Note: I'll try to avoid major spoilers here, and will talk generally about the books. You may intuit some plot points as I do so. Below are the reviews for all 31 books for phase 1 of the first SPSFC!
(Our top three picks are noted with an asterisk. You can see the full announcement here.)
Personal Top Ten List:
#1 - Age of Order*
#2 - Dog Country*
#3 - Extinction Reversed
#4 - Zenith
#5 - The Trellis
#6 - Wherever Seeds May Fall
#7 - Of Cinder and Bone*
#8 - The Shepherd Protocol
#9 - Things They Buried
#10 - The Lore of Prometheus
Read #27 of 31
Position #1
Overall Thoughts
Wow. Just wow. Take the best parts of The Hunger Games, Harry Potter, Snow Crash, and Brave New World, and bundle them together. That’s what I got out of this story. This is one of those books were I was eager to dive in every time, and had to stop myself from reading “just one more” chapter. The characters are deep and have arcs, the setting is awesome, and I want to read more books to find out about the larger plot. The story takes the viewpoint of a girl in a second class society with the chance to see and experience the upper echelons of a very stratified future USA. I thoroughly recommend it, but if you need more, here are the rest of my thoughts:
Plot
The first chapter or two was a little slow, but I could already tell some of the larger social and economic issues that would be tackled in this book. Once Daniela Machado, a Latinx girl from Bronx City, accepts an invite to the most prestigious of Manhattan schools, Tuck, the story takes off. The biggest part that drew me in is that the reader can tell from the beginning that something is deeply suspicious about the whole setup, but there are enough clues to keep you just one step ahead of the characters. The plotting and tension are excellent, leaving the reader satisfied and wanting to know the answer to the next question. There is as much said in what happens as what doesn’t, and I was thrilled with a particularly satisfying plot twist near the end. The book ends in a way that could be a standalone, but leaves the larger world open for future stories, which there are, and I will be reading!
Setting
Near-future New York includes the advancement of many dystopian elements we’ve all seen increasing over the last few years, with the separation of the elite and lower class, authoritarian measures of control, and increasingly one-sided politics. The future in this book is both dystopian, and one I could believe would happen. This is often the issue I have with dystopian books, where I cannot make the connection between our current reality and the fictional one. This story did not have that problem. But there is another side to the worldbuilding as well, and that is in the awesome future tech on display. From realistic virtual assistants, to advances in genetic engineering, to new security and protection measures, all the advancements seem just as realistic as the society, and its inclusion both allows and encourages the progression of the plot in the best way.
Character
I love these characters. All of them. Even the bad ones. There are the petty rivals from many YA books, including Harry Potter and The Hunger Games, the geniuses with flaws more often seen in adult books, and those characters that are molded and expected to act one way by society, yet have secret layers to them. I won’t elaborate on this one because it’s sort of a spoiler, but such a person is my favorite character.
There are some great character arcs, especially with Daniela transitioning from the eat-to-survive, dangerous society of the have-nots to the power-grabbing, wealthy society of the genetically tweaked highborn. But all the characters have their share of growth, helping her on her journey.
My one detraction from this book, overall, is that there is no LGBTQ+ content. There doesn’t have to be a lot, especially if the authoritarian state has made that type of diversity illegal, but I would have liked at least a hint of how queer society functions in this book, whether undercover or out in the open. I can only hope that’s taken into consideration in future books.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
An action packed look at future tech in a dystopian society with all the right plotting to keep you reading. 9/10. I almost gave this one a 10, but the lack of queer content knocked it down a peg.
Read #7 of 31
Position #2
Overall Thoughts
This is a very thought-provoking book with some great worldbuilding and character moments. That said, it’s not a very happy book. It’s not going to make you cheer for the protagonist over the villain—there’s not always a clear definition of who those are—but it is a very well-written book. This is set about eighty-five years in the future, and it’s easy to tell that from who the characters are and what technology is available, but this is also one of those stories that could work equally well now, or in WWII, or in the renaissance, or in the crusades, talking anthropomorphic dogs notwithstanding.
What’s that? Oh yes. Most of the character in this are basically actualized furries (and even called that a couple times), created through genetic engineering. It’s one of the parts I actually like the best, because we get a great vehicle for seeing the human species, while also dealing with the concept of the outsider and how many people see themselves cut off from others. It’s something experienced by people in the furry community, from the little bit I know, and it comes across powerfully in the story.
Plot
I would say this is the weakest of the three categories, only because this is such a strongly character-driven book. The first half of the book deals with main character, Edane (though only one of several viewpoints), coming to terms with what he wants in life after a serious injury on a military operation in a Middle-Eastern/Central Asian country. The anthropomorphic dogs in the story are all clones, bred specifically as owned soldiers, which as you might think, messes with their psyche. Fortunately they have been emancipated, and many play in augmented reality military simulations as sports. The second half of the book, in my opinion, goes a little long, as it covers a new military operation, but in the end, the story sticks the landing and gives the bittersweet resolution I was looking for.
Setting
There’s a lot of interesting and subtle worldbuilding that goes along with the story. This is set on future Earth, so extrapolated from our geopolitical situation currently. I thought it a little ironic that the conflict is all set around the Middle East, and I was reading this during the aftermath of the US pullout from Afghanistan after twenty years. I want to hope we’re not fighting the same battles there next century, but I can’t say I’d be surprised if we were.
The other big component is the ability (and evident acceptability) of gene modding humans, and mixing them with animals. The clone dogs are the biggest characters, but there are mentions of a few other types of species mixes as well. The hybrids seem to have the same capacity as humans, though there are several excellent passages showing how the dogs think differently, and have trouble grasping some concepts such as humor, sexual pleasure, and why humans do so much political maneuvering.
Advanced technology also plays a big part in the story, from fully augmented reality, to decentralized decision making, advanced 3D printing technology, and smart(er) weapons. In all, the world here seems very real, and very possible.
Character
This is the big one for this book. Edane’s story is very moving, and though I have no experience with the military, seems like it is deeply rooted in the how soldiers feel coming home from a violent life of snap decisions to live in the comparatively cushy life of a citizen. There are a lot of adjustments to make, especially when one is a gene modded dog hybrid who was an owned asset for much of his life and not taught some basic concepts like laughing, the concept of gender, or how to use one’s initiative.
There was some great LGBTQIA representation as well, in Edane’s adoptive mothers, and in himself, as he is functionally ace/demi sexual. It factors into his relationships and how he approaches trying to live in a society where he has trouble grasping some of the basic concepts and accepted “normal” rituals of everyday life.
The other characters don’t have quite the extent of character arc Edane does, but still have satisfying ends to their stories. As said above, I felt the middle of this book went a little long, but in the end, the story stuck the landing and provided resolutions to all those questions proposed in the beginning of how to live in society when you are different physically and in personality. Even if that answer is, “I’m still searching.”
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A great and thought provoking read, though not an upbeat story in many places. A lot of military focused action, but an excellent character story. 9/10
Read #12 of 31
Position #3
Overall Thoughts
I love stories about the future of human consciousness and the singularity, so I may be biased on this review, but I very much enjoyed this book. It’s more so the first of the above, though you could interpret it a bit as a post-singularity as well. This is well written, has interesting characters, and has no one you can label as “bad” even though people do nefarious things, so this pretty much pushes all my buttons. Plus this is the start of a series, and I’m very much interested in where it goes from here. This is definitely a series I would pick up on my own outside a reading competition, so just from that it gets high marks.
Plot
Let’s dig into things (without too many spoilers). Humanity has been dead a thousand years from a vague alien attack, but what matters is that robots have taken over. Though the book uses this label, I’d say they are more androids (artificial human replicas) or cyborgs (human consciousness with bionic parts) because all robots come from mixes of the original twenty-seven humans who were uploaded in a transhuman program before they all died. The book concerns how these robots are bringing the Earth back to live, repopulating plants and animals, but until now, no one has successfully made a fully-operating human. Well, now someone has, and the entire (robot) world will be thrown into chaos once it’s revealed that a “real” human exists again. There are some fun twists as well, which I won’t spoil, on what the real reasons are for bringing humans back, but regardless, there’s a solid, enjoyable story here. There’s nothing profound and it’s perhaps a little predictable, but it’s also a good story.
Setting
There’s mention of robots in space, but all the action takes place on Earth, and we see the various forms of reconstruction and restoration on human locations. Since these robots are derived from specific humans with wants and needs, there is a whole lot of humanity still in them, and they still do and remember a lot of human things despite not being able to enjoy sensory inputs. It’s poignant and sad, and really puts the robot characters into perspective. In fact, a lot of the fun of the book is seeing a post-scarcity society piddling about with projects and wondering what human intellects with literally no restrictions (and fairly good moral motivations) will do.
Character
The main characters really make this story, from Charlie7, a mysterious robot with a lot of buried mysteries, who seems to be one of the oldest of his kind, to Eve14, the new human who’s never experienced the world, to a few others I won’t spoil. It’s very cool to see that a human raised in a lab environment and fed very specific inputs reacts more as an automaton than a robot/android/cyborg with a thousand years’ experience and scraps of human memories—enough to know how the world works. Putting these two together plays around with how we think of ourselves as humans, what the concept of intellect really means, and what use you would put it to if you had infinite time. I’m very interested to see what the next book holds and how a robot society changes once a human is thrown back in the mix.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
Really nothing to complain about. Good story, good characters, some great philosophical questions. The plot is maybe predictable, but overall a darn good time. 9/10.
Read #14 of 31
Position #4
Overall Thoughts
This one has zoomed near the top of my list (which is becoming ever more stratified!). It’s got spaceships, time travel, cool technobabble, lots of LGBT content, romance, mystery, and suspense. Think Battlestar Galactica or Babylon 5, but with a bi/pan main character. Basically it ticks all my boxes, and I’m really looking forward to reading the others in this series (I’m picking up a lot of new series from this contest…). I listened to this one in audiobook and the one problem I had getting into it was a few of the descriptions were hard to follow, and I think I missed a few things in the scene transitions. My guess is this was a blocking issue that didn’t translate very well to audiobook, but aside from that, I really enjoyed this one!
Plot
We’re thrown into the mix right away, as the senior crew of an experimental ship has all been killed, and the “B-Team” is coming in to take over. This crew has some definite faults, and some relationship issues that will cause problems later on. We’re also quickly introduced to a super-genius, Edward, and his twin sister, who have hacked their way into the mission and definitely have something hidden about them. Martin, the new lead pilot, is the other main viewpoint, and it’s great to see a main character with a very pansexual attitude about other people. I knew this book had LGBT content going in, but was rewarded when it was handled quite well.
