Wolf Worm by T. Kingfisher

 

In the past 4 years, or so, I have become a HUGE fan of T. Kingfisher aka Ursula Vernon. 

Ms. Vernon is the author of the Hamster Princess books, which both of my daughters have enjoyed (as have I!). Those books were my introduction to her, along with her social media presence, which I found through Seanan McGuire. 

Ordinarily, I don’t like horror. I never wanted to watch scary movies as a kid. I got nightmares from E.T.  But based on recommendations I read the Twisted Ones and The Holllow Places and I realized that I loved Ms. Vernon’s writing and I could make it through the scary parts unscathed with her as my guide. 

I started devouring her back catalog and putting all new releases on hold at the library.  I have subscribed to her Patreon and I convinced my wife to read Nettle and Bone, which she loved (as did I). I even backed the kickstarter for the rerelease of Digger, which was wonderful. 

I was very excited when I heard she had a new book out in 2026 called Wolf Worm and I was even more excited when I got an eARC from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review. 

This book was super creepy in the best ways! I will not be recommending it to my wife for that reason but to anyone that liked her other more horror-y books this is a slam dunk. The protagonist, like many in her recent novels, is a not young woman who reads as slightly neurodivergent who ends up in a creepy situation. She is a scientific illustrator in the post Civil War south who gets a job in a creepy house painting bugs for a creepy naturalist. I won’t spoil the big reveal but suffice it to say I was surprised and pleased by how the plot resolved. Very satisfying!

The Subtle Art of Folding Space by John Chu

 

Ever since I started voting for the Hugo awards, I have tried to be more mindful of the names of authors that I enjoy so I can seek them out again. Hugo reading is where I first discovered John Chu. I rarely read short stories except when I am reading for the Hugos so I hadn’t encountered him before, but I enjoyed his stories and looked forward to seeing what else he wrote. I was very happy when NetGalley and the publisher gave me an advanced copy of his debut novel, The Subtle Art of Folding Space. This is a family drama in an sff setting. The protagonist is coping with the impending death of her mother and the disdain of her much older sister while studying for her PhD. She and her family are also part of a secret organization that helps maintain the universe. I really enjoyed this book, but much more for the family and character work than for the sff aspects. They weren’t bad, mind you, but what the author does with character is so much more powerful. It reminded me of how I felt reading 11/22/63 by Steven King - I enjoyed it but I wondered how great a non-sff book by the author would be. I look forward to his next book!

Ignore All Previous Instructions by Ada Hoffman

 

Tachyon has become one of the publishers I seek out work by - they have a really good track record of publishing books I enjoy. Now, I hadn’t heard of the author ADA Hoffman before, but I was perusing Tachyon’s offerings on NetGalley and I was intrigued by this book. I’m a sucker for a story set on a Jovian moon so I requested a copy in exchange for an honest review. Boy was I glad I did! This book was wonderful and powerful and sad and kind in so many ways! The protagonist is a neurodivergent woman who works as a script supervisor for an AI generated tv show and she gets caught up in her ex’s heist hijinks when he comes back into her life.  There is humor and love and pathos and sadness and I just could not put this book down. I am so glad I read it and I know you will be too. 

We Burned So Bright by T J Klune

 

I really love TJ Klune’s vibe even when I don’t love his work. When I saw Mr. Klune at NY Comic-Con a few years back, I remembered how cool I thought he was and how much I liked his style and sensibilities. I really enjoyed his Extraordinaries trilogy (although his strong pro- and anti- police stands in different volumes gave me whiplash), but I didn’t really vibe with Under the Whispering Door. I enjoyed the sentiments of House on a Cerulean Sea but felt the world building was weak in a way that took me out of the book, and I felt the sequel had a deus ex machina that felt cheap. Ultimately, I enjoy his takes on love and joy even when I don’t enjoy the stories they are in. 

So I decided to request from NetGalley and the publisher an eARC of We Burned So Bright, his newest book. The world is about to end due to a black whole moving through our solar system and an elderly gay couple tries to make a cross country trip before the end. Like many of his books, the meditations on love and the hearts of the characters is what shines in this piece. The world building, however, totally take me out of the story. The idea that society would be functioning enough in the weeks leading up to total annihilation to support a cross country road trip is ludicrous, and the physics does not seem plausible. It reminded me of The Last Policeman series, which was much better in just about every way. That being said, the character and relationship stuff was very moving. I sometimes wish Mr. Klune would write a nonfantastical story - I would read and enjoy it. I enjoyed this too, but with these quibbles I often have with his work.  

