State of the Ark: Canadian Futurefiction edited by Lesley Choyce
State of the Ark is the long-awaited follow-up anthology to the 1992 landmark Canadian science fiction collection Ark of Ice.
speculative fiction
A Dream Wants Waking by Lydia Kwa
Weaving a silken web of Chinese myth, speculative fiction and storytelling Lydia Kwa has brilliantly realized a future where questions of sentience, of personhood and of the truth of dreams wrap around a timeless quest for freedom and for love.
The Boulevard by Jerrod Edson
Hell is due for an inspection by the Big Guy and Satan has to scramble to de-beautify his underworld Capital City of “the Boulevard”.
100 Places to See After You Die by Ken Jennings
Jennings covers a broad spectrum of cultures, beliefs, and literary artifacts, spanning across time. There’s everything here from Norse Mythology to pop culture.
The Earthborn By Arlene F. Marks
Marks ramps up the action with plot twists and revelations, ensuring along the way that Bilyash is an active character with dilemmas to resolve and choices to make. The book is smoothly written and offers characters we can root for.
The Ugly Truth: The Multiverse Refugees Trilogy By Ira Nayman
Fans of Nayman’s humor and capacity for imagination should find The Ugly Truth a worthy addition to the series.
Apastoral by Lee D. Thompson
Harold “Bones” Malone has become an unnatural thing. Convicted of murder, he is tried and sentenced to become Constock, a new penal system wherein the worst of society have their brains transplanted into farm animals — Pigs, goats, even llamas, and Bones’ case, a Shetland Sheep.
Everything You Dream is Real by Lisa de Nikolits
Hilarious and at the same time poignant, Everything You Dream Is Real is a fabulous, adventure-filled sequel to highly acclaimed The Rage Room that will delight fans both new and old.
James’ Rapid Review Roundup May 2022
I have decided to write up seven “brief and breezy” reviews of some recent reads.
The Sisters Sputnik: A Novel, by Terri Favro
Ingenious, smoothly written, and funny, at times bitingly so, Terri Favro’s The Sisters Sputnik is well worth a read.
The Quiet is Loud by Samantha Garner
The Quiet Is Loud is an intergenerational tale of familial love and betrayal, and what happens when we refuse to let others tell our stories for us.
Lucy and Bonbon: A Novel, by Don LePan
Lucy and Bonbon is the story of mother and child, and of the controversy that swirls around them over the course of the child’s first fourteen years. It is a story of freedom and captivity, of love and friendship, of borders and of border crossings, and of what it means to be a human animal.
The Sick Box by Matthew Fries
In Matthew Fries’ novel The Sick Box, wanna-be advice columnist, Ben Matthews, is faced with a ridiculous problem that even he can offer no explanation for.
Dream Signs: Stories by Melanie Bell
Dream Signs is a collection of short stories that takes you on multiple journeys through multiple worlds, all unified by the common cause of realizing one’s dreams.
Matters of Time: An Outliers Anthology
Five years after their initial meeting at a Lindsay coffee shop, a writing group known as The Outliers has released an anthology of their work, Matters of Time. This mixed-genre collection draws on an array of fantastically complex characters, drops them in strange and unusual places, and gives them free rein to explore Time.