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Science Fiction & FantasyHorror

Come With Me

Review by Laura Hubbard

What is left when a person dies? Their spirit? The obsessions they had in life? Or are the ghosts that haunt us of our own making, composed of grief and the impulse to somehow hold onto the soul that has been taken from us? Veteran horror writer Ronald Malfi tackles these questions and more in Come With Me, a stunning and heart-clenching novel that represents the best of what both the horror and thriller genres have to offer.

All marriages have their secrets. But before his wife Allison’s death in a Christmas Eve mass shooting, Aaron Decker never contemplated the depths of the secrets held in his. Afterward, the discovery of an unassuming box launches a haunting that is part grief and—perhaps—part otherworldly. Buried within that box is a slip of paper that shakes Aaron to his core: a receipt for a motel in rural North Carolina, paid for in cash, when Allison was supposedly at home alone while Aaron was gone on a business trip.

Mired in grief and tormented by what could either be his own delusional emptiness or the ghost of his dead wife, Aaron is driven to find out what exactly she was up to. His search envelops him in a decadeslong mystery that had consumed Allison prior to her death, testing his own sanity and making him question just how much he actually knew about his wife.

A striking meditation on love, grief and the drive for closure, Malfi’s latest novel is eerie and claustrophobic. Told from Aaron’s first-person perspective, Come With Me captures the unreality of bereavement, the sense that the person you’ve lost is just in the other room and that the world you’re experiencing can’t possibly be real. This feeling is compounded by the novel’s narrative structure. As Aaron begins to unravel the mystery of his wife’s obsession, Come With Me jumps back and forth between his investigation and his memories of Allison, both of which contain clues for Aaron to piece together. Malfi creates a mental landscape that is both easy to empathize with and impossible to take at face value, as the thin line between memory and reality is continually blurred.

A perfect fit for fans of Stephen King and modern true crime classics like Michelle McNamara’s I’ll Be Gone in the Dark, Come With Me both awes and terrifies from beginning to end.

A perfect fit for fans of Stephen King and modern true crime classics like Michelle McNamara’s I’ll Be Gone in the Dark, Come With Me both awes and terrifies from beginning to end.

Science Fiction & FantasyFantasy

The Jasmine Throne

Review by Chris Pickens

Has there ever been a better time to be both a reader of fantasy and a lover of history? With greater and greater frequency, real history is inspiring new yet familiar fantasy worlds. The best authors of such fantasies faithfully harness the richness of the past and make it their own, and in The Jasmine Throne, author Tasha Suri does just that.

Inspired by the lush and shimmering epics of India, The Jasmine Throne is the story of two women: Princess Malini, the sister to an emperor who has been imprisoned for heresy, and Priya, a maidservant with a hidden past. Malini and Priya would never have met if it weren't for the Hirana. The massive temple-turned-prison is, for Malini, a structure of ancient, magical power. Even as Priya ascends its steps to wait on Malini for the first time, she can feel the Hirana’s magic calling to her. After Priya defends the princess from an assassin and reveals to Malini Priya's own magical abilities, the two women find their lives intertwined. Together, they’ll either overthrow Malini’s zealot brother and save Priya’s family, or die trying.

I couldn’t help but think of R.F. Kuang’s The Poppy War while reading Suri’s work. I immediately sank into The Jasmine Throne just as I did with Kuang’s dark military fantasy inspired by 20th-century China. Both authors use real places as the foundations for their fictional worlds, which grants the reader a rich sense of place from the first page. The Jasmine Throne is sumptuous and heady, mystical and intricate, with Suri’s natural, precise prose deftly shifting as she alternates among multiple charcters' perspectives.

But Malini and Priya's connection is what will have fans raving about this book. Their relationship evolves slowly and carefully, and one never gets the sense that the rest of the story is being artificially slowed down or altered in order for them to interact. A recurring theme of the narrative is fire, both cleansing and destructive, and without spoiling anything, that theme is embodied perfectly by these two characters. There are some moments between them that are absolutely electric on the page.

