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Artemis by  by Andy Weir
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The global success of The Martian and its subsequent film adaptation, catapulted Andy Weir into the public eye. Whatever he chose to write next was always going to draw attention.

Set in our near future, Artemis is the story of Jazz Bashara, a young girl living on the moon. Struggling...

Article by Allen Stroud on 17th January 2018
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On the surface, this post-apocalyptic tale of infection, nuclear fallout and scattered, savage humanity is no different from the many others that have gone before it. But what saves it from being just another drop in the great maelstrom of dystopian novels is the author’s taught and affecting...

Article by Alice Wybrew on 21st January 2018
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Aurora Rising by  by Alastair Reynolds
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Aurora Rising is a stand-alone novel written within the authors Revelation Space universe, set before other novels and before the cataclysmic event of the Melding Plague.

It's worth noting that Aurora Rising was published in 2007 as The Prefect. Reynolds fan's who are looking for a new...

Article by Ant on 22nd January 2018
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Elysium Fire by  by Alastair Reynolds
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Elysium Fire is the sequel to Aurora Rising (also known as The Prefect), set in Reynold's Revelation Space universe but before events of his previous novels. Like Aurora Rising, it can be read as a stand-alone novel.

It's the 25th century (with no Buck Rogers in sight) and...

Article by Ant on 24th January 2018
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Salems Lot by  by Stephen King
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Salem's Lot was Kings second published novel, following on from his success with Carrie. Written shortly after King moved to Maine (the bulk of the story was actually written before Carrie), it follows the writer Ben Mears as he moves back to the small town of Jerusalem's Lot (known...

Article by Ant on 29th January 2018
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After Atlas by  by Emma Newman
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After Atlas is Newman’s follow up to her science fiction debut, Planetfall. This story is not a sequel, instead it focuses on our future Earth, that has been left behind by the colonists on the Atlas mission.

This aftermath is the setting for a murder mystery plot involving a...

Article by Allen Stroud on 4th February 2018
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The Gone World by  by Tom Sweterlitsch
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This Christmas a member of the family introduced me to NCIS. For those who have yet to discover this long-running US-based TV show it's a police-procedural series that follows the Naval Criminal Investigation Service. Until this time I hadn't even known such an organisation existed, not...

Article by Ant on 6th February 2018
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The Memory Chamber by  by Holly Cave
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With the premise of Holly Cave's new novel, you could be forgiven for thinking it's a literary version of The Good Place. But Heaven Architect Isobel is no omnipotent Ted Danson, and The Memory Chamber no comedy.

Cave's idea here is an interesting one. After you die, your...

Article by Alice Wybrew on 11th March 2018
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Forest of Eden by  by Elizabeth Counhan
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An interstellar expedition, tracing an anomalous signal back to its origin. Three men on board a ship called the Fargo, all returning dead, two hundred years later, but with the cargo hold full of an unknown mineral that makes the fortune of the company that sent them into the unknown.

...
Article by Allen Stroud on 13th March 2018
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A new fantasy series from Stephen Donaldson, the author of the Thomas Covenant chronicles and the two Mordant’s Need novels. The first book, The Seventh Decimate tells the story of the war between the nations of Amika and Belleger that has raged for generations. Its roots lie in the distant...

Article by Allen Stroud on 15th March 2018
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The Wolf by  by Leo Carew
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The Wolf is the debut of Leo Carew, a graduate of Cambridge University with a degree in Biological Anthropology, specialising in the Palaeolithic.

The authors knowledge and perspective colours the story, providing a rich and detailed backdrop of an alternative world that somewhat...

Article by Ant on 22nd March 2018
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Black Star Renegades by  by Michael Moreci
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Cade Sura finds himself in the unenviable postion of having within his hands the galaxies ultimate weapon. A weapon that promises to bring about peace from the Evil Praxis Kingdom and it's fantatic overlord Ga Halle.

Cade never wanted such responsibility and would do anything he...

Article by Ant on 23rd March 2018
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Final Girls by  by Riley Sager
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Final Girls asks the question what happens after the horror film has ended. How does the fastest and smartest girl cope after the horror ends?

Quincy Carpenter went on vacation with her student friends 10 years ago. She was the only one to return, surviving a horror film level...

Article by Ant on 26th March 2018
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Joe R Lansdale, a prolific writer, has written in a variety of genres from westerns to graphic novels and horror stories. He's won ten Bram Stoker awards, the Edgar award, the American Horror award and the British fantasy award. Apart from his horror stories he is perhaps best known for...

Article by Ant on 2nd April 2018
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The Chalk Man by  by C J Tudor
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I picked up The Chalk Man purely as a result of Stephen King recommending it on twitter after he said If you like my stuff, you'll like this. He isn't wrong. While it has a voice all it's own, The Chalk Man is a perfect accompliment to Kings' work.

