Favorite Reads of 2016

2016 is almost over which means that it is the time for me to wrap-up the year and tell you all about the amazing things I read this year. According to Goodreads, I read 120 things (books, SFF Magazines, novellas etc…) which is incredible for me, I don’t know how I managed to do it, I always think that I don’t have much time to read but well, an average of 10 books by month is actually a fairly good number.

2016 was the year of short fiction for me, I am terrible at tracking how many I read (I’ll try to do better in 2017) but I must have read at least 150 stories. It has been a great experience and hopefully, I will continue to read as much if not more in the future.

My average rating was 3.4/5 stars (and this would be slightly more if Goodreads did half stars but oh well..) which is normal for me since most of the books I read tend to have a 3 stars or a 4 stars rating. If I don’t count rereads, I gave eight books five stars. However, you’re not here to read boring stats, let’s move on to my favorite reads of the year!

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BOOKS

 

I discovered Solaris earlier this year and they have managed to become on of my favorite publishers of all time. Three of my favorite books of the year happened to be published by them and I highly recommend their works. I hesitated a bit to put two books by the same authors on this list but you can count them as one, it was just too hard to choose which was was the best between the two so I decided to put them both. The Fractured Europe Sequence by Dave Hutchinson is one of the most relevant series of all time and it deserve so much more attention. Those books are fast paced clever spy/political thriller with a pretty unique science fiction twist. Of course, I also had to mention the incredibly clever military sci-fi Ninefox Gambit,  if you like complex books with fantastic characters and great concepts, look no further.

 

Too Like The Lightning and Anathem completely blew my minds when I read them.  Those books are quite diferent from one another, Palmer’s novel is a based on a utopian society where the main character is a mass murderer who becomes entangled in political intrigues, it’s fascinating, challenging and quite brilliant. Those terms could be used as well to describe Anathem, a hard science fiction novel set in an alternate universe where scientists live secluded like monks and where they don’t have access to any technologies. It took me three attempts to finally finish this book but I am glad I persevered, it was well worth the time.

I read those two books when I decided to read the 2016 Arthur C. Clarke shortlist, I don’t think I would have pick them up if it weren’t for this challenge. The Book of Phoenix is one of the most angry books I read this year,  you can fill the rage flowing through the words and it’s the book you wish to give to all the racist and misogynistic people out there. I had some issues with it but it’s a book everyone should read nonetheless. Children of Time is wonderful tale of uplift and a compelling commentary on conciousness which I did not expect from a book featuring giant spiders as main characters.

Well fantasy was missing from this list, I haven’t read as much as I did in 2015 but I still managed to find amazing titles. An Accident of Stars is your typical coming of age portal fantasy novel… with a twist. It is full of great characters, feminism and it’s not at all as cheesy as the cover would make you think. I read this earlier this month and I am so glad I did, this is fantastic! The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps is also a novel that has a lot to say about gender, it is a blend of SF and fantasy and it is both quiet and brutal. It’s an experience I would recommend to open-minded readers, I read it twice this year and I will come back to it again several times again in the future.

SFF MAGAZINES & ANTHOLOGIES

My favorite SFF magazine this year definitely was Interzone, they always feature fantastic and clever authors and so far, I have really enjoyed all the issues I have read. They also have really interesting reviews of books that are always a pleasure to read. I am planning on getting a subscription for 2017.

My favorite anthology of 2016  unsurprinsingly was The Paper Menagerie by Ken Liu. I would recommend this collection of short stories to everyone, even if you don’t really like short fiction, I am pretty sure that it will change your opinion.

 

SHORT STORIES

Those are some of the best short stories and novellas I read this year, I provided links to the ones you can find online for free.