Both protagonists have to make some tough choices as the story unfolds, and neither one’s hands are clean by the end. Their moments of righteous vengeance will satisfy fans of other great writers of political intrigue, such as George R.R. Martin and Pierce Brown, but Suri maintains her hold on the reader’s affections even as Malini and Priya find themselves morally compromised in their journey.

The Jasmine Throne more than lives up to the hype with its rich and expansive world, compelling characters, cool magic system and Suri’s excellent writing, which holds it all together. But wait, there’s more good news! This book is the first of a trilogy, so if you’re already hooked, there’s more of Priya and Malini coming soon. I can’t wait to see where they take each other next.

The Jasmine Throne more than lives up to the hype with its rich and expansive world, compelling characters, cool magic system and Suri’s excellent writing, which holds it all together.
Science Fiction & FantasyShort StoriesFantasy

The Tangleroot Palace

Review by Stephanie Cohen-Perez

Marjorie Liu’s haunting collection of short stories, The Tangleroot Palace, is an astonishing foray into fantastical escapism. These are reworkings of older works of short fiction, and together they create both a love letter to Liu's illustrious career and a curious and joy-filled glimpse into the future. Readers who want to be immersed in otherworldly adventures with feminist themes will find a gifted and enchanting guide in Liu.

As readers find themselves gleefully lost in the labyrinthine forest of stories and monsters that Liu has created, certain beloved tropes will ring true. Liu’s love for superheroes is apparent, especially in the tale of lonely geneticist Alexander “Lex Luthor” Lutheran, who fantasizes about being a comic supervillain. Liu consistently returns to themes of found family, freedom from societal expectations and grappling with the good, the bad and the ugly of family legacy to forge one’s own path as a strong hero. Her various reconstructed fairy tales will also be pleasant surprises for those who grew up wondering why princesses never had more agency and why witches were often portrayed in a negative light.

While common motifs develop across these tales, Liu’s versatility within and mastery of multiple fantasy subgenres also shines. In “Sympathy for the Bones,” teenage Clora reluctantly helps her guardian, Old Ruth, create poppets to kill locals on demand; “The Briar and the Rose” and “The Last Dignity of Man” showcase two very different queer love stories; “Call Her Savage” envisions an alternate history in which women are respected and feared in the military and across timelines; and “After the Blood” is a post-pandemic Amish vampire story (talk about words you never expected to see together in a sentence!) that tests a couple’s love and offers hope and light in the face of a ravaged world.

With its vivid characters and relatable themes, The Tangleroot Palace is, frankly, a marvel. Liu is a chameleon of a writer when it comes to settings and world building. From another writer, these various stories might have felt haphazardly cobbled together, but not here. These are all stories of survival and strength, no matter the cost, in which women are joyously celebrated as heroes, warriors, scientists, sorceresses and duelists. On every page of The Tangleroot Palace, women have the power to take their own stories back and rework them in ways that are resilient, powerful and new.

Marjorie Liu’s haunting collection of short stories, The Tangleroot Palace, is an astonishing foray into fantastical escapism.

Science Fiction & FantasyFantasy

The Library of the Dead

Review by Stephanie Cohen-Perez

T.L. Huchu’s first installment of the Edinburgh Nights series, The Library of the Dead, is a kaleidoscopic adventure that melds the phantasmagoric with the mundane.

Ropa Moyo is struggling to both make ends meet and take care of her beloved Gran and little sister, Izwi. She dropped out of school to work as a ghosttalker, a messenger between the deceased and the people they left behind. Ropa is always eager for a quick gig, but an eerie pattern has begun to emerge. Ghosts all over Edinburgh have been warning her of cursed and bewitched local children, and Ropa is wary of whatever powerful entity might be employing this dark magic. To help her figure out what’s going on, her childhood best friend, Jomo Maige, takes Ropa to the mysterious Library where his father works, an occult research facility where Ropa can check out books on magic to supplement her patient Gran’s ghosttalker lessons and where her library card is a desiccated ear. Huchu’s twisty and devilishly macabre novel follows Ropa, Jomo and Ropa's new Library ally, Priya, a healer who uses a wheelchair, as they unravel a mystery so chilling that even the ghosts of Edinburgh shudder in revulsion.

