Difference between revisions of "Newest Science Fiction Reviews"

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[[Category:New Reviews|Science Fiction]]__NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Charlie Laidlaw
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|author=Chris Brookmyre
|title= The Things We Learn When We're Dead
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|title=Places in the Darkness
 +
|rating=4
 +
|genre=Science Fiction
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|summary= Living in 2017 has me longing to live in some sort of futuristic Utopia, in a world of free thinking and no major crime.  Perhaps in a Space Station high above the Earth were the greatest minds have travelled so that they can build a vessel that will send the next generations of humans to populate new planets.  You know that as soon as you arrive it will be the same old problems.  You can't really have a Utopia with people in it, can you?
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>035650624X</amazonuk>
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}}
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{{newreview
 +
|author= Abi Curtis
 +
|title= Water & Glass
 
|rating= 5
 
|rating= 5
|genre= General Fiction
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|genre= General Fiction  
|summary= On the way to a dinner party, Lorna Love steps into the path of an oncoming car. Waking up in what appears to be a hospital, but a hospital in which wine is served for supper, everyone avoids her questions, and her nurse looks suspiciously like Sean Connery, it soon transpires that Lorna is in Heaven, or, at least, on HVN. Because HVN is a lost, dysfunctional spaceship, and God the aging hippy captain. At first Lorna can remember nothing, but as her memories return – some good, some bad, she realises that she has a decision to make, and that maybe, she needs to find a way home…
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|summary= Something has happened, something very nasty and on a submarine a pregnant elephant is one of only a handful of animals living below the waves. We follow Nerissa Crane, a vet, as she remembers recent events, looks after the animals and falls into a world of intrigue. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0995465754</amazonuk>
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786150352</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= William Gibson
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|author= Philip K Dick
|title= Neuromancer
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|title= Philip K Dick's Electric Dreams
|rating= 4
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|rating= 3
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=''He still dreamed of cyberspace…all the turns he'd taken and the corners he cut in Night City, and he'd still see the matrix in his dreams, bright lattices of logic unfolding across that colourless void''
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|summary= Philip K Dick's stories were originally published in the 50s, but they are more present than past. On the big screen ''Blade Runner 2049'' relaunched the Dick-inspired cult classic to reviews of pure praise; and on slightly smaller screens, Channel 4 has adapted the author's short stories for TV. Startlingly, Dick's current relevance reaches beyond fiction and into the factual: his topics from intrusive advertising and loss of privacy to the increasing machination of society are all headline material in today's news. It is as if half a century after their inception, Dick's electric dreams are becoming reality.
 
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473223288</amazonuk>
Neuromancer follows Case, who used to be a cyber cowboy with exceptional hacking skills, before attempting to steal from his former employer, who as a result severed his connection to cyberspace by injecting him with a mycotoxin. No longer able to enter the Matrix, Case enters a dark depression having suicidal thoughts and developing a drug addiction, which is where the reader first meets our troubled protagonist and antihero. Waiting for someone to help him escape his misery, a mysterious stranger proposes a deal to restore Case's ability to connect to cyberspace in exchange for working for him. Surrounded by secrecy, Case joins the recruits on their mission to uncover artificial intelligence and start life afresh.  
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}}
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473217385</amazonuk>
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{{newreview
 +
|author=George Mann
 +
|title=Ghosts of Empire
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|rating=4
 +
|genre=Science Fiction
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|summary=Taking on a band of undead Mummies will take it out of the best of us and a holiday may be needed.  If you are from New York there are not many other cities worldwide that could impress you, but London is one of them. Surely, a nice visit to England, far from the hustle and bustle of the Big Apple, will help you to relax. It is not as if Russian Tsarists are on the loose with magical powers or the events are conspiring to raise the sleeping power of Albion from its slumber. Is it?
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1783294183</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Brandon Sanderson
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|author=Ian Doescher
|title= Arcanum Unbounded
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|title=William Shakespeare's the Force Doth Awaken: Star Wars Part the Seventh
|rating= 4
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|rating=4.5
|genre= Fantasy
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|genre=Science Fiction
|summary= Brandon Sanderson is more cannon than man. He fires out more works than any other author of fantasy. Not only does he write an awe inspiring amount of novels, but he also writes various short fictions that go alongside them. And in here, for the first time, all the major ones are collected together.
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|summary=A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, there was a man called William Shakespeare, who was able to create a series of dramatic histories full of machinations most foul, rulers most evil and rebellious heroes and heroines most sturdy. You may or may not have noticed the cinematic version of his original stage play for ''The Force Doth Awaken'', but here at last we get the actual script, complete with annoying-in-different-ways-to-before droids anew, returning heroes from elsewhere in his oeuvre, and people keeping it in the family til it hurts.  And if you need further encouragement, don't forget his audience only demanded three parts of Henry VI – here the series is so popular we're on to part seven – surely making this over twice as good…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473218039</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>159474985X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= James Young
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|author=James Goss and Russell T Davies
|title= Rise of the Dust Child
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|title=Doctor Who: Now We Are Six Hundred: A Collection of Time Lord Verse (Dr Who)
|rating= 4
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|rating=4.5
|genre= Science Fiction
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|genre=Children's Rhymes and Verse
|summary=An age has passed since the fall of the old world, and the rise of the malignant Dust people. Amongst the terrors of this new age, humanity still lingers within the wreckage of civilisation, held together by the promise of a better existence in the next life. But not all are satisfied by this dogma. Within the smoggy city of Fort Palmer, eight year old Doran and his friend Alena stand apart, struggling to retain the lost glory of their faith. But the unquiet dead and the forces of faith do not take kindly to those who try to fix a broken world. As the quest to save the future leads each of them down a dark path, they are cast apart - struggling to overcome the monstrous dusters and the fear within themselves, desperate to see each other again.  
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|summary=Consider the Doctor.  Just how many birthday and Christmas gifts must he have to hand out each year, were he to keep in touch with even half of his companions?  He would certainly need a few novelty gifts for some of them, say, for example, whimsical books of verse that pithily encapsulate the life of a Time Lord and that of some of his friends and enemies. As luck would have it, he has the space in his TARDIS to stock up in advance, so my advice to him – sorry, her – would be to pop along to his local Earth-based book emporium and get himself ready.  And if you're working on a shorter timescale, with a shorter lifespan, and thinking perhaps just one gift season ahead, well my advice is pretty much the same.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1524634379</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785942719</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Ken Liu
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|author= Andy Weir
|title= Invisible Planets
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|title= Artemis
|rating= 4.5
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|rating= 3.5
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary= Invisible Planets is an eclectic collection, translated beautifully, and Ken Liu’s opening essay provides a welcome introduction for those who aren’t familiar with the genre. The stories are dreamlike and hypnotic, evocative and inspiring.
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|summary=Welcome to Artemis, the first city on the moon. A powerhouse for the rich and a once in a lifetime trip for earth tourists, and also a place a small community of citizens call home. Jazz Bashara is one such citizen. She came to Artemis with her father aged six, it's the only place she's ever known but she wouldn't say she's flourishing.  In fact, the phrase most often used to describe Jazz is a waste of talent. Jazz lives in the low end of town, sleeping on a bunk, using a shared bathroom, which is all she can afford through her job as a porter. However, Jazz dreams above all else of being rich and to this end, she has set up a side business of illegal smuggling activity. When one of Jazz's regular clients wants her to step up from petty criminal to major criminal for a handsome reward, it is just too tempting to refuse. What Jazz doesn't know is all the facts behind what she is being asked to do.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784978809</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091956943</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= James Goss
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|author= Wes Stuart
|title= Class: What She Does Next Will Astound You
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|title= My Name is Sam
 