Rabbit Test and Other Stories by Samantha Mills

 

I first encountered Samantha Mills when her story, Rabbit Test, was nominated for a Hugo Award. I read it along side the other nominees and I loved that story so much - it was incredibly well written and was number one on my ballot. (Regardless of what we later learned about how the 2023 Hugo nominations were hijacked, that story was amazing and it will always be a Hugo winner in my mind.)

After reading that story, I was excited when I found out that Ms. Mills had a first novel, The Wings Upon Her Back coming out, and I was even more excited when NetGalley and the publisher gave me an eARC in exchange for an honest review. I really enjoyed it and said that I was excited to read more of Ms. Mills’s work in the future. So I was thrilled when the publisher gave me an ARC of Rabbit Test and Other Stories, what I hope is the first of many short story collections by this author, in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this book! I often said that I much prefer single offer short story collections to anthologies because, among other things, the quality of the work is usually more consistent and there’s less tonal whiplash. But even in the best collections, there are often stories that are weaker or don’t work as well for an individual reader.  In this collection, however, every story slapped.  There was not a single dud in the bunch that I kept getting wowed over and over again.  My only complaint about this book was that it was too short.  When I got to the end, I just wished that there was more.  This was wonderful from beginning to end.  

Platform Decay by Martha Wells

We all love Murderbot, right? Murderbot is one of the absolute best characters to come out of SF in years. I remember when I read the description of Martha Wells’s All Systems Red and thought to myself “I’ve got to put that on hold at the library!”  And I was right - it was excellent. I have eagerly awaited each new Murderbot book and also have been reading some of Ms. Wells’s other fantasy books. I was thrilled to be able to meet Ms Wells at Worldcon last year and got her to sign my daughter’s copies of the first six Murderbot books. 

So I was overjoyed when NetGalley and tordotcom gave me an eARC of Platform Decay, the new Murderbot book, in exchange for an honest review. 

This was stupendous! Before this, Fugitive Telemetry and System collapse were my favorite Murderbot books, but this one now claims the top spot.  I love getting more Mensah family dynamics and this book did not disappoint. It was a road trip rescue mission in a fascinating space station environment and was a total page turner that I could not put down. 

This book is a must buy!!

River of Bones and Other Stories by Rebecca Roanhorse

 

I first discovered Rebecca Roanhorse when her short story "Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience™”, was nominated for a Hugo Award.  I loved it and her! Her writing style is crisp and it pulled me in right away.  When Trail of Lightning, her first novel, was nominated for awards the next year, I read it and thoroughly enjoyed it.  I felt like it had some “first novel” roughness but was altogether enjoyable.  The sequel, Storm of Locusts, was even better! I enjoyed Black Sun, and I was excited to be at the Hugo Awards last year when she won best series. 

So I was thrilled when NetGalley and Saga Press gave me an eARC of her new short story collection, River of Bones, in exchange for an honest review. As I’ve said several times before on this blog, I love a single author short story collection very much, and this one was no exception! It was wonderful to revisit "Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience™” which was just as enjoyable and haunting as it was the first time I read it. “The Boys From Blood River” was great and “Falling Bodies” was heartbreaking. The title story, “River of Bones” was a new entry in the series started in Trail of Lightning and I really enjoyed it too. This is an excellent collection!

The Lost Daughter of Sparta by Felicia Day

Who doesn’t love Felicia Day? From Buffy to Dr Horrible to MST3K, she has been a part of nerdom for a long time. So when I saw that she had an upcoming graphic novel based on Greek mythology, I got very excited. (Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review. )

This book tells the story of a sister of Helen of Troy and Clytemnestra who seeks to break the curse on her family that she will betray her future husband. The art style is very evocative, with only red being used a an accent color - and also for the protagonist’s facial birthmark. This is a lovely love story that sometimes feels simple but always feels powerful. An enjoyable read. 

To Ride a Rising Storm by Moniquill Blackgoose

 

When I reviewed the first book in this series, To Shape a Dragon's Breath, I was angry at myself for waiting so long to read it. 