Huchu has crafted an unforgettable character in Ropa, from her green locs to her black lipstick to her sense of humor, which is sharp enough to rival the dagger she carries on her body at all times. Ropa is a smart-talking, intelligent survivor, and she wants to provide the best opportunities for Izwi and a safe, stable home for her benevolent Gran. Ropa secretly finds joy in helping set spirits free, though she hides this soft spot with her sardonic quips. She gives off the impression of being a lone wolf, but her friendship with Jomo is constantly endearing, and her connection with Priya provides her with a new ride-or-die pal who is just as passionate about all things strange and unusual.

Ropa conveys messages from the dead to their unrequited high school crushes and alleviates tensions to prevent intrafamily hauntings, so how difficult could this new adventure be? But her Library explorations push her skills further than she ever imagined, while helping her learn more about the magical abilities passed down through her Zimbabwean family. Ropa’s pursuit of greater power and knowledge is always tied to how she can best protect her community, which is one of the most charming aspects of this very charming book. She is dedicated to becoming not only a proper magician but also a more compassionate ghosttalker, trailing the footsteps of those who came before and forging a new path for those who will follow.

T.L. Huchu’s first installment of the Edinburgh Nights series, The Library of the Dead, is a kaleidoscopic adventure that melds the phantasmagoric with the mundane.

Science Fiction & FantasyHistorical FantasyFantasy

The Lights of Prague

Review by Mya Alexice

Nicole Jarvis’ debut fantasy, The Lights of Prague, welcomes readers into an arresting and vivid historical fantasy world.

Set in 19th-century Prague, Jarvis’ careful and effective world building suggests an abundance of research and showcases her descriptive skill. In her version of the culturally rich European city, creatures from Czech folklore haunt its streets and endanger its citizens. Pijavice—vampiric monsters consumed by bloodlust—are particularly terrifying to those who walk alone at night. The Lights of Prague follows Domek Myska, an earnest member of the lamplighters, who in this world are also a monster-hunting secret society that keeps these creatures at bay, and Lady Ora Fischerová, a charming widow with her own ties to Prague’s supernatural underground.

The two protagonists’ paths cross and uncross as they each unravel the threads of a conspiracy that threatens the safety of the city, each bringing their own skillset to the fight to save Prague from doom. Their interactions exude chemistry when Ora’s playful flirtations bounce off Domek’s endearing shyness, a dynamic bolstered by how tangible and layered both characters feel when they are apart from each other. As the many secrets of her past unfold, Ora becomes especially engrossing. An intriguing cast of supporting characters surround the central duo, from a sentient and manipulative will-o’-the-wisp to an aristocratic pijavice who feeds on unwitting servants in his looming castle. Everything feels real, from the intriguing lore to the communities of people (and not quite people) who make up the gothic, powerful city.

The story unfolds at a measured pace, submerging the reader into moments of reflective exposition or lush descriptions of Prague. The book clocks in at more than 400 pages, and some of these passages can drag. Readers hoping for a fast-moving adventure might be left a bit wanting, but those interested in a story that’s meditative will enjoy spending their time in the world Jarvis has built. The Lights of Prague is an impressive and mature feat from a debut novelist.

Nicole Jarvis’ debut fantasy, The Lights of Prague, welcomes readers into an arresting and vivid historical fantasy world.

Science Fiction & FantasyHistorical FantasyFantasy

A Master of Djinn

Review by Ralph Harris

P. Djèlí Clark’s A Master of Djinn is the literary equivalent of a cup of lovely mint tea: a refreshing, delightful and magical mystery to enjoy while absorbing vitamin D on a crisp spring day. The fourth installment and first full-length novel of Clark’s Dead Djinn Universe series, the smooth and welcoming A Master of Djinn provides the perfect amount of fan service to engage returning fans without alienating new readers.

