Men written and directed by Alex Garland
(A24, 2022)
Reviewed by Josh Pearce
Men is Alex Garland’s third film as director, following two well-regarded science fiction forays (Annihilation and Ex Machina), and he has also written several other SF gems (28 Days Later…, Sunshine, and Dredd). Men, however, is decidedly fantasy. (Garland himself calls it “folk horror.”)
It stars Jessie Buckley as Harper, a recent widow renting a large country house for a couple of weeks as a place to recover from her tragedy. The owner of the house is Geoffrey (Rory Kinnear), who gives off enough creepy vibes that when he asks Harper if she plays the piano, she lies and says, “No.” Anything to avoid prolonging being in the same room as him.
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Review from BSFA Review 18 - Download your copy here.
Horizon Zero Dawn: Liberation by Anne Toole and Ben Maccaw Art by Elmer Damaso
(Titan Comics, 2022)
Reviewed by John Dodd
(Minor spoilers for the video game Horizon Zero Dawn.)
Novels based on video games fall into two different categories for me, the ones that give us something that we were utterly unaware of, and those that tell a story that expands on something we already knew.
I love the lore of games, particularly in video games where the temptation must surely be to paper over the cracks in the lore with more action and hope that no one notices. The more that time goes on, the more that games designers realise that many are just like me, they want the story, they want all the things that go with it, they want to know everything.
Azimut by Wilfred Lupano Art by Jean-Baptiste Andreae
There was a tale of the time snatcher, who had power over all things, and both gave and took time as it suited them to do. Thought by many to be a legend, a story to frighten children, still the dominion of time holds sway over everyone, and many seek to find a way to escape that inevitability.
It begins with La Perue, out at sea for two years, finding himself upon the beaches of the new world that he has sought for so long, only to find that someone has taken away the ability of the world to navigate without him knowing, and he is instead on the very shores that he departed so long ago, to the amusement of many and the multitude of humiliation that he must endure.
Elric Volume 3: The White Wolf by Julien Blondel and Jean-Luc Cano Art by Julian Telo and Robin Recht
Reviewed by David Lascelles
This graphic novel adaptation of one of Michael Moorcock’s more famous creations, Elric of Melnibone, is certainly a nostalgia trip for someone who, like me, was brought up in the 80s as a lover of all things fantasy and SF. Back then, Elric was a property that was very different to the fantasy offerings of the time. Amidst a lot of Tolkienesque fantasy that swamped the genre at the time, it certainly stood out. From my point of view as a rather sickly teen, I personally loved the idea of a hero who had a debilitating condition that could be managed by magic—albeit a dark and corrupting, soul stealing magic.
So, it was with a certain amount of anticipation that I entered into reading this graphic offering.
Blade Runner: Origins Vol 2: Scrap by K. Perkins, Mellow Brown, Mike Johnson Art by Fernando Dagnino
I’ll go on record as saying that I love all things to do with Bladerunner, from the original films (in all its many forms), to the book and its sequels, to the film sequel and all the lore and mythos that has been built up over time.
This was something I hadn’t yet encountered and that was a very refreshing thing to encounter.
Cal Moreaux (the significance of the name is not lost on me), is a man who has been brought in by the LAPD to assist on a case involving problems with the Nexus 4 model replicants. It quickly becomes apparent that there are issues with the 4’s malfunctioning, with the first one that they encounter going into a recursive loop till their programming comes to the conclusion that it needs to, albeit that no one knows what the conclusion should be.
The Last Legacy by Adrienne Young
(Titan Books, 2022)
Reviewed by Anne F. Wilson
The story starts with our heroine, Bryn Roth, arriving by ship to the Bastian city docks. After the death of her parents fourteen years ago, Bryn has been brought up abroad by her great aunt who has taught her to be ladylike. Now Bryn is eighteen she has been summoned home by her controlling Uncle Henrik to meet the rest of her family, and find her place in it.
The Roth family business is jewellery, or rather, fake gemstones. They also indulge in piracy. They occupy an unfashionable house in a downmarket district. The household is disproportionately male, including, apart from one self-effacing aunt and a female housekeeper, Bryn’s male cousins, her uncles, and a number of craftsmen. Henrik’s ambitions involve using Bryn, who is ladylike and marriageable, to help him join the merchants’ guild, and take a step up the socio-economic ladder.
Chasing Whispers by Eugen Bacon
(Raw Dogs Screaming, 2022)
Reviewed by Phil Nicholls
This collection of 13 Afro-irrealist short stories by Eugen Bacon, an African Australian writer, is published by Raw Dog Screaming Press, 2022. The book includes a short introduction by American novelist and critic D. Harlan Wilson, who sets these stories in context within the current state of black speculative fiction.
A book of short fiction, even one from a single author, is even harder to categorise than a novel. Bacon includes only limited genre elements in many of these stories, but the overall effect is a magical re-imagining of modern life. Chasing Whispers fits neatly within the wider definition of magical realism, if the term can genuinely be applied beyond the work of South American writers.
The Tangleroot Palace & other stories by Marjorie Liu
I really like Monstress in all its volumes, so I was very interested to read the stories that came purely in words, so when The Tangleroot Palace came up for review, I was straight in there.
‘Sympathy for the Bones’ is a tale of magic and death, of family and the things that we must do for them, no matter what it costs us, no matter where it takes us. Most of all, it was about making your own choices, no matter what the family you have will make of them and living with the consequences or delights of those actions.
‘The Briar and the Rose’, a tale of two women, both of them monsters in their own way, but one with far more to quantify them as such. This isn’t just Sleeping Beauty, this is something else entirely.
Dawnshard by Brandon Sanderson
I’m not a big Brandon Sanderson fan, so I’m going to apologise in advance if I’ve missed some of the nuance in the book because I haven’t read anything else of his.
Dawnshard is the story of Rysn, a captain who seeks her own way out on the ocean with her crew and companions. She’s different from other captains in that she doesn’t have the use of her legs, and so has to make up for this with the use of her mind and her mental alacrity. I’m making a point of this in the review because this is heavily noted in the beginning of the book, which is at odds with how things continue in this book.
Silver Queendom by Dan Koboldt
(Angry Robot, 2022)
Silver Queendom is Dan Koboldt’s first book for Angry Robot, but the geneticist writer has previously published fiction and non-fiction titles. His new release is the story of a small band of thieves who run a battered inn on the edge of civilisation in the queendom of Rethalta. Of course, the Red Rooster inn is only a front for the band’s nefarious activities.
It is these illegal activities which form the core of this entertaining book, starting with low-level crime at a glittering ball and increasing in scope as the plot develops. Each crime seems to bring a fresh twist, which makes the crew ever more desperate and ready to accept a more daring heist for their next adventure. It is this spiral of events which makes the plot move so fast with flowing action.
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