot, though everyone except Mary Robinette Kowal and Rebecca Roanhorse have been Best Novel finalists before. Kowal, of course, has three Hugo Awards in other categories, Roanhorse has one, and both Kowal and Roanhorse are previous winners of the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. Suffice it to say that this category is stacked.

Let's take a look at the finalists, shall we?


The Calculating Stars, by Mary Robinette Kowal (Tor)
Record of a Spaceborn Few, by Becky Chambers (Hodder & Stoughton / Harper Voyager)
Revenant Gun, by Yoon Ha Lee (Solaris)
Space Opera, by Catherynne M. Valente (Saga)
Spinning Silver, by Naomi Novik (Del Rey / Macmillan)
Trail of Lightning, by Rebecca Roanhorse (Saga)

Record of a Spaceborn Few: I dig that each of Becky Chambers' three novels have reasonably been standalone stories. Record of a Spaceborn Few focuses on that segment of humanity that took to the stars, but then never left the ships when so many then spread to new stars. A tightly contained story, Record of a Spaceborn Few deals with the responsibility of the individual to a community. This is slice-of-life science fiction. It could be set anywhere, but is far more interesting when in a more austere environment, especially one which failure for everyone to do meaningful work could cause the failure of a system.

I thought this was a much stronger novel than A Closed and Common Orbit (A Hugo Award finalist in 2016) and a pure delight to read. The only thing Record of a Spaceborn Few has working against it is that this is an incredibly stacked ballot.

Space Opera: Space Opera has been described as Eurovision in Space and as a spiritual successor to Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which is a hell of a lot of expectation to live up to. For the most part, Catherynne Valente hits her mark. In some ways, I admired Space Opera more than I loved it. It's been a while, but I remember the opening of the novel to be a touch longer to get going than I was looking for. Once it does and we get to that Intergalactic Grand Prix, though, Space Opera is a pure delight through and through. (my review)

Revenant Gun: Yoon Ha Lee's Hexarchate novels are a looser trilogy than I would have expected. There is a larger story in play, but Revenant Gun picks up some nine years after the events of Raven Stratagem and shifts the viewpoint to Shuos Jedeo (the infamous dead general) reborn as a seventeen year old with no memories of who he would become - which is interesting because it raises a question about whether inherent genius is enough to accomplish a goal or whether it is the sum or later experiences that exploits and develops that genius.

Revenant Gun is a strong ending to a truly unique series. In some ways the closest comparison I have is Ann Leckie's Ancillary novels, but that doesn't line up exactly. This is a fascinating novel and extremely strong conclusion to the trilogy. I'd be curious how well Revenant Gun would stand on it's own. It's one of two third novels in a series, but the only one that is not a true standalone (Record of a Spaceborn Few is a standalone in a series). It may not fully standalone, but Revenant Gun is a standout. (Adri's review)

Trail of Lightning: I've mentioned this before, but if "Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience" was the announcement of Roanhorse's emergence on the scene (it did win all of the awards after all), Trail of Lightning was the exclamation point confirming that she was a major talent. It also marks a rare appearance of urban fantasy on the Hugo ballot and a well deserved one.

Trail of Lightning is a badass novel, full of driving energy and it was a raw delight to discover Roanhorse's Sixth World. (Paul's review)

Spinning Silver: Despite being a fairy tale retelling written by Naomi Novik, Spinning Silver shares almost nothing in common with Uprooted. Tonally, thematically, and stylistically, these are distinct novels as different from each other as they can be. The one thing they truly share is that they are excellent and one of the best novels of their respective years.

As part of her review, Adri wrote "As a technical accomplishment, it's excellent (except for the awkwardly stereotyped autistic-presenting character), hitting a perfect fairytale tone that weaves multiple character's lives together in a compelling way. There's plenty of kindness and positive relationships, especially between women and across cultures, to keep a reader company even during the story's darker turns. I recommend picking up Spinning Silver with eyes open and critical faculties engaged: much like that dark forest at the edge of the town, its not a place to be taken lightly, no matter how lovely it may look from the outside." (Adri's review)

The Calculating Stars: When I wrote about The Calculating Stars last year, I said that "More than just achieving a sense of wonder, the science of The Calculating Stars is magic. Kowal brings the dream of spaceflight beyond the page and into readers' hearts." There were plenty of excellent novels published last year and every novel on this ballot is worthy of recognition and are among the best of the year. For me, for my money, The Calculating Stars is the class of the field.

