Last Argument of Kings

Okay, playing mad catch-up:

A podcast with Joe Abercrombie on the Dragon Page. Their description: “This week, Mike, Summer and Mike talk with Joe Abercrombie about Last Argument of Kings,the third book in The First Law Trilogy. We talk about the characters and the more contemporary feel of their speech, the more intimate nature of relationships and intrigues, and about how the buzz about these stories surround the writing style of the battle scenes.”

Meanwhile, Patrick Rothfus, he of The Name of the Wind,raves about Joe Abercrombie (and Brandon Sanderson) on his blog: “The books are good, really good. They pulled me in. Well-developed world. Unique, compelling characters. I like them so much that when I got to the end of the second book and found out the third book wasn’t going to be out in the US for another three months. I experienced a fit of rage, then a fit of depression, then I ate some lunch and had a bit of a lay down… I will also say this. This isn’t some cookie-cutter fantasy. It’s refreshingly realistic, but also very gritty and dark. It might even be fair to call it grim. You have been warned.” Of course, I should point out, the books are all three available in the US now…

Discover Magazine on Fast Forward 2: “It’s a great collection, with a good mix of stories ranging from hard science fiction to near magic realism. Stand outs for me included ‘True Names,’ a novella by Doctorow and Benjamin Rosenbaum set in a post-post-post-human universe, and ‘An Eligible Boy,’ written by Ian McDonald, that takes place in the mid-21st century India that McDonald has used as the backdrop for his 2004 book River of Gods.” Our friend and frequent commentator Rene also has a nice review on her blog, Little Bits of Everything: “This is a fantastic anthology that I look forward to rereading. I sincerely hope that Fast Forward becomes an annual anthology; the first two volumes are incredibly strong.”

Over at Adventures in Reading, Joe Sherry reviews Mike Resnick’s Starship: Mercenary. I was struck by a particular comparison he made – “This may be an odd comparison given the length and success of Mike Resnick’s career, but Starship: Mercenary is a fun military science fiction novel that fans of John Scalzi’s work will want to jump right into. There is a certain comparison and similarity in style.” This struck me because I read the manuscript for Mercenary within a month of The Last Colony and thought the same thing.

Also a positive review of Stalking the Vampire at Monsters & Critics: “…features offbeat humor, amusing dialog and a zany cast of characters that is sure to entertain the most jaded sci-fi fan and spark plenty of interest in an emerging series.”

And here Intercontinental Ballistic Discourse discusses a host of Mike Resnick works, including the extant Starship series: “I’ve got to say: wow! The characters are engaging, the story is fast and entertaining, and the plots are believable. My favorite form of science fiction is loosly described as military science fiction, or sci-fi that takes place around a starcraft or some form of governmental space navy and this series started off that way and branched out to something even more.”

Whew!