In this fantastical version of our world, a man named Al-Jahiz tore a hole in reality in 1872, unleashing Djinn and magic across the earth. In the 50 years since, international governments have taken a variety of approaches to the new existence of the supernatural. In Egypt, magic has not only been allowed, but embraced. This decision put Egypt on the map as a world power, driving other countries (seemingly on the precipice of this world’s version of World War I) to meet for a peace summit in Cairo. The summit is only a few weeks away when a man claiming to be Al-Jahiz returned from the dead commits a series of grisly murders. Fatma, a famous agent of the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities is assigned to the case. She is one of the Ministry's few female operatives, and her success has made her one of the Ministry’s favorite agents for difficult cases.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: How P. Djèlí Clark came up with the idea for his magical vision of Cairo.

Clark’s characters have wholesome, wonderful interactions with each other, never waiting long to address their interpersonal conflicts and always resolving on friendly terms. “Friendly” is an apt description of the book as a whole. While there is certainly conflict, tension and danger in A Master of Djinn, the reader will find themselves propelled along through the book by the likeability and relatability of Fatma. Even if you guess the plot's various twists and turns, Fatma’s endearing style, gruffness and no-nonsense approach make A Master of Djinn worth reading.

While A Master of Djinn admittedly breaks little new ground, Clark has created an engaging mystery and a vivid world with intrigue, arcane secrets and an epic climax.

P. Djèlí Clark’s A Master of Djinn is the literary equivalent of a cup of lovely mint tea.

Science Fiction & FantasyHistorical Fantasy

The Chosen and the Beautiful

Review by Noah Fram

Adapting classic works of literature is always challenging, not least because the adapting author must decide how much novelty is appropriate. Too much and fans will shun it out of pique; too little and they’ll shun it out of disinterest. This dilemma is only heightened when the book in question is as widely read as F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. And yet, in The Chosen and the Beautiful, Nghi Vo perfectly strikes that balance of the new and the familiar.

Retold from the perspective of Daisy Buchanan’s best friend, amateur golfer Jordan Baker—here recharacterized as a wealthy Louisville missionary family’s adopted Vietnamese daughter—the familiar contours of Fitzgerald’s tragedy are warped with a hazy dash of demonic and earthly magic. The result is an utterly captivating series of speakeasies, back-seat trysts, parties both grand and intimate and romances both magical and mundane, all spiraling through a miasma of Prohibition-era jingoism and entitlement toward its inevitably tragic conclusion.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Summer reading 2021: 9 books to soak in this season

Vo is a remarkable writer whose talent for reviving Fitzgerald’s style of prose is reminiscent of Susanna Clarke channeling Jane Austen in Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. But it is Vo’s additions to Gatsby’s original plot that truly shine. By foregrounding Jordan’s and Daisy’s perspectives rather than Nick’s, she recasts a story about the consequences of male overreach as one about the limitations of female and non-white agency. This is further complicated by Jordan’s inability to remember anything of her childhood in Vietnam before she was brought to Kentucky. She sees herself as American, the daughter of the Louisville Bakers, but neither her white peers nor the Vietnamese immigrants she meets agree with her. 

For both Jordan and Daisy, magic can offer some surcease, but only to a point. In the first scene of the book, for instance, when the two women go flying through Daisy’s house with a magic charm, they must return demurely to the couch when Daisy’s husband comes home. Throughout the book, the women’s choices are constrained by those of the men surrounding them. Even magic, whether a charm, an enchantment or a potion (which are always consumed as cocktails), can only win them a brief reprieve from the decisions others make for and about them.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Nghi Vo on the dangers of Hemingway.