• The Devil in America by Kai Ashante Wilson (Tor.Com)
• The Pauper Prince and the Eucalyptus Jinn by Usman T. Malik (Tor.Com)
• Anything written by Sam J. Miller but Things with Beard, When Your Child Strays From God and Calved are my top 3. (Clarkesworld for the first two and Asimov)
• Hungry Daughters of Starving Mothers by Alyssa Wong (Nightmare Magazine)
• And Then, One Day, the Air was Full of Voices by Margaret Ronald (Clarkesworld)
• Balin by Chen Qiufan (Clarkesworld)
• Other People’s Thoughts – Chinelo Onwualu (Cyber World)
• Small Offerings – Paolo Bacigalupi (Cyber World)
• Coral Bones – Foz Meadows (Monstrous Little Voices)
• The Literomancer – Ken Liu (The Paper Menagerie & Other Stories)
• Rusties – Nnedi Okorafor (Clarkeworld)
• Sideways – Ray Cluley (Interzone)
• Starlings – Tyler Keevil (Interzone)

 

FAVORITE AUTHORS OF 2016

This year, I discovered some amazing authors that really impacted my reading. Sam J. Miller and Kai Ashante Wilson definitely were the authors I most fangirled about this year. Their short fiction is top notch and I just cannot wait for The Art of Starving, Miller’s debut novel, forthcoming next year. If it’s half as good as his short fiction, it’s going to be glorious.

As for the ladies, my two picks are Nnedi Okorafor and Foz Meadows. When I first read Lagoon at the beginning of 2016, I never thought once that Okorafor would become one of my favorite authors, her fiction is angry and unsettling but oh so clever. I think that her prose just needs a bit of an acquired taste because I realized that the more I read her stuff, the more I like them but I am glad I gave her works a chance. For Foz Meadows, it was a completely different experience, I discovered her with Coral Bones, a novella of the Montrous Little Voices anthology and I immediatly fell in love with the way she discuss genders and feminism through a fantastical setting.

HONORABLE MENTIONS

Those books didn’t make it to my favorite of the year list but it doesn’t mean that they aren’t excellent!

 

 

Have you read any of those books and what did you think of them ? What are your favorite books that you read this year ? 🙂

 

Book Review: Europe in Winter by Dave Hutchinson

Genre: Science Fiction, Thriller

Publisher: Solaris

Length: 320 pages

Format: eARC

Rating: 5 stars

Publication Date: November 3rd 2016

 

 

 

Publisher’s description

“Rudi, the former chef-turned-spy, returns on a mission to uncover the truth—in a fractured Europe utterly changed by the public unveiling of the Community.

Union has been forged and the Community is now the largest nation in Europe; trains run there from as far afield as London and Prague. It is an era of unprecedented peace and prosperity. So what is the reason for a huge terrorist outrage? Why do the Community and Europe meet in secret, exchanging hostages? And who are Les Coureurs des Bois? Along with a motley crew of strays and mafiosi and sleeper agents, Rudi sets out to answer these questions—only to discover that the truth lies both closer to home and farther away than anyone could imagine.”

Review

The Fractured Europe Sequence is one of the most relevant series of all time. I devoured the first two installement of this series at the beginning of the year and I was highly anticipating the continuation (or ending ?) of this series. Europe in Winter did not disappoint. As much as Europe at Midnight was an extremely loose sequel to Europe in Autumn (it did not follow the same characters and the story did not take place in the same countries), Europe in Winter is a perfect balance of the two, we have the pleasure to reacquaint ourselves with Rudy, the main protagonist of the first installment. I didn’t realize how much I missed his perspective until I followed his adventures again.

It’s very difficult to put this series in any genre, it has a bit of sci-fi (with the parallel universe), a bit of a spy thriller novel (the main character Rudy is a Coureur des Bois, a member of an organization which transport mysterious packages across borders) but it’s also very much a commentary on European politics. I mean you could read this only for the enjoyment level and you would still like it but once you start digging a little, you realize that this definitely not a James Bond book. In The Fractured Europe Sequence, espionnage isn’t very sexy, the research is tedious and takes years and our main character is a middle aged and ordinary looking man who walks with a cane.

The whole idea of this series is based on two facts. First of all, because of a disease, the European Union has imploded in a multitude of small countries, new borders are created everyday and power is the ability to travel across them and it is reserved to few people (as power usually is). In this context, being a part of Les Coureurs des Bois is wonderful opportunity for anyone who wish for freedom.

The second fact is that, centuries ago, an English family has managed to slowly build the Community, a kind of alternate Europe where they don’t have to deal with other countries that they consider dangerous. Of course, because of different things explored in the first two books, it doesn’t really work the way they wanted and they are discovered by other countries

As much as the similarities between the Community and England are obvious, Hutchinson manages to quitely craft a Cold War II type of a setting. Indeed the Community is a nuclear power and they don’t want to have any types of relations with the barely hold-together Europe.  However, even though no visible power is there to fund European countries, odd structures, such as The Line, a huge railway that allows its citizen to travel all the way across the former Europe, still manage to exist. But who provides the money ?