Also from my review, "It's not just Elma overcoming everything stacked against her that makes The Calculating Stars such a fantastic read, it's the completely thrilling mundanity of a countdown towards a launch. It's the checklists and the waiting. It's tremendous and exhilarating. We've been on this journey with Elma for some four hundred pages and The Calculating Stars is beyond a sense of wonder. I'd say that it's magic, but it's science. It's near perfection." (my review)


My Vote:
1. The Calculating Stars
2. Spinning Silver
3. Trail of Lightning
4. Revenant Gun
5. Space Opera
6. Record of a Spaceborn Few


Joe Sherry - Co-editor of Nerds of a Feather, 3x Hugo Award Finalist for Best Fanzine. Minnesotan.

Top Nine Books Published in 2018

Some people do a top ten list, others do a top eleven (insert your Spinal Tap joke here), yet others may only do five. My list is 9 books long. Why? Partly to be a little bit different and partly because I want the tenth spot on my list to be reserved for that really great book which I simply did not get the chance to read during 2018. That really great book may also be something I have only heard whispers about and I may not discover for several more years. Whatever that tenth great book is, I’m holding a spot for it on my list.

Also, there is no doubt that this list, like every other list out there is built entirely on the combination of the books I've actually read with my own prejudices, taste, preferences, and the choices I made when selecting books to read across the breadth of 2018. That's really what we're saying when we say we've put together a list of the "Best Books of the Year". It's the best we've read, the best we can remember, the best based on what we appreciate in speculative fiction. One of the other best books I've read this year is Nicola Griffith's latest novel So Lucky (my review), but this is a speculative fiction blog focusing on more nerdy endeavors, so for the sake of theme I'll limit this list to science fiction, fantasy, and everything in between and around the edges. With that said, I adore Nicola Griffith's fiction and everyone should go read her 1993 science fiction novel Ammonite (my review).

This Top Nine List is more or less in order.  The top two slots are a complete lock, but ask me tomorrow and some titles may shift around a bit.  Whichever order the list is in, these are the nine novels published in 2018 which I feel were the strongest titles of the year.

1. The Calculating Stars, by Mary Robinette Kowal (Tor): From my review: "More than just achieving a sense of wonder, the science of The Calculating Stars is magic. Kowal brings the dream of spaceflight beyond the page and into readers' hearts."  Most years there is at least one book that becomes a novel of my heart, that engages the core of who I want to be as a reader, that thrills and delights me, and that showers me in the warmth of its wonder. This year that novel is Mary Robinette Kowal's The Calculating Stars.

Also from my review: "It's not just Elma overcoming everything stacked against her that makes The Calculating Stars such a fantastic read, it's the completely thrilling mundanity of a countdown towards a launch. It's the checklists and the waiting. It's tremendous and exhilarating. We've been on this journey with Elma for some four hundred pages and The Calculating Stars is beyond a sense of wonder. I'd say that it's magic, but it's science. It's near perfection." (my review)

2. The Poppy War, by R.F. Kuang (Harper Voyager): Similar to Full Metal Jacket, The Poppy War is a novel split in two. The first part is Rin's arrival at Sinegard, her nation's highest military training school. She's an outsider, a nobody from nowhere with no family name. Kuang brings us through Rin's training, her singular drive to sacrifice anything, even herself, to survive and excel at the Sinegard. There's a very real sense of "if this is what I did to get here, what do you think I'll do to stay here?" It's brutal from the start. Kuang goes hard.  The second part  of the novel is the rumored war that everyone is training for. Kuang does not relent and it is simply excellent. (Adri's not quite a review)

3. Trail of Lightning, by Rebecca Roanhorse (Saga): From Paul's review: "There is plenty to love in Trail of Lighting, and Maggie as a main character is front and center the heart of the novel and she makes the novel sing. An indigenous woman granted supernatural powers that are complicated and make her an outsider by their very nature, Maggie’s life as a newly solo monster hunter is a fraught one."