In this alternate America, the fear of demons is consistently paralleled with the fear of immigrants. Magic is unavoidable in Vo’s West and East Egg, but although it may be consumed by those at the center of American society, it emanates from those at its periphery. To its consumers and connoisseurs, it is valuable precisely because it is foreign, while those who create and practice it are ostracized and hated for precisely the same reason. The fetishization of earthbound magics is reminiscent of the real-world fascination with traditions like folk medicine, and even demoniac, the psychotropic beverage derived from demon’s blood that several characters drink, could represent any number of exoticized vices prized by the American wealthy. There are lessons here for those of us living in the mundane reality of the 21st century, just as there are in Jordan’s commentary on the ways her agency is constrained as a Vietnamese American woman.

The Chosen and the Beautiful, like the novel it retells, is as much a tragedy as it is a social commentary. The reader will likely know how Daisy’s story ends, but Jordan is in the spotlight here, and her story is just as captivating, if not more so. By putting her in the foreground, and highlighting the voice among Fitzgerald’s core characters that was the least heard, Vo has transformed The Great Gatsby utterly.

Nghi Vo perfectly balances the new and the familiar in her magical adaptation of The Great Gatsby.

Science Fiction & FantasyFantasy

Malice

Review by Stephanie Cohen-Perez

Heather Walter’s debut novel, Malice, transforms the familiar fairytale of Sleeping Beauty into a captivating fantasy romance between the storybook Princess Aurora and the dark sorceress Alyce.

Walter’s immersive world building plunges readers into the Briar Kingdom, built on a system of inequality and discrimination. The fae, known as Graces, are kept as magical servants for cold-blooded mortal nobles. The Graces can create beauty and light, but Alyce’s magic seems to produce only ugliness and pain. Known as the Dark Grace, Alyce is the last descendant of a type of fae known as the Vila, and her relationship with the other fae is complicated—some avoid her, all fear her and most are willing to throw her under the bus. 

When Alyce decides to attend a masquerade ball despite not being invited, she is outed as the dark fairy by one of Princess Aurora’s failed and jealous suitors. Alyce flees, but Aurora runs after her and Alyce is shocked at how down-to-earth the princess is. Aurora must find her true love by age 21 or she will be cursed to sleep forever. She has been kissed by many noblemen, often strangers, to try and break the curse, but none have succeeded. As Alyce and Aurora grow closer, the Dark Grace becomes determined to find a way to break the spell.

Told through the puckish voice of Alyce, Malice is a sympathetic take on the traditionally one-dimensional figure of the dark fairy. Alyce’s wry wit and determination to save Aurora make her instantly sympathetic, a refreshing change from other fairytale retellings that attempt to conjure some meticulous, outlandish backstory to explain the evil doings of a nefarious character. Alyce is feared, yes, but for things she’s had from birth and can’t control. Her growing love for Aurora and her increasing resistance to the status quo shine through her gloomy outlook, and as she learns about the history of Briar and the truth behind the treatment of the fae, Alyce learns some unexpected truths about her powers as well.

This heartfelt, ever-escalating story of true love burns bright, encouraging readers to brush aside shame or condescension and follow their hearts.

Heather Walter’s debut novel, Malice, transforms the familiar fairytale of Sleeping Beauty into a dark and compelling fantasy romance between the storybook princess and the dark sorceress Alyce.

Science Fiction & FantasyFantasy

The Helm of Midnight

Review by Ralph Harris

With a magic system that’s two parts enchantment and one part pseudoscience, The Helm of Midnight is a well-executed fantasy set in a heavily religious world reminiscent of Renaissance Europe. Author Marina Lostetter (Noumenon) brings together a cast of relatable, remarkably human characters across three separate timelines to tell a beautiful story of struggle, loss and, eventually, triumph.