The first book of this series was published in 2014 when Brexit was only an idea and now that the UK are planning to leave the EU, it’s pretty scary to see how this book managed to create a big “what if” scenario that doesn’t seem to science-fictioney anymore(parallel universe set aside..).

 

 

I actually don’t know if this last installment is the end of trilogy or if we are going to be able to read more books set in this universe (as always with Hutchinson, his endings are pretty vague, you could read Europe in Autumn as a standalone ), I could live with Europe in Winter being the end, this could be a frankly genius trilogy as it is but I am definitely on board for more, and, if a sequel is coming, I will read it the second it’s available.

 

Highly recommended.

 

Short Fiction Roundup | 25.12.2016

Merry Christmast everyone ! I hope that you had a great a day and that you are all celebrating with the ones you love! 😀

I am here today to do a quick wrap-up of the short stories I read recently, some of them I read two months ago but I still wanted to mentionned so here they are! 🙂

 

Interzone #266 (September-October 2016) 4*

The Apologists by Tade Thompson 4.5*

I have been meaning to read some of Thompson’s work since I first heard of him when fis debut-novel, Making Wolf, won a Kitschies award last year and I saw that one of his stories was featured in this issue of Interzone, I was very happy. This story was amazing, I don’t think that I ever come across a tale as brutal and fascinating in a long while. It’s the story about the five remaining humans trying to rebuild Earth after an alien invasion. It’s bloody, terrying but you can’t put it down. Fantastic and highly recommended. I will be reading one of his novels soon.

Extraterrestrial Folk Metal Fusion by Georgina Bruce 1.5*

This story was so unimpressive that it paled in comparision with The Apologists. It was so weird that I had to look a synopsis up online to remember what it was actually about, as it happens, this story is about an alien transmission whose meaning changes on the receivers. I don’t know how I managed to finish this one.

Sideways by Ray Cluley 5*

The Apologists was an excellent story but Sideways was an even better one. It was a mix of an historical fiction and a horror story about a test pilot who, towards the end of his life finally confess how his best friend, a fellow pilot assigned to fly a strange arrow shaped rocket, died. Like Thompson’s story this was fascinating in a dark twisted way. The writing was gorgeous and I will be reading other things by Cluley.

Three Love Letters From An Unrepeatable Garden by Aliya Whiteley 2.5*

Hum, after reading Sideways this one fell flat for me, the premise was quite good  but overall, I didn’t really see the point of this story. It follows a gardener that has to take care of a flower that no one is allowed to smell because of how special the smell is.

The End Of Hope Street by Malcolm Devlin 4.5*

This is such a quiet little horror story, it’s a very depressing tale about the houses in Hope Street that slowly became unlivable and how the different inhabitants dealt with the loss. I wouldn’t recommended reading this if you’re feeling a bit down because it is not going to make your day any brighter but it’s still a very good little story.

 

As always, Interzone managed to surprise me with some amazing stories. I really really enjoy this magazine because I always manage to find fascinating stories and great authors. It’s true that this issue was a bit of a mixed bag but it was so worth it for The Apologists, Sideways and The End of Hope Street that were for me three gems! I will be getting a subscription to this magazine next year!

Clarkesworld #121 (October issue) 4*

The Next Scene by Robert Reed 3*

What if AIs wanted to be entertained by humans melodrama ? That’s the idea explored by Reed in this very interesting and unique short story. I usually like Reed shorts but it’s true that I always have the same complain, I always think that the ideas behind his stories are good but I wish he explored them a bit more. The ending of this stry was really good but it could have expanded a bit. I want to try his novels to see if he has the same issue writing longer works.

One Sister, Two Sisters, Three by James Patrick Kelly 2*

This was my least favorite of the issue, its two main characters  are sisters and they live on a remote island where technologies are seen as evil and dehumanizing. The inhabitants of the islands are seen as tourist attraction but then one of the sister falls in love with a tourist and dramas ensues. It wasn’t particularly original and the ralationship between the two sisters wasn’t really present enough which made some of the dramas a little boring. For what it was, it should have been a lot shorter.

The Calculations of Artificials by Chi Hui 4.5*

This is