I never heard of this author until the 2024 Hugo Award nominations came out, and when the author won the Astounding Award in 2025, I finally got around to reading it and really enjoyed it.  I was excited for the sequel and quite pleased when NetGalley and the publisher gave me an eARC in exchange for an honest review. 

I also really enjoyed this sequel, but the pacing felt a bit off. I wanted to get back to school right away, not spend the whole summer on the protagonist Anequs’s island. This book kind of felt like middle book of trilogy setup stuff without a big plot of its own, but that’s a minor quibble since what it was setting up was very interesting. I liked the political stuff and I really enjoyed most of the new characters. I was a little miffed at the cliffhanger ending, but I’ll keep reading this series because I have to find out what happens next!

The Poet Empress by Shen Tao

 

Sometimes it pays to just say “why the heck!”

I have been reviewing books I get from NetGalley on this blog for several years, but it is still rare that I get offered a book I did not request. So I was startled last month to get an email offering me an audio eARC of The Poet Empress, a book by a debut author with an interesting magic system - poetry could create magical effects and in order to craft a death spell you would have to live the target. Intrigued, I accepted the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. 

I really enjoyed this book. Don’t get me wrong, it is super grim, starting off with starved babies and moving on to ripped out tongues and torture,  but I really liked the voice of the protagonist and how she learns how to handle herself as a concubine striving to be empress. This was an engrossing audio book. I listened at 2x speed. 

There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm

I am very lucky- my wife’s sister married an awesome guy that I really enjoy hanging out with. We play D&D  weekly and talk books all the time. My brother-in-law suggested I read There Is No Antimemetics Division this book years ago when it was self published because he really enjoyed it, but I never got around to reading it because I was busy with other books. When it got picked up by a traditional publisher, I requested an eARC from the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. 

This book was interesting. It was in essence about a shadowy government organization fighting Eldritch horrors that cannot be perceived. Although it felt very well written on the sentence and paragraph level, with some delightful and haunting language, the characters all fell flat for me, and since I didn’t care about them, it was hard to care about or follow what was happening. I can see why my brother-in-law liked this, but it just wasn’t really for me. 

After the Fall by Edward Ashton

 

I didn’t know anything about Edward Ashton until last year when I got an email from NetGalley telling me I was auto-approved for a bunch of books by authors I had never heard of.  I decided to say “what the heck!” and I ended up really liking The Fourth Consort by Edward Ashton. So I was looking forward to this new book by him and I appreciated getting an eARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. 

I didn’t enjoy this one as much as The Fourth Consort. After the Fall is set on Earth a few generations after an alien invasion. Humans are kept as pets, basically, by aliens that have wiped out most of the independent humans on the planet. The book is told from the perspective of a human pet who was adopted like a shelter dog by one of the aliens who then sets out to open up a bed and breakfast for other aliens. The tone of this book feels really weird. Sometimes it touches on the horrors of humans being conquered and enslaved, and other times it’s wacky hijinks. The plot hinges on some coincidences that I didn’t buy. Overall, this book was a bit of a letdown. 

Trace Elements by Jo Walton and Ada Palmer

OMG this book was like it was written just for me!

For starters, I love Jo Walton’s books. I first encountered her in 2013, when I checked Among Others out from the library - I knew it had won the Hugo and the Nebula Awards and I wanted to see what it was about.  I was in love with this book.  I loved the protagonist and I loved the magic.  I remember reading through the section on how the narrator thought she had used magic to conjure up the book club at the library and then I turn the page and found a bookmark that some previous reader had left in this library book I was reading. The bookmark turned out to be a torn our page from her day calendar. The day of the calendar page was the day of my first child’s birth. This only made the book feel more magical.

So when My Real Children came out, I borrowed from the library and I also loved it. And then I found out about her Thessaly books.  As a lapsed classicist who loves robots, time travel, and Greek mythology, this seemed like the perfect book for me. And it was! I devoured the series and was thrilled to be able to meet Ms. Walton at a bookstore in Brooklyn for her book tour of the third volume, during which I got her to sign all three books in the series. 

Also on that book tour with her was Ada Palmer, who had just come out with her first book, Too Like The Lightning. I enjoyed that, but the writing style was a little too archaic for my tastes. I tried picking up book two in that series as an audiobook but I couldn’t focus on it. 