Rather than spells and grand wizards, the world of The Helm of Midnight is built on a foundation of “scientific magic,” which is similar to traditional representations of alchemy. Magic is accessed via specific metals that each represent one of the five gods of the pantheon: Emotion, Knowledge, Unknown and twins Time and Nature. The twins are male and female; Emotion and Knowledge go by unique pronouns to represent their genders; and the Unknown's identification is undisclosed (perhaps representing nonbinary or genderfluid identity). These gods are central to everything in Lostetter’s world. Magic follows their rules, government is modeled on them and the plot circles around their religion.

In the present-day storyline, Krona, a Regulator of magical items and enchantments, is searching for two lost items: a death mask imbued with the spirit of a religious fanatic and serial killer and a stone of pure despair, enchanted to bestow grief on its wearer. As Krona continues her search, Lostetter weaves in the other two storylines, which unfold in the past, to paint a broader picture of the city-state and the greater history at play.

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Marina Lostetter on why The Helm of Midnight needed to be told from three perspectives.

While the setting is rich and full of layered, complex culture, the core draw of The Helm of Midnight lies in its characters and their plights. These characters have suffered, are suffering or will suffer serious hardship. Dealing with grief, loss and emotional damage is as much a part of the book as the enchantments and murder wrought throughout. The city’s currency is literally lost time, which is taxed at birth, then bottled and sold. Emotions are drained away into stones in order to embrace good feelings and wash away painful ones. Masks are enchanted with the knowledge of the dead to avoid their disappearance into oblivion.

While clearly setting up for a series, Lostetter tells a complete and satisfying story within the 400 or so pages of The Helm of Midnight. Tears, smiles and surprise await any reader that opens this book.

With a magic system that’s two parts enchantment and one part pseudoscience, The Helm of Midnight by Marina Lostetter is a well-executed fantasy set in a heavily religious world reminiscent of Renaissance Europe.

Science Fiction & FantasyHorror

Near the Bone

Review by Laura Hubbard

Two monsters lurk on Mattie’s mountain. The first is her husband, William, a harsh man as likely to starve, berate or beat Mattie as he is to make sure she’s safe. The other is an unknown terror in the woods, a clawed beast that strings its kills up in the trees as if displaying a macabre collection. William is convinced that it’s a demon. Mattie isn’t so sure. But when a trio of strangers bent on photographing the strange creature suddenly appear on the mountain, Mattie knows that no matter what the truth actually is, the situation can only end badly.

With its visceral depictions of gore and emotional and physical abuse, Christina Henry’s Near the Bone can be a difficult read. At times, it inspires cold sweats of terror. At others, it causes stomach-clenching levels of dread. As Mattie and her strangers move around the mountain, we feel rather than see the sinister intelligence dogging their every step and threatening to turn them into piles of bones. Bigger than any bear, with razor-sharp claws and a nearly human intellect, the beast lurks just offstage, all the more terrifying for its incomplete profile. It is humanity’s primeval fears given form.

Near the Bone is a tale of survival in more ways than one, pulling readers through Mattie’s struggle against both her husband and the unknown terror in the woods. Just as she must deal with the terror of the unknown beast, Mattie must also come to terms with what she doesn’t remember of her own past, including just how she and William came to live on the mountain. That part of the tale isn’t an easy one to read. As the book opens, Mattie is meek, even pitiable, weakened by years of malnutrition and physical and psychological abuse, a far cry from the typical heroines of the monster-slasher subgenre. Even as the book progresses and she begins to process her trauma, Mattie is far more practical than heroic, more cautious than selfless. In short, she is believable rather than fantastic, a trait that makes rooting for her success all the more nerve-racking.

Henry is the author of more than a dozen novels, including the Chronicles of Alice series, and she may have written her best book yet. Near the Bone features compelling and creative characters, descriptions of snow so realistic that they’ll make you reach for a blanket and a monster so terrifying that it is sure to haunt the dreams of even the most stoic reader. Best for people with a strong stomach, Near the Bone is a terror-ridden yet poetic hike that will leave your nerves frazzled and heart aching.

Two monsters lurk on Mattie’s mountain. The first is her husband, William. The other is an unknown terror in the woods.