Also: "The worldbuilding is top notch and a leading light of the power of #ownvoices. There is an authenticity to the myths and legends made supernatural manifest fact within the Sixth World that the author presents here. This is a post-apocalyptic world whose suipernatural denizens, threats and features felt like the author was truly delving deep into her own culture, understanding it and presenting it to us in context and the richness of what is on offer. And much of it is new to most readers and rich with details and ideas that I was very happy to have the author explore.  I particularly liked her interpretation of Coyote, the Trickster, who has an agenda for Maggie that only slowly becomes clear as the novel unfolds. But it is the things that go bump in the night, the entities that Maggic must encounter and fight, that shows the author’s invention the best." (Paul's review)

4. Beneath the Sugar Sky, by Seanan McGuire (Tor.com Publishing): From my review: "Beneath the Sugar Sky is filled with wit and biting commentary on how children are perceived and all too often squeezed into boxes they don't belong in order to fit the ideas and dreams of their parents and other adults, and how pervasive that can be. It's also a delightful adventure story filled with charm and wonder and it's a book I did not quite want to end because I wasn't ready to say goodbye." (my review)

5. Spinning Silver, by Naomi Novik (Del Rey): From Adri's review: "Despite its uncomfortable undertones, however, there's no question that this is one of the best books I've read in 2018 so far. As a technical accomplishment, it's excellent (except for the awkwardly stereotyped autistic-presenting character), hitting a perfect fairytale tone that weaves multiple character's lives together in a compelling way. There's plenty of kindness and positive relationships, especially between women and across cultures, to keep a reader company even during the story's darker turns. I recommend picking up Spinning Silver with eyes open and critical faculties engaged: much like that dark forest at the edge of the town, its not a place to be taken lightly, no matter how lovely it may look from the outside." (Adri's review)

6. Temper, by Nicky Drayden (Harper Voyager): I thought Prey of Gods was an excellent debut that showed Drayden's promise as a writer. Temper is Drayden leveling up. Everything that was good in Prey of Gods is better in Temper. In her review, Adri wrote that Temper was "a more focused story which instead channels its energy into a plot that soars precariously, like a skyscraper made out of playing cards holding up despite gravity saying otherwise. I came away from Temper entertained, impressed and more than a little confused, and I'd recommend it to anyone who likes their high tech fantasy with a heavy dose of inventive unpredictability." (Adri's review)

7. Revenant Gun, by Yoon Ha Lee (Solaris): Set the third volume of a trilogy ten years after the second and have the primary viewpoint character be the resurrected famous genocidal general Shuos Jedao, except it is the significantly younger Jedao who has no memory of why he is famous, feared, or the strategies he might be expected to employ against Kel Cheris and adult Jedao with full memory. It's an interesting choice made by Yoon Ha Lee that fully pays off and makes Revenant Gun a satisfying conclusion to the Machineries of Empire space opera trilogy.

8. The Fated Sky, by Mary Robinette Kowal (Tor): I questioned myself whether to include The Fated Sky here. It is an exceptional novel, there is no question of that, but with The Calculating Stars already topping this list I didn't know if a second novel from the same series should take up another spot on the list.

"The Fated Sky may not have the same newness and sense of wonder that only a first book in a series can have, but it delivers in all the ways that matter. The raw joy of being in space is there. The amazement of landing on a new planet is palpable, where it doesn't matter if you are the first man or woman to place your foot on that soil. The simple fact of being there is wondrous and Mary Robinette Kowal manages to convey that emotion so perfectly the reader experiences it.  The Fated Sky stands well on its own, but when coupled with The Calculating Stars it is a masterpiece." (my review)

9. Taste of Wrath, by Matt Wallace (Tor.com Publishing): Attentive readers of Nerds of a Feather will remember how much I've loved Wallace's Sin du Jour novellas. Taste of the Wrath is the culmination of the seven volume journey that Matt Wallace has taken us own. It began with the "catering event of the week",  but built into a story of deep and wrenching emotion. Wallace has earned the ending here and Taste of Wrath is a truly satisfying conclusion to one of my favorite series. (my review)



As I mentioned in the introduction, for as many books as I read in a year, there is always something amazing that I missed and that I just didn't have time to get to. Or, as plugged in as I try to be, that I just haven't heard of (or heard enough about). As much as I wanted to, I did not read Red Moon (Kim Stanley Robinson), How Long Til Black Future Month (N.K. Jemisin), Semiosis (Sue Burke), Blackfish City (Sam J. Miller), Friday Black (Nana Adjei-Brenyah). The list of highly recommend and presumably stellar novels that I just didn't get to read this year is long and distinguished. That's the reason for the tenth spot on the list. 

