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WoGF Review: Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
In his youth, Barry F. (bazhsw), really enjoyed reading science fiction and fantasy, and then stopped for the best part of twenty years. In 2012 Barry made a committment to “read more science fiction” and decided the Women of Genre Fiction Reading Challenge would be his launchpad.
Shades of Milk and Honey is an openly acknowledged homage to Jane Austen. It’s a Comedy of Manners set in the Regency period where pretty much the only thing a young rich woman can do is wait for an eligible suitor. Young women in the hope of attracting a husband are expected to be proficient in the skills of music, art and Glamour. Glamour is the magic of the book. Strands of Glamour are pulled from the ether and used to change the environment. They can be used to create illusions, create sounds and smells and entertain. On a day to day basis these skills are used to beautify rooms (and people!) and create a pleasant ambiance.
Jane is exceptionally proficient in the use of Glamour although being of plain appearance and at the ripe old age of 28 (!) feels destined for spinsterhood. Melody is her beautiful sister who appears to have men queuing for her attentions but herself is insecure at her lack of skill using Glamour compared to her sister.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier Trailer!
Looks much better than the first one, I must say.
Month of Horrors / Vampire Manga 101: Dance in the Vampire Bund
Glenn Hough (gallyangel) is a nonpracticing futurist, an anime and manga otaku, and is almost obsessive about finishing several of the lists tracked on WWEnd. This is the first in Glenn’s new series on Vampire Manga, a companion piece to his excellent SF Manga series, which will be accompanied by separate series for Horror and Fantasy.
The Japanese love, love, love, the supernatural. Their folklore and native religion of Shintoism foster a worldview that is positively bursting with gods, demons, and beings of all shapes and sizes living alongside Humanity. When Stoker unleashed his Count Dracula upon the English speaking world, Vampires and European Vampire lore found especially fertile soil in Japan. Like a sponge.
It’s not a surprise then, that Vampire related Manga is prolific enough for it’s own category blog. So we start.
One of the best – number one as far as I’m concerned – is a relative newcomer to the manga scene. It debuted in 2006. What gives it top of the heap status for me? Two words: Mina Tepes.
Princess of the Vampire Clans and Ruler of the Night: Mina Tepes.
Anyone who knows Stoker and the saga of Vlad the impaler should appreciate how deeply entwined her name is in all the Vampire lore which has gone before. How deeply right that name sounds for a Vampire: Mina Tepes.
Women of Genre Fiction Reading Challenge: September Review Poll Winners!
The Women of Genre Fiction Reading Challenge September review poll is now closed and we have our three winners!
September WoGF Review Poll Winners:
Congrats to Alix, Rae and M and thanks to everyone who participated in the poll. Our winners will find an Amazon gift card, $25, $15 and $10 respectively, waiting for them in their email inbox.
There are still 3 more months of prizes to be awarded so if you didn’t win this time there are still more chances.
WoGF Review: Arslan by M. J. Engh
Guest Blogger and WWEnd member, Rob Weber (valashain), reviews science fiction and fantasy books on his blog Val’s Random Comments which we featured in a previous post: Five SF/F Book Blogs Worth Reading. Be sure to visit his site and let him know you found him here.
For my tenth read in the Women of Genre Fiction Reading Challenge I picked Arslan by M. J. Engh. I’ve read a couple of more recent works in the past few months so I thought I’d pick an older one this time around. Arslan is Engh’s first novel and was published in 1976. To date, only four novels by Engh have appeared but with that small oeuvre she did manage to make quite an impression. She was named author emerita by the SFWA in 2009. Engh is also a scholar of Roman history. Something that clearly influenced this novel. The edition I’ve read is the Gollancz SF Masterworks edition. I guess the editors of that series have a knack for picking controversial books. Personally, I’m not sure I would have included it.
Some time during the later stages of the cold war, a figure from the small nation of Turkestan rises to prominence in the world. Caught between China on one side and the USSR on the other, he cleverly uses a combination of politics and extortion to gain control of the armies of the major powers in the world. What he means to do with it remains unclear but the inhabitants of the small town of Kraftsville, Illinois get a shot at finding out when the new dictator of the world settles there for a time. His motives are unclear but he brings great change to the town. Whatever Arslan is up to, he has changed the world for good.
WoGF Review: Summer of Love by Lisa Mason
Stephen Poltz (spoltz)‘s love of anything SF and Fantasy was inspired by his childhood heroes Carl Sagan and JRR Tolkien. Oh yeah, and by watching cheesy ‘50s sci-fi movies on a black and white TV. He got a book-reading-reboot when he met his partner, Jacob, a voracious reader from a family of hard-core, genre fiction enthusiasts. After seeing a display of Hugo Award winning books at his local bookstore, Steve became obsessed with reading all the winners. Now, when not QAing software, learning Polish, or finding new books to read on WWEnd, he writes reviews on his blog It Started With The Hugos…
For some reason, when somebody tells me, “You have to read this book,” I normally raise my hackles and resist. I prefer discovering books on my own, perusing the shelves at the library or bookstore, or finding a recommendation on a website or NPR. Over time, I’ve learned to keep those hackles a little lower and be more open to other people’s suggestions, but it still creates cognitive dissonance in my head. So when my partner recommended Summer of Love by Lisa Mason to fill my time while waiting for a hold on my next book at the library, I reacted with outward enthusiasm and my usual internal hesitancy. He’s a good judge of books, and I know that; I’ve read his recommendations before. The psychedelic-designed cover of his trade paperback first edition is in tatters from the numerous rereads, so I know he loves it. I needed another book for my Women of Genre Fiction challenge anyway. I acceded and took the book… and loved every word.
