Detective Science Fiction
Detective Science Fiction is a sub genre that revolves around the solving of a crime or crimes (usually murders) within a science fiction setting. The protagonist is often a detective, but this doesn't have to be the case.
Books Reviewed
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![Aurora RisingAlastair Reynolds]()
Science FictionAurora 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 book will ne...
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![The Glass WomanAlice Mcilroy]()
Science FictionIt can feel at times like the entire world is out to get you, but who is the person you must watch out for the most? Your family, spouse, work colleagues? Nope, the biggest saboteur is often yourself. Your own thoughts and deeds coming back to haunt you. Iris Henderson has it worse than most as she...
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![The Fractal EpisodesAllen Stroud]()
Science FictionWhat differentiates a short story series from episodes? Allen Stroud’s The Fractal Series comes in a collection or can be read separately. There are twelve individual stories, that sounds like a short story collection, but there is a difference as they all take place within the Fearless universe tha...
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![Shadow Service Volume 1Cavan Scott]()
HorrorSome of my favourite Urban Fantasy is about a normal world that is unaware of the creatures that lurk in the night. Whilst we are all safely asleep, there is are demons and witches lurking around the corner. Most of us will never even know that these things exist, but what if we did require someone’...
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![Death Comes Too LateCharles Ardai]()
General FictionThere is an art to the short story. They should not try to emulate their longer cousins, or even the novelette format. A short story should pop up, throws a few punches then head off again without a backwards glance, but the best of them with leave an impression, a lingering sense of something in a...
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![Sherlock Holmes and Count DraculaChristian Klaver]()
When a beloved intellectual property enters the public domain, it can be a fearful time for fans, what on Earth are all these authors going to do with your beloved characters? In the case of Sherlock Holmes, it has been a magnificent time. Each year the shelves bulge with new tales about the detecti...
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![The Death I Gave HimEm X. Liu]()
Science FictionShakespeare plays have been around for a long time, and you do not need to do a straight adaptation. Many of the terms used in the plays have entered the common vernacular and the storylines can be traced throughout modern film and television. I don’t recall Romeo or Juliet breaking out into song, b...
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![Batman: The Court of OwlsGreg Cox]()
Science FictionBatman stalks the villains of Gotham and for many he is their worst nightmare. Bats may be inherently scary to some, but in nature they are not the top of the food chain and several animals like to eat them for a snack. One such animal is the Owl, a natural enemy of the Bat. This being Gotham dressi...
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![Within WithoutJeff Noon]()
Science FictionI have conversations with my colleagues and a surprising number of them are dismissive of Science Fiction as being too farfetched and complicated. This is not true, as it is such a wide genre. There are Sci Fi books that will cater for readers who only want a touch of the unreal, but there are also...
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![Hummingbird SalamanderJeff Vandermeer]()
General FictionFollowing the news, it feels like the world is going to hell in a handcart. Put aside any politics and there is enough going on environmentally to worry most people. The idea of the oceans rising, smog filling the skies and animals dying out whilst the infrastructure of countries collapse, all have...
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![Hellwegs KeepJustin Holley]()
HorrorI have always felt that the idea of travelling space is horrific enough without the thought of added monsters or manipulations of the mind. The only thing between you and the vast vacuum of space is a few inches of steel. When you arrive on a new planet, things are not much safer. The air may be bre...
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![Green ValleyLouis Greenberg]()
Science FictionThe average person seems to put a lot of trust in their Government. No way they are spying on me online and even if they are, what am I doing that they would care about? This attitude has shown that ignorance is not bliss, they may just sell your data to the highest bidder and before you know it the...
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![InscapeLouise Carey]()
Science FictionA lot of the political hustle and bustle in today’s world has its roots in how far you think capitalism should go. Some countries are all for state control, others are far more lais s ez faire . Do private companies already have too much power pull ing the strings behind our elected repre...
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![BasiliskMatt Wixey]()
HorrorI have read thousands of books, and they normally follow the same structural rules, but on occasion an author likes to experiment with the format. Perhaps they will forgo the need for speech marks and instead write people speaking as part of a sentence. No thanks. What about telling the story as a s...
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![TitanbornRhett Bruno]()
Science FictionTitanborn follows the life of "collector" (part bounty hunter part detective) Malcom Graves. Graves is a seasoned veteran who has seen the worst of humanity and is often tasked with cleaning up such flotsam. He lives in a future where mankind has spread to other planets and have adapted, with the hu...
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![Doorways in the SandRoger Zelazny]()
Science FictionI have always been a fan of Roger Zelazny. When I was a teenager, The Chronicles of Amber were a library book quest to find the whole set, which never quite happened, so it wasn’t until later in adult life that I was able to purchase the bumper edition that contained them all. Doorways in the Sand w...
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![From Divergent SunsSam Peters]()
Science FictionScience fiction is a minefield for any author. So many others genres are available that have a set of rules that you can follow. Crime has it, even most fantasy books follow a pattern, but science fiction can be almost anything. It can be set in an alternative today with only a tiny tweak to our way...
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![The Seven Deaths of Evelyn HardcastleStuart Turton]()
Science FictionI am not an argumentative fellow and the only two full on blowouts I can remember are well within the geek sphere. Who was the actor alongside Harrison Ford at the start of Raiders of the Lost Ark and how does time travel work? I may have been wrong about Alfred Molina but I am right about time...
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![The Escher ManT R Napper]()
Science FictionCalling your book The Escher Man is a bold move, but a move that T. R. Napper made. The name conjures up imagery from the artist of staircases to nowhere that lead back to the start. How does that effect the man eternally made to walk these steps? Throw in some Cyberpunk future and memory manipulati...
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![Ghost of the Neon GodT R Napper]()
Science FictionI have a soft spot for cyberpunk, the gritty noir feel mixed with high end science fiction. Like many subgenres it can be dismissed as a passing phase, in this case from the 80s, but fans know that there are still exceptional stories out there written today about crying androids or buildings that mu...
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![Far from the Light of HeavenTade Thompson]()
Science FictionThe locked room scenario is a classic tool in crime fiction that most great authors in that genre have tried at least once. The premise is that someone has apparently been murdered in a room that no one else can get in or out of. This may mean that the killing should have been impossible, or that th...
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![Vampires of AvonmouthTim Kindberg]()
HorrorThere are seminal books aplenty in genre fiction. These books are giants and other fiction stands on their shoulders to reach greater heights. Bram Stoker’s Dracula is one of the biggest influences on the horror genre bringing with it a folklore and character that still resonates today. With Dracula...
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![The Imaginary CorpseTyler Hayes]()
FantasyWhere do dreams go when we forget them? Do they dissipate into the ether, or do they settle somewhere? This is the intriguing premise of Tyler Hayes’ The Imaginary Corpse , an alternative detective noir novel. How alternative? It stars a stuffed toy triceratops private investigator called Tippy who...
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![The Babel ApocalypseVyvyan Evans]()
Science FictionMost of us have a subject at school that we struggled with more than others and for me that was languages. Maths, English, Science, I was fine, but my brain does not feel designed for languages. So, if someone offered me a chip that would allow me to instantly understand all languages on Earth, I wo...
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