Dia Reeves: Slice of Cherry

I liked Reeves’ first novel Bleeding Violet so much that I ordered her second in advance of its publication date. And then I didn’t read it until now thanks to a quandary familiar to me: I didn’t want the new book to be the same as the one I just read, but I wanted to

Jim C. Hines: The Stepsister Scheme

I first heard of Jim C. Hines via his project of challenging the objectification of women on “urban fantasy/paranormal romance” book covers by painstakingly (literally) re-creating the poses with himself in the starring role. Like much of my favorite activism, it’s funny and serious at the same time. (He even tackles a book where I

Sarah Rees Brennan: The Demon’s Lexicon

I wasn’t initially terribly impressed by Brennan’s world-building, but I was drawn in by the good cop/bad cop juxtaposition of brothers Alan and Nick. I thought it was pleasingly unusual that the primary viewpoint character was really not that nice a boy, and there were a few other good details, but I thought I’d worked

Brom: Krampus

Krampus mixes a familiar, if competently drawn, macho fantasy of a down-on-his-luck guy trying to win back his estranged bride with the conflict between Christianity and Norse beliefs, personified in the opposing midwinter present/punishment dispensers, jolly Saint Nicholas and the frequently frightful Krampus. The odd blend is seasoned by a generous spatter of grue. I

Tod Davies: Lily the Silent

Lily the Silent reminded me of works by authors who blur the line between fable and emotionally realistic, less overtly symbolic (if still fantastic) narrative, like Angela Carter, Rachel Pollack, and Kelly Link. There’s a lot I admire about it. It’s unambiguously, but not heavily-handed, feminist. It explicitly opposes the conventions of Tolkein-derivative heroic fantasy.

Caitlin R. Kiernan: Trilobite

I loved Threshold and it scared the bejeezus outta me, but I’m not sure that I completely got it. It’s a bit of a puzzle box. It’s not the sort of book where one version of “objective reality” is an applicable concept, and it’s about the unknowable more than about the unknown. But throughout I

Catherynne Valente: The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making

I loved this book so much that weeks later I’m still struggling to express my reactions coherently. Valente explicitly draws on the works of Barrie, Baum, Carroll, Lewis, and the folk tale tradition as represented by the Grimms and Andrew Lang’s compendia. It has a dash of post-modern self-referential awareness of its own narrative (but

T. A. Pratt: Blood Engines

Blood Engines is a contemporary fantasy, but tonally the works it most reminded me of were Zelazny’s Amber books — especially the latter set centered around Merle — and Steven Brust’s Vlad Taltos novels. Protagonist Marla Mason displays a similar flexible morality, penchant for multi-flavored mayhem, and degree of badassedness. There’s also a dash of

Caitlin R. Kiernan: Threshold

Threshold is dark and rich and strange, and no superficial description is going to do it justice. Its bones are a Stumbling Onto That Which Should Not Be Disturbed tale in a mode not completely un-Lovecraftian. Kiernan isn’t as resolutely xenophobic as Howard P., but perhaps no less sanguine about the outcome of encounters with

Caitlin R. Kiernan: Alabaster

Dancy Flamarrion is a young drifter shadowed by a being that calls itself an angel and tells her to go places and kill things. Not people, usually, depending on how you define your terms. The stories in this volume mostly grew from a paragraph in Kiernan’s novel Threshold that lists some of Flamarrion’s prior exploits,