Also it is worth noting the six books that just missed the list but were in serious contention: Space Opera (Catherynne M. Valente), Record of a Spaceborn Few (Becky Chambers), Armistice (Lara Elena Donnelly), Consuming Fire (John Scalzi), Mem (Bethany C. Morrow), State Tectonics (Malka Older),


POSTED BY: Joe Sherry - Co-editor of Nerds of a Feather, 2017 & 2018 Hugo Award Finalist for Best Fanzine. Minnesotan.  

Microreview [Book]: Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik

Charming on the surface but with dark moral undertones, Spinning Silver is a technically accomplished but unsettling read.

Spinning Silver is the latest offering from the author of the Temeraire series and the Nebula Award-winning Uprooted, based on a story which started life as a novelette in Navah Wolfe and Dominik Parisien's Starlit Wood anthology. Alas, I haven't read that anthology yet, so I can't compare this to its previous incarnation, though I certainly didn't notice any obvious seams; Spinning Silver reads like it was always meant to be a novel. Like Uprooted, the book takes a fairytale recognisable to Western European traditions (Rumplestiltskin), but weaves a more complex mythology and world around it based on Eastern European traditions. Though Spinning Silver is not set in the same world as its predecessor, there's some commonality between the two settings, particularly the role of the forest as a threatening presence in the protagonists' lives; friendships and support networks between women are also foregrounded in both stories.

 The protagonist of Spinning Silver is Miryem, daughter of a moneylender whose family are the only Jews in a small, poor town. Miryem's father has made a name for himself by being generous to a fault, rarely collecting what is owed, and sinking the family into poverty as the community happily takes advantage of him. Miryam's only moments of comfort come through visits to her mother's wealthier family, and when her mother becomes ill, she feels she has no choice but to take over the job her father has done so poorly. To the horror of her parents and the approval of her grandfather, her foray into moneylending quickly becomes successful and Miryem is soon able to take pride in her ability to turn silver into gold. There are two serious dangers to this ability, however: first, her success quickly draws the attention of the Staryk, the dangerous spirits of the winter forests, who are known to kill humans that hunt their animals or travel on their roads. Second, her business sense quickly plays into the current of anti-Semitism in Miryem's town, creating an increasingly hostile environment for her family at the very time when they might need support from the community. It's the first threat that kickstarts the story, as Miryem is pushed into an unwinnable bargain with the Lord of the Staryk and finds herself caught up in the politics of both fairy and human courts, with the fate of both lands at stake.

Miryem starts off as the only narrator in Spinning Silver but her voice is soon joined by that of two other young women. The first is Wanda, eldest daughter of a widowed, alcoholic farmer who is indentured by Miryem to pay off her father's debt. From the perspective of Miryem's narrative, this is an early turning point signalling the character's willingness to inflict harsh punishments on for the sake of her profession. However, we immediately discover that from Wanda's perspective, this represents a shot at freedom from her father's house, and his desire to marry her off. The third major perspective is that of Irina, the daughter of the local human lord, overlooked since her own mother died and her stepmother started running the household. After being indirectly affected by one of Miryem's schemes to avoid the Staryk, Irina catches the attention of the Tsar, only to find herself in a highly unsafe, supernaturally charged situation of her own. These three perspectives are supplemented by occasional narration from secondary characters, including Irina's nurse and Wanda's younger brother (who unfortunately narrates in Stereotypical Autistic Voice). 

