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Mercenary has Mass

Don D’Ammassa’s Critical Mass, on Mike Resnick’s Starship: Mercenary:

“Wilson Cole and his crew are back for their third outing. …The story is very episodic, chronicling their adventures as they perform a rescue mission, foil an extortion plot, and evacuate hospital, among other things. In each case, Cole is able to prevail through his wits as much as his gunnery, but of course the author has set the situation up that way. Although in a sense this is somewhat contrived, it isn’t obvious and Resnick has come up with some clever ploys for outsmarting the bad guys. The characters are flimsier than in his more serious novels, but the storytelling is as good as ever and we genuinely regret it when he and his former ally, the Valkyrie, find themselves on opposite sides. The ability to write good space opera is increasingly a misplaced, if not entirely lost art, but Resnick knows how to draw on a hidden lode of it. Lightweight but genuine fun.”

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Before They Are Hanged: Beating the Middle Book Syndrome with a Starred Review

Before They Are Hanged (The First Law: Book Two)

Joe Abercrombie

This grim and vivid sequel to 2007’s The Blade Itself transcends its middle volume status, keeping the reader engaged with complicated plotting and intriguing character development… Abercrombie leavens the bloody action with moments of dark humor, developing a story suffused with a rich understanding of human darkness and light. (Mar.)

—Publishers Weekly, starred review, January 21, 2008

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Paragaea: Old Fashion Aventure!

Comic book scribe Ron Fortier has posted a review of Chris Roberson’s Paragaea: A Planetary Romanceon his Pulp Fiction Reviews site, and seems to have liked it.

“Hold on to your hats! When you open this book you are in for a rip-roaring, old fashion adventure in the tradition of Edgar Rice Burrough’s planet stories… Their quest is a lively action filled romp that I enjoyed to the max and was sorry to reach the end all too quickly. It does end with several unresolved plots that I hope will be handled in forthcoming sequels. Heironymous, Leena and Balam are three of the best adventure heroes ever created and I’m so happy to have made their acquaintance. It’s an experience I’d like to repeat and soon. So will you.”

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SciFiNow: Best of 2007

Just got the news that SciFiNow magazine, one of Britain’s premiere sf media mags, has released their Best Books of 2007. And among the list, Ian McDonald’s Brasyl,and Michael Moorcock’s The Metatemporal Detective.

Here’s the full list:

1) Halting State (Stross) – ORBIT
2) Stealing Light (Gibson) – TOR UK
3) Brasyl (McDonald) – PYR/GOLLANCZ
4) The Metatemporal Detective (Moorcock) – PYR
5) Helix (Brown) – SOLARIS

Congratulations to Ian and Mike! We’re very proud.

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Time-Drinking Never Tasted So Good

Author, editor, commentator Jeff Vandermeer interviews Michael Moorcock for Amazon’s Omnivoracious blog today, talking about the origins of the Seaton Begg character in his recently released The Metatemporal Detective. The interview is a hoot, and well worth checking out in full, but here is a taste:

Amazon.com: Which of the following best describes your metatemporal detective, Seaton Begg (and why): “time-drunk slave to his insatiable appetites”, “linear successor to the hardboiled eccentrics of Dashiell Hammett,” “debonair ladies man who hardly has time out of the sack to solve crimes.”

Michael Moorcock: All of them.

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SFSite’s Best of 2007

Greg L. Johnson of SFSite has posted his Best of 2007 list, a list of “the ten science fiction and fantasy books that I liked the most in 2007.” And wouldn’t you know it, Pyr takes the # 2 and # 1 spot.

Greg’s #2 choice for 2007 is Ian McDonald’s Brasyl,of which he says, “With wit and stunning imagery, Ian McDonald takes us to a near-future, and a distant past, that is as strange as any alien world. …a story that masterfully blends history, character, Portuguese street slang and cosmological speculation, meeting both the requirements of hard SF and literary style along the way.”

And coming in at #1, Kay Kenyon’s Bright of the Sky,which “lies somewhere between Gene Wolfe’s The Book of the Sun and Karl Schroeder’s Ventus, and was, for me, the one book of the year that, once I started reading, was impossible to put down.”

Congratulations to both Ian and Kay!