|rating= 4
 
|rating= 4
|genre= Fantasy
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|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=At Coal Hill School, things have started to get public. Kids have become obsessed with a website that demands you perform risky stunts, or tell it your most painful secrets. And Seraphin, everyone's favourite vlogger, wants you to get involved. All in the name of charity. At first people just get hurt. Then their lives are ruined. Finally, they disappear. As April's fragile group of friends starts to fracture, she decides she's going to uncover the truth behind thie site herself. Whatever it takes, whoever she hurts, April's going to win. But then, to her horror, she wakes up and finds her whole world's changed.
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|summary=Who is the real enemy? This is the question which confronts Sam, the champion of the Sereia in their cosmos-spanning war with the Gibbus, and the main character in this story. Sam is an unimposing boy who has no past and no memory of who he is, yet he possesses extraordinary abilities. He is also Earth's last hope for salvation from the Gibbus who, in seven days, will destroy the planet and everyone on it. This is not his choice however: that is the decision of the alien Sereia, his mentors and guides, as he is forced to confront this hazardous task. They have their own reasons for wanting Earth to be saved, but are too weak to challenge the Gibbus themselves. In their search for a human champion they find the unlikely and ill-prepared young boy, Sam – but this child is not quite as he appears…
What she does next will astound you.
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1540504506</amazonuk>
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785941887</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= A K Benedict
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|author= C Robert Cargill
|title= Class: The Stone House
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|title= Sea of Rust
|rating= 4
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|rating= 4.5
|genre= Fantasy
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|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=There's an old stone house near Coal Hill School. Most people hurry past it. They've heard the stories. But, if you stop, and look up, you'll see the face of a girl, pressed up against a window. Screaming. Tanya finds herself drawn to the stone house. There's a mystery there, and she's going to solve it. But the more she investigates, the more she realises that there's a presence in the house. One that wants her. Something is waiting for Tanya in the stone house. Something that has been trapping others in its web over the years. Something that is far worse than any ghost...
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|summary=Have you ever watched the ''Terminator'' movies or some similar 'Robo-geddon' franchise and wondered what would have happened if the robots had actually ''won?'' Well wonder no more, because ''Sea of Rust'' hinges on that exact premise; a world where the robots have wiped out every living thing from planet earth. Only artificial life remains; there is no trace of organic matter anywhere, since the robot uprising that devastated the planet. Now two huge mainframes compete for world domination: CISSUS and VIRGIL. They capture robots and turn them into drones; uploading their minds into a hive consciousness. The few remaining bots are called 'freebots,' and inhabit a desert called the Sea of Rust, where they do what they can to survive, including cannibalising other bots for spare parts.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785941879</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473212782</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Guy Adams
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|author= Paul McAuley
|title= Class: Joyride
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|title= Austral
|rating= 4.5
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|rating= 3.5
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=Poppy is a quiet girl, right up until she steals a car and drives it through a shop window. Max is a nice guy, but then he kills his whole family. Just for fun. Amar always seems so happy, so why is he trying to jump to his death from the school roof? Some of the students of Coal Hill School are not themselves. Some of them are dying. Ram has just woken up in a body he doesn't recognise, and if he doesn't figure out why, he may well be next.
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|summary= Austral has no doubts about who she is.  Her birth was, as she puts it, ''a political act.  Conceived in a laboratory dish by direct injection of sperm into an egg.  I was customised by a suite of targeted genes…''  She was, as the jargon of her world has it ''edited''. She is, as a result, a Husky. A human modified to withstand the cold temperatures of the Antarctic continent.  Those temperatures are still hard for un-modified humans to survive in, but maybe not for much longer. This is a world in which the threats of global warming went unheeded…a world in which the ice has retreated and continues to retreat…a world in which the harshest of environments is being opened up for exploitation.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785941860</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473217318</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Stephen Baxter
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|author= Geoffrey Arnold
|title=The Massacre of Mankind
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|title= Hunted
|rating=4
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|rating= 4
|genre=Science Fiction
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|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=An intellectual property no longer dies with the author. After a certain period the copyright is lifted so that an independent author can tackle the characters, hence the proliferation of Sherlock Holmes books.  For many fans of the original, these books feel like cover versions and are best avoided. It is only when the estate of the author gets involved that their interest is piqued.  H. G. Wells' ''The War of the Worlds'' left enough of a door open to explore further and when you hire as an experienced a science fiction author as Stephen Baxter to pick up the official story, it may just be worth a read.
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|summary=Tullia learns about survival in the bush when she is taken hostage and later saves a youth's life during a hunt. Adopted into a Bushman family and the tribe, her presence stirs disparate feelings amongst the young men and women, a mixture of awe, desire, fear and hate. Living a very different life, Qwelby, Tullia's twin, is deeply shocked by the violence on Earth. As he is rescued by his four best friends from the Pit of Despair, he experiences his first feelings for Tamina, a girl he has known for years. Feelings which become much stronger for another girl he tries to help during a violent attack from his own world as he and Tullia seek to restore their telepathic link. Forming a connection with the twins during the attack, the girl, Xaala, is charged by her master with monitoring their attempts to mentally reconnect – and to prevent them. Xaala is torn between her mixed feelings for the twins and obeying her orders. Meanwhile, on the planet Vertazia and in secret, Quelby's family and friends build what they hope will be the first ever inter-dimensional transport. On a short test run, the village where he is staying is discovered. When Quelby finds out he is being watched, he flees from the village...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473205093</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785891855</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Robert Dickinson
+
|author=Daniel Suarez
|title=The Tourist
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|title=Change Agent
|rating=3
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|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Science Fiction
 