It begins in 1986,...

Article by Ant on 6th April 2018
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One Way by  by S J Morden
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People have been imagining life on Mars for hundreds of years but it seems to becoming an increasingly popular destination at the moment. We've got a growing number of films, games, VR "experiences" and of course books. NASA has it's own "Journey to Mars" program of sending humans...

Article by Ant on 9th April 2018
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Zero Day by  by Ezekiel Boone
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Zero Day features a return to those creeping, swarming and skittling spiders that were introduced in The Hatching and Skitter.

The world is a quite different place and the realisation that there is some co-ordination to the vast deadly swarms of arachnids raises the difficult question...

Article by Ant on 16th April 2018
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The Silenced by  by Stephen Lloyd Jones
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Mallory Grace had been successfully hiding out in London for some time until she met Obadiah in a seemingly random encounter. Now she's just had to kill someone and if she wants to survive the next few hours she'll probably have to kill again. To survive the night she'll need a...

Article by Ant on 23rd April 2018
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Acadie by  by Dave Hutchinson
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I've always said that Hutchinson is an under-appreciated author. His Europe series not only being an accomplished trilogy, but also somewhat prophetic given the UK's current realtionship with the EU.

Acadie is a step away from his near-future,alternative fiction series,...

Article by Ant on 30th April 2018
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Witchsign by  by Den Patrick
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It’s a bleak start to Den Patrick’s latest fantasy adventure and the first instalment of his Ashen Torment trilogy. It’s been a tough year in the village of Cinderfell and Blacksmith Marek is struggling to make ends meet for him and his two children. But feeding his family isn’t his only...

Article by Alice Wybrew on 2nd May 2018
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One of us will be dead by morning. Fifteen people trapped on Skek, a small, barren island in the middle of the North Sea between the coasts of Denmark and the UK. Skek is the home of the extreme sports company Hazelton Adventure Experiences, who specialise in corporate team building in an...

Article by Ant on 7th May 2018
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Embers of War by  by Gareth L Powell
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A new space opera story from an author with a strong legacy in SF is a nice treat. Powell’s work on Ack-Ack Macaque has always intrigued me, but never enough to go out and read it. Whereas this, a more conventionally presented science fiction novel with comparisons to Ann Leckie and Iain M....

Article by Allen Stroud on 26th May 2018
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Fictional Alignment by  by Mike French
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Mike French returns to the world of An Android Awakes with this initially more conventionally presented sequel. Fictional Alignment is not the same animal as its predecessor – an oversized picture story book anthology of the attempts of Android PD121928 to create fiction that can be accepted...

Article by Allen Stroud on 30th May 2018
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From Distant Stars by  by Sam Peters
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From Distant Stars is the follow-up to Sam Peter's impressive debut From Darkest Skies. Detective Keon Rause has mostly come to terms with the death of his wife five years previously and his illegally created AI Liss has gone - presumably destroyed.

He's tasked with...

Article by Ant on 1st June 2018
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Dogs of War by  by Adrian Tchaikovsky
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I don't know how he does it, but Adrian Tchaikovsky manages to get inside the heads of different creatures and allow us to see through their eyes. Last time I read one of his books it was Spiders, this time it's Dogs, Bears, Bees and Lizards.

Dogs of War imagines that we've...

Article by Ant on 4th June 2018
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Smoke Eaters by  by Sean Grigsby
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Fire fighter Sean Grigsby’s near future debut sees the world infested with dragons risen from beneath the ground. The wingless wyverns rise up to destroy cities and take lives, leaving only the shadows of people - ‘wraiths’ - behind. It’s up to the ‘smoke.

Cole Brannigan, a...

Article by Alice Wybrew on 15th June 2018
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The Quanderhorn Xperimentations is a book thats been adapted backwards via the future from the Radio 4 series before it was made. It's pure, british comedy gold from the genius minds of Rob Grant and Andrew Marshall.

The story is set in England, 1952. A time of (relative) peace...

Article by Ant on 18th July 2018
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Empire of Silence is the debut of Christopher Ruocchio and the first in the Sun Eater series. It describes the early life of Hadrian Marlowe, an infamous figure who is remembered galaxy-wide as both hero and monster. The man who burned every last alien Cielcin from the sky. The man who...

Article by Ant on 20th July 2018
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Pandemic by  by A G Riddle
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As the name suggests, Pandemic explores what happens when a deadly infection takes the leap from epidemic to pandemic. A sobering passage on the cover aknowledges, it's not a question of if but when.

There are many things that endanger the human race but with the exception of the...

