Steelheart, first in the Reckoners series, may have the broadest appeal of Brandon Sanderson’s growing variety of imaginary worlds. At a time when Marvel and DC turnout multiple blockbusters at the movie theater each year–think The Avengers, Iron Man, the Dark Knight, and Man of Steel–interest in superheroes is at an all time high and […]
Archives for 2013
Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson is an exciting twist on superheroes…and supervillains [Review]
2013-10-19 · by ·
Review | A War of Gifts by Orson Scott Card
2013-10-16 · by ·
Editor’s Note: This is the fourteenth in Stephen Olson’s series of posts on Orson Scott Card’s award winning Ender’s Game novels. You can find his other posts on the Ender’s Game series here. After reading the heavy material in Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind, I’ve started to really enjoy the simpler material in Orson Scott Card‘s […]
Review | The Color of Magic by Terry Pratchett
2013-10-12 · by ·
How does one rate a book published thirty years ago, by an author considered among the greats of our day, and that commences one of the most read and popular series in recent times? The Color of Magic introduces us to Discworld, a series that has grown to include forty novels. Given that I didn’t […]
Prediction v. Prescription in Dystopian Science Fiction [Guest Post]
2013-10-09 · by ·
Authors of science fiction are often graded on the accuracy of their predictions. Gibson’s Neuromancer is praised for its prescience, and popular culture is littered with comparisons of contemporary regimes to the government of 1984. But is this the right measure of their success? Hardly. Descriptive accuracy is the province of journalism. Books like 1984 and Brave New World are great not […]
Review | Children of the Mind by Orson Scott Card
2013-10-08 · by ·
Editor’s Note: This is the thirteenth in Stephen Olson’s series of posts on Orson Scott Card’s award winning Ender’s Game novels. You can find his other posts on the Ender’s Game series here. After a long journey, the patient reader eventually gets to Children of the Mind, currently the last book chronologically in the Ender series. I first read it after […]
Review | Rejiggering the Thingamajig by Eric James Stone
2013-10-07 · by ·
Go buy this book. Buy it, put it by your bed, or desk, or chair, or couch, or where ever you like to read, and then read it. But don’t read it straight through. Stop at the end of each story, set your head back on your pillow/headrest/cushion/ground and enjoy the warm sense of wonder […]
Review | Xenocide by Orson Scott Card
2013-10-01 · by ·
Editor’s Note: This is the twelfth in Stephen Olson’s series of posts on Orson Scott Card’s award winning Ender’s Game novels. You can find his other posts on the Ender’s Game series here. Whenever I start reading the Ender’s Game series, I immediately feel a sense of dread because this means I’ve started down a road that eventually leads through the longest […]
Review | The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater
2013-09-30 · by ·
The ley lines around Cabeswater have been woken, and as a result, strange things are happening in Henrietta. Adam, having made a personal sacrifice to wake the lines, seems to be withdrawing more and more from his friends. Ronan, rough as ever, is falling into deeper and deeper dreams, and the consequences of his dreams […]
Review | The Runaway King by Jennifer A. Nielsen
2013-09-27 · by ·
Jaron has just taken the throne of Carthya and is trying to settle into his role as King. But before he can even take a deep breath, someone attempts to assassinate him and rumors of war are threatening his kingdom. Desperate times call for desperate measures and Jaron is no stranger to the challenges of […]
Which Banned Book Week books have you read?
2013-09-26 · by ·
This is Banned Book Week. Have you read a banned book before? With no small amount of curiosity, I set out to discover what qualifies as a banned book. I was curious to see what books end up getting banned and somewhat surprised to find that books of a quality both high and low end […]
