Speculative Fiction

Exit Strategy

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by Martha Wells
First sentence: “When I got back to HaveRatton Station, a bunch of humans tried to kill me.”
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Others in the series:  All Systems Red, Artificial Condition, Rogue Protocol
Content there is some violence and a handful of f-bombs. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

To be honest, I really don’t have anything new to say about Murderbot. This one wraps up the arc that started with book one, as Murderbot meets back up with Mensah and they all take on GrayChris, the corporation that has been killing people to cover their tracks. It still has everything I have come to love about these books: it’s funny, it’s got action, it’s a bit of a heist book, it’s a quick read, and I love it so much.

Seriously: if you haven’t read these yet, do. They’re great.

The Last Cuentista

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by Donna Barba Higuera
First sentence: “
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Content: There are some intense moments and suggestions of killing. It’s in the YA section (but will be moved to the Newbery section, since it won the Newbery medal on Monday) of the bookstore.

Petra wants to be a storyteller like Lita, her grandmother. But the world is ending, and her family is one of the few that found a space on the departing ships because they are scientists. She is put in stasis, which kind of goes wrong, and when she wakes up 380 years later the world has gone sideways. A group called the Collective has taken over the ship, and it’s nothing like Petra — who can still remember Earth — was expecting.

What she found is a ship full of “shrimp” people, who eat this nutritious “biomass” block every day, who have tonics who alter their moods, and who don’t question the word of the Chancellor. All diversity, all difference, all remnants of Earth life have been erased.

In many ways, this is the same old story: diversity is what makes us strong; the acts that get us to sameness are despicable. Butt his adds a layer. Petra is a storyteller, a person who loves to tell the stories that she grew up with. And stories, more than anything else, are what connect us to our past. I loved that Higuera emphasized the importance of stories in addition to knowledge.

There was so much to love. It’s a brilliant world Higuera created, one that I would love to know more about. And she knows how to ramp up the tension. I was quite anxious several times in the story, not knowing how it was going to go. The stakes were real without being harsh. You do have to suspend your disbelief a bunch – can a 13-year-old who has been in stasis for 380 years really do this? – but other than that, it’s an incredible book.

I’m glad I read it.

Rogue Protocol

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by Martha Wells
First sentence: “I have the worst luck with bot-driven transports.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series:  All Systems Red, Artificial Condition
Content: There is some swearing including a handful of f-bombs. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

Murderbot is traveling again, looking for more information about the GrayChris corporation, information that they are breaking laws and illegally mining for alien material on planets. This means it has to head to yet another planet, one with a closed “terraforming” project, on yet another bot-driven transport. (All it wants to do, though, is watch entertainment media it has downloaded. It’s a hard thing it’s doing.) Once on the planet, though, Murderbot gets roped into being a security consultant/SecUnit (not entirely against its will) as the people on the ship are suddenly faced with life-threatening situations.

Summing these up really doesn’t give you a sense of how fun they are. Yes, it’s’ hard SciFi, but they are smart, funny, and a pretty good thriller. I laugh aloud, I want to read parts aloud to people, and I have to put the book down because the tension is so high. In short: They are perfect and I wouldn’t change a thing.

On to the next one!

Artificial Condition

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by Martha Wells
First sentence: “SecUnits don’t care about the news.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: All Systems Red
Content: There is some violence, and a small handful of swear words, including a couple of well-placed f-bombs. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

Picking right off where All Systems Red left off, Murderbot is determined to figure out what happened in its past that made it kill 57 people. Was it because it hacked its governor module? Was it because it was following orders? It figures it needs to go back to the scene of the crime, that there will be answers there. So it hitches a ride on a research transport ship, that happens to have a super-intelligent, curious bot on it, which Murderbot nicknames ART (for a-hole research transport because the bot just won’t shut up). Between the two of them, they manage to get Murderbot a job as a security consultant for some humans with what Murderbot calls a “death wish”, and start to figure things out.

I adore this series. I adore Murderbot as a narrator; it is sardonic and blunt and so very funny. They are tight thrillers, with some good twists and turns. I adore that they’re less than 100 pages; there are no extra words in here, just some tight, fantastic storytelling.