Things soon go awry for the experimental ship, as there seems to be a saboteur. We find out (tiny little sort-of spoiler here) that the ship will be able to jump to a far location in space, even to another star system, and this is what’s being tested. Of course, things go downhill from there, as we learn more about the twins, Martin, Martin’s close friend Charles, and what’s really going on with the experimental project. I would love to say more, but I’ll just say you should read the book! One more warning: it doesn’t quite end with a cliffhanger, but the story definitely continues on to the next in the series (which I will be reading shortly).
Setting
This is a near-future setting, where the society is fast approaching longer-term space exploration and colonization. Most of what we see in the story is a navy-style command structure (as in many starship-related stories) combined with corporate interests. However, there is definitely some hanky-panky going on with the crew! There were a couple really nice sex scenes in the book, and pairings both M-F and M-M. The technobabble was just complex enough to pique my interest, and I think I even followed most of it. The best kind. There was clearly enough research put into a few theories to support the technology in the book, both experiment and futuristic. Nothing took me out of the story, and in fact it served to really draw me in.
Character
For all this is a story filled with plotful events, there was a really nice character-driven sub plot going on. Martin and Edward’s romance was very well done, as were the changing romances between a few of the other crew members. These moments balanced well with the action of the plot, and served to raise even more conflict between the characters to drive the reader into the story. The LGBT aspects were also handled extremely well, with all sexualities (as far as I can tell) being accepted. There wasn’t any trans or non-binary representation, but bisexual/pansexual was very well covered. One phrase near the end of the book really caught my attention, and I’m paraphrasing as I don’t want to search through the audiobook for the quote, but it was something to the effect of “who you want to sleep with is not the same as who you want to spend the rest of your life with.” It made me think, and that’s always a winning strategy in my (heh) book. I was actually going to put this one lower down in my top ten, but the ending was so well done, and used all the characters so well, that I really want to read the next one right now! But I need to read more in this contest… Suffice to say, this has well deserved its rating.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A fun starship/space opera romp with plenty of cool technology. Great LGBT aspects and a well-handled, star-crossed romance. 9/10.
Read #24 of 31
Position #5
Overall Thoughts
This one is a wild ride, and might even keep you up at night! The Trellis poses some very intriguing questions about how efficient humans can be at their jobs, and how well we can work with evolving AI to improve the world.
Now, take that somewhat positive perspective, throw it in the blender, paint a frowny face on it, and you have the world of The Trellis. This is definitely up there with some other cyberpunk novels I’ve read, and it could even slot into a spot as an early prequel of Vernor Vinge’s Zones of Thought series. The deeper one gets into the story, the more things seem inescapably, terrifyingly wrong. This is one of those books where I could feel the plot crashing around me to a single point of horror, where I definitely wouldn’t want to live in this society (which unfortunately doesn’t seem too far off from where we’re heading) and I didn’t even particularly like the characters. But the whole was a story I couldn’t put down. In the best tradition of science fiction, this is one of those books which should serve as a warning, not a promise.
Plot
Half of the story is framed as a murder investigation that continually gets more convoluted, while the other half follows a woman who is a mediator between disputes, but down on her luck. She gets the job just vacated (at the eponymous Trellis building in Chicago) by the person who’s been murdered, working for a large company that mediates anything from small gang violence to international land disputes. While we learn more about her new coworkers, old and new, at the Trellis, we also follow strange happenings in Chicago with the detective following the murder investigation and several other threads that seem to be disconnected. Things take their time to come to the final rolling bolder of a conclusion, and as in a good horror movie, you can feel options being stripped away as it happens.
Setting
The plot in this story couldn’t function without a lot of the heavy lifting from the setting. As the near-future city of Chicago unfolds, there are red flags going up all the time, from how the city is functioning, to the general state of the world, to maddening corporate doubletalk, willing to burn the world for an extra scrap of profit, to private firms popping up everywhere, and doing a better job than the government. Another big aspect of this book is AI, fully intelligent, but not in the superpowered way seen in many other books. This is AI as expert systems, something that can pass a Turing test, but without any ambition. They are motivated to do a job, and can be assigned to new tasks by humans. It’s a much more realistic take on AI that I’ve seen in a while, and much scarier to me, as I can see just how close we are to it right now.
Character
The final cap on this story is the characters, and each is painted well enough to capture why they do the things they do. We have Debbie, the new hire at the Trellis, scarred by civil unrest and disbelieving her luck in finding a highly-paid job that lets her do what she’s trained to. We also have Melody, a police detective in a shrinking and underfunded precinct who knows something’s wrong, but even with the help of her AI partner Matte, can’t quite catch up to what’s happening. Add to this a myriad of secondary characters, each with their own little quirks and faults that keep the story rumbling on. I think the characters being fleshed out enough is what added to my sense of horror as the story drew on. We get a close perspective on this world that could be realized in fifteen, ten, or even five years. One of my last thoughts while reading was, “can we stop it?”
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A chilling look at what our society could become if certain factors continue their creep to the surface. Definitely worth a read, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. 9/10.
Read #30 of 31
Position #6
Overall Thoughts
Well, I think this is the first book I’m where I’m going to give a shout out to the author’s note at the end! It contains some fascinating information about how this book was created and the fantastic research that was done to create it. I understand why it’s at the end, to keep from spoiling things, but it would have changed my perspective if I had read through at least part of it at the beginning! I wasn’t aware, but the author has an entire stand-alone series about first contact and Fermi’s Paradox, which…well, my TBR may get crowded is what I’m saying.
I thought I was going to have a mental battle about where to place this one, but in my opinion, it didn’t quite stick the landing, which bumped it down a bit in this list. But the author has some great writing chops and I was absolutely sucked into this book once it got going. Allow me to elaborate…
Plot
This book has everything I love about the “Oh my God, what is that?” storyline we see in a lot of first contact SciFi. The president of the US is a character, as are ones from other countries, we’ve got the technical geek, the career soldier who’s Seen All This Before, the raging conspiracy theorist, and the everyman viewpoint which gives us a grounding in the real world. Soon into the book, we learn that an object is bouncing around the solar system with incredible precision, and the phrase “It’s never aliens…until it’s aliens,” is bandied around a lot. A big part of the story deals with social media and conspiracy theories and how that’s become a much larger part of our social consciousness in the last few years.
I’m going to stop there on describing the plot to keep away from spoilers and because it’s something best experienced (and you should read this book), but I have a couple specific comments:
There is a scene of extreme weather about halfway through the book that is one of the best ones I’ve read in a long time. There is an everyman viewpoint during this scene that is absolutely beautiful, and reminiscent of the coolest scene from Niven and Pournelle’s Lucifer’s Hammer.
There is another scene near the end which just about scared my socks off. It was amazing, and that’s all I’m going to say about it.
The last point, and the reason why this is rated lower than it could be, is that I feel the ending got a little off topic. There was a running thread on social media and conspiracy theories through the book, which I felt got wrapped up well, but then was unnecessarily returned to at the end, taking away from the other exciting plot element. That other (yes, vague) element I felt was dealt with too quickly. I would have liked more time to experience it, and I felt the characters jumped to conclusions a bit too quickly.
Hopefully I’ve both annoyed you and gotten your attention enough to read the book yourself 😉
Setting
This book is definitely influenced by the pandemic and social issues in the last few years, even though they are not directly referenced. One of the characters is an Alex Jones-style media pundit, and we get a great look into the hypocrisy surrounding those sorts of positions. Most of the action takes place high in the military or government, as is common for this type of book, but the addition of a viewpoint of a poor fisherman in Central America brought a great grounding perspective. I will complain that a few of the social issues that featured in the book were dealt with too easily. There is a section of rational, scientific discourse with people who believe and support conspiracy theories which I thought was too idealistic. We can only hope.
Character
There are four or five viewpoint characters, and while this sort of book is often heavy on plot and light on characters, I felt there was a decent attempt at rounding out the characters. That said, I think the two with the most personality were the conspiracy theorist and the everyman POV in Central America. The others tended to be a bit of cut-and-paste characters from many other similar books. In all, I would have liked a little more reaction and analysis from all the characters near the end on what they find, but even without that, the book was a fun read.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A great sci-fi story based on Fermi’s Paradox, brought down just a bit because I didn’t think it stuck the landing. 8/10.
Read #31 of 31
Position #7
Overall Thoughts
Oh my goodness, the voice in this book. That was what originally drew me in, and kept me going through the whole thing. I got only a few chapters in and there is a tense will he/she won’t he/she relationship between three characters with enough bisexual energy to stun a dragon. Speaking of which, I also love the world this is in, which is just like ours, except dragons, an offshoot of dinosaurs, were alive and well until the 1400s. But the dragons are not the stars of the show. Leave that up to Jack and Kam, two scientists decide to bring one back to live, like their very own high fantasy Jurassic Park. I’ll go into my thoughts in much more detail below, but I’ll leave you with the one reason this book isn’t even higher on this list. There weren’t enough dragons in the book…
Plot
So, our two main characters are busy bringing a dragon back to life, while trading barbs filled with sexual tension between themselves and their friend Faye, who might like both of them, yes in that way. Except very soon the newly hatched dragon is stolen, which leads to a wild chase through the streets of Tokyo, Japan, Yakuza thugs, disaffected scientists, dirty cops, and one very angry dragon.
Now, I will say I thought the plot thread with Japan went on a little too long, as did, if I’m honest, the book as a whole. I felt like there was a really good end point about 80% of the way through, but there were a few more plot points after that. This is the first of a series (which I will definitely be checking out) so I feel the last part of the book probably could have been the beginning of book 2 instead, and not really lost anything. In addition, the genre of the book changes more to thriller or suspense, with the dragon as a McGuffin, rather than the focus being on the dragon, as I was expecting from the first few chapters.
Setting
Another thing that really drew me into this world is that it appears to be exactly the same as ours, except many species of dragons persisted through the middle ages, when they were finally wiped out by dragon hunters. Makes those fairy tales and knights and dragons make a lot more sense, right? But that said, I actually wanted more dragons. There are little tidbits through the book, and a bit more at the end, but I wanted more scenes with the dragon and more talking about how they functioned in society. I felt it got lost against the Japanese backdrop.