Article by Ant on 27th July 2018
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Ravencry by  by Ed McDonald
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Last year one of the most impressive debut's I read was Ed McDonald's Blackwing. It's dark, confident and bold fiction with some exceptional world-building and even finer characters,

Ravencry is the sequel and does everything a sequel should, building on the best elements...

Article by Ant on 30th July 2018
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Shelter by  by Dave Hutchinson
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Hutchinson's writing has, at times, turned out to be worryingly prophetic - he wrote about the break-up of the European Union while Brexit was just a twinkle in David Cameron's eye, in his astounding Fractured Europe series.

This time he's writing about life in rural...

Article by Ant on 6th August 2018
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Raft by  by Stephen Baxter
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Raft was originally a short story published in Interzone back in 1989. Baxter admitted struggling to contain the story to such a short space however and eventually Raft became the authors first published novel. It's also the first book in the authors Xeelee sequence (although no Xeelee...

Article by Ant on 20th August 2018
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The Ember Blade is a legendary sword, the sword of kings, and the spark needed to ignite the fires of revolution.

Aren has lived by the rules all his young life, without question. Then his father is executed for treason and his whole world is shattered. Thrown into a prison-mine with...

Article by Ant on 27th August 2018
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Ball Lightning by  by Liu Cixin
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Cixin Lui writes incredibly imaginative fiction, exploring vast ideas and bringing them down to a human level. His Remembrance of Earth's Past series has won awards and brought much deserved recognition, with the first in the series The Three Body Problem even becoming a favourite of Barack...

Article by Ant on 3rd September 2018
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Before Mars by  by Emma Newman
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Before Mars is the third book set within the authors Planetfall Universe. As the name suggests it's actually set before the events of Planetfall and After Atlas.

After months of travel, Anna Kubrin finally arrives on the Red Planet to begin her job as geologist and in-residence...

Article by Ant on 7th September 2018
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Daughters of the Forgotten Light is set in a deep space penal colony called Oubliette. Floating in space, it's home to the most savage criminals and other members of the population Earth no longer wants.

To survive on Oubiette you need to join a gang and Lena "Horror" Horowitz...

Article by Ant on 10th September 2018
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Snapshot by  by Brandon Sanderson
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We are told to live in the moment; don’t worry about the past or the future, it is now that you should care about, but how many of us really do? We spend endless hours checking our phones or having meaningless arguments online. If someone walked in on you right now and said that you are not...

Article by Sam Tyler on 17th September 2018
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Sleeping Giants by  by Sylvain Neuvel
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I missed reviewing Sleeping Giants when it first came out. I've finally got round to picking up a copy to find out it's now been out long enough that there are two further novels in the series: Waking Gods and Only Human. Back in 2016 It was one of those break-out novels such as The...

Article by Ant on 24th September 2018
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The clue to what makes the Fantasy genre so great is staring you straight in the face; it is fantastical. It gives author the chance to transport their readers to a different time and place. Lands full of wonder, populated by creatures only seen in your dreams. So, it is sometimes a little sad...

Article by Sam Tyler on 28th September 2018
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Rogue Protocol by  by Martha Wells
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Murderbot, the gruff yet lovable, media obsessed Security AI is back in Rogue Protocol, the latest tale in Martha Wells’ The Murderbot Diaries, a Tor.com series of novellas. In the first story, the Nebula Award winning All Systems Red, Murderbot, a self-nicknamed...

Article by Michael Feeney on 1st October 2018
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The Left Hand of Darkness was first published almost 50 years ago, receiving critical acclaim and firmly establishing Le Guin as a serious, talented author. It's known as one of the first examples of feminist science fiction and retrospectively won the Hugo and Nebula awards. I don't...

Article by Ant on 3rd October 2018
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Exit Strategy by  by Martha Wells
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The sassy, media loving AI ‘Murderbot’ returns in Exit Strategy, the fourth entry in The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells. Murderbot first burst on to the scene in 2017’s All Systems Red. In that first instalment, Murderbot was hired as a security unit (SecUnit) to protect a...

Article by Michael Feeney on 5th October 2018
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The Folio Book of Horror Stories is a new anthology, collecting some of the finest stories of the macabre written over the last two hundred years or so. The collection is edited and introduced by the award winning, legendary author and critic Ramsey Campbell, who has thoughtfully provided an...

Article by Ant on 8th October 2018
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Hearts of Granite by  by James Barclay
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How do you shake up the familiar “war that never ends” trope? James Barclay has one answer; add alien DNA with lizards to create genetically modified dragons; then fly those dragons into the battlefield burning your enemies to a smoking crisp. If that wasn’t enough, he also...