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=Time travel in any format is a tricky business.  In the real world it is pretty much impossible, or we would all be reading about how people from the future kept trying to assassinate Hitler, but he managed to avoid themIn film, time travel can be super cool and lead to some mind bending adventures, but spend a few moments unbending your mind and you discover more plot holes than an entire Terminator TetralogyIn the written form this is even worse as you don't have the visual splendour to distract the eye. The key to time travel in science fiction is to keep it simple.  Or you could just ignore this advice and write ''The Tourist''.
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|summary=I wish I was a little bit taller, I wish I had blue eyes, I wish, I wish, I wish.  In the genetic lottery that is our lives we are given a selection from our mother and our father to work withHowever, although they may be over six foot, you could still end up being shorterYou can't currently choose what coding you get, but what if you could cherry pick the best aspects of your family traits?  It would be a great way to save people from hereditary disease, but would we end up with a world full of identikit humans all following the latest genetic fashions? In the future someone would need to be in charge of stopping science going too far.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356508153</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>110198466X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Luke Rhinehart
+
|author= Stephen Baxter 
|title= Invasion
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|title= Xeelee: Vengeance 
|rating= 4.5
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|rating= 2
|genre= Humour
 
|summary=Super-intelligent furry aliens suddenly appear from another universe. And they've come to earth to have fun. Alien Louie follows fisherman Billy Morton home one day, and he and his family quickly come to love the playful alien. But when Louie starts using their computer to hack into government and corporate networks, stealing millions from banks to give to others, they realise that Louie and his friends mean trouble. As Billy and his family begin a roller coaster ride of fame and fortune, as well as a ranking high on the FBI's most wanted list, the Government soon decides that these aliens are terrorists, and must be eliminated. Whilst the aliens are playing games they hope will help humans to see the insanity of the American political, economic and military systems, they soon come to realise that the Powers that Be don't play games: they make war. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785651757</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview <!-- remove 12/9 -->
 
|author= Yan Vana
 
|title= The Message
 
|rating= 3.5
 
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=The Message follows an official Inquiry into the wanton destruction of a Protected Nature Reserve. The first witnesses give evidence of the extent of the damage and later witnesses identify those responsible. As the inquiry unfolds it becomes apparent that the Nature Reserve is Earth, and that the Inquiry is being undertaken by regulators from other Galaxies who have responsibility for the protection of Reserves throughout the Cosmos. Science Fiction? A love story? A study of human civilisation? A warning message...
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|summary=Michael Poole, Earth's greatest living engineer, changed the galaxy when he opened a worm hole to allow for quick and easy transportation across the solar system. However, such a thing was created with a degree of naivety and a lack of foresight because out of the worm hole flew an unknown vessel of alien origin. Unlike anything seen by human eyes before, it is unstoppable and unfathomable. Bent on an unknown path, the vessel is unresponsive to the human life around it. It ignores hails and even direct attacks. Nothing affects it, not even the surface of the sun. All it seems to want is energy, and Earth has plenty of that to be absorbed.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>B019NDIP1A</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473217172</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Adrian J Walker
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|author=Daniel Godfrey
|title=The End of the World Running Club
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|title=Empire of Time (New Pompeii)
|rating=4
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|rating=5
|genre=Thrillers
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|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=When the end of the world as we know it comes, Edgar is totally unprepared. Still slightly drunk from drowning his sorrows, and in a panic, he throws random items, including his daughter, down into his cellar, and then he and his family eke out a nightmarish existence in the dark until their supplies run outFortunately they are lucky, and they are rescued from the cellarAs they emerge back into the world they see the ruin and disaster around them, caused by hundreds of large asteroids hitting the earthLarge areas of the country have been destroyed.  Groups of people left alive scavenge houses and towns, turning feral, trying to find what's left to help them to surviveEdgar's family are rescued by a small remaining army unit, but he and his wife and children become separated, and so begins Edgar's desperate race to reach his loved ones, who are hundreds of miles away, before they leave on an evacuation ship for another country.
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|summary=Warning: Spoilers for [[New Pompeii by Daniel Godfrey|Book 1]] from the beginning.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785032666</amazonuk>
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The experiment to study Ancient Romans by transporting them through time to a new Pompeii just before the disaster hits the old one sounded great in theoryThe practice has been going on for years now, but the modern and old worlds living alongside each other in an uneasy peaceScientist Nick Houghton only ever wanted to live within the experiment out of curiosity but it's more dangerous than he ever dreamtSince he arrived, he's watched the Romans kill the inventors of the machine that saved them.  Nick, or Decimus Horatius Pullus to give him his Roman name, is the only non-Roman living in New Pompeii and that's not a safe position or location in which to live.
 +
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785653156</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Nina Allan
+
|author= Cixin Liu
|title= The Race
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|title=The Wandering Earth
|rating= 4
+
|rating= 5
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary= The Race alternates between our world and that of one set in a future Earth scarred by fracking and ecological collapse. In our world, the story follows Christy, a young aspiring writer whose mother left when she was only 15 and whose life is dominated by fear of her brother, a man capable of monstrous acts. Meanwhile, in Sapphire a world similar to our own yet very different, with the entire economy funded by illegal smart dog racing, we encounter Jenna Hoolman whose young niece is kidnapped at the tender age of 4. We also learn about Alex, a man who can help Christy uncover the truth behind her past as well as Maree, an intelligent young woman who has the power to change the world forever.
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|summary= If anyone thought that the short story as a form had been relegated to the pages of women's magazines (no disrespect) – think again.  One genre that has always been a stalwart supporter and encourager of the short form is Sci-fi. So when you pick up a collection of Sci-fi shorts, you know that it will have just as much depth and thought-provoking philosophy as any similar novel.  Add to that the intrigue of seeing how the concepts are approached by someone from China which – to be polite – has a somewhat different world-view in many ways to much of the rest of the planet…and add to that an author who is not only a best-seller in his home country but has the distinction of having produced the first translated work of SF ever to win the Hugo Award…this has got to be good!
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178565036X</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784978493</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Geoffrey Arnold
+
|author= Jack Campbell
|title= Ripped Apart
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|title= The Genesis Fleet: Vanguard
|rating= 3.5
+
|rating= 5
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary= Qwelby and Tulia are teenage aliens, growing up in a world and environment far removed from our own. When the twins interfere with a forbidden experiment, they find themselves transported to opposite ends of our Earth – Qwelby in Finland and Tulia in Africa. To survive, they must re-establish their telepathic connection, find each other, avoid capture, and return home. They say that their people arrived on Earth 75,000 years ago, were the cause of the development of the human race, and now need the help of those humans if their race is to survive.
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|summary=The human adventure continues! As humanity spreads to the stars it takes with it both the best and the worst examples of itself. The isolation and edginess of a Spaghetti Western meets hard Sci-Fi in this tale of far-flung colonies and bullying neighbours. We follow our protagonists, each failures in their own careers (crisis management, space navy, politics and marines) as they become heroes.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784624756</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785650408</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=George Mann
+
|author= Anne Corlett
|title=Ghosts of Karnak
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|title= The Space Between The Stars
|rating=4
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|rating= 4
|genre=Science Fiction
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|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=The superhero market is crowded and sometimes a little boring. Who cares about what a God-like person can do when the rest of us are scrambling around trying to avoid papercuts, never mind trying to repel a rogue asteroid. The best heroes are those that are just normal blokes or ladies dressed up in some fancy outfit. When it comes down to it Batman or The Shadow are just men, but it is their vulnerability that makes them ace to read about. Add to this list George Mann's 'The Ghost', a World War One veteran who returns to New York no longer willing to watch the criminals taking over his home town.
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|summary= Jamie Allenby wakes, alone, and realises her fever has broken. But could everyone she knows be dead? Months earlier, Jamie had left her partner Daniel, mourning the miscarriage of their baby. She'd just had to get away, so took a job on a distant planet. Then the virus hit. Jamie survived as it swept through our far-flung colonies. Now she feels desperate and isolated, until she receives a garbled message from Earth. If someone from her past is still alive – perhaps Daniel – she knows she must find a way to return. She meets others seeking Earth, and their ill-matched group will travel across space to achieve their dream. But they'll clash with survivors intent on repeating humanity's past mistakes, threatening their precious fresh start. Jamie will also get a second chance at happiness. But can she escape her troubled past, to embrace a hopeful future?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1783294167</amazonuk>
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|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1509833528</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Jenny T Colgan, Jacqueline Rayner, Steve Lyons, Guy Adams and Andrew Lane
+
|author= Elizabeth Moon
|title=Doctor Who: The Legends of River Song
+
|title= Cold Welcome: Vatta's Peace
|rating=3
+
|rating= 4.5
|genre=Science Fiction
 