Science Fiction & FantasyShort StoriesScience Fiction

I’m Waiting for You

Review by Chris Pickens

A character awakens after dying in “That One Life,” one of the four stories in South Korean author Kim Bo-Young’s expansive, captivating collection, I’m Waiting for You. In the afterlife, he’s greeted by a god who tells him, “Every life changes the whole universe. Whether or not that life is yours.” Where does humanity end and the universe begin? What are the limits of love and hope? What is the difference between creation and destruction? These are big questions, but Bo-Young’s attempt to bring shape to them in these stories is stunning, humbling and utterly beautiful.

I’m Waiting for You’s four stories form two pairs with interwoven thematic elements. In the titular story and in “On My Way,” an engaged couple, one on Earth and one on Alpha Centauri, exchange letters about their plans to meet to get married. (Each story contains one person’s letters.) Due to the problems posed by the theory of relativity and by light-speed travel, they must carefully coordinate their departures so they can arrive together at their destination at the same time, yet each lover encounters increasingly difficult complications to their original plan. Weeks, then months, then years are added to the journey’s overall time. Can the lovers hold out hope of finally being in the same place, at the same time?

In “The Prophet of Corruption” and “That One Life,” godlike beings, the progenitors of human existence, contemplate their impact on Earth and everything in it. From the smallest rock to the largest ocean, all of creation is an extension of them. When a young god created by Naban questions whether controlling the human world is right, Naban wonders if he and his fellow divine beings have had it backward all along. What if they exist because humanity exists, rather than the other way around?

The collection’s translators, Sophie Bowman and Sung Ryu, should be commended on shepherding these stories so gracefully into English. They introduce complex and ambitious ideas about space travel, philosophical and metaphysical riddles playing out in worlds inhabited by gods . . . you get the idea. But even when it’s challenging, Bo-Young’s prose is always oh-so-gorgeous.

This is some of the most beautiful science fiction writing that I’ve read recently. Not every element between the pairs of stories is analogous, but sometimes, just there, right under the surface, Bo-Young has hidden common threads. The bookended stories of lovers traveling through space in time and the feelings of longing and trust in the face of astronomically impossible circumstances are particularly lovely. Even in the huge expanse of space, the second-person voices in their letters are intimate and genuine, and the emotional power of each story’s closing moments is hefty. Grab your tissues, because you may be thoroughly moved.

I’m Waiting for You isn’t just a statement of action. It’s a promise: I’m waiting on your behalf, to be with you, to experience the universe’s purpose for me through you. If only we can live up to such a promise.

A character awakens after dying in “That One Life,” one of the four stories in South Korean author Kim Bo-Young’s expansive, captivating collection, I’m Waiting for You
Science Fiction & FantasyFantasy

Black Water Sister

Review by Laura Hubbard

Sometimes a book makes you forget everything: the water boiling on the stove for tea, the lunch or dinner that has long since gone cold. These books don’t just pull you in; they tug at the edges of your consciousness, cultivating a new reality that you can slip into as easily as an old T-shirt. Zen Cho’s Black Water Sister is one such book. It plunges readers headlong into the often troubled and usually sarcastic mind of Jess Teoh, a recent Harvard graduate with far more on her plate than finding gainful employment.

As Black Water Sister opens, Jess is adrift. She’s living with her parents and helping them move from the United States to Malaysia, a country she hasn’t called home since before she could walk. Then the voices start. Or rather, a single voice: that of her dead grandmother, her Ah Ma, a woman Jess never met. Ah Ma is bent on getting Jess’ help to destroy a real estate developer who threatens to demolish a local temple devoted to Ah Ma’s god. Although Jess resists, she soon finds that once the spirit world has marked her, it will not easily let her go. As she is forced into a world of mediums, gods and spirits, Jess must face the possibility of losing not just her autonomy but also her life. 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Zen Cho on major and minor gods, and the importance of good food in fantasy writing.