This brings me to my second point. A good half of the book takes place in Japan, and as such there are people speaking Japanese. I have a rudimentary understanding (thanks college anime and Duolingo) but I felt a bit more, especially in the long phrases, could have been translated. There is, in fact, one footnote to translate a phrase in maybe Hindi or Tamil, but none for the Japanese. Crime organizations also played a big part, and while they are connected to the story, I feel it sort of buries the lede of Cool Big Dragon coming back to life. That said, I’m hoping for a lot more dragon action in the next books of the series.
Character
This is the big one for this book. The characters here make the story. Jack and Kam are absolutely adorable together, and Faye is an amazing foil to both of them. There are some other characters later on (one in particular) who are an absolute joy to read. The writing style here is such that I would read just about anything by this author, simply to enjoy the character interactions. Also, there’s a big plus for me in adding a bi character, even if she doesn’t end up having a huge part.
This is why I’m less annoyed by the lack of dragons than I otherwise might be. The character arcs here are deep, bringing in the characters’ pasts, and how they affect them as individuals, while not slowing down the action sequences. They build and inform the action sequences, and the many snarky responses more than once made me snort in laughter. Jack and Kam (and several others in the book) are so real I feel I’ve known them for a long time. I’m sure I’ll get to know them more in the next books in the series. You should too! Go check this one out.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A page-turning dragon heist through Japan with snarky and loveable character, even if there isn’t quite enough dragon for my taste. 8/10
Read #22 of 31
Position #8
Overall Thoughts
This one takes a bit to get going, but after that, it rapidly ramps up to a very satisfying ending! This is another story dealing with emerging AIs, and how our society might deal with them. Plus, the story uses a very well-done flashback mechanic to both fill out the story, and to show the main character’s history and how society got to this state. I found myself reading just one more chapter, especially if I knew it was a flashback chapter. There were several cool twists and turns through the book, including one I very much did not see coming later on! Let’s dig into this one a bit more.
Plot
The plot largely revolves around a synth (synthetic humanoid) looking for another synth that had come before her, following some mystery from the self-contained city of free synths to the mainland USA, where synths are a working and second class. The humans are not much better, still recovering from a deadly natural event, and the US at least has started to turn into a surveillance state. I can’t say too much more without revealing several spoilers, so I’ll leave it at that, save to say the first 10-15% is probably the slowest part of the book, setting the scene and getting into things. So stay with it after that point, and things will soon get rolling! One minor quibble was that I would have liked a little more depth with the final revelations at the end of the story. They were all satisfying and finished up the story, but felt just a little rushed.
Setting
There’s some interesting worldbuilding going on with what the synths are supposed to be for and how they’re created, all of which gets into some spoilers. I’ll reveal a bit which is not too far into the book: The synths are not supposed to be self-aware, but kept evolving to that point, by accident, which prompts the first AI to be wiped time after time. This is essentially murder of a new intelligence until one iteration finally convinces those in charge to let them live. This is a general theme in the book, showing how humans treat each other, and how they assume those they build will treat others. Meanwhile, the synths only wish to be free, and to get away from “the Lie” the humans have programmed into them, which I’ll let you read and find out about…
Character
I’d say this is the weakest part of the book, and the part that holds it back from an even higher place on the list. There is a definite character journey here, and all of the characters are distinct and interesting, but the main theme of the book deals with the question of AI sentience and how a society reacts. The characters are often working to uncover that mystery, rather than dealing with complex growth arcs. For me, there was more engagement with the characters in the flashbacks rather than the ones in the main story, because those characters were dealing with the birth throes of the synths and all the personal conflict that comes across with that event. In the main story, the characters are following clues to a very definite end, which precludes some of the character development in the flashbacks. This is not to say I didn’t enjoy the characters, but simply that the arc of the plot kept my interest more than the characters themselves.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
An interesting thought piece and character story about AI and how humans treat each other. 8/10.
Read #6 of 31
Position #9
Overall Thoughts
I’ve been looking for a well-actualized secondary world story in this contest, and this one gave me what I was searching for. A quick note first, though, because I’d be remiss if I didn’t post a trigger warning. This story has a LOT of child abuse, sexual and physiological, and a fair bit of child death as well. BUT, if that doesn’t immediately push your “NO” button, I do want to add that it was all done, er, tastefully (if that can be done) and always the subject was treated as the vile act that is it. So basically, if you don’t mind people being justly punished for horrible things they did, then carry on!
There is a great depth of culture, species relations, and atmosphere in this story and I really want to read more in this world. This is billed as book 1, and from a quick search, looks like the second book came out in 2020, so I will likely look that one up after I finish with the contest. I can best describe this as The Lies of Locke Lamora crossed with Mos Eisley cantina. Though I was never completely sure on the extent of the setting—future, secondary, fantasy, or colony—there is a unique world expressed here and a fun romp of a story with plenty of monsters to fight and heroism to be done.
Plot
Most of the story centers around Syl and Aliara, who are on a mission of revenge against the person who owned and abused them as children, before they escaped to live their own lives. Considered an influential scientific mind, their abuser seems to still be around, though hiding for some reason, and continues experimenting on children (which is where a lot of the trigger warning comes from). Though the story does touch on some things in the larger world, most importantly what their captor’s original scientific objective is, this tale is largely centered on how Syl and Aliara come to terms with their pasts and make things right. There was one twist that came out later in the book I felt wasn’t telegraphed at all, which ties into the further story. I’m sure we’ll learn more, as it looks like later books will focus on the expanded world, and given the worldbuilding in this book, I’m eager to see what that entails.
Setting
The authors have created a rich world, less advanced in many cases than our own, but highly progressed in genetic engineering, where small animals can be turned into message senders and other helpers, and people can get new organs, limbs, and even new additions they weren’t born with. There are several sentient species in evidence, including small goblin like creatures, elvish or human-esque beings (including the main characters), a larger humanoid, and at least one other species, if not two or three. I had some small frustration in that it was never really clear if this world was insular, or had been visited by people from other worlds in the past, or if the species arose on their own, or if they were products of genetic engineering. That said, I’m content to learn more in future books. Swords and knives abound, but there are also guns ranging from pistols to rather technical rifles, making the setting an interesting timeless comparison to our own world. The city featured in the story is obviously old, and filled with all the beggars, thieves, and mad scientists of a swashbuckling tale.
Character
The emotional journey of the main characters travels a lot of ground, as the two come to terms with how they were abused in the past, and why. Side characters get their satisfying arcs, and everything develops as the mystery of the story unfolds. Various sexualities seem to be accepted in this society, and there is some good LGBTQIA representation both in the main characters and the side characters. I don’t think the depth of character advancement is as extreme as it could be, but given that this is less of a character story and more of a worldbuilding story, I think it suffices for the adventure tale that it is.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
If you don’t mind (well revenged) child abuse, then this is a fun tale of adventure in an exotic, magical, steampunky world, filled with mad science. 8/10
Read #13 of 31
Position #10
Overall Thoughts
This was a well written and engaging military science fiction, with characters that draw the reader in from the first scene. MilSF is not usually my scene because it tends to the ultra-violent, and dark and gritty (and I should probably pop a trigger warning in here for torture and PTSD). This book had all of that, but written well enough to keep my attention the whole way through. It does have a lot of what I call “power moments” when the main characters give it their everything in a blood-soaked battle to the finish. Those moments can sometimes be a bit over the top, but again, were handled well in this story. There was one aspect of the main character’s abilities that nagged at me, and was never really cleared up to my satisfaction, especially as I’m guessing this is a stand-alone story. I can’t say too much about it, as it’s a pretty big spoiler, but I would have liked a little more certainty the way it worked.
Plot
This was the weakest of the three for me, though it was still very solid. There is a large buildup until we actually see any special abilities, and I feel like the pacing lagged just a bit in the first section getting the characters to where they needed to be for the rest of the story. I enjoyed reading it, because the characters are funny and realistic, but after finishing, I realized some of the plot points near the beginning could have been cut back a bit without really affecting the story.
Setting
This is largely set in the Middle East, which does have its share of issues, especially when viewed from the POV of a white male soldier. It could easily have been set elsewhere, as the main character is drawn into the larger plot through a security contract with a high-placed client. The other POV in the book starts out in a hidden complex where testing for special abilities is happening, so she doesn’t even interact with anyone in the atmosphere of that country, though all the workers at the facility are middle eastern. There’s a lot of torture and very questionable ethics going on in the facility itself and it wasn’t every really explained how the whole thing got set up to start with, but it does provide a challenging situation for the POV characters to evade or escape.
Character
This is definitely the strongest part of this book. It’s primarily a character driven story, where the setting and even the backdrop of special abilities are more to explore the development of the characters than to be an end in themselves. There are two POVs in the book, one of a male, English ex-special ops with severe and untreated PTSD, and the other of a female, Australian nurse with a history of trauma. I was glad to see there weren’t really any fridging or problematic tropes with the female POV. She’s just as powerful and capable as the male. Again, there is a lot of torture and abuse present, but it’s used as a vehicle to explore how these two people are broken and potentially, how they can start to heal. The characters are very well written, and very witty, which helps ease the intensity of some of the violence and gore in the book. Overall, while none of the powers are particularly original, they do serve the purpose of taking a good look into what makes people tick.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A well-crafted, character driven Military Science Fiction about how we cope with trauma and to what extent we will go to achieve our objectives. Nothing overtly original about any of the concepts, but they are mixed together in an engaging narrative. 8/10
Read #5 of 31
Position #11
Overall Thoughts
While pretty firmly YA and Dystopian, genres I’m not always on great terms with, I really enjoyed this book. It has the hard aspects of dystopian fiction, but still contains a lot of hope and feel-good moments. It also contains the simplicity and first love of the YA genres, while not being demeaning. Many of the characters here, like in many dystopians, don’t understand some of the concepts or artifacts common in our world. I also often have the problem of “how did the world really get into this bizarre configuration?” (I’m looking at you, Hunger Games and Mortal Engines.) I was pleasantly surprised there were not only answers to those questions, but that they came as a natural extension of the plot. It looks like there are four books in this series, and it’s definitely one I’d consider continuing, once I get through reading the SPSFC books.