The interweaving of characters' stories and lives in Spinning Silver is masterful, with multiple subplots touching and intertwining as Miryem, Wanda and Irina try to find their way out of the constraints of the men and monsters in control of their lives. The common thread here is that of bargaining and debt, and of the cultural expectations surrounding it. Novik takes this value system very seriously throughout: there's no sudden but predictable subversion where "it turns out the only real value is love", or other such easy options here. This doesn't mean friendship and kindness don't play an important role in the text: the positive relationships in Spinning Silver significantly outweigh the negative, and characters are always rewarded for being kind rather than cruel to those around them. However, these positive emotional bonds always end up becoming part of the framework of deals and promises, working alongside recognisable human economic systems as well as fae-inspired exchanges that encompass knowledge, status, safety and rights. In Spinning Silver, nothing comes for free, because any gift you give still causes the other person to give up something of themselves in return, even if it is just gratitude or a feeling of being in your debt. While I was impressed with how deeply and effectively this system is entrenched into the narrative, I found the implications uncomfortable at times, particularly when it came to the various marriages and the power dynamics within them. 

(Spoilers follow, with a content warning for normalisation of abusive relationship dynamics) 

Despite appearances, there's very little romantic love in this book (and you can forget about overt LGBTQIA+ representation). Both Miryem and Irina find themselves in marriages through no choice of their own, and towards the end of the book Irina pushes her female cousin into a quick forced marriage which is universally portrayed as a positive development for the cousin in question. Only Wanda is able to repudiate male power by avoiding marriage, and even then the takeaway is ambiguous: is the problem that her father has been trying to sell her off, or simply that he keeps undervaluing her when he attempts it? Miryem and Irina's only option is to level the power dynamic in their existing marriages: both do manage this, but its hard to escape the fact that these situations are likely to read to modern audiences as dangerous and abusive even at the end. 

(Spoilers end)

Spinning Silver doesn't celebrate these outcomes, and I think the text intends us to question the assumption that the ending really represents a "happily ever after" beneath the surface. However, it also makes no apology for the aspects of its value system that may read as negative to modern readers. There's no reason it should, of course: the overall effect will be a feature or a bug depending on the individual reader. However, given that Spinning Silver, like Uprooted, is likely to be recommended on grounds of being a "nice" story, I think its important to note that the regular moments of kindness and solidarity that make this a charming read on the surface are underpinned by a worldview with highly unsettling implications. I wouldn't recommend this as a comfort read to anyone sensitive to abusive or imbalanced relationship dynamics in their media, although I also wouldn't discourage anyone from reading it for the same reasons.

Despite its uncomfortable undertones, however, there's no question that this is one of the best books I've read in 2018 so far. As a technical accomplishment, it's excellent (except for the awkwardly stereotyped autistic-presenting character), hitting a perfect fairytale tone that weaves multiple character's lives together in a compelling way. There's plenty of kindness and positive relationships, especially between women and across cultures, to keep a reader company even during the story's darker turns. I recommend picking up Spinning Silver with eyes open and critical faculties engaged: much like that dark forest at the edge of the town, its not a place to be taken lightly, no matter how lovely it may look from the outside.

The Math

Base rating: 8/10

Bonuses: +1 Rich, complex worldbuilding that takes fairytale retelling to the next level

Penalties: -1 Yes, that's how marriages work in some cultures... but it doesn't mean I have to like it.

Nerd Coefficient: 8/10 "Well worth your time and attention".

POSTED BY: Adri is a semi-aquatic migratory mammal most often found in the UK. She has many opinions about SFF books, and is also partial to gaming, baking, interacting with dogs, and Asian-style karaoke.

Reference: Novik, Naomi. Spinning Silver [Del Rey (US) / Macmillan (UK), 2018].

New Books Spotlight

Welcome to another edition of the New Books Spotlight, where each month or so we curate a selection of 6 forthcoming books we find notable, interesting, and intriguing. It gives us the opportunity to shine a brief spotlight on some stuff we're itching to get our hands on.

What are you looking forward to? Anything you want to argue with us about? Is there something we should consider spotlighting in the future? Let us know in the comments!

Emrys, Ruthanna. Deep Roots [Tor.com Publishing]
Publisher's Description

Ruthanna Emrys’ Innsmouth Legacy, which began with Winter Tide and continues with Deep Roots, confronts H. P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos head-on, boldly upturning his fear of the unknown with a heart-warming story of found family, acceptance, and perseverance in the face of human cruelty and the cosmic apathy of the universe. Emrys brings together a family of outsiders, bridging the gaps between the many people marginalized by the homogenizing pressure of 1940s America.