I can’t wait to read the next one.

All Systems Red

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by Martha Wells
First sentence: “I could have become a mass murderer after I hacked my governor module, but then I realized I could access the combined feed of entertainment channel carried on the company satellites.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is a small handful of swear words, including two f-bombs. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

In this future, everything is run by a nameless company. Everything costs, and is for hire, including Murderbot, a security robot (AI with human bits?). Except Murderbot (which is what it calls itself) has gone rogue: it has hacked the module that is supposed to make it obey commands. It’s good at faking it, and so the people on its current job — protecting those who are surveying an unknown planet — dosn’t know. That is until they realize that something has happened to the other sureying crew on the planet. Then it becomes a matter of life and death, and Murderbot is the key.

This is one I’ve heard about and have had on my TBR list for a long time. I probalby owuldn’t have picked it up, except I wanted a short book to finish out the year, and this fit the bill. (That, and Wells just won the Hugo award wo I was reminded about it.) Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed this. It was short, tight intesne, and lots of fun. I have a coworker who says she’s never identified more with a character than Murderbot, and I get it. It was a compelling narrator, and I found myself thoroughly enjoying being its presence (which would probaby mortify it).

An yeah, I’m probably going to keep reading about Murderbot’s adventures.

The Near Witch

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by V. E. Schwab
First sentence: “It starts with a crack, a sputter, and a spark.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is talk of violence, but it’d be appropriate for teenagers if they were interested. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

There has never been a stranger in the town of near. At least not in Lexi’s memory. And so, when one shows up, the town — especially the council — takes notice. And, when children start disappearing the night after the stranger arrives, the town is out for blood. Lexi doesn’t believe that the stranger has anything to do with the disappearances so she decides to set off on her own – against the wishes of her uncle and the town council – to solve the problem and get the children back.

Perhaps the thing I like best about Schwab is that she never writes the same book twice. Every single one of her books is vastly different. This is a bit of a coming-of-age story, about a girl learning to stand up for herself, and about a girl trying to find her own voice in a man’s world. It’s lyrical and delighful, and very very much a captivating story. Schwab is an excellent storyteller, and this, her first book, is a solid, captivating story.

I’m glad I finally got around to reading it.

Audiobook: A Spindle Splintered

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by Alix Harrow
Read by Amy Landon
Support your local independent booktore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There is some mild drug use (marijuana) and a few f-bombs. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

Zinnia Gray is dying. She has known her whole life that she won’t live long past her 21st birthday, so as it arrives, she figures she is doomed. Her best friend, Charm, throws a Sleeping Beauty-themed party in a tower for Zinnia’s birthday. But a rip in the continuum opens up and Zinnia finds herself in the actual Sleeping Beauty story. Or at least one version of it. The princess’s name is Primrose, and Zinnia has disrupted the curse. Together they need to figure out how to break the curse and get Zinnia back to her world.

It sounds like a pretty basic fairy tale retelling, but I did appreciate Harrow slightly subverting it. Primrose is gay, which is why she doesn’t want to marry the boorish prince. The Wicked fairy is.. .not. The tale and everyone’s impending death/sleep can’t be changed. And yet, Harrow keeps the reader pulled in and intrigued in the story. It helps that Landon is a fabulous narrator, keeping me intrigued. It also helps that it’s a short read: only 4 hours– so I didn’t feel like Harrow padded the book with anything but the bare necessities.

All this to say that it was a delightful diversion, and an enjoyable listen.

Under the Whispering Door

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by T. J. Klune
First sentence: “Patricia was crying.”
Support your local independent bookstore: Buy it there!
Content: There is some mild swearing and talk of death. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

Wallace is a partner in his own law firm, successful, powerful, demanding. He is not well-liked, but that doesn’t bother him. He is determined to milk the most out of his employees and works twice as hard as he demands they do. And yet, one weekend, he finds himself strangely outside his body. That’s odd, but what is even odder is when he finds himself at his own funeral, and the only person who can see him is a woman who calls herself his Reaper. That sets Wallace on a very interesting path as he lands at Charon’s Crossing Tea and Pastries with Mei, the Reapers, and Hugo, the ferryman. Wallace sets about trying to figure out his (after)life, and learning how to live and love better than he did when he was alive.