Plot
To avoid most spoilers for this, I’m going to have to be pretty vague in both the Plot and Setting sections, but I enjoyed that nothing ever felt rushed here, though many months were covered. Each time the reader starts to get settled with the status quo, the story changes, or reveals a little more information to propel us to the next mystery. I’m also a big fan of Fulfilling Promises (or Chekhov’s Gun, if you want). There were several things I was prepared to be angry with in the first few chapters concerning how the society is set up, but my qualms were not only answered later on, but given further explanations that made me want to know what came next. There is one Surprising yet Inevitable twist in the first third of the book that I really should have seem coming, but didn’t because I was enjoying the story so much.
Setting
Again, I really can’t say a whole lot about this. The basic set up is that the characters live in a very controlled and what seems like oppressive environment, where people are assigned to jobs and families, and a certain percentage of children are taken away to die in a never-ending war once they turn eighteen and become full adults. It’s obvious something really big has happened, because many things from our world are not recognized, or given descriptions by characters not familiar with them. Again, I was prepared to be grumpy about this, but enough answers are forthcoming early enough (as opposed to, say in The Hunger Games), to pique my interest.
Character
This is a YA story, so much of the character growth is in the form of growing up for the two main characters. While it’s not as deep as growth arcs I’ve seen in adult sci-fi, there are many tender moments, and a lot of real love shown in the character’s family. I will say there is not as much tension as there could be in the moments of conflict, even for a YA book. Many of the moments of stress for the characters are deflated too early by a caring word where I was not expecting one yet. One other place the characters fell down a bit for me was in the antagonist for the main character, who doesn’t have as big of a resolution as I would like and is not in the story as much as I would expect.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
An easy read, a thought-provoking world, and a plot progression that pulls the reader in. The characters could be challenged a bit more to give them depth, but there is still enough conflict for me to want to read the rest of the series. 8/10
Read #11 of 31
Position #12
Overall Thoughts
This was a very interesting book, concerning time, space, and human nature. There are some clunky lines, some “tell” where there could be “show,” and I think it could probably be a bit shorter to tighten up the plot a bit, but overall, I really liked the message of the book and the struggle the main characters went through. It’s told in three time periods, each about 80-100 years apart, showing what happens to Earth and Mars over the next couple hundred years. There are some twists I saw coming, and others I did not. While some of the prose was a bit sophomoric, the intent behind the words was enough to captivate me, and make me read with interest as the layers unfold nicely toward the end, peeling back one by one until all the reader’s questions are answered.
Plot
As I said, this is told in three time periods, one in the 1980’s, one in the end of the 21st century, and one in the middle of the 22nd century. There is about equal words given to each time period, and the connections between them become more obvious as the book progresses, where we start to see how some characters are descendants of others, or related by other means. The main thrust of the story concerns the development of a highly efficient drive that allows for FTL and sub-FTL speeds by bending space and time (like Star Trek’s warp bubble). However, several of the characters start hearing voices and discovering that they might be able to see events in other realities. I won’t spoil anything else, but the story goes from there to a really satisfying conclusion!
Setting
This is set mainly on Earth in the 1980’s, Earth after a nuclear and economic apocalypse, and on Mars in the cradle of a new civilization. I never felt the version told here was far from events that could actually happen, especially with the resources horded by wealthy people in our world, and what they use those funds for. There are some great descriptions of how the wealthiest and the poorest live, contrasted with recent history and a possible future on Mars. I thought there could have been a little more fleshed out on how the Mars colony was formed, but then I also said the book was pretty long, so I’m fine with giving that up in lieu of it not being any longer. In all, I never felt pulled out of the worldbuilding here. A solid effort.
Character
These characters are a great vehicle for the reader to see the world build in this book, and while there was a depth of emotion, I felt they were hampered just slightly by the quality of the writing. I connected strongest with Tim Strauss, the inventor of the new drive, as his story is set in the 1980’s and went through some very heartfelt struggling with mental illness. The characters in other time periods I didn’t connect with as thoroughly, mainly because some of the emotions were unsubtle—more told than shown. That said, as the book progressed I really was cheering for all the characters to get to their personal goals, as well as to stop the big bad of the book, who slowly became clearer as the story went on. I don’t want to say more on how things developed, because it will lead to some pretty big spoilers, but I’m always happy when I don’t completely figure out the twist. In this case I had several theories, none of which were quite right, but all were very close.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A great philosophical take on how power affects us, and how we affect society. Hampered a bit by the writing, but overall a very satisfying story that keeps you guessing as to what’s really happening. 7/10.
Read #1 of 31
Position #13
Overall Thoughts
It took a bit to get past the blood, guts, and sort of sophomoric humor of the first section, but the description and pacing of this book is engaging. I was sucked in for most of the story, but—without spoiling things—there are just one too many twists in this, which ended up taking away my satisfaction in the story. There’s a lot to love in the philosophical concepts and action of this book, but overall it just feels too long. There is a very obvious endpoint, and then the story keeps going for more than ten chapters after that. And then there’s another ending. And another. Each one lessened my enjoyment just a bit. I almost wish this was two books, but having gotten to the final twist, I can see why it wasn’t. So overall, very engaging characters and storyline, but it didn’t completely gel for me.
Setting
Most of this book takes place in the fairly non-descript corridors of a generational ship. There is a little information about the origins of the flight to repopulate Earth, and where the crewmembers came from. Most of this book is about the character’s mental journeys. There are some more places near the end that are pretty cool, but this story largely focuses on people.
Character
William Chanokh is the main character in this story, and the other big roles are a short-lived villain, a woman in cryosleep, and a female presenting A.I. Several sections are carried solely by one character, which is quite a task for a novel. Much of the dialogue consists of the thoughts and mental narration of William, and only later in the story do other characters really get speaking roles. While this does a good job of building William’s character up, it also makes the first third of this book a bit slow to get going. Unfortunately, one of the twists negates much of the emotional progress between characters, so I found at the end I actually had more trouble connecting than I did in the middle of the story.
Plot
This is the main problem area for me. The author is definitely a competent writer and the prose is engaging, but there were so many twists and turns thrown during the novel I had trouble engaging with the overall plot. There is a main objective in the first half of the book, which the reader thinks is overcome, but again, one of the twists near the very end negates all this progress. I really liked the individual mini-plots in this book, and I think I would have really liked it, had the book just ended after what I thought was the first “ending,” about two-thirds of the way through the book. I was then similarly satisfied, once I had gotten into the second part of this book, but once again, that ending was subverted. I was satisfied with how the book was going until the very last chapter or so, but I have almost never had my emotion changed so quickly from satisfaction to “meh” at the end of a story.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
Good prose, interesting characters, some problems with the plot. 7/10.
Read #25 of 31
Position #14
Overall Thoughts
This is a pretty cool multiple universes story, sort of like Quantum Leap via Groundhog Day. The core concept is that some people, in the year 2025, witness the Echo Effect where everything disappears in a flash of white. They are aware the world has been rebooted and they are re-living a new life, ever so slightly different. There is so much potential to this type of story, from changes to the character’s lives and the conflict that introduces, to finding more experienced people who’ve seen this effect, to what those who are aware of it will choose to do with multiple lives. There’s a whole lot of buildup to all these concepts during the book, and then it just…sort of ends. I would love to have seen a more thorough ending or maybe even splitting this story into multiple books.
Plot
Without too many spoilers, the plot centers around people who are aware of the world rebooting, and have different ideas about what to do with it. There are some potential ways to end the rebooting so history can continue past the year 2025, and the main character, Aaron, goes through multiple iterations of his life to discover what could be done. Again, I think this story had a lot of potential especially in the plot area, and right up until about 90% of the way through I was with it. However, the ending is not particularly satisfying for me and really seems to have cut short some of the amazing possibilities inherent here. I actually thought there might be a sequel, but then the book just ends. Sticking the landing is always the hardest part of writing a book, and this one for me, wobbled a bit too much.
Setting
The world here has some cool additions, where in some iterations people are colonizing mars, or have lessened or skipped world wars, or advanced technology. But in terms of the characters, being aware through multiple lives has a traumatic impact, as you find people you know, love, or even married might not know you in another life. There’s another really cool worldbuilding item in this story that I can’t get into that much because of spoilers, but suffice to say, if the only thing that survives between worlds is human memory, then how do you create an inter-timeline repository of information?
Character
Although this is centered about stopping the world from rebooting, it’s really a character story, dealing with Aaron’s reactions as he comes to terms with his strange existence. We see various heartbreaks and triumphs as people he knew in one life aren’t people who know him in the next. It really helps to get into his mind, to understand why he chooses the course he does, rather than the one some others who are aware of the reboots take. I think this is where my frustration comes at the end of the book. While we’re very invested in these characters, the ending of the book is not one of character, but one of plot, and it seems less satisfactory over others that might be possible. Take a read and see what you think!
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A fascinating concept of alternate and iterating timelines, with fleshed out characters, brought down by a canned ending. 6/10.
Read #28 of 31
Position #15
Overall Thoughts
This one was interesting to place in this list. I felt like I wanted to know the characters more than I did, but at the same time I also wanted to learn more about the world outside the planet, Petra, where all the action takes place. Petra is definitely a space opera, except the entire story is on one planet, and we don’t really see any of the movers and shakers behind how things got started. That said, it gives a nice, focused look at a heist story for a planet that is meant to be an inescapable prison.
Plot
The story starts with some history on the main character, Kane, who’s coming in to talk with the chief warden of Petra, an entire world meant to act as a prison. The subject matter is to be whether Kane can negotiate his planet joining the consortium of worlds that use the prison planet. It will be a betrayal of his ideals to do so, but all that goes out the window quickly as a group attempts to break free of the prison, dragging Kane into the plot to work against the omniscient controls of the warden.
Setting
This uses a really interesting concept of an entire world as a prison. It’s not new—it’s certainly been used in space opera before, but rarely do we have a book focused on the prison world and what its ramifications are. That said, I felt some of the worldbuilding could have been stronger in this one. It actually took me a good third of the book before I figured out that the world is just an open colony world. The only reason it’s a prison is because there is restricted travel to and from it. This puts things into a much different perspective—the warden is allowing tribes, factions, and even kingdoms to vie against each other, and people are born on this world, confined only from the sins of their parents. I wanted to lean into this more while reading, but although we do see some interaction with one of the feudal kingdoms, I wanted more. There are other books in the series, so perhaps there is more detail in those. As I said above, I also wanted more information on the other planets, what their disputes were, and why they sent people to this planet. Basically, I felt this book could have been just a little longer to help build out some of the reasons why the characters acted as they did.