 

While Black Water Sister terrifyingly depicts the otherworldly and uncanny horrors of the spirit world, it is also funny and poignant, full of the angst and irony of a recently graduated “zillennial” living with her parents. This balance allows Cho to explore facets of Jess’ life that may be smaller on the cosmic scale than angry gods and vengeful spirits but are no less important. From Jess’ internal struggle about how (and whether) to come out to her parents to intra-family discomfort around religion, Black Water Sister peers into the evolving relationships of an entire family, not just those of a single character. 

Fans of Cho’s Sorcerer Royal duology might not initially see the resemblance between her Regency-era romantic fantasy and this modern mix of horror and the supernatural. But it is there in Cho’s turns of phrase and her spare sentences as she reveals a world so real that you feel as if you could step into it. And like the Sorcerer Royal novels’ alternate England, this world will surprise you when you least expect it. Vivid and masterfully done, Black Water Sister will haunt you.

Sometimes a book makes you forget everything: the water boiling on the stove for tea, the lunch or dinner that has long since gone cold.

Science Fiction & FantasyFantasy

The Unbroken

Review by Noah Fram

Lieutenant Touraine is a conscript. Kidnapped as a small child from her homeland—once the Shāzan Empire, now the colony of Qazāl—she was forced into service in the Colonial Brigade of Balladaire, serving alongside others who, like her, were seized from their native desert lands.

They've recently been deployed to El-Wast, the capital of Qazāl and Touraine’s own hometown. Her immediate superior is a noble-born sadist who denigrates her and her companions any chance he gets. Her commanding officer is a woman both respected and feared for her single-minded devotion to the throne and pragmatic brutality. Her best friend yearns for revolution, her lover for safety, and Touraine herself for success, for a chance to prove her worth and the worth of her fellow fighters to their Balladairan overlords. When Touraine foils an assassination attempt against Luca Ancier, the princess of Balladaire, Touraine is hurled headlong into a whirlwind of intrigue, romance and rebellion. She encounters revenants from her past, as well as types of magic that the nobles of Balladaire have denied but that Touraine and her comrades know to be horrifyingly real.

Throughout The Unbroken, the first book in C.L. Clark's Magic of the Lost series, Clark introduces characters as if they're old friends, trusting the reader to infer the connections between Touraine and her fellow soldiers. Although this feels jarring at first—for the first several chapters, the reader almost constantly feels as though they have missed something—it quickly becomes one of The Unbroken’s greatest strengths. As the book submerges the reader in this way, it gives the story a unique urgency and drive, and it persuades the reader that if you just keep going, the answers will reveal themselves. Combined with Clark’s undeniable skill as both a writer and a world builder, this plunge into plot renders The Unbroken a remarkably active read. It requires attention from the reader in ways few speculative works do.

The Unbroken also follows in the grand tradition of speculative fiction that comments directly on the real world. Clark presents a searing and unflinching view of European colonization in North Africa, and of Africans' struggle against it, and she refuses to soften any of the harshness or resolve any of the complications inherent in those events.

In Clark’s world of Balladaire and Shālan, no benevolence goes untarnished and no grand ideal is left uncompromised. Even her villains are driven less by sadism or a desire for chaos than by simple selfishness, greed and the thoughtless cruelty of a bigot convinced their bigotry is, in fact, truth. And yet, for all the disturbingly plausible grime, gore and occasional horror that coat every surface of this tale, The Unbroken is not a dark fantasy. There is a current of optimism that flows throughout: optimism for Touraine and Luca, optimism for Shālan and Balladaire, and perhaps optimism for the real regions Clark has translated onto the page. It's a hope that all these people and places will somehow remain, in spite of the destruction that flawed, selfish, well-meaning people wreak on each other, unbroken.

Lieutenant Touraine is a conscript. Kidnapped from her homeland as a small child—once the Shāzan Empire, now the colony of Qazāl—she has been forced into service in the Colonial Brigade of Balladaire.

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