Chiron Cat’s Eye in Draco, a time traveler from the year 2467, comes back to San Francisco 1967, the Summer of Love, to find a young girl, Susan Stein, aka Starbrite. His mission is to protect her so that the timeline leading to his present, his Now, is conserved. Ruby A. Maverick, a metaphysical shop owner in the Haight district, meets Susan and later Chi, and reluctantly lets them crash at her place. Together they must make it through the summer avoiding the craziness of the hippy culture and demons of an alternative future.
JFF: Path of Needles Winners!
Our Jo Fletcher Fridays re-tweet contest for Alison Littlewood‘s book, Path of Needles, has closed. We had 44 entries and we have drawn our 6 random winners.
Congrats to our winners:
Congrats to all our winners! If you are one of our prize winners please send your mailing info to us at “info [at] worldswithoutend [dot] com” so we can get your books in the mail right away. Please mention which book you’ve won in your email so we don’t send you the wrong one.
Our thanks to Alison Littlewood and, as always, to Jo Fletcher Books for donating the prizes. We’ll be back on Friday with another giveaway so stay tuned for more free books.
“The Day of the Doctor” Trailer
This trailer for the 50th Anniversary Doctor Who special promises great things. In one month, we’ll see if they deliver!
WoGF Review: The Giver by Lois Lowry
When Beth Besse (Badseedgirl) is not preparing for the coming zombie apocalypse, or having long, and often bitter arguments with her sister over whether “Night of The Comet” is actually a zombie movie (well of course it is, it even says it in the movie description), she can be found curled up somewhere in her Tennessee home reading SF and Horror of questionable quality. Her guilty pleasure reading almost always involves urban fantasies or Southern Fried Vampires. Her Goal is to be able to someday boast that she has read every title in at least one WWEnd book list. (And finally convince her sister that “Night of the Comet” is a Zombie movie)
A society where there is no hunger, where everyone is employed and happy in their job, no real illness. It sounds too good to be true, and as The Giver by Lois Lowry shows once again, that nothing comes without a price.
The story revolves around Jonas, a 12 year old boy who lives in what appears to be an idyllic community. Births are strictly regulated to 50 children a year, each family is allowed to have 2 children, one female and one male. All children born during the year celebrate their birthday on the same day. At age 12 all birthdays stop and the child is considered an adult and assigned a job. Jonas is assigned the job of “Receiver of Memories”. This person holds the collective memories of all the past receivers. He was given the memories in a form of mental transfer and taught how to use them by the current Receiver, known in the novel as “The Giver”.
The more memories he receives, the more Jonas realizes what society has given up in its quest to achieve “sameness”. Jonas’ faith in the system he was raised with is shaken to the core in one tragic viewing. The Giver realizes that things in the community are not right, but has felt powerless to change it. Together with Jonas, he devises a plan to help Jonas escape the community and in doing so: release all the memories Jonas has collected over the year from the Giver, and thus showing the people of the community what they have given up. Unfortunately events occur and Jonas is forced to flee without the benefits of the plan when a small child his family is fostering is endangered.
Jo Fletcher Fridays: Path of Needles by Alison Littlewood
Last week’s JFF giveaway of Peter Liney‘s The Detainee was a big hit and we’re back with another one that’s sure to please. We have 6 paperback copies of Alison Littlewood‘s newest book Path of Needles for your reading pleasure. This is Alison’s second book and follows her critically acclaimed debut novel, A Cold Season.
By now you know know we like to keep things simple: re-tweet this tweet, share it on Facebook or comment here in the blog to enter the contest. Easy peasy. Do all three and triple your chances! We’ll have a random drawing and announce the winners next Monday so tweet away and don’t forget to tell your friends.
Path of Needles
by Alison Littlewood
Some fairy tales are born of dreams… and some are born of nightmares.
A murderer is on the loose, but the gruesome way in which the bodies are being posed has the police at a loss. Until, on a hunch, Alice Hyland, an expert in fairy tales is called in. And it is Alice who finds the connection between the body of Chrissie Farrell and an obscure Italian version of Snow White.
Then, when a second body is found, Alice is dragged further into the investigation – until she herself becomes a suspect.
Now Alice must fight, not just to prove her innocence, but to protect herself: because it’s looking like she might well be next.
What people are saying:
“Fairy godmothers have been ditched in favour of horrific murders with little left to the imagination when it comes to gore.” – SciFi Now
“A great page-turner and by the time I reached the last quarter of the book, I absolutely could not put it down… This will appeal to fans of both horror and crime, and on the strength of this sophomore novel, Littlewood is going to be very big indeed.” – British Fantasy Society
“Path of Needles retains the elements of her first novel that were so successful, the crisp prose and perfect pacing chief among them.” – ThisIsHorror.co.uk
This looks like an interesting and gore filled fairytale/horror mix that’s just right for our Month of Horrors. And if you’re taking part in the Women of Genre Fiction Reading Challenge this could be a good fit for you. Best of luck to you all.