Oh, my heart. I picked this one up when it came out in October and I have been just waiting to have a chance to sit and savor it. And it was just as wonderful — heartfelt, funny, poignant, bittersweet — as I was hoping it would be. Seriously: if you haven’t given Klune’s books a try, do. His storytelling is incredibly affirming, and you can’t help but be happier having read them. I loved his vision of the Afterlife, of what it means to come to grips with your life and death, and just the overall love and care he put into this story.

I will most definitely be reading everything he writes from here on out.

The Heartbreak Bakery

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by A. R. Capetta
First sentence: “The splintered crack of my egg of the counter sounds like an ending.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is talk of sex, and a couple of f-bombs with some mild swearing It’s in the YA section (grades 6-8) of the bookstore.

This book hits all my buttons: it’s a book about food and baking — Syd our main character, loves to bake as self-expression; it’s a book about Austin (which I really do love to visit); it’s a book about friendships and finding love; it’s a book that truly embraces the entire rainbow of LGBTQIAP+ life and culture.

The plot is simple: Syd goes through a bad breakup, and bakes heartbreak into brownies, which get sold at the bakery, and which cause everyone who eats them to break up. Syd, feeling guilty and miserable — the owners of the Proud Muffin bakery where Syd works are one of the couples — sets about with Harley, the delivery person at the bakery, setting things right. There are lessons Learned and Love along the way, along with a smattering of magical baked goods.

Syd doesn’t have pronouns, and identifies as agender, which to be honest, has made writing this really difficult. One doesn’t consider how much pronouns are a part of life until one tries to write a review not using them.

But the book is still cute and light and frothy, following the paces of a foody romance, with an LGBT+ spin. I did like that this one felt Queer in incredibly inclusive ways (I think the only cis/het characters were Syd’s parents); I felt like (as an outsider) that the whole rainbow was represented. As a baker, I love the idea of magical baking, and some of the recipes Capetta includes sound amazing.

I don’t think tis is going to be my favorite book this year, but I am so happy that a book like this exists in the world.

Cinderella is Dead

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by Kalynn Bayron
First sentence: “Cinderella has been dead for two hundred years.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There are illusions to domestic abuse. It’s in the YA section (grades 6-8) of the bookstore.

In the kingdom of Lille, the story of Cinderella is not just a fairy tale, it’s fact. It’s the book by which every young woman is to live their life. Serve their family. Prepare for the ball, which happens every fall, where they are to be Chosen by one of the eligible men in the kingdom, and then live out their lives happily ever after. There are problems with this, of course: there are rules — curfews, limits on autonomy — that work to keep women and girls in line. Our main character, Sophia, isn’t interested in being chosen — she’s in love with another girl, which is strictly forbidden — and doesn’t want any part of the ball. Unfortunately, that’s not allowed. But, at the ball, she can’t take any more, so she runs off — which is a crime. She hides out in the woods, finds Cinderella’s mausoleum, and meets one of Cinderella’s only living descendants, and discovers the story that everyone in Lille is told is actually built upon a lie.

On the one hand, I’m always down for a new telling of a fairy tale. I adore retellings, and this one does have a unique spin. I liked that Sophia, in the end, was able to begin to fix the country — with help of course — and find her own version of happiness. What didn’t sit right with me was the way she got there. I didn’t like that all the men (except for the gay one) were complete assholes on one level or another. I get that you’re drilling down the misogynistic rules, but “not all men”? It sounds bad saying that, but that’s what I felt reading it. I also felt like Bayron felt she needed to have Sophia be gay because to have her in a hetero relationship would be Bad for the Message. (I just didn’t feel like this book was Queer in the way books written by LGBTQ+ authors are.) It’s not a bad book, but in the end, I didn’t love it.