Aphra Marsh, descendant of the People of the Water, has survived Deep One internment camps and made a grudging peace with the government that destroyed her home and exterminated her people on land. Deep Rootscontinues Aphra’s journey to rebuild her life and family on land, as she tracks down long-lost relatives. She must repopulate Innsmouth or risk seeing it torn down by greedy developers, but as she searches she discovers that people have been going missing. She will have to unravel the mystery, or risk seeing her way of life slip away.

Why We Want It: I've never given a rip about the Cthulhu Mythos or Lovecraft, and I still don't. More than anything else, knowing a story is Lovecraftian is a major turn off. And yet. And yet when I read Winter Tide last year I didn't want the book to end. I didn't care anything about what may have inspired the novel. I cared about Aphra and the story Emrys was telling. I didn't know if there would be a second book, but if there was, I knew I wanted it.

Hurley, Kameron. Apocalypse Nyx [Tachyon]
Publisher's Description

Ex-government assassin turned bounty-hunter Nyx is good at solving other people’s problems. Her favorite problem-solving solution is punching people in the face. Then maybe chopping off some heads. Hey—it’s a living.

Nyx’s disreputable reputation has been well earned. After all, she’s trying to navigate an apocalyptic world full of giant bugs, contaminated deserts, scheming magicians, and a centuries-long war that’s consuming her future. Managing her ragtag squad of misfits has required a lot of morally-gray choices. Every new job is another day alive. Every new mission is another step toward changing a hellish future—but only if she can survive.

Apocalypse Nyx is the must-have collection of Kameron Hurley’s five newest Nyx adventures.

Why We Want It: It's been six years since Kameron Hurley last gave us a full length Nyx novel with Rapture. With Apocalypse Nyx, we get to see what Nyxnissa has been up to with this story collection detailing Nyx's further adventures. We're in for one hell of a ride.

Kowal, Mary Robinette. The Calculating Stars [Tor]
Publisher's Description

Mary Robinette Kowal's science fiction debut, The Calculating Stars, explores the premise behind her award-winning "Lady Astronaut of Mars."

On a cold spring night in 1952, a huge meteorite fell to earth and obliterated much of the east coast of the United States, including Washington D.C. The ensuing climate cataclysm will soon render the earth inhospitable for humanity, as the last such meteorite did for the dinosaurs. This looming threat calls for a radically accelerated effort to colonize space, and requires a much larger share of humanity to take part in the process.

Elma York’s experience as a WASP pilot and mathematician earns her a place in the International Aerospace Coalition’s attempts to put man on the moon, as a calculator. But with so many skilled and experienced women pilots and scientists involved with the program, it doesn’t take long before Elma begins to wonder why they can’t go into space, too.

Elma’s drive to become the first Lady Astronaut is so strong that even the most dearly held conventions of society may not stand a chance against her.

Why We Want It: "The Lady Astronaut of Mars" won a Hugo Award for Best Novelette and knowing that The Calculating Stars is the first of two prequel novels expanding on that story and that alternate history. I absolutely adored "The Lady Astronaut of Mars" and tend to thoroughly enjoy Kowal's work. How can I not be excited for this?

Novik, Naomi. Spinning Silver [Del Rey]
Publisher's Description

A fresh and imaginative retelling of the Rumpelstiltskin fairy tale from the bestselling author of Uprooted, which was hailed as “a very enjoyable fantasy with the air of a modern classic” by The New York Times Book Review.

With the Nebula Award–winning Uprooted, Naomi Novik opened a brilliant new chapter in an already acclaimed career, delving into the magic of fairy tales to craft a love story that was both timeless and utterly of the now. Spinning Silverdraws readers deeper into this glittering realm of fantasy, where the boundary between wonder and terror is thinner than a breath, and safety can be stolen as quickly as a kiss.

Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her father’s inability to collect his debts has left his family on the edge of poverty—until Miryem takes matters into her own hands. Hardening her heart, the young woman sets out to claim what is owed and soon gains a reputation for being able to turn silver into gold.