|summary=''Hello, sweetie.''  And with those words we know where we are – in the company of River Song, one of modern TV's more infuriating characters.  Now she's likeable enough, it was just the timey wimey stuff she was lumbered with that made her hard to live with.  I would say this was a return to her side, but have we had that pleasure yet – isn't it in our future, which is her past, and vice versa at the same, er, time?  Either way, five tales here bring a selection of her escapades to a YA audience.  The results can be bordering on the written ''Who'' as seen elsewhere, but can certainly frustrate as usual.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785940880</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author= Alex Lamb
 
|title= Nemesis
 
|rating= 3.5
 
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary= I'm not a great lover of back-cover blurb, but every now and again it tells you everything you need to know…if you read between the lines. ''Hugely promising'' said SFX. ''Hits the ground running'' said the Guardian. I can't disagree with either of those two statements. Unfortunately for this particular reader, it ran very quickly into a swamp of dense pseudo-scientific-explicatory-strangle-weed. And didn't live up to the promise.
+
|summary=''I'm convinced we can survive anything''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473206111</amazonuk>
+
 +
After saving the empire, Admiral Kylara Vatta wants nothing less than to return to her home planet. But after her cousin's request, that's exactly where Ky finds herself, enroute to tie up some family business. Promised a hero's welcome, Ky plans to stay as little time as possible back in the place filled with such horrible memories. But as soon as she arrives, Ky finds herself in perilous danger, caught in the middle of an assassination attempt. Now stranded at sea and without communication links with the outside world, Ky must use every ounce of skill she possesses to battle for survival. But with an unfamiliar crew who don't trust her, sabotaged equipment and a traitor in the midst, the odds aren't in her favour. While the survivors hunt for land, Ky's family members are doing everything possible to ensure her rescue. Old friends are called in and new alliances are made, but will it be enough? Will they get to Ky before it's too late?
 +
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356506282</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Emma Geen
+
|author=Sam Peters
|title=The Many Selves of Katherine North
+
|title=From Darkest Skies
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Science Fiction
 
|summary=As a Bristol-area 'phenomenaut', nineteen-year-old Kit projects herself into the lab-grown bodies of all sorts of creatures. She's recently spent a lot of time as a fox (appropriate given her nickname) and got particularly close with a vixen named Tomoko. It's becoming much harder for her to leave the animal world behind at the end of her 'jumps'. Even after Buckley, her neuroengineer, signals her to 'Come home' and she resumes her original body, she has trouble giving up animal tendencies like territorialism, toileting outdoors and raiding bins.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408858436</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Philip Martin
 
|title=Doctor Who: Vengeance on Varos
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Science Fiction
 
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=If only those critiquing ''Doctor Who'' had access to a time machine, they would be able to temper all their responses.  When Mary Whitehouse found the likes of [[Doctor Who and the Genesis of the Daleks by Terrance Dicks|Genesis of the Daleks]] to be too violent, she and her coterie had no idea the series would soon turn to a prison world, where soon-to-be victims of snuff movies are trapped in a reality-show styled existence, and a hard-done-by populous are sat at home doing nothing other than watching the feeds from the executions, the morgues and worseIf those watching ''Doctor Who'' had the benefit of foresight they might have responded to ''Vengeance on Varos'' differently.  They were quite vocal in complaining about a horrific character being a trade delegate who is half-man, half-slug and wholly stupid evil laugh, and such an artificial premise. Little did they know the series would soon lumber people with Bonnie Langford, and aliens looking like liquorice bleeding allsorts…
+
|summary=No one likes to see a loved one die, but when they do we can reflect on how they lived and eventually move on with a piece of them inside usHowever, what would happen if we could take all the memories we have saved on the internet and combine them into an Artificial Intelligence that represented them? Would this work to keep them close, or just give you a false facsimile that prevents you from moving on?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785940406</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473214750</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Eric Saward
+
|author=M R Carey
|title=Doctor Who: The Visitation
+
|title=The Boy on the Bridge
|rating=3
+
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=Science Fiction
 
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=Have you ever given your children a time machine?  No?  Are you sure?  What about that thing in the corner upstairs called a dressing-up box have they never been transported bodily to the 1970s by some orange cords and wide-collared shirts or whatnot? Have they never been in a museum and put on a mediaeval smock and told they're now in the middle ages?  Well adults can get involved in that, too, of course – the cast of this ''Doctor Who'' adventure had to put on 17th Century garb, and that was pretty much it as far as looks goYes, there is an evil-seeming alien, yes there are some control bands he makes us poor humans wear, and yes there is a giant android dressed as Death, but on the whole it was one of the more simple episodesStill, who's to say the novel isn't much more substantial, rich and varied?
+
|summary=It's ten years since mankind was almost wiped out by a virus that turned the great majority of it into the hungries zombies by any other name. A lone, heavily armoured vehicle is travelling from the British redoubt on the south coast the length of the Kingdom, tracing a previous expedition that failed to return, and hoping to find evidence somewhere, somehow, of something that can either counter the virus or rid the survivors of their enemyAs a result the vehicle is divided in personnel between scientists and the military, and as neither side is completely cohesive it's no surprise to see the crew split along partisan lines.  That's not helped by one of the scientists, Samrina Khan, being heavily pregnantBut she's also rubbed people up by insisting on an intriguing character being on board – a teenaged savant, no less, called Stephen Greaves.  But that source of the unusual is nothing perhaps to the bizarre the team will find on their explorations…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785940392</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356503534</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Terrance Dicks
+
|author= John Scalzi
|title=Doctor Who and the Genesis of the Daleks
+
|title= The Collapsing Empire
|rating=5
+
|rating= 5
|genre=Science Fiction
+
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=If you were to randomly travel in time and space, where would you end up?  Well, if our own battle-torn history was anything to go by, you'd like as not end up in a time and place of war.  The thing is, however, the Doctor is not, for once, travelling randomly – he's been charged with carrying out errands for the Time Lords.  And the most tricky of those is to go the planet Skaro, deeply enmeshed in a thousand year war, and put paid to one of the most heinous plans that could risk the universe – that of Davros to create his Dalek race.
+
|summary='' ''Just out of curiosity if this is the smaller problem, what is the bigger problem?'' ''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785940384</amazonuk>
+
 