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Politics and Action: Two Great Tastes that Taste Great Together

There were two things that drew me to Joel Shepherd’s Cassandra Kresnov series initially. The first was that his was the first prose work that I’d encountered that fully embraced and explored the ramifications of a totally integrated mind-to-net world, in a way I’d never seen done in prose SF before, but had seen only in the manga (not the anime) Ghost in the Shell. I mean, we all remember Case and Molly in each others heads from way back, but I’d yet to encounter a novel in which the entire population was chipped, with multiple conversation threads and images zipping around between everyone. And since this is pretty much where I think we’re heading in the real world, I was surprised it took me till Joel to see it anywhere outside of manga. (I’m sure there are other examples, our own David Louis Edelman being one, but I’m talking my perspective.)

The second was the way he so seamlessly interwove action and political intrigue, and the coin toss it was to decide which was the more gripping. So it was really gratifying to see so many reviews stating things like “I can’t wait to get through the action to the next political discussion.” Not something you expect to see, right? Since then, I’ve held Joel up many times as the epitome of what a good SF novel can be – I mean, it has synthetic warrior women leaping out of flying cars with machine guns blazing, and is also a masterful examination of what it means to be human and the ramifications of artificial life, chocked full of strong female protagonists. It’s smart, it’s deep, it’s fast-paced, it’s action packed, it would make a hell of a good movie or tv series, and it’s quintessential SF.

So this latest review from Rob H. Bedford of SFFWorld makes me smile. Since it just confirms everything above, “I also found the political maneuvering to parallel the action very well, much like the previous two volumes. Shepherd’s adept hand at balancing these two differently flavored adrenaline inducing types of scenes continues to be a strong point in his writing.”

See? Rob continues, “Another strength that comes to the fore in Killswitchis that Shepherd doesn’t offer easy answers to his character’s problems. The relationship between Vanessa Rice and Sandy has been both intense and a walk across eggshells. Although these two do try to confront the tension between them, it doesn’t fully become resolved. I found this to be somewhat refreshing.”

Hey hey!

He concludes, “With this trilogy complete, Shepherd has proven his ability to deliver politically and action charged science fiction. …the books stand well together as good action-packed Science Fiction. Kresnov is a strong character and a very human non-human character at that. Killswitch is a nice ending to the trilogy and a culmination of Sandy’s journey.”

Thanks Rob. I couldn’t agree more!

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Starship: Mercenary Scores a Hit

Now this is interesting. Graeme of Graeme’s Fantasy Book Reviews, admits to “not really being into science-fiction” and also & therefore to having never heard of multiple Hugo-winning author Mike Resnick. And to picking up Starship: Mercenarywithout having read books one and two in the series (why do people do that? Okay, we sent it him to review, but I know there are readers out there who do it too). So, coming in cold midway to the series without an over-abiding love for SF to fall back on, how did he find Mercenary?

Why, the book is “just the kind of sci-fi that I can see myself reading more of… it’s fun and it doesn’t take itself too seriously. A clever blend of ‘military sci-fi’ and ‘space opera’ that is just the job for a trip into work or a lazy weekend. Seven and a Half out of Ten.”

Now, if that’s not an endorsement, I don’t know what is.

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Williams, Avery, McDonald, Oh My!

Sean Williams is interviewed on the wonderful Adventures in SciFi Publishing podcast, available via iTunes and as a direct download. (Also interviewed, best-selling author Kevin J. Anderson.)

Meanwhile, The Book Swede takes us all the way back to our first season with a review of Fiona Avery’s historical fantasy, The Crown Rose.Says the Swede, “This is a good read. It combines classic French history, with an even older story, with generally good, intriguing and likeable characterisations, and a very well imagined 13th century Paris. It does indeed has a certain YA feel to it, but certainly less than the cover would seem to indicate, and is quite a fun feel-good read, but with enough battles, etc to keep my interest! 8.5/10.”

And Gardner Dozois has posted the contents of his forthcoming The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fifth Annual Edition. I’m thrilled that “Sanjeev and Robotwallah” by Ian McDonald has made the list, as it appeared originally in my own Fast Forward 1.Here’s the full list at SFScope.

Finally, we’ve uploaded a few more book pages from our 2008 season. Click “Forthcoming” on the left to see if you are on the Pyr site, and if you are viewing this through a feed click here.

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