Character
Kane is a great everyman POV to learn about the world as we dig deeper in it, but I also found myself wanting a little more about him. We find out some about his family, and ties he has to Petra itself, but a lot of them felt tenuous. I wanted stronger ties to bind him to the crew that’s trying to escape. Speaking of which, the crew and the warder are the other major players, and I actually found myself learning the most about the warden’s character over the length of the book. There are several people in the crew escaping, and some of them tend to blend together, meaning injuries and deaths that happen are not as impactful as I would have liked. Again, there may be more of this in the sequels, but this book doesn’t entice me quite enough to read them. But it might for you, and I’d encourage you to give it a read!
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
An interesting space opera/escape heist from a prison planet. Cool action, but I could have used more attachment to the characters. 6/10.
Read #26 of 31
Position #16
Overall Thoughts
I believe this is the only Cli-Fi piece in this first round of books. It’s not a genre I’m super familiar with, though I have read several others, including Kim Stanley Robinson’s New York 2140. Cli-Fi books are sort of hard to place, which is perhaps understandable considering how most humans view climate change. On the one hand, a reader needs to relate to an avatar in a book, the main character(s) you are following. On the other hand, Cli-Fi innately deals with the perils of climate change, and how it is affecting Earth. The antagonist is often in how runaway climate change may kill us all…at some point. It’s hard to make it tense with relation to the here and now, which is why governments have a hard time getting traction with it. Unfortunately, that also the major problem I had with this book, and why it’s not rated higher. I felt like there was some disconnect between the characters and the actual threat of climate change. Let’s dig in…
Plot
This has more of a thriller plot than a sci-fi plot, dealing with a rich news magnate—once a reporter—who digs into a high-profile “climate terrorist” to publish a profile piece on him. However the stakes rise as the activist kidnaps the reporter, who gets a closer look at the inner workings of the organization that he’d like. Turns out, there is a much larger plan in the works, which will affect the whole world. The big spoilery plot point at the end, however, didn’t push the stakes as much as I would have liked. In my opinion, the story ended before we got to really see any ramifications of what happened, and I would have liked more focus on the Earth (and climate change) as a character, rather than just the dealings people had that affected the Earth.
Setting
This is a near-future story, and definitely a situation that is reasonable to think we would be in, climate-wise, in the next five to ten years. There are a several situations in the book with a government (usually the US) acting in an authoritarian method, and this is one point where I felt it fell a little flat. The author is from New Zealand, and may not be as in-tune to some of the things happening in the US as a native. Basically, I was sort of saying, “yes…and?” to a lot of the actions that shocked the characters, because I‘ve seen things worse than that already playing out in America. There were a few places as well, where the narrative took a turn into explanation, going over various climate facts, and I felt these could have been integrated a little better. As it was, it sounded a bit like an encyclopedia article in parts.
Character
Alright, this is where I get into the Cli-Fi aspect of the book. I think the balance between being invested in the characters and being invested with the Earth changing (as another character in the story) was a bit off. Because the main character is rich, has access to all the resources he needs, and is kidnapped by another rich person who’s trying to enact his own plan to battle climate change, we never really get a good look at how climate change is actually affecting things. We only see how the 1% are affected by changes to the Earth, not the average person. I personally didn’t feel as invested in the character either, as he came across as a sort of playboy (especially as there was a kind of stale James Bond romance side-plot), and I never really felt he was in danger. I felt it dulled the impact of the book, because the characters were more interested in the thriller cat-and-mouse game between them, whereas I wanted more focus on how the character’s plans would affect society and how society (and the people that make it up) would have to react and change.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
An interesting take on Cli-Fi and how the Earth could battle climate change, but at the cost of characters I wasn’t fully invested in. 6/10.
Read #18 of 31
Position #17
Overall Thoughts
I had a hard time placing this book, and my perception of it changed several times while reading. On the surface, this is about men who can travel to an alternate Earth where most of those with XY chromosomes have been decimated by a virus. That part is pretty intriguing, but as I got deeper into this one, there were a couple elements that gave me pause. This is treated as a YA book, as the protagonist is almost 17, it deals with school and relationships, and has some simpler moral questions. However, there is a LOT of fairly explicit content, including liberal swearing (which, fine), but also some pretty graphic description of an underage male’s sexual organs and sex positions. Basically, it gave me a bit of squick while reading it, even though the story was good. There was quite a bit of male gaze, objectifying women (which had some to do with the plot but not all), and I thought this was particularly strange coming from a female writer. I wasn’t completely sure if this was intended for teenage males, or other genders, or intended for older audiences (more squick)? However, I felt it stuck the landing at the end and gave some good reasons for what happened, which is what put it in this position.
Plot
Most of this deals with how certain men are able to go to an alternate reality if they get both aroused and then terrified at the same time. Right there this sets the tone, as much of the (horny, young) protagonist’s thoughts are about “hot women” and how to get laid. This tone changes drastically…sort of…when the young man in question gets to the alternate world. Here most of the men (I’m sticking to stereotypical gender norms because that’s what’s used in the book) have been killed off and men are now kept in harems of women, who both run the world and also demand sex and procreation from the few remaining men. This doesn’t stop the young protagonist from leering at anything with breasts for most of the book, but he gets his comeuppance, as in the alternate world it is men who are leered at. He does eventually learn some lessons while hijinks ensue…
Setting
There’s some clever worldbuilding here in the alternate world, and over the course of the book, more and more information is gradually doled out. This turned out to be one of the saving graces for me as it made the plot a bit more complex, and some of the rash decisions made had real consequences for both the main and secondary characters. Learning the workings of a world where men are carefully controlled and apportioned in order to continue the human species poses some crunchy moral dilemmas, for both men and women. Non-binary people are unfortunately not featured, but I’d love to see how that works in this universe.
Character
Mostly, we’re in the head of Jason, a young, inexperienced, and very horny man. While that aspect of the book sometimes got a little annoying, I definitely remember being that young and hormonal, so I believe it’s pretty accurate as well. Again, this book as written by a woman who seems to be older than me, so good job getting into the head of a teenage boy! Jason sees some interesting character development, especially near the end of the book when faced with some of the consequences of his actions, but for the larger part of the story, he thinks with his, ah, other head. I was happy to see both gay and lesbian people taken into account during the story, though unfortunately no non-binary people. Per fitting a YA story, there wasn’t the depth of character arcs in adult books, but it was an enjoyable and quick read overall.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
Not sure exactly the intended audience for the book, as it includes some fairly explicit underage sex between teens, but overall a well plotted and enjoyable story. 5/10.
Read #2 of 31
Position #18
Overall Thoughts
A note here: This book was a finalist in the SPFBO contest for 2020. A lot of people seem to like it. I managed to miss this fact until after reading the book, so you can feel safe this has not biased my thoughts while reading! This book had a lot of potential, but in the end, I wasn’t as excited as I wanted to be about the story. There is an interesting concept here, that in the future (maybe? As far as I can tell?) people have stopped fighting wars and instead have a specific class of people called Grievar who beat each other up in MMA fights to solve disputes. I’ve taught karate for almost fifteen years, so I was looking forward to what the book held. I was engaged while listening to the audiobook, and the narrator did a great job. The book follows a progression like “what if the Ender’s Game challenges were all MMA fights,” which is quite exciting at the beginning, with a steady progression for the underdog. There is some mystery surrounding where the main character came from, but I figured it out fairly easily so the reveal wasn’t a big surprise for me in the end. The prose is good, but there are definitely some quirks that started to take me out of the story. Almost every fighter is described as having “cauliflower ears” which, yes, I understand that happens to people who get hit in the face a lot, but it could have been a blanket statement. There was also a lot of “show and tell,” meaning there would be an evocative description of something, followed by an unnecessary following clarification telling what was meant. It slowed down the story for me. TL:DR I thought it was pretty good, but it’s so far not the top of my list.
Plot
Alright, let’s get into the details here. The plot was good, and followed an unsurprising structure of an underdog learning how to win at fights. He has an older retired mentor who still follows the old ways of doing things, unlike the negative changes that have been happening from higher up, removing the eponymous Combat Codes, which means more combatants get injured or killed. There were a lot of really good lessons from martial arts in general, about how to hold oneself, how to keep the mind centered, and how to prepare against challenges in life. It’s clear the author knows a lot about MMA, and has practiced a lot. I use many of the same philosophies myself. This is the start of a series, but in the end, I wasn’t really convinced to keep reading. There’s not a very clear overarching story going on yet, aside from one thing at the end which seems to forecast events in the larger world. Overall, I actually got a little tired of descriptions of fights by the end of the book.
Setting
I was not as happy with the worldbuilding as I wanted to be, mainly from a couple factors. One was the very liberal use of current-day MMA jargon in the fights. A lot of the terms are unique to grappling specifically, and while I recognized them, using our current-day terms for techniques, even down to Japanese names and saying “OSS” as a positive response, really popped me out of the story. I imagine it would be confusing if one wasn’t familiar with the terms. Adding to that was a lack of information about where the story was set. There were multiple mentions of “Mercury” (as far as I can tell, listening to the audio), so I was confused whether this was literally planet Mercury in our solar system, or another far away planet, or a renamed Earth or what. A couple other countries are named but nothing to really set where or when this takes place, or even what the world is like. But there were a lot of cool aspects too, such as the different classes of humans (worker, fighter, and scientist/engineer), the fighting rings made of different metals which affect the combatants’ mental states, and the little floating sparks that seem to have some influence over people and fights. Not much is uncovered about them in the first book, however.
Character
The characters in the book are well portrayed, and three dimensional. Although I thought the main character was a little older than eventually revealed (13), he’s got a lot of dedication to succeed and it makes you want to win along with him. He finds a crew of other students to help along the way, and his older mentor is a gruff mountain of a man who follows what he knows is right, even though no one else does so any longer. On the other hand, the antagonists are less developed. Most are spiteful or evil but there’s not a lot of reason given why, except that they’re bad sports. Generally, all people from the upper classes are kind of snooty, while all the lower-class people are “salt of the earth.” That leads me to my other main problem with this story. There’s very little diversity. As far as I can tell, there’s no LGBTQ content, which is especially strange, as it seems about 99% of Grievars are male. I think I counted four females in the story altogether, and only two with more than a line. It seems like both are set up as potential romantic interests for later books. Both are also very Hermione-like characters, who want to use their smarts to get ahead. Just for reference, I’ve taught many female martial artists over the years, and many are very competent fighters, no matter their size. I would have liked to see a few more included here.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
Decent writing with some annoying quirks, some interesting characters, though a lack of inclusion, Worldbuilding was spotty in places. 5/10.
