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I recently finished "Gods of Risk," the latest novella in James S.A. Corey's Expanse series (SciFi). I really enjoy these short, insightful stories. They fill the time spent waiting between novels, and as a functional bonus... serve to further flesh out characters/locations/themes and general back-story in a way that frankly without the novellas, would probably have to be included as mind-numbing info-dumps in the "meat and potatoes volumes." Bravo!
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I also finished Felix Gilman's The Rise of Ransom City—the second half of a duology that began with The Half-Made World. I'd consider this more of a "true" duology; in that the two volumes are only loosely connected by setting and a few characters. They both stand basically on their own. Even so, I wouldn't recommend reading the second before (or without) the first; there's some concepts and "Powers" at work in the world that get a much more complete introduction in the first book.
Anyway... I feel my bullheaded reluctance to outright dismiss Gilman has finally payed dividends with a work of his that I can say I thoroughly enjoyed. Even long after I'd decided the previous two books of his I'd read just didn't quite do it for me—story-wise—something about his writing continued to "tug" at me. So I couldn't stop reading. This time it all clicked, and I'm glad I stuck it out.
Western, New Weird and Steampunk all rolled up into a classic and powerful first-person, story-within-a-story tale that's just rife with archetypal subtext the reader can chew on (should they enjoy that sort of thing). I look forward to his future endeavors.
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Up next: Warren Ellis's Gun Machine.
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