Article by Sam on 9th October 2018
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Spiders seem to tap into a primeval fear inside humans. Perhaps in the days of cavemen there were 20 foot spiders that ate those that travelled at night? What I do know is that the average domestic spider in the UK is unlikely to spring off the wall and eat through your skull. This set of events...

Article by Sam Tyler on 11th October 2018
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131 Days by  by Keith Blackmore
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Blackmore is a vastly under-appreciated author. His Mountain Man novels are a superb example of a post-apocalyptic / zombie series.

131 days does for heroic, gladiatorial fantasy what Mountain Man did for Zombies, a charged, fast-paced story that has confidence, style and plenty of...

Article by Ant on 16th October 2018
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By the pricking of her thumb follows on from The Real Time Murders published last year, but can be read as a stand-alone novel. Set in a future where almost everyone spends all their time in a virtual world, private investigator Alma is caught up in another impossible murder. She has been...

Article by Ant on 22nd October 2018
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Hallowdene by  by George Mann
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Hallowdene is the second book in the Wychwood series, a crime thriller that weaves into the story supernatural elements. Elspeth Reeves is making a new life for herself in a quiet, sleepy village near Oxford, having escaped the hectic life of London. As a journalist for the local paper, she...

Article by Ant on 26th October 2018
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The very nature of horror means that it should not always be a pleasant read. You should be unsettled, scared and perhaps even disgusted at times, but a balance must be struck. If an author is failing to get genuine scares into their book they may resort to cheap tricks such as writing things so...

Article by Sam Tyler on 31st October 2018
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Ramsey Campbell has won countless awards over the years and many of his stories are considered classics in the field of horror. S. T. Joshi has stated that "future generations will regard him as the leading horror writer of our generation, every bit the equal of Lovecraft or...

Article by Ant on 5th November 2018
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There seems to be a rise in a new form of entertainment these last few years, that of the live action experience. While "escape rooms" seem to the most prevelant, there is also a niche for those who would prefer to be scared rather than think about puzzles.

The House by the Cemetery is...

Article by Ant on 5th November 2018
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Popstars of the 60s dread their back catalogue going into the public domain. Their retirement fund has now been opened to everyone to listen to for free. If you think that is sad, please spare a moment for the poor authors who have long died and whose work is open to all. The likes of...

Article by Sam Tyler on 15th November 2018
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Academ's Fury by  by Jim Butcher
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There is a surprising amount of Fantasy that is essentially an epic game of magical rock, paper, scissors. Various mages, witches and Gods all fighting each other with differing powers. They are strong against one power, but weak against another. The balance of the world rests on all these...

Article by Sam Tyler on 23rd November 2018
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Ghost Story by  by Jim Butcher
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It's difficult to write a review of Ghost Story without giving spoilers away about the previous book, Changes. Having said that, I'd recommend reading Changes before attempting Ghost Story, while any of the Dresden Files novels can be read individually, read this one without knowing the...

Article by Ant on 26th November 2018
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A Question. If something hurts, does that make it true? With this intriguing opener of a question begins Seth Dickinson’s The Monster Baru Cormorant, the first of three planned sequels to 2015’s The Traitor Baru Cormorant. Dickinson burst onto the fantasy scene with...

Article by Michael Feeney on 3rd December 2018
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Starship Troopers by  by Robert A Heinlein
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Illustration ©2018 Stephen Hickman from The Folio Society edition of Starship Troopers

The Folio Society has produced a beautiful, limited edition of Robert Heinlein’s classic book, Starship Troopers, first published in 1959.

In 1998, aged 22, I went to the cinema to see...

Article by Allen Stroud on 4th December 2018
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Illustration ©2018 Chris Samnee from The Folio Society edition of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

It is 1939. Forced to live together in a small New York apartment, two young men, Samuel Clay and Joseph Kavalier bond over their shared interest in comic books and cartoon art....

Article by Allen Stroud on 6th December 2018
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The Tourist by  by Robert Dickinson
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The Tourist (not to be confused with the book and film of the same name by Olen Steinhauer) is a story of time travel, imagining a future where people can take holidays to the past and experience the genuine 21st century in all it's glory.

There are three main tour operators...

Article by Ant on 10th December 2018
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Sherlock Holmes and his creator may be long dead, but this has not stopped the master detective living on in the works of others. James Lovegrove has written several stories that have expanded on Arthur Conan Doyle’s legacy, but The Cthulhu Casebooks offer something very different by...

Article by Sam Tyler on 11th December 2018
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Mecha Samurai Empire by  by Peter Tieryas
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Mecha Samurai Empire follows on from the United States of Japan, an alternative history novel which continues the story of Philip K Dicks seminal novel The Man in the High Castle (now an established TV series). For those who are aren't aware, the idea is that the "Allies" lost World War two and...

Article by Ant on 28th December 2018
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