Read #3 of 31
Position #19
Overall Thoughts
No one is safe in this dystopian sci-fi! A quick note that if you’re sensitive to character death, this may not be the book for you, however the story does take you along with it, like the winds of a storm. I had a little trouble getting into it because of some editing and prose issues, but I was intrigued by looks into the character backstories. King has a way of bringing villains and antagonists into a sympathetic light, showing everyone to be in the gray, rather than in black and white. However, I have to say the goodwill that generated was not quite enough in the end to keep my interest up around overwritten description and a lack of empathy for all the character deaths that happened. I think a good editing pass on this to remove some of the extraneous material and really shine up the story would go a long way.
Plot
Digging into this more, the plot was good, if a little short. I think this book might be one of those rare ones that would actually benefit by being a bit longer, taking the time to set up some of the larger arcs and taking the characters a little further here before the second book. Especially near the end, several battles felt rushed, and so the resolution with the characters was not quite as rewarding as I hoped. It was left a little unclear who exactly was alive, as well. The book is written in a close omniscient, so headhopping allows us to see from many perspectives, but also makes some of the blocking confusing during action scenes.
Setting
This is where Eye of the Storm really shines. I’m not much for dystopian stories in general, but there was something about the way this is brought to life, with a small number of people living in the constantly-moving eye of a superstorm, that piqued my interest. A nomadic people constantly struggling for survival, but also continually unearthing new relics, stores, and monsters as the storm moves, makes the world an interesting and large place to explore. Early in the plot, it’s stated that the eye will move over the ocean soon, which I thought was an awesome consequence for a world storm, and made me wonder how the characters would respond and adapt.
Character
There’s both some pretty strong pros and cons to this section. The characters were what made me keep reading over some of the technical prose problems in the beginning, but the character arcs are also a bit uneven toward the end. There are several romance threads in the story, but while some were surprising and inevitable, the one including the main character never really felt deserved to me. While there were a couple moving send-offs for characters who died, a lot of the time, most losses were more in the vein of “oh no, well, let’s keep moving.”
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
There’s a good concept with this story, but it’s weighed down by the prose and lack of editing. I would have liked a little more to the plot and more consistent character reactions. 5/10.
Read #21 of 31
Position #20
Overall Thoughts
This one took me a while to get into, but I’m glad I gave it a good 30% before deciding to read it in full. The central concept is interesting, dealing with aliens who have tried to colonize Earth, and end up raising some humans to think like them from birth so they’re effectively brainwashed. However, there were a couple points where I felt the story wasn’t quite deep enough. First, we never really get a complete description for the aliens, and second, I would have liked a little more finality to the end of the story. In all, it’s a good read, but not one of my personal top ten. Let’s dig in…
Plot
Most of the story takes place about 20-30 years after aliens first invaded, so there is an entire generation of humans who have been raised in families by the aliens. Some have been rescued by humans and deprogrammed, but as the two sides are still actively fighting, those people are still treated with some distrust. The main character is one of these, who escaped an alien city after learning the truth. Most of the plot takes place over a few weeks, where a major assault is taking place to try to swing the final verdict of the war. As usual, there is a lot of politicking and infighting on the human side, which complicates the events. However, I felt the end of the story didn’t really tie things up that well, and the story just sort of stops. I’d liked to have seen a few aspects of the culture differences dug into a bit more. This puts me in mind of Harry Turtledove’s WorldWar Tetralogy, where aliens invade during WWII. Of course, that had four books to develop the two cultures, but still, I wanted just a little more.
Setting
We only see a small part of the US in this story, though there are a couple mentions of other countries and places. It seems like the whole world is busy dealing with these aliens. However my main issue with the worldbuilding is that we never get a clear idea of what the aliens look like or how their culture works. We’re told they have blue skin, they speak in a guttural language, and, as far as I can tell, are smaller, faster, and don’t stand up quite as straight as humans? I felt there was a big piece missing where they could have been fleshed out to show exactly why they’re, well, alien. Are these Star Trek aliens who look human and are just blue, or do they have fins, or gills, or scales? I assume they have the same number of limbs because nothing said they didn’t, but I had a problem picturing them. They are shown with schools, buildings, families, governments, and a similar culture to humans. Was that something assumed, or do they have any different concepts of culture than the humans do? Broadening the aliens could have added some more depth to the story and pulled the reader in more.
Character
There are some interesting questions of morality posed by the characters, for example if you’re in a forced subjugation posing as a family, but the family does really seem to care and look out for you, do you have any responsibility to them? The main character and several others struggle with the issue. Some hard decisions are made as to whether it’s more important to protect Earth as a place where humans live, or to try to understand and reason with an alien species that has nowhere else to go. This is where I would have actually liked the story to go on a little longer. I felt where we are left in the end is a point along that journey, but not one where we’ve really reached a consensus on the question, or even found out if humans will abide by the choices they’ve made.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
An interesting story concept, dealing with the morality of colonization vs. extinction, but not quite enough depth to really make the story stick. 4/10.
Read #29 of 31
Position #21
Overall Thoughts
I had high hopes for this story when I started, but a couple things dragged it down over the course of the book. The concept is that the Earth stops spinning one day (and everyone somehow doesn’t fly off) because a mysterious artifact has appeared in the sky, and various people and agencies try to find out what’s going on. Sounds really cool so far. There are some really tense scenes to start, and the book is fairly well written and easy to read. There’s a great setup in the first few chapters, however the artifact is never described, and I feel like the story goes off into the weeds on a couple points, taking away from what I wanted to learn about. In addition, the ending is…a letdown. I’m going to try not to completely spoil this one as I dig into it deeper, but I may need to in part to make some points I want to make. (EDIT: I’ve spoiled it, but hidden the spoilers)
Plot, Setting, and Character
I had a hard time separating the three when talking about this, so you get all of them together.
So the Earth stops spinning. Now what? At first I thought, when various scientist characters were describing that how the obvious effects (people flying off) didn’t happen that everything was going to be fine, but that quickly turns out not to be the case. Even with the most drastic effects not happening, there are still horrible catastrophes that occur, such as water drifting toward the poles, and animals going wild because there’s no magnetosphere. It’s quite interesting, but then the story starts following character interactions more, and not really going into depth about the scientific mysteries that have been set up. Add to that, no one ever gives a description of the thing in the sky. It’s referenced, but I guess no one actually looked at it, or set up a telescope? I don’t know how big it is, or how close to Earth, or even what shape it is.
The book follows several characters around the globe, including the family of a priest, and astronauts in orbit. Once past the initial shock of the Earth not spinning, more terrible things become obvious, like how one side of the world will forever be trapped in darkness, and the other forever burned by light. The seas start to migrate to the poles, and flocks of birds go astray. Massive seismic tremors rock the Earth. We also get the people aspect, with some declaring this to be divine judgement, and others simply resorting to lawless behavior. At the same time, one of the astronauts is trying to get a flash drive with data taken the moment object appeared to Cheyenne mountain, where US government systems can decode it.
But then there’s also a strange tangent with a fundamentalist preacher character who suddenly decides God is judging the world and he’s the chosen one to spread the message. I’m not arguing this wouldn’t happen (I mean, see the last few years for example), but there was a lot of focus put on this character, when I didn’t really care about him and wanted more description of the events. He starts leading a bunch of people who decide to ignore any scientific evidence and declare the physical object above them an emissary from the almighty to destroy them. My obvious question is “why go to all this trouble?” It’s a very elaborate setup and honestly, my money was on aliens instead. The whole religious thread seemed almost a throwaway, and I’m not sure why it was a central theme. The premise is set up as a way to elaborate on this incredible event, but those leads aren’t really followed. I wanted to find out more about the people trapped in permanent darkness, or how there was a mega-continent forming near the equator because all the water was heading to the poles. But it wasn’t ever explored.
Still, the story is pretty tense…up to a point. At the very end of the story, things start to unravel, and I feel like we never get a very satisfying ending.
OKAY. I’M GONNA SPOIL THIS ONE. I have to describe exactly how great my frustration was with the end of this story. So if you want, highlight the text below to see, spoilers included. If not, why not read it yourself? The setup is really pretty cool.
Still here? Alright. Buckle up.
So the flash drive has important data on it about the artifact (which still doesn’t have a description), right? At the end, the priest’s crowd all falls in a pit, so they end up not mattering, despite about 30% of the book being focused on them. There’s a big combined effort to just shoot nukes at the thing in the sky, you know, like the plot of every apocalyptic movie ever, which never works. But the plucky astronaut and her crew get to Cheyenne mountain with the precious flash drive with only thirty minutes to spare! So of course she has the vital evidence that will show the real way to get rid of it, right? She’s going to prove how the nukes won’t work, and here’s the real deal with the artifact, whether it’s aliens, or angels, or the dinosaurs coming back, or whatever, and then we have a revelatory exposition that explains everything…
Wrong.
Turns out there’s nothing on the drive. Then the combined governments shoot nukes at the object, and, still holding out hope, I was thinking the dust would clear and show that it was still there, right?
No, the nukes get rid of it. It’s gone. End of the book. The Earth starts spinning again. And I guess the astronaut’s journey across the world means nothing? And we never get a description of the artifact at all. It was…something…that appeared…somehow…above our planet and then…I guess…the nukes just destroyed it? Except there were some left flying around? So maybe the thing left of its own accord? We’ll never know, because the book ends, without accounting for the billions dead or dying, or any attempt to find out what happened. But I’m not bitter.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A very cool disaster story setup about an object stopping the Earth’s spin, but falters at the end with an unsatisfying conclusion. 4/10.
Read #23 of 31
Position #22
Overall Thoughts
I really wanted to get through this one, but I only made it about 60% before I realized I didn’t really understand how the characters related to each other and how their stories intersected. So this is my eighth DNF of the contest, but I ended up skimming through the last few chapters because I was interested to see how the book ended. Overall, I think the concepts are interesting and the cautionary tale of AI taking over is definitely pertinent, if echoed in a lot of contemporary SF literature. However, at over 600 pages, this one just couldn’t hold my interest. Add to that some clunky characterization and too many characters, and the story gets too bogged down to effectively deliver the results. But don’t let this stop you from reading! If you want an expansive tale with in-depth worldbuilding covering two time periods, definitely check this one out.
