FREE/BARGAIN — Science Fiction & Fantasy

[DuskyRose]

Originally Posted by Hollow Man

While I liked the first Wool novella, I found the rest of the stories (confusingly compiled into a work also named Wool) not as compelling, so I didn't bother with Shift and Dust. I did get break down and get all of them when the three book omnibus was on sale a bit ago, so maybe someday I'll try the other two and see what I think.

The writing is breezier than Stephenson. They're very different style wise.

Shift is a different tone, as it mostly follows the beginning of the silos. But it does reveal a lot about what's going on in the background.

[maddz]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

You really should read Hugh Howey.

Maybe. But I have so much on my TBR as it is that it's not worth the hassle involved in 'travelling' to the US.

[salty-horse]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

Under the Eye of the Big Bird by Hiromi Kawakami is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Translated by Asa Yoneda. Was on several 2024 highlight lists. This is a mosaic novel composed of short stories.
Review by Niall Harrison on Locus

On sale again.

Was recently covered on the podcast A Meal of Thorns:
https://ancillaryreviewofbooks.org/2...-of-thorns-36/

[salty-horse]

Volatile Memory (The Volatile Memory Duology #1) by Seth Haddon is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

This is How You Lose the Time War meets Ex Machina: Seth Haddon's science fiction debut, Volatile Memory, is a whirlwind novella of sapphic revenge in space.

With nothing but a limping ship and an outdated mask to her name, Wylla needs a big pay day. When the alert goes out that a lucrative piece of tech lies hidden on a nearby planet, she calls on all the swiftness of her prey-animal instincts to beat other hunters to it.

What you found wasn’t your ticket out—it was my corpse wearing an AI mask. When you touched the mask, you heard my voice. A consciousness spinning through metal and circuits, a bodiless mind, spun to life in the HAWK’s temporary storage. I crystallized and realized: I was alive.

Masks aren't supposed to retain memory, much less identity, but the woman inside the MARK I HAWK is real, and she sees Wylla in a way no one ever has. Sees her, and doesn’t find her wanting or unwhole.

Armed with military-grade tech and a lifetime of staying one step ahead of the hunters, Wylla and HAWK set off to get answers from the man who discarded HAWK once before: her ex-husband.

[salty-horse]

Meet Me at the Crossroads by Megan Giddings is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Review by Abigail Nussbaum

From the award-winning, critically-acclaimed author of Lakewood and The Women Could Fly, a dazzling novel about two brilliant sisters and what happens to their undeniable bond when a mysterious and possibly perilous new world beckons.

On an ordinary summer morning, the world is changed by the appearance of seven mysterious doors that seemingly lead to another world. People are, of course, mesmerized and intrigued: A new dimension filled with beauty and resources beckons them to step into an adventure. But, perhaps inevitably, people soon learn that what looks like paradise may very well be filled with danger.

Ayanna and Olivia, two Black midwestern teens—and twin sisters—have different ideas of what may lie in the world beyond. But will their personal bond endure such wanton exploration? And when one of them goes missing, will the other find solace on her own? And will she uncover the circumstances of what truly happened to her once constant companion and best friend?

Megan Giddings brings her customarily brilliant and eye-opening powers of storytelling to give us a narrative that dazzles the senses and bewitches the mind. Meet Me at the Crossroads is an unforgettable novel about faith, love, and family from one of today’s most exciting and surprising young writers.

[Ashartus]

The Navigator's Children by Tad Williams, final book of the Last King of Osten Ard is $4.99 at Kobo (Canada). This is the only book in the series that wasn't in the Tad Williams Humble Bundle a while back.

[salty-horse]

Chaos Terminal (The Midsolar Murders #2) by Mur Lafferty is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

Mallory Viridian would rather not be an amateur detective, and fled to outer space to avoid it…but when one of the new human arrivals on a space shuttle is murdered, she’s back in the game.

Mallory Viridian would rather not be an amateur detective, thank you very much. But no matter what she does, people persist in dying around her—and only she seems to be able to solve the crime. After fleeing to an alien space station in hopes that the lack of humans would stop the murders, a serial killer had the nerve to follow her to Station Eternity. (Mallory deduced who the true culprit was that time, too.)

Now the law enforcement agent who hounded Mallory on Earth has come to Station Eternity, along with her teenage crush and his sister, Mallory’s best friend from high school. Mallory doesn’t believe in coincidences, and so she’s not at all surprised when someone in the latest shuttle from Earth is murdered. It’s the story of her life, after all.

