Andrea Beatriz Arango: Westwood Monster Patrol

I really enjoyed Andrea Beatriz Arango’s modernized take on “A Christmas Carol,” and I was eager to read anything else I could get my hands on, enough to read a little out of my comfort zone. And I’m glad I took a chance on this, it’s completely unlike any other supernatural-themed YA I’ve read. The

Lucy Score: The Worst Best Man

I loved Mia Sosa’s book of the same title so much that I read a bunch of reviews, looking for other readers as enthused about it as I was … and I stumbled on one that mentioned also really liking this novel. And I did, eventually, really like this too. What won me over primarily

Mia Sosa: The Worst Best Man

Things I found delightful about this book, an incomplete list: vivid, credible portrayal of my hometown (made me sorry I never went to “The Grill from Ipanema” when I lived there, though); learned a bit of Portuguese; #enemiestolovers that I believed on both sides; protagonists’ careers are important to the plot/theme, and convincingly depicted; had

Steven Erikson: Willful Child

I thought this started out very strong, but even though its episodic, aimless nature is explicitly part of the point, I was ready for it to be over well before it was.

Apology; Ann Aguirre: Wanderlust

There’s been mess of foamy-mouthedness around the Science Fiction Writers of America association over the past couple weeks. I won’t link to the petition that jump-started it, but it basically asserts that for the the official bulletin of a professional organization to have editorial standards that avoid hostility to its constituency is an assault on

Karen Joy Fowler: We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves

Several folks whose judgment I respect urged all and sundry to read We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves without reading any of the jacket copy or other reviews. If the combined weight of multiple recommendations wasn’t enough to convince me, my previous experience with Fowler’s short fiction and The Jane Austen Book Club was. I’d

Jane Palmer: The Watcher

The Watcher is a little slippery. If I described the bones of its plot or its characters (which include a planet threatened with destruction from an energy-being, time travel, sea monsters, and a conveniently bulletproof resident of Earth) it would sound either like a pulp-era space opera, or a consciously zany send-up of same (perhaps

Victoria Connelly: A Weekend with Mr. Darcy

Connelly has come up with a clever new tactic for reaching the surprisingly healthy market for Jane Austen-related fiction: instead of a working with Austen’s characters directly, or even in a Regency setting, she’s penned a modern day romance about Austen-obsessed characters. Connelly’s own love for Austen shines through, and there’s enough solid detail to

Lynn Thomas, Deborah Stanish (ed): Whedonistas! A Celebration of the Worlds of Joss Whedon by the Women Who Love Them

This collection of essays about Joss Whedon’s creations (through Dollhouse; it’s pre Cabin in the Woods/Avengers) includes contributions from writers whose work I already know (Jane Espenson, Emma Bull, Catherynne Valente…) some I didn’t, and some who aren’t writing professionals. It’s kind of all over the map: there’s some really insightful critical analysis, and there’s

Barbara Comyns: Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead

This is an odd, disquieting, and hard-to-pin down little novel. Comyns manages to make strengths of qualities that are often considered flaws. The tone varies substantially, sometimes within the span of a single page or less. A vein of mildly satirical comedy of manners runs through it, but it also encompasses an eerie streak not