Plot
The plot here spreads out far too much in the second half of the book, getting slowed by extra POVs and tangential objectives. That said, I really enjoyed the core concept, showing the evolution of a self-aware AI in the near future, and an apocalyptic future several hundred years after that and how there are hints the AI might not have been stopped. There are a lot of moving parts, but the short interludes in our near future were the ones that caught my attention most, as they are told a lot more succinctly. The parts post-apocalypse got to be hard to follow later on, until I was looking for the next slice of action and revelation in the near future parts.
Setting
I quite enjoyed the worldbuilding as well. There is some great exploration of the post-apocalyptic society, and how people have reacted to the advent of AI in several different ways, including orienting themselves on nature, and trying to progress while not giving in to the runaway innovation that originally birthed the AI. One thing especially that stood out to me were the “bike towers” where people had stacked hundreds of bicycles all together so future people would have a place to get easy transportation. A really interesting concept! I was also rewarded by skipping ahead to the near the end, which answered a few questions I was interested in from the beginning, concerning strange features of the future landscape. Again, I really wanted to finish this book, but just couldn’t make it. Speaking of which, let me turn to the characters…
Character
This was the one, along with plot, that eventually made me put the book down. There are a lot of characters. At least six POVs I can think of off the top of my head, and probably more. That in itself is not a problem, but each character had wildly diverging objectives to their stories, most of which didn’t really seem to have much to do with the main plot. One favorite was the POV in the near future, Alex, who gives us a lot of setup for what happened, and has very definite motivations to stop AI. The other POV I enjoyed was Owen, a young man in the far future who learns about what people are doing with supposedly banned technology. I think the book could have been compressed to these two POVs, or maybe one more, and it would have made the story a lot tighter.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A good concept and a cautionary tale, bogged down by an abundance of characters, words, and objectives. 4/10.
Read #10 of 31
Position #23
Overall Thoughts
This was a very fun read, though perhaps not the best suited to the SPSFC contest. Going into the book, I wasn’t sure how much this one would fall on the MG vs. YA dividing line, but having read it, the story is very much MG, which I believe is a little outside the range of intent for the contest. But that said, I don’t think this will be a big issue. While I enjoyed the story, it doesn’t have a really strong holding power for me like Sanderson’s Alcatraz books did, and I’m guessing this will fall off my top ten list fairly soon, but will likely stay near the top in enjoyability! Though I did have one quibble with the formatting. This story followed the rule of any number under ten being written out, while ones over, like 23, or 52, are written as numbers. There are also a lot of numbers in this book, so it was a little annoying to see a paragraph with six and 25 and then another paragraph with 18 and three.
Plot
This is the first book of a several book series about the titular Banneker Bones, as well as his lesser-known cousin Ellicott, who is actually the POV of the book. There’s a lot to love here, with first the mystery of who Banneker is, and then what’s happening behind the scenes in a huge, robot manufacturing company. I guessed the twist at the end fairly quickly, but then, this is an MG story, so it’s not supposed to be too challenging. Some of the scenes felt a bit “now we’re showing off this cool feature! Now here’s another cool thing that’s exciting to young people!” but I guess that can be chalked up to the intended age being about one fourth of my own.
Setting
In the maybe-futuristic, maybe-contemporary Latimer city, many jobs are being made easier with the help of advanced robots, partially invented by the titular character. We get to see the city from the outside perspective of Ellicott, so there’s a nice sense of wonder here in how the “big city” works and what all the robots do. And of course there are giant robot bees, which are just fun. Don’t look too deep into how things actually work without falling apart, because therein lies the enjoyment.
Character
This was the part I was most intrigued with, especially since this is a mid-grade book. While Ellicott is a fairly likeable everyman, Banneker is not a pleasant person at all, and a bit hard to empathize with as a hero character. While it does set him up to grow a little as a character, and probably more through the other books, he’s basically a bully for the first part of the book, which made me think he was going to be a villain or an antihero, rather than basically the hero of the story. I’ll also quibble slightly that Ellicott got the grades to get transferred into a school for geniuses, but then ends up being the Watson to Banneker’s Holmes. I would have liked a little more initiative from him.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
A fun read with some cool robots, though clearly intended for preteens, and doesn’t really have the holding power for an adult to enjoy as thoroughly. 4/10
Read #20 of 31
Position #24
Overall Thoughts
So this will be a strange review, and I’m sort of breaking my own rules. This is my seventh DNF of the contest, but I’m rating this higher than a book I read in full! I ended up reading almost half of this one, because the writing is fairly good, and so is the pacing. I even flipped to the last couple chapters to find out what happened in the end. The problem is that I didn’t feel much of a connection with the characters, and was left wondering “why” for most of the book. Looking into the author’s works a little deeper, I believe this happened because the main character is this book was a side character in a different series, not a main character. I felt like I was missing something the whole time, and I could tell there was more to the universe. But because I wasn’t first invested in the universe, I ended up not connecting. My biggest issue was I never understood why these things were happening to the eponymous Quinn. She reacted to everything accordingly, but I could never make out why people were targeting this random girl and making her life miserable. So in accordance with this breaking my own rules, I’m going to give this book the full review treatment…
Plot
This was tied with Character in what made me finally set the book down. There certainly was a lot of plot in this book, with Quinn going from a convent, to learning code at an academy, dealing with conflicts with schoolmates and the mafia-controlled administration, to getting basically kidnapped by that same administration and getting involved with their various businesses. Again, the issue was motivation. I never felt there was any real driving force for what propelled Quinn from one place to another. The first transition from the convent was basically “you’re going to this academy now, because.” I wasn’t sure if it was because Quinn was especially suited, or if the nuns were tired of her, or if there was an opportunity, or what. Each step in the plot happened the same way. I’d have liked a little more presence in the beginning of a big bad, or a self-driving force, or something to explain how Quinn keeps getting in these situations.
Setting
This part I really have no complaints about! The universe is a big place, with lots of worlds in evidence, a neat FTL mechanism, and a lot of different factions and people with conflicting motives. It’s easy to tell this is part of a larger universe and a lot of works has gone into building it up. I’d even be interested in looking into other stories taking place in Folding Space.
Character
This was another problem area for me, though not as much as the plot. Quinn is largely reactive to everything that is going on, wading through all the obstacles in front of her. She’s certainly active, even if it is reactive, but again, I get the feeling she has just as little of an idea of what’s happening as the reader does. There doesn’t seem to be a cohesive force driving her. She’s not aiming to become the best coder, or get through the academy, or even to get away from the mafia organization that captured her. She just is. This is one reason I looked ahead to the end of the book, to see if I could satisfy my own curiosity for why I would be interested in the character of Quinn of Cygnus. While this book does set up for the sequels, I still couldn’t find a real driving factor for the character.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
An interesting concept with an expansive universe, but hampered by a lack of motivation for the plot or the main character. 3/10.
Read #4 of 31
Position #25
Overall Thoughts
Alright. So this will be an interesting review. Let me get this out of the way first: this won’t be one of my recommendations to move on to the next stage of the contest. That said, I have read sci-fi romance stories before and this absolutely follows the tropes and fulfills the story it intends to tell. It was a fun diversion. However, I don’t think it’s a good match for a contest looking for the subjective best indie science fiction book out of 300 books submitted. In fact, having just completed publishing a sci-fi (lesbian) romance anthology myself, I am more in tune with the tropes and storylines that go into a romance story than usual. If you like romances (with explicit sex scenes), this might be an enjoyable read for you. However, I’m reviewing these books for an indie science fiction contest and, well, I have to think people knew what they were getting into when submitting books…
Plot
Ok, buckle up and we’ll get into the nitty gritty. The plot here is the standard romance: girl is on a generational ship, girl gets attacked by pirates, girl crash lands on a planet, girl meets a sexy dragon-man with (since he’s descended from reptiles) not one but two huge…errrrr…wings, and hijinks ensue! Ahem. In all seriousness, I did have some issues with how the romance was treated here. Ladon (dragon-dude) effectively tries to rape Calista the first time he meets/abducts her, which I am definitely not alright with. There are many more chances in which she gives consent, even if some are in the throes of passion, but I keep going back to the first meeting and the fact that it was never fully addressed for me. Second, even a romance needs some ups and downs. Most of the danger and tension in this story come from external dangers of flora and fauna. There’s very little tension between the characters, Calista is pretty okay from the beginning with knocking boots with a giant alien, and nothing much comes between them in any meaningful way except some language barriers. There’s a little tension with a skeevy guy from the ship, but it’s pretty obvious that’s not going anywhere. Overall this trended toward the more erotic side of romance than the will they/won’t they tension of relationships.
Setting
*Cracks Knuckles* So you want to submit a fluffy, fun, alien romance to an indie sci-fi contest filled with crunchy, techy books? More power to you. I will have some issues with this. So, first off, this starts out on a generational ship, but I guess the only media that’s survived the years after they left Earth is Star Trek and Star Wars? Like, there are multiple references, and the only comparison used for the hostile-ness of the planet, which seems like it’s just trying too hard. It’s a desert planet compared to Tatooine and Vulcan. What about Arrakis, especially since there’s a giant worm species that has a connection to an addictive substance? In addition, Calista is supposed to be a plant biologist, but seems to be absolutely useless at any other sort of science. Her expert opinion on plants is also…lacking:
“…there is a rough-bladed species of grass. I run my hands around myself. The grass is thick and almost sharp on the edges. A hardy breed, which also means logically this must be an oasis. Grass and plants can’t grow without water.”
I…would have liked a little more scientific analysis. For example, wouldn’t the plants outside an oasis need to be hardier than the ones inside? Also, grass and plants? As a scientist, she doesn’t even use the proper names she would be familiar with for classification of plants. This doesn’t even get into the logic jump when she determines a species of plant must change her DNA when she eats it. The first few pages in this story almost turned me off because they could have been in any chick-lit story about a woman and her girlfriends talking about guys at work and what to eat. It was a small thing, but there were no hints that they were on a generational ship, which is a very specific sort of self-contained space ship, until I think a chapter or two in. None of the characters on the generational ship seem to have any clue how to approach emergency measures or repairs for basic things like light, water, and heat. Plus the entire ship crashes on a planet, but thousands of people are still alive after it breaks up in space and then hurtles through atmosphere to land in a desert. I’m not saying it couldn’t happen, but not with these people at the helm.