 +
'' ''The complete collapse of the Flow, the end of the interdependency, and the possible extinction of the human race.'' ''
 +
 
 +
In the distant future, mankind has been forced to leave Earth behind and has subsequently built an impressive empire compromising of 47 human colonies all connected by The Flow: a river of alternate space-time which makes travel across the Interdependency possible. Dependent on trade, the Holy Empire's survival is all thanks to the Flow… which is now collapsing.
 +
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1509835075</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Malcolm Hulke
+
|author= Geoff Gaywood
|title=Doctor Who and the Dinosaur Invasion
+
|title= Omnipotence: Odyssey Book I
|rating=4.5
+
|rating= 4.5
|genre=Science Fiction
+
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=What effect do you think you'd have if you were to time travel?  I dare say it depends who or what you were to begin with, and when you went and what you did.  The creatures in this story only seem to stay in the same place, and do just what comes natural – but as they're giant rampaging dinosaurs and they suddenly appear in the middle of modern-day Central London they do kind of get noticed. As a result the entire place has been evacuated, all ten million people shipped out, and the Government resettled in that hotbed of politics, Harrogate.  As a result, when the Doctor and Sarah Jane turn up they immediately get accused of being looters – and UNIT are just a touch too much out of contact. What is causing time to leave the dinosaurs moving around London, and what is a mediaeval man, complaining of witchcraft under King John, doing there too?
+
|summary= Against a backdrop of relentless global warming and deepening social conflict on Earth, an expedition sets out to secure a foothold on a distant planet thought suitable for human habitation. Almost immediately, the crew are sorely tested by a violent internal conspiracy, alien aggression and simmering emotional tensions. They complete a spectacular transition to a remote solar system where they find that their goal, as dangerous as it is exotic, already has the ominous attention of another civilisation. Moreover, a series of perplexing events suggest that their mission may be subordinate to a much greater power with its own strategic agenda.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785940376</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178589918X</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Terrance Dicks
+
|author= Kim Stanley Robinson
|title=Doctor Who and the Web of Fear
+
|title= New York 2140
|rating=4
+
|rating= 5
|genre=Science Fiction
+
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=What do you look like if you time travel?  Perhaps like a lunk-headed Austrian, naked and with fizzy blue stuff all over you. Or perhaps, to the confusion of Professor Travers, you look exactly as you did when he met you in Tibet forty years ago. That escapade has had a legacy, as he has brought back a deactivated robot Yeti – and has mistakenly managed to reactivate it.  Or perhaps, you look very much like yourself if you're a time traveller, for just by reading this book you won't change your appearance, but you'll be sent back to 1968, by way of 1975, when this book-of-the-series was first published.
+
|summary=By 2140 sea level has risen by around fifty feet, leaving coastal cities the world over with major problems. Some places will always be desirable, however, and when you've invested a lot of time and money somewhere you're reluctant to leave. Consequently New York remains a thriving, popular place even though half of Manhattan is under water and the streets are now canals. There are still financial traders, local politicians, celebrities, street urchins (albeit known as water rats) sharing the city and getting by. It seems like New York has stabilised into a new, watery normal but when a couple of programmers go missing from a building on Madison Square and some of the other residents start looking into it, a question begins to be asked: Does it have to be this way?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785940368</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356508757</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author=Bill Strutton
+
|author= Stefan Mohamed
|title=Doctor Who and the Zarbi
+
|title= Stanly's Ghost: Book 3 (The Bitter Sixteen Trilogy)
|rating=3.5
+
|rating= 5
|genre=Science Fiction
+
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=Consider the time machine.  You probably know of it as looking like either some fancy Edwardian sit-upon machine that the Morlocks nick, or perhaps a battered old English police call box. I would suggest it can also look like a small paperback book – pretty much like the subject at hand. This reprint of a ''Doctor Who'' novel, first presented in 1973 from the series shown in 1965, certainly has the ability to take you back. I grew up with the series on TV and the books in a Target imprint, but this predates that – it was, apparently, the second ever Who book-of-the-series. In it, the good Doctor and his three companions arrive on a certain quarry-like planet. One stays in the TARDIS, only to find it and her nicked by aliens; another needs rescuing from alien mind control by a different species of aliens; and the third with our irascible hero work out what actually took control of their ship and stranded them there in the first place…
+
|summary= Cynical, solitary Stanly Bird used to be a fairly typical teenager – unless you count the fact that his best friend was a talking beagle named Daryl. Then came the superpowers. And the super powered allies. And the mysterious enemies. And the terrifying monsters. And the stunning revelations. And the apocalypse. Now he's not sure what he is. Or where he is. Or how exactly one is supposed to proceed after saving the world. All he knows is that his story isn't finished. Not quite yet …
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178594035X</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784630764</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= David Wingrove
+
|author=Tom Toner
|title= The Ocean of Time
+
|title= The Weight of the World (The Amaranthine Spectrum)
|rating= 3.5
+
|rating=4
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary= The War for Time continues. From the frozen tundra of 13th Century Russia to the battle of Paltava in 1709 and beyond, Otto Behr has waged an unquestioning, unending war across time for his people. But now a third unidentified power has joined the game across the ocean of time, and everything Otto holds dear could be unmade…
+
|summary= One thing great science fiction needs is solid world building. When I pick up a book like this, I need to imagine that the universe has existed before the plot has started and will continue to do so after: it needs a strong sense of history and future. With this book, and series, I feel like I have just had a brief glimpse into something much larger. A great deal happens in the plot, but even more is happening, and has happened, across the Firmament.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009195617X</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473211395</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Holly Jennings
+
|author= Amanda Hocking
|title= Arena
+
|title= Freeks
 