Only this time she has more than a killer to deal with. Between her fugitive friends, a new threat arising from the Sundry hivemind, and the alarmingly peculiar behavior of the sentient space station they all call home, even Mallory’s deductive abilities are strained. If she can’t find out what’s going on (and fast), a disaster of intergalactic proportions may occur.…

[salty-horse]

Mind Over Ship (Counting Heads #2) by David Marusek is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

Welcome to Mind Over Ship, the Endeavour Award-winning sequel to David Marusek's stunning debut novel, Counting Heads, which Publishers Weekly called "ferociously smart, simultaneously horrific and funny."
The year is 2135, and the international program to seed the galaxy with human colonies has stalled as greedy, immoral powerbrokers park their starships in Earth's orbit and begin to convert them into space condos. Ellen Starke's head, rescued from the fiery crash that killed her mother, struggles to regrow a new body in time to restore her dead mother's financial empire. And Pre-Singularity AIs conspire to join the human race just as human clones, such as Mary Skarland and her sisters, want nothing more than to leave it.

[salty-horse]

Immaculate Conception by Ling Ling Huang is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Review by Archita Mittra in Locus:

Originally Posted by Archita Mittra

Luxuriantly meditative and quietly unsettling, Immaculate Conception doesn’t provide any clear answers but gently encourages the reader to sit with the questions and reflect on them. Balancing intellectual rigor with immersive poignancy, Huang’s novel is an intimate deep dive not just into how advances in technology can alter the way we create or experience art, but what it means to be a “successful” artist in this day and age. Overall, it’s definitely one of the most uniquely captivating and sustained interrogations of artistry and technology – and the transformative conversations between the two – that I’ve read this year.

What if you could enter the mind of the person you love the most?

Enka meets Mathilde in art school and is instantly drawn to her. Mathilde makes art that feels truly original, and Enka—trying hard to prove herself in this fiercely competitive world—pours everything into their friendship. But when Mathilde’s fame and success cause her to begin drifting away, Enka becomes desperate to keep her close.

Enter SCAFFOLD. Purported to enhance empathy, this cutting-edge technology could allow Enka to inhabit Mathilde’s mind and access her memories, artistic inspirations, and deep-seated trauma. Undergoing this procedure would link Enka and Mathilde forever. But at what cost?

Blisteringly smart, thought-provoking, and shocking, Immaculate Conception offers us a portrait of close friendship—achingly tender and twisted—that captures the tenuous line between love and possession that will haunt you long after you turn the final page.

[ottdmk]

Pawn, by Timothy Zahn is on sale for $1.99 at Kobo Canada... $1.79 if you're a VIP.

The $1.99 price is matched at Amazon.ca.

I haven't read this book, but Zahn is a favourite author of mine and I'm willing to promote (and buy, as I just did) this sight unseen.

[salty-horse]

The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Novella. I read it. It's good.
Includes a reprint of a short story from The Book of Witches.

The River Has Roots is the hugely anticipated solo debut of the New York Times bestselling and Hugo Award winning author Amal El-Mohtar. Follow the river Liss to the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, and meet two sisters who cannot be separated, even in death.

“Oh what is stronger than a death? Two sisters singing with one breath.”

In the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, dwells the mysterious Hawthorn family.

There, they tend and harvest the enchanted willows and honour an ancient compact to sing to them in thanks for their magic. None more devotedly than the family’s latest daughters, Esther and Ysabel, who cherish each other as much as they cherish the ancient trees.

But when Esther rejects a forceful suitor in favor of a lover from the land of Faerie, not only the sisters’ bond but also their lives will be at risk…

[salty-horse]

Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Review by K.J. Charles

Ocean’s 8 meets Blade Runner in this trail-blazing debut science fiction novel and swashbuckling love letter to Hawai’i about being forced to find a new home and striving to build a better one—unmissable for fans of Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir and Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo.

Edie is done with crime. Eight years behind bars changes a person—costs them too much time with too many of the people who need them most.

And it’s all Angel’s fault. She sold Edie out in what should have been the greatest moment of their lives. Instead, Edie was shipped off to the icy prison planet spinning far below the soaring skybridges and neon catacombs of Kepler space station—of home—to spend the best part of a decade alone.

But then a chance for early parole appears out of nowhere and Edie steps into the pallid sunlight to find none other than Angel waiting—and she has an offer.

One last job. One last deal. One last target. The trillionaire tech god they failed to bring down last time. There’s just one thing Edie needs to do—trust Angel again—which also happens to be the last thing Edie wants to do. What could possibly go all hammajang about this plan?