Book Review: Beneath the World, a Sea by Chris Beckett

When I read the cover blurb for Chis Beckett’s new novel Beneath The World, A Sea, it seemed vaguely familiar. A British policeman is sent to investigate the killings of the indigenous species of the Submundo Delta, the Muendes, whom the local human populace do not consider to be sentient. The Muendes mess with their minds and to make things stranger and the only way into the Delta is through the Zona, a region that wipes any memories of having been there.

Read the rest of my review at SF Crowsnest.

Book Review: Morhelion by Dominic Dulley

Morhelion follows on from Dominic Dulley’s debut novel, the breezy space opera adventure Shattermoon, bringing back the roguish and mismatched crew of the Dainty Jane to mix it up with a new batch of criminal gangs, opportunists, charming conmen and villainous authority figures.

Read the rest of my review at SF Crowsnest.

Estonian Mole Rats

The Estonian translation of my story The Righteous Indignation of the Naked Mole Rat is now out at Reaktor.

I sent the story to them around 3 years ago and had given up all hope, so this was a nice surprise!




This is the third language for this story, following English and Spanish.

Book Review: Atlas Alone by Emma Newman

Atlas Alone is the fourth novel set in Emma Newman’s Planetfall universe, all of which I have enjoyed and found to be engaging and emotionally charged, with wonderfully complex characters and an intriguing background. Each of the first three novels stands alone and could be read in any order, but this book follows on directly from After Atlas and really needs to be read in the right order.

Read the rest of my review at SF Crowsnest.

Tall Tale TV

Today's episdoe of podcast Tall Tale TV includes 3 stories, by myself and my two eldest boys Alex and Haydn!

Brothers in Qualms by Alex

The Final Battle is But a Game by Haydn

Escapades in Time by me.

Escapades in Time is a dialogue-only story, and the narration by Chris Herron carries it off brilliantly, making it sound even better than when I wrote it!

Magazine Review: Visions #1: Visions of Home

It’s been a long time since a new UK-based print genre magazine has appeared, so I was delighted to discover Visions, which has arrived to fill that void. When I started writing reviews years ago, I particularly concentrated on this type of publication, switching gradually to novel reviews as the magazines disappeared one by one.

Read the rest of my review at SF Crowsnest.

Familiy Podcasting Triptych

Tall Tale TV will be podcasting an episode containing three stories, one each by myself, and my two sons Alex and Haydn!

Alex pitched the idea when the editor said his story was too short to podcast by itself. I've not had many stories podcast, so I'm rather pleased and it will be particularly exciting to hava e whole family podcast to ourselves!

Book Review: From Divergent Suns by Sam Peters

After the tumultuous events of From Darkest Skies and From Distant Stars, Agent Keon Rause of the Magenta police force is back in full swing, investigating a mysterious high-profile suicide. Working through the aftermath of discovering that his long-dead wife Alysha is actually alive, Agent Rause is attempting to get to the bottom of the on-going conspiracy that has kept them apart for six years.

Read the rest of my review at SF Crowsnest.

Book Review: Invisible Ecologies by Rachel Armstrong

Rachel Armstrong’s second novel Invisible Ecologies is subtitled Songs of the Ecocene II although, from what I could tell, it is unrelated to last year’s Origamy, which is now volume I of the series. The interesting thing about this series title, I thought, is that actually when you step back and think about what you’ve read, ‘Invisible Ecologies’ takes on the aspect of a song rather than a novel. It’s not written as a song of course, but you end up with the impression of it having been some kind of epic folk ballad.

Read the rest of my review at SF Crowsnest.

Book Review: No Way by S.J. Morden

Last year’s Martian thriller One Way introduced us to Frank Kittridge, a convicted murderer who was offered a one-way ticket to Mars as part of an all-convict crew who would build a base for NASA’s astronauts to use in the future. It didn’t seem such a bad deal, it would just mean Frank serving out his life sentence on the glorious expanse of Mars rather than a maximum security prison in the USA.

Read the rest of my review at SF Crowsnest.