|rating= 3.5
 
|rating= 3.5
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary= Kali Ling competes in the RAGE tournaments – a competition of Virtual Gaming, where the world's best gamers compete in a fight to the digital death. Every fights is broadcast to millions, and each player leads lives of fame. Although the weapons are digital, the players feel every blow… Kali Ling – the first female captain in tournament history, is famed for her prowess – but has her world shaken when her teammate and lover overdoses. Now, she must win the tournament and uncover the truth about the tournament, for the Virtual Gaming League has dark secrets. And the only way to change the rules is to fight from the inside…
+
|summary= In the spring of 1987, the carnival comes to small-town Caudry, Louisiana. Then events take a dangerous turn. For Mara Beznik, the carnival is home. It's also a place of secrets, hidden powers and a buried past - making it hard to connect with outsiders. However, sparks fly when she meets local boy Gabe Alvarado. As they become inseparable, Mara realizes Gabe is hiding his own secrets. And his family legacy could destroy Mara's world. They find the word 'freeks' sprayed on trailers, as carnival employees start disappearing. Then workers wind up dead, killed in disturbing ways by someone or something. Mara is determined to unlock the mystery, with Gabe's help. But can they really halt this campaign of fear?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1101988762</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1509807659</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Michael Cobley
+
|author= Alec Birri
|title= Ancestral Machines
+
|title= Condition: Book Two - The Curing Begins...
|rating= 3
+
|rating= 4
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary=Having completed the Humanity's Fire trilogy with the Ascendant Stars, I expected to go off and do something completely different.  He didn't.  In Ancestral Machines, we're back in the same universe.  The Construct (an ancient AI on a mission) is still doing its best to protect sentient species, and the drone Rensik is still one of its key agents. 
+
|summary= Discovering an infamous Nazi doctor conducted abortions in Argentina after the Second World War may not come as a surprise, but why was the twisted eugenicist not only allowed to continue his evil experiments but encouraged to do so? And what has that got to do with a respected neurologist in 2027? Surely the invention of a cure for nearly all the world's ailments can't possibly have its roots buried in the horrors of Auschwitz? The unacceptable is about to become the disturbingly bizarre. What has the treatment's 'correction' of paedophiles got to do with the President of the United States, the Pope and even the UK's Green Party?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0356501779</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785898779</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
}}
 
{{newreview
 
{{newreview
|author= Jo Walton
+
|author= Alastair Reynolds
|title= The Philosopher Kings
+
|title= Slow Bullets
|rating= 3.5
+
|rating= 4
 
|genre= Science Fiction
 
|genre= Science Fiction
|summary= Twenty years have passed since the Goddess Athene founded the Just City. The god Apollo is still living there, albeit in human form. Now married, and the father of several children, the man/god struggles to cope when tragedy befalls his family. Beset by grief and a need for revenge, Apollo sets sail to find the man who caused him such pain, but discovers something that may change everything…
+
|summary=When hundreds of worlds have been at war for a long time, the announcement of a ceasefire takes a while to reach everyone. It's perhaps not surprising that the worst of the soldiers using the war as an excuse for crimes, don't immediately give up. Scur, a conscript who has just been given the hope of returning to her family, has the misfortune to run into one of these war criminals before the peacekeepers arrive. He leaves her to die, but she subsequently wakes up from hibernation on a prison ship, only to discover that he is there too. And that's the least of her worries.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1472150791</amazonuk>
+
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147321842X</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Mike Brooks
 
|title=Dark Sky
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=Science Fiction
 
|summary=Making money is not easy, especially if you live life on the edges of known space scraping a living doing odd jobs with your crew; some legal, some not so legal.  You may not have much money, a good ship or even adequate washing facilities, but what you do have is the friendship and comradery of your fellow crewmates.  That is unless you have all just discovered that the captain used to be a space pirate who once suffocated his entire crew so that he could escape. Welcome to the jolly ship Keiko.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009195665X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}

Revision as of 09:34, 24 November 2017

Places in the Darkness by Chris Brookmyre

4star.jpg Science Fiction

Living in 2017 has me longing to live in some sort of futuristic Utopia, in a world of free thinking and no major crime. Perhaps in a Space Station high above the Earth were the greatest minds have travelled so that they can build a vessel that will send the next generations of humans to populate new planets. You know that as soon as you arrive it will be the same old problems. You can't really have a Utopia with people in it, can you? Full review...

Water & Glass by Abi Curtis

5star.jpg General Fiction

Something has happened, something very nasty and on a submarine a pregnant elephant is one of only a handful of animals living below the waves. We follow Nerissa Crane, a vet, as she remembers recent events, looks after the animals and falls into a world of intrigue. Full review...

Philip K Dick's Electric Dreams by Philip K Dick

3star.jpg Science Fiction

Philip K Dick's stories were originally published in the 50s, but they are more present than past. On the big screen Blade Runner 2049 relaunched the Dick-inspired cult classic to reviews of pure praise; and on slightly smaller screens, Channel 4 has adapted the author's short stories for TV. Startlingly, Dick's current relevance reaches beyond fiction and into the factual: his topics from intrusive advertising and loss of privacy to the increasing machination of society are all headline material in today's news. It is as if half a century after their inception, Dick's electric dreams are becoming reality. Full review...

Ghosts of Empire by George Mann

4star.jpg Science Fiction

Taking on a band of undead Mummies will take it out of the best of us and a holiday may be needed. If you are from New York there are not many other cities worldwide that could impress you, but London is one of them. Surely, a nice visit to England, far from the hustle and bustle of the Big Apple, will help you to relax. It is not as if Russian Tsarists are on the loose with magical powers or the events are conspiring to raise the sleeping power of Albion from its slumber. Is it? Full review...

William Shakespeare's the Force Doth Awaken: Star Wars Part the Seventh by Ian Doescher

4.5star.jpg Science Fiction

A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, there was a man called William Shakespeare, who was able to create a series of dramatic histories full of machinations most foul, rulers most evil and rebellious heroes and heroines most sturdy. You may or may not have noticed the cinematic version of his original stage play for The Force Doth Awaken, but here at last we get the actual script, complete with annoying-in-different-ways-to-before droids anew, returning heroes from elsewhere in his oeuvre, and people keeping it in the family til it hurts. And if you need further encouragement, don't forget his audience only demanded three parts of Henry VI – here the series is so popular we're on to part seven – surely making this over twice as good… Full review...

Doctor Who: Now We Are Six Hundred: A Collection of Time Lord Verse (Dr Who) by James Goss and Russell T Davies

4.5star.jpg Children's Rhymes and Verse

Consider the Doctor. Just how many birthday and Christmas gifts must he have to hand out each year, were he to keep in touch with even half of his companions? He would certainly need a few novelty gifts for some of them, say, for example, whimsical books of verse that pithily encapsulate the life of a Time Lord and that of some of his friends and enemies. As luck would have it, he has the space in his TARDIS to stock up in advance, so my advice to him – sorry, her – would be to pop along to his local Earth-based book emporium and get himself ready. And if you're working on a shorter timescale, with a shorter lifespan, and thinking perhaps just one gift season ahead, well my advice is pretty much the same. Full review...