Sometime around this time I found Jo Walton’s nonfiction essays on tor dot com. I loved them! They reminded me of the parts of Among Others where the protagonist talked about books. I happily bought and devoured her nonfiction essay collections What Makes This Book So Great and An Informal History of the Hugos. 

So when I saw this book on NetGalley I just had to request it! A nonfiction book about science fiction by two great writers? And I was right to be so excited! This book was excellent- I could not put it down! I learned so many fascinating things from it and the writing style made it a page turner from beginning to end. I may have become slightly insufferable when I kept sharing cool tidbits of the things l learned from this book with my wife, like the reasons why mass market paperbacks have the page inside about torn off covers and how the size of spinner racks dictated novel length in the 20th century. 

If this book doesn’t win Best Related Work at the Hugos next year I will be quite surprised!

Obstetrix by Naomi Kritzer

 

I have been so excited for this book and it did not disappoint!

I first encountered Naomi Kritzer’s writing when her short story “Cat Pictures, Please” was nominated (and later won) the Hugo Award. It was just delightful in every way and I cannot recommend it enough. It’s about a benevolent artificial intelligence that just wants to help people and to look at pictures of cats. This story was included in a short story collection after it won, Cat Pictures Please and Other Stories, and I enjoyed that collection very much. 

Later, Ms. Kritzer took this premise and turned it into the award winning Catfishing on Catnet, in which the AI hangs out with a bunch of teens in a chat room and helps out when the protagonist is pursued by her stalker of a father.  It was a delight and deserved every award it won. (And more!) I also very much enjoyed the sequel, Chaos on Catnet, and her more recent book, Liberty’s Daughter. 

So of course, when I went to Worldcon for the first time this past summer and I saw that Ms. Kritzer was reading from a new upcoming work, I had to be there! She read from this book, Obstetrix, which is set in a not too distant future in which an obstetrician is kidnapped by a cult. I couldn’t want to read the rest of it, so I was so thrilled when Tor and NetGalley approved me for an eARC in exchange for an honest review!

It did not disappoint. Once again, the author creates an immersive world with believable characters that make you unable to stop turning the pages. You really feel you are there, captive, with the protagonist, and you share her creeping dread.

I predict this book will be on the Hugo ballot next year - it’ll certainly be on mine!

The Nameless Land by Kate Elliott

What an interesting conclusion! Before I’d read The Witch Roads, I’d seen the name Kate Elliott in the past, when browsing bookstore shelves or at the library, but I’d never really heard of anyone reading her work or read any online chatter about her books. I loved the  Witch Roads - it was fantastic and was exactly what I needed at the time. You know how sometimes you just want a big long fantasy novel to sink your teeth into? The Witch Roads was that and more. 

So I was very excited when I got an advance reader copy from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review of the sequel and conclusion to the duology, the Nameless Land. 

This book was good, but was not what I expected. After the end of the last volume I expected to see the protagonist accompany the prince to the capital for imperial succession drama. Instead, the book detours into the titular nameless land where we learn more unexpected backstory of the protagonist. The ghostly shorn dragon from the first book returns, because of course he had to, but it happened much later in the story than I had anticipated and the return was worth waiting for. Overall, I liked this book a lot, even if I liked it less than the predecessor - and part of that was a mismatch between what I had anticipated and what we got that is not fault of the book itself. I definitely will pick up Ms. Elliott’s next book set in this world. 

For We Are Many by Dennis E. Taylor

I’m so glad I started reading this series! 

As I said in my review of the first book, I didn’t know anything about the Bobiverse series except that I would see this book pop up on Audible occasionally as a suggestion in the Science Fiction section, but it didn’t seem like it would be for me because the back cover blurb made it seem like an irritating comedy. 

Now that they are publishing new editions, Saga Press gave me an e ARC of this book exchange for an honest review.

I thought this sequel was alot of fun! This book follows up on almost all of the lingering plot threads from the first volume, including the survival of humanity and Bob’s oversight of the first alien species he contacted. This book also introduces a new external threat, some interesting Borg-like aliens. Other than the space combat stuff, which ended up feeling a little dull, I found this book to be a page turner. I really wanted to find out what happened next, and I am looking forward to book three.