When an ill-advised boast draws the attention of the king of the Staryk—grim fey creatures who seem more ice than flesh—Miryem’s fate, and that of two kingdoms, will be forever altered. Set an impossible challenge by the nameless king, Miryem unwittingly spins a web that draws in a peasant girl, Wanda, and the unhappy daughter of a local lord who plots to wed his child to the dashing young tsar.

But Tsar Mirnatius is not what he seems. And the secret he hides threatens to consume the lands of humans and Staryk alike. Torn between deadly choices, Miryem and her two unlikely allies embark on a desperate quest that will take them to the limits of sacrifice, power, and love.

Channeling the vibrant heart of myth and fairy tale, Spinning Silver weaves a multilayered, magical tapestry that readers will want to return to again and again.

Why We Want It: I wrote that Uprooted (my review) was a standalone fairy tale which felt both fresh and familiar. I was, in fact, left wanting more. Spinning Silver is not a sequel to Uprooted and the only sense that it is a follow up is that it is also a standalone fairy tale. That's exactly what I want. After the roaring success of Uprooted, my expectations for Spinning Silver are extremely high. Novik has the skill to meet and perhaps even exceed those expectations.

Strahan, Jonathan. Infinity’s End [Solaris]
Publisher's Description

The highly-anticipated final volume of the critically-acclaimed science fiction anthology series

Life in space is hard, lonely and the only person you can rely on is yourself. Whether you’re living deep in the gravity well of humanity’s watery home, mucking out air vents in a city floating high in the clouds of Jupiter, or re-checking the filtration system on some isolated space station, life is hard and demanding, and life is small.

The stories of Infinity’s End are set in those empty spaces, in futures where planets have been disassembled and reused for parts, or terraformed and settled; where civilisations have risen and fallen; where far future people make their lives anywhere from colonies hanging in the clouds of Neptune or Venus to the repurposed cores of distant asteroids; on worldlets and asteroids, inside Saturn’s rings or distant spheres and wheels, on-board ships trucking from home to home, and port to port. They're set in a future that's lived in. And they make it clear that even if we never leave the Solar System, there's life enough and room enough to live out all of science fiction's dreams.


Infinity’s End is the future. The stories you’ll find here are the stories of your life.

Why We Want It: I've been a fan of Jonathan Strahan's Infinity Project since its inception. Many science fiction anthologies offer visions of the future. It's somewhat inherent in the genre, but Strahan has offered up somewhat more focused looks at possible futures around a loose theme of Engineering or Building or War. With Infinity's End, Strahan brings the Infinity Project to a close and I know I'm going to miss my annual volume of Infinity. Unless, of course, there is a secret anthology titled Infinity's Rebirth. If there is, I'll be there for that, too!

Yang, JY. The Descent of Monsters [Tor.com Publishing]
Publisher's Description

JY Yang continues to redefine the limits of silkpunk fantasy with their Tensorate novellas, which the New York Times lauded as "joyously wild." In this third volume, an investigation into atrocities committed at a classified research facility threaten to expose secrets that the Protectorate will do anything to keep hidden

You are reading this because I am dead.

Something terrible happened at the Rewar Teng Institute of Experimental Methods. When the Tensorate’s investigators arrived, they found a sea of blood and bones as far as the eye could see. One of the institute’s experiments got loose, and its rage left no survivors. The investigators returned to the capital with few clues and two prisoners: the terrorist leader Sanao Akeha and a companion known only as Rider.

Investigator Chuwan faces a puzzle. What really happened at the institute? What drew the Machinists there? What are her superiors trying to cover up? And why does she feel as if her strange dreams are forcing her down a narrowing path she cannot escape?

Why We Want It: At this point, a Tensorate novella is essential reading. The Black Tides of Heaven (my review) is one of the finest novellas I've read. It was a sublime experience. The Red Threads of Fortune was never going to quite hit that height, but it was likewise exceptional. The Descent of Monsters is the third novella from JY Yang and I can't wait.



POSTED BY: Joe Sherry - Co-editor of Nerds of a Feather, 2017 & 2018 Hugo Award Finalist for Best Fanzine. Minnesotan.