Artemis by Andy Weir

3.5star.jpg Science Fiction

Welcome to Artemis, the first city on the moon. A powerhouse for the rich and a once in a lifetime trip for earth tourists, and also a place a small community of citizens call home. Jazz Bashara is one such citizen. She came to Artemis with her father aged six, it's the only place she's ever known but she wouldn't say she's flourishing. In fact, the phrase most often used to describe Jazz is a waste of talent. Jazz lives in the low end of town, sleeping on a bunk, using a shared bathroom, which is all she can afford through her job as a porter. However, Jazz dreams above all else of being rich and to this end, she has set up a side business of illegal smuggling activity. When one of Jazz's regular clients wants her to step up from petty criminal to major criminal for a handsome reward, it is just too tempting to refuse. What Jazz doesn't know is all the facts behind what she is being asked to do. Full review...

My Name is Sam by Wes Stuart

4star.jpg Science Fiction

Who is the real enemy? This is the question which confronts Sam, the champion of the Sereia in their cosmos-spanning war with the Gibbus, and the main character in this story. Sam is an unimposing boy who has no past and no memory of who he is, yet he possesses extraordinary abilities. He is also Earth's last hope for salvation from the Gibbus who, in seven days, will destroy the planet and everyone on it. This is not his choice however: that is the decision of the alien Sereia, his mentors and guides, as he is forced to confront this hazardous task. They have their own reasons for wanting Earth to be saved, but are too weak to challenge the Gibbus themselves. In their search for a human champion they find the unlikely and ill-prepared young boy, Sam – but this child is not quite as he appears… Full review...

Sea of Rust by C Robert Cargill

4.5star.jpg Science Fiction

Have you ever watched the Terminator movies or some similar 'Robo-geddon' franchise and wondered what would have happened if the robots had actually won? Well wonder no more, because Sea of Rust hinges on that exact premise; a world where the robots have wiped out every living thing from planet earth. Only artificial life remains; there is no trace of organic matter anywhere, since the robot uprising that devastated the planet. Now two huge mainframes compete for world domination: CISSUS and VIRGIL. They capture robots and turn them into drones; uploading their minds into a hive consciousness. The few remaining bots are called 'freebots,' and inhabit a desert called the Sea of Rust, where they do what they can to survive, including cannibalising other bots for spare parts. Full review...

Austral by Paul McAuley

3.5star.jpg Science Fiction

Austral has no doubts about who she is. Her birth was, as she puts it, a political act. Conceived in a laboratory dish by direct injection of sperm into an egg. I was customised by a suite of targeted genes… She was, as the jargon of her world has it edited. She is, as a result, a Husky. A human modified to withstand the cold temperatures of the Antarctic continent. Those temperatures are still hard for un-modified humans to survive in, but maybe not for much longer. This is a world in which the threats of global warming went unheeded…a world in which the ice has retreated and continues to retreat…a world in which the harshest of environments is being opened up for exploitation. Full review...

Hunted by Geoffrey Arnold

4star.jpg Science Fiction

Tullia learns about survival in the bush when she is taken hostage and later saves a youth's life during a hunt. Adopted into a Bushman family and the tribe, her presence stirs disparate feelings amongst the young men and women, a mixture of awe, desire, fear and hate. Living a very different life, Qwelby, Tullia's twin, is deeply shocked by the violence on Earth. As he is rescued by his four best friends from the Pit of Despair, he experiences his first feelings for Tamina, a girl he has known for years. Feelings which become much stronger for another girl he tries to help during a violent attack from his own world as he and Tullia seek to restore their telepathic link. Forming a connection with the twins during the attack, the girl, Xaala, is charged by her master with monitoring their attempts to mentally reconnect – and to prevent them. Xaala is torn between her mixed feelings for the twins and obeying her orders. Meanwhile, on the planet Vertazia and in secret, Quelby's family and friends build what they hope will be the first ever inter-dimensional transport. On a short test run, the village where he is staying is discovered. When Quelby finds out he is being watched, he flees from the village... Full review...

Change Agent by Daniel Suarez

3.5star.jpg Science Fiction

I wish I was a little bit taller, I wish I had blue eyes, I wish, I wish, I wish. In the genetic lottery that is our lives we are given a selection from our mother and our father to work with. However, although they may be over six foot, you could still end up being shorter. You can't currently choose what coding you get, but what if you could cherry pick the best aspects of your family traits? It would be a great way to save people from hereditary disease, but would we end up with a world full of identikit humans all following the latest genetic fashions? In the future someone would need to be in charge of stopping science going too far. Full review...

Xeelee: Vengeance by Stephen Baxter

2star.jpg Science Fiction

Michael Poole, Earth's greatest living engineer, changed the galaxy when he opened a worm hole to allow for quick and easy transportation across the solar system. However, such a thing was created with a degree of naivety and a lack of foresight because out of the worm hole flew an unknown vessel of alien origin. Unlike anything seen by human eyes before, it is unstoppable and unfathomable. Bent on an unknown path, the vessel is unresponsive to the human life around it. It ignores hails and even direct attacks. Nothing affects it, not even the surface of the sun. All it seems to want is energy, and Earth has plenty of that to be absorbed. Full review...

Empire of Time (New Pompeii) by Daniel Godfrey

5star.jpg Science Fiction

Warning: Spoilers for Book 1 from the beginning. The experiment to study Ancient Romans by transporting them through time to a new Pompeii just before the disaster hits the old one sounded great in theory. The practice has been going on for years now, but the modern and old worlds living alongside each other in an uneasy peace. Scientist Nick Houghton only ever wanted to live within the experiment out of curiosity but it's more dangerous than he ever dreamt. Since he arrived, he's watched the Romans kill the inventors of the machine that saved them. Nick, or Decimus Horatius Pullus to give him his Roman name, is the only non-Roman living in New Pompeii and that's not a safe position or location in which to live. Full review...

The Wandering Earth by Cixin Liu

5star.jpg Science Fiction

If anyone thought that the short story as a form had been relegated to the pages of women's magazines (no disrespect) – think again. One genre that has always been a stalwart supporter and encourager of the short form is Sci-fi. So when you pick up a collection of Sci-fi shorts, you know that it will have just as much depth and thought-provoking philosophy as any similar novel. Add to that the intrigue of seeing how the concepts are approached by someone from China which – to be polite – has a somewhat different world-view in many ways to much of the rest of the planet…and add to that an author who is not only a best-seller in his home country but has the distinction of having produced the first translated work of SF ever to win the Hugo Award…this has got to be good! Full review...

The Genesis Fleet: Vanguard by Jack Campbell

5star.jpg Science Fiction

The human adventure continues! As humanity spreads to the stars it takes with it both the best and the worst examples of itself. The isolation and edginess of a Spaghetti Western meets hard Sci-Fi in this tale of far-flung colonies and bullying neighbours. We follow our protagonists, each failures in their own careers (crisis management, space navy, politics and marines) as they become heroes. Full review...