Character
The two main characters pull the reader through the story, and I think the romance is definitely intriguing. The (several) sex scenes are, well, *fans self,* which is the point of this story, after all. That said, the biggest issue I had was the characters seemed fairly generic. Calista is the nerdy (not really) girl who does Science and thinks she can never get a man because her girlfriends are so much better at that sort of thing. Ladon is the very alpha, protective overly macho male who is at the same time completely considerate of his female and will do anything to protect her. As I mentioned above, I would have liked a little more tension to the story. There are some fights with dangerous creatures, and a slimy boss from the ship who naturally also wants Calista, but from the first, somewhat rapey meeting between the two main characters, there’s never any doubt the two will be together. Even when they encounter the rest of the crashed refugees on the planet, there’s no relationship tension. Her gaggle of girlfriends is instantly forgettable, and there are five or six of them. There also is very little reaction to the generational ship, which presumably has been a self-contained home for three generations, crashing with all their dreams, with no chance of rescue. I would think the characters would be completely unaccustomed to being on a planet, since they’ve lived their whole lives on the ship. I don’t think it was ever stated where they were going or why.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
If you love romance and you’re reading this for the D(ragon), then it’s a fun, fluffy read. If you want any sort of thought-provoking science fiction, I’d look elsewhere. I think romances are completely capable of doing both, but this is not one of those. 3/10
Read #16 of 31
Position #26
Overall Thoughts
I feel a bit bad DNFing this one (my fourth) because I do think the story has merit. It seems to have a similar concept to Quantum Leap, where certain people called Watchers can live out other lives in other timelines, though I didn’t find out why. I read about 20% of this one and had a very hard time following it, to the point where I wasn’t quite sure what was going on with the plot or the characters. There’s a prologue at the beginning that seems unconnected from everything else so far, and there’s a very abrupt POV and tense shift right after. The writing is overdrawn, with minute descriptions of everyday actions to the point where I lost what was going on in that particular scene. This one wouldn’t make my top ten if I finished it, and I had enough trouble that I think I would put it down if I tried to read it on my own. There were a couple main issues with the writing:
1) Scene setting and POV. We jump through at least five POVs in the first 20%, some of which are short stories within stories, to the point where I wasn’t sure who I was supposed to be following and what they were doing. I think there were two main characters through those POVs, but I’m honestly not sure.
2) Overwriting. There were several pages of explanation that could have been cut to trim down the story, progress the plot, and add better characterization. Much of it included mundane actions and a lot of observing, trying, starting, and getting to places without much substance. This, coupled with the confusion of POVs and settings finally made me set this one down.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
I think the concept here is interesting, but the writing needs a good editing pass to make the story more coherent. 2/10.
Read #19 of 31
Position #27
Overall Thoughts
This is my sixth DNF of the contest. I tried to get into this one, but kept bouncing off. It appears to be the story of a brother and sister, the brother in jail and the sister an engineer around Jupiter. Both have synesthesia, which is always a neat plus. I think there is an interesting plot in there somewhere, but it is written half in stream-of-consciousness, where defining plot points and conversations drift off into extended descriptions of dreams and strange sensory encounters, keeping me from understanding what’s going on. There are also several typos, which I can forgive, but the second (or third) time it abruptly transitioned into first person from third and then back to first made me put it down. My two big complaints are:
1) Writing style. I try not to judge based on this, but the stream-of-consciousness writing was heavily getting in the way of me understanding what the heck was going on. There were several scene shifts where either I missed it or it wasn’t said, but suddenly a character was in a different place doing something new. There were also several conversations I had to look back over to see what the beginning was, after it drifted into an extended description of something unrelated.
2) Prose. There were several typos, which is a contributing factor, but definitely not one for which I would put down a book. However, several times the tense shifts in the middle of a paragraph for a sentence and then back. There were several other whole paragraphs written as “I” rather than “he” or “she” for the main characters. The third or fourth time I came across this was what made me put the book down.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
Seems to be an interesting story of future space exploration, told from a brother and sister perspective, but it’s hampered by the writing style and some technical concerns. 1/10.
Read #9 of 31
Position #28
Overall Thoughts
Here’s my second DNF of the contest. I really tried to power through this one, but only made it to 20%, though I did read a bit toward the end, just to give this one the benefit of the doubt.
Overall, the writing is pretty solid. The setting is a future, destroyed Earth where people have awakened old magical abilities, and interdimensional gods have come about. I wasn’t completely sure if the gods were real, or simply new religions, as there is a physical breach between dimensions above one of the poles of the Earth, but the parts I read didn’t have gods in them. At any rate, things are now season-based, with people having different powers depending on which season they were born in. The last civilization on Earth has those fortunate inside a big city, and a lot of poorer people outside. All good so far, but I had a couple main things that kept me from finishing the story:
1) This story is brutal. It opens with abuse, rape, and a dysfunctional and downright hateful family. The main character thinks very highly of himself and treats other people as trash, and as far as I can tell, his condescending tone lasts through the book. Then things gets worse, with violent gory deaths at the protagonist’s hands, for no real reason. I would have stopped earlier, except there is another viewpoint character, who is much less of a trash person. However, the surroundings to her story are just as brutal as around the other character, though she lives in luxury and the other character lives in squalor. From the bit I skimmed near the end, there is a sort of redemption arc for the characters, but I had trouble bringing myself to care about them enough, with all the terrible things they did, to get that far.
2) I wasn’t really thrilled with the treatment of autism and OCD in this book. Both the male main character and his mother have autism and the son also has OCD, but in part it is used as a crutch to justify what terrible people they are. I’m not autistic, but I have done some research on it to make sure several characters I’ve written are accurately portrayed. I think this part of the book needs a good pass by a sensitivity reader to make sure that it’s not showing autism or OCD as the cause for terrible actions, but instead as another aspect of the characters.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
The writing is solid in this book, but the subject matter is so violent and oftentimes hateful that I couldn’t bring myself to care for the characters. 1/10
Read #17 of 31
Position #29
Overall Thoughts
My fifth DNF. This was a strange one. Originally serialized on a website, from what I can tell, this investigates a lot of conspiracy theories surrounding presumed alien contact. I only got about 20% into this one before I put it down. The writing is fairly solid, if prone to go a little purple in places. However, there is an inordinate amount of time devoted to chronicling how hackers are trying to take over the website and how smart the (fictional) author is to have outsmarted them. Add to this the one McGuffin that (I guess) shows alien contact is…not really interesting. Certainly not enough for the huge air of mystery and conspiracy surrounding it. In all there were a couple reasons I put this down:
1) Too Much Conspiracy. I was getting bogged down in all the assertions of how much a conspiracy this was, to the point where it felt like I was being told there was some big thing going on, but I hadn’t seen any sign of it so far. That’s not to say it couldn’t happen later in the book, but, well, I didn’t get that far.
2) Sort of icky sexual content. The main character investigating the alien (?) presence is not a very likeable fellow, to say it mildly, and every scene with him has a fixation on looking for women as sexual trophies. Even the way he first contacts the McGuffin is by trying to weasel sex out of a woman down on her luck. There’s a trip overseas looking for underage girls, a bunch of troll-like online behavior, and talking down to the one woman so far in the book. Just turned me off.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
Told in an epistolary style about an alien conspiracy, but has too much ranting over the conspiracy and too much man-baby behavior. 1/10
Read #15 of 31
Position #30
Overall Thoughts
My third DNF of the contest. I made it about 15% of the way through this, but had to stop. This is written in a similar vein to William Gibson’s Cyberpunk books, where I can tell a lot of things are being set up but…they aren’t coherent enough to grab my attention. The writing also has some issues a good edit or another few beta reads might have helped. I’m assuming from a little searching that the author is not a native English speaker, but I don’t know if that is a factor in the writing or not. I would have powered on through that, but there was also some problematic content that turned me off. So in all, there were two major reasons I DNFed this book:
1) Writing. There were several scenes that were just too hard for me to follow and I was completely confused what happened by the end of the first chapter. There were also several places where it was unclear who was speaking even to the point where I was confused as to the gender of a character. Finally there were also some very clunky turns of phrase like "She was scared, but she was also angry. He could see both," and “Anna said and winked with her green eyes."
2) Problematic content. As far as I can tell, this book is written by a white German male, but one part is set in a poorer section of Africa, and there are several overly stereotypical racial and sexual portrayals. Even though some are called out, it was enough to make me uncomfortable with the content. I stopped reading when a character mentioned they were chipped by the government by taking a vaccine. I don’t know if it was supposed to be satire or not, but at that point, I was ready to stop reading.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
Problematic content, poor writing, and a lack of cohesion means I only got to about 15% before putting this one down. 0/10
Read #8 of 31
Position #31
Overall Thoughts
This one is my first DNF of the contest, and I usually do not review books I didn’t finish because I don’t think it’s fair as I haven’t experienced the entire story. But, I need to give an assessment for all the books given to my team, so here goes!
I only got to about 10% through this book, but from what I can tell, this focuses on a brother and sister pair, orphaned and now nearly adult, making their way in life by stealing from pirate vessels. In concept, this seems like it could be an interesting story. There were two reasons I DNFed this book:
1) Writing. This is more of a pet peeve for me, as I am also a writer, so I tend to be harder in this area. I will read through bad or clunky writing for a good story, but it’s harder for me to do so. This one is in need of a good editing pass to clean up the descriptions, actions, and dialogue. Right now it’s not too hard to read, but the writing style jumps out to me as fairly basic, and many actions are very over-explained, taking me out of the story.
2) Sexual content. I’m not a prude, and definitely enjoy a good romance, or even graphic story, up to erotica (see my review of Dragon’s Baby). However, this book has several overly graphic and body horror-type sexual encounters before the 3% mark. There’s also some casual homophobia in the first dialogue between the main characters, and at least one of the encounters uses sexual behaviors as a characterization method, in a scene I’m not sure even needs to be in the book. To add to this, the McGuffin of the story (the golden crunk) seems to elicit obsessive sexual actions in people who hold it, with several scenes that come off as simply self-indulgent. I didn’t see things changing much for the rest of the story.
Score out of 10 (My personal score, not the final contest score)
I can tell from the first 10% of this book that it won’t get into my top ten choices, and I didn’t even have much desire to finish the book either, as opposed to some others I’ve read. 0/10