My favorite read so far this month has been the annual Year in Review issue of Locus, which contains detailed round-ups of the best fiction of 2017 from Gary K. Wolfe, Paul Kincaid, Geoff Ryman, Gardner Dozois, and many others. For those who (like me) didn’t get nearly as much read last year as you might’ve liked, it’s an irreplaceable guide to the novels, collections and stories worth your time last year. We also added SFX‘s March Books Issue to…
Another issue from fairly early in Cele Goldsmith’s tenure. The cover is by Lloyd Birmingham, his first of a fair quantity of covers for Amazing, Fantastic, and also Analog through 1964. Interiors are by Virgil Finlay, Dan Adkins, and (as a reprint from 1930) Leo Morey. S. E. Cotts’ book review column, the Spectroscope, begins with a look at one of the most famous of SF novels, Robert A. Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land. She disliked it — “408…
The cover to this issue is by George Schelling. Interiors are by Schelling, Virgil Finlay, Jack Gaughan, Leo Morey, and Leo Summer. The editorial is about using computers to determine national policy. S. E. Cotts’ book review column, the Spectroscope, reviews three anthologies: The Sixth Galaxy Reader, The Best from F&SF, 11th Series, and Groff Conklin’s Worlds of When. Cotts is disappointed in the two magazine-based collections, suggesting that in neither case was there enough first rate material for a…
2017 closes out with a splendid crop of new magazines, featuring fiction from Mary Robinette Kowal, Matthew Hughes, John Hornor Jacobs, Matthew Kressel, Gardner Dozois, Robert Reed, Octavia Cade, and a feature on one-shot vintage magazine digests by BG blogger Steve Carper. Here’s the complete list of magazines that won my attention in late December (links will bring you to magazine websites). Cemetery Dance — the brand new December issue has an interview with Stephen King and Richard Chizmar, plus fiction by John Hornor Jacobs,…
God bless DAW for being willing to experiment. They published Jacey Bedford’s debut space opera novel Empire of Dust in paperback in 2014, and it has done well enough to spawn two additional volumes: Crossways (2015) and the upcoming Nimbus. [Bedford has also launched the Rowankind fantasy series that currently stands at two novels: Winterwood (2016) and Silverwolf (2017).] I hope all their experiments work out so well for them. Empire of Dust seems tailor-made to appeal to old-school SF fans. Liz…
Over the last four years we’ve spent a lot of time and energy covering Del Rey’s 1970s-era Classic Science Fiction line, also know as the Best of…. series. In the process we may have angrily shaken our fists at the entire publishing industry once or twice, shouting “You don’t have the guts or the imagination to do something like this any more, do you??” And of course, along comes Baen Books to prove us wrong. Last week Baen Books released…
As we segue (stagger, stumble, reel, crawl, stop-drop-and roll) from winter into spring, we are faced as always with the never-ending question: “What in the world am I going to read next?” Everyone will solve this dilemma in their own way. Dart and ouija boards, animal entrails, tarot cards, various dice systems, and the blind recommendations of pimply, pasty complexioned clerks in chain bookstores have all been resorted to by readers desperate for guidance. For many people (Black Gate followers no…
Baen Books continues its fine tradition of attractive, inexpensive omnibus editions of top-notch science fiction. Most recently they’ve turned their attention to the Under Jurisdiction novels of Susan R. Matthews, the tales of a doctor of conscience who is a faithful servant of the Bench, where institutionalized torture is an instrument of State. This is a grim (and often controversial) series, as Lisa DuMond noted in her SF Site review of the first two novels: Andrej Koscuisko wants nothing more than to…
I love omnibus volumes. I did a series on them a while back, looking at inexpensive paperback omnibus (omnibi?) volumes from C.J. Cherryh, Andre Norton, Murray Leinster, James H. Schmitz, Steven Brust, Jack Vance, and others. But omnibus novel collections aren’t just for classic writers — oh, no. Saga Press is putting the format to good use collecting Annie Belett’s bestselling fantasy series The Twenty Sided Sorceress, which originally appeared from a small press. The first volume, Level Grind, was…
Hank Davis is my kind of editor. He’s one of the very few out there still mining pulps and science fiction digest magazines and packaging them up for a modern audience, in terrific books like In Space No One Can Hear You Scream (2013) and The Baen Big Book of Monsters (2014). In short, he’s one of the only folks introducing the work of Edmond Hamilton, John W. Campbell, Clifford D. Simak, Randall Garrett, Fritz Leiber and others to a…