The Space Between The Stars by Anne Corlett

4star.jpg Science Fiction

Jamie Allenby wakes, alone, and realises her fever has broken. But could everyone she knows be dead? Months earlier, Jamie had left her partner Daniel, mourning the miscarriage of their baby. She'd just had to get away, so took a job on a distant planet. Then the virus hit. Jamie survived as it swept through our far-flung colonies. Now she feels desperate and isolated, until she receives a garbled message from Earth. If someone from her past is still alive – perhaps Daniel – she knows she must find a way to return. She meets others seeking Earth, and their ill-matched group will travel across space to achieve their dream. But they'll clash with survivors intent on repeating humanity's past mistakes, threatening their precious fresh start. Jamie will also get a second chance at happiness. But can she escape her troubled past, to embrace a hopeful future? Full review...

Cold Welcome: Vatta's Peace by Elizabeth Moon

4.5star.jpg Science Fiction

I'm convinced we can survive anything

After saving the empire, Admiral Kylara Vatta wants nothing less than to return to her home planet. But after her cousin's request, that's exactly where Ky finds herself, enroute to tie up some family business. Promised a hero's welcome, Ky plans to stay as little time as possible back in the place filled with such horrible memories. But as soon as she arrives, Ky finds herself in perilous danger, caught in the middle of an assassination attempt. Now stranded at sea and without communication links with the outside world, Ky must use every ounce of skill she possesses to battle for survival. But with an unfamiliar crew who don't trust her, sabotaged equipment and a traitor in the midst, the odds aren't in her favour. While the survivors hunt for land, Ky's family members are doing everything possible to ensure her rescue. Old friends are called in and new alliances are made, but will it be enough? Will they get to Ky before it's too late? Full review...

From Darkest Skies by Sam Peters

4star.jpg Science Fiction

No one likes to see a loved one die, but when they do we can reflect on how they lived and eventually move on with a piece of them inside us. However, what would happen if we could take all the memories we have saved on the internet and combine them into an Artificial Intelligence that represented them? Would this work to keep them close, or just give you a false facsimile that prevents you from moving on? Full review...

The Boy on the Bridge by M R Carey

3.5star.jpg Science Fiction

It's ten years since mankind was almost wiped out by a virus that turned the great majority of it into the hungries – zombies by any other name. A lone, heavily armoured vehicle is travelling from the British redoubt on the south coast the length of the Kingdom, tracing a previous expedition that failed to return, and hoping to find evidence somewhere, somehow, of something that can either counter the virus or rid the survivors of their enemy. As a result the vehicle is divided in personnel between scientists and the military, and as neither side is completely cohesive it's no surprise to see the crew split along partisan lines. That's not helped by one of the scientists, Samrina Khan, being heavily pregnant. But she's also rubbed people up by insisting on an intriguing character being on board – a teenaged savant, no less, called Stephen Greaves. But that source of the unusual is nothing perhaps to the bizarre the team will find on their explorations… Full review...

The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi

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Just out of curiosity if this is the smaller problem, what is the bigger problem?

The complete collapse of the Flow, the end of the interdependency, and the possible extinction of the human race.

In the distant future, mankind has been forced to leave Earth behind and has subsequently built an impressive empire compromising of 47 human colonies all connected by The Flow: a river of alternate space-time which makes travel across the Interdependency possible. Dependent on trade, the Holy Empire's survival is all thanks to the Flow… which is now collapsing. Full review...

Omnipotence: Odyssey Book I by Geoff Gaywood

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Against a backdrop of relentless global warming and deepening social conflict on Earth, an expedition sets out to secure a foothold on a distant planet thought suitable for human habitation. Almost immediately, the crew are sorely tested by a violent internal conspiracy, alien aggression and simmering emotional tensions. They complete a spectacular transition to a remote solar system where they find that their goal, as dangerous as it is exotic, already has the ominous attention of another civilisation. Moreover, a series of perplexing events suggest that their mission may be subordinate to a much greater power with its own strategic agenda. Full review...

New York 2140 by Kim Stanley Robinson

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By 2140 sea level has risen by around fifty feet, leaving coastal cities the world over with major problems. Some places will always be desirable, however, and when you've invested a lot of time and money somewhere you're reluctant to leave. Consequently New York remains a thriving, popular place even though half of Manhattan is under water and the streets are now canals. There are still financial traders, local politicians, celebrities, street urchins (albeit known as water rats) sharing the city and getting by. It seems like New York has stabilised into a new, watery normal but when a couple of programmers go missing from a building on Madison Square and some of the other residents start looking into it, a question begins to be asked: Does it have to be this way? Full review...

Stanly's Ghost: Book 3 (The Bitter Sixteen Trilogy) by Stefan Mohamed

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Cynical, solitary Stanly Bird used to be a fairly typical teenager – unless you count the fact that his best friend was a talking beagle named Daryl. Then came the superpowers. And the super powered allies. And the mysterious enemies. And the terrifying monsters. And the stunning revelations. And the apocalypse. Now he's not sure what he is. Or where he is. Or how exactly one is supposed to proceed after saving the world. All he knows is that his story isn't finished. Not quite yet … Full review...

The Weight of the World (The Amaranthine Spectrum) by Tom Toner

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One thing great science fiction needs is solid world building. When I pick up a book like this, I need to imagine that the universe has existed before the plot has started and will continue to do so after: it needs a strong sense of history and future. With this book, and series, I feel like I have just had a brief glimpse into something much larger. A great deal happens in the plot, but even more is happening, and has happened, across the Firmament. Full review...

Freeks by Amanda Hocking

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In the spring of 1987, the carnival comes to small-town Caudry, Louisiana. Then events take a dangerous turn. For Mara Beznik, the carnival is home. It's also a place of secrets, hidden powers and a buried past - making it hard to connect with outsiders. However, sparks fly when she meets local boy Gabe Alvarado. As they become inseparable, Mara realizes Gabe is hiding his own secrets. And his family legacy could destroy Mara's world. They find the word 'freeks' sprayed on trailers, as carnival employees start disappearing. Then workers wind up dead, killed in disturbing ways by someone or something. Mara is determined to unlock the mystery, with Gabe's help. But can they really halt this campaign of fear? Full review...

Condition: Book Two - The Curing Begins... by Alec Birri

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Discovering an infamous Nazi doctor conducted abortions in Argentina after the Second World War may not come as a surprise, but why was the twisted eugenicist not only allowed to continue his evil experiments but encouraged to do so? And what has that got to do with a respected neurologist in 2027? Surely the invention of a cure for nearly all the world's ailments can't possibly have its roots buried in the horrors of Auschwitz? The unacceptable is about to become the disturbingly bizarre. What has the treatment's 'correction' of paedophiles got to do with the President of the United States, the Pope and even the UK's Green Party? Full review...

Slow Bullets by Alastair Reynolds

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When hundreds of worlds have been at war for a long time, the announcement of a ceasefire takes a while to reach everyone. It's perhaps not surprising that the worst of the soldiers using the war as an excuse for crimes, don't immediately give up. Scur, a conscript who has just been given the hope of returning to her family, has the misfortune to run into one of these war criminals before the peacekeepers arrive. He leaves her to die, but she subsequently wakes up from hibernation on a prison ship, only to discover that he is there too. And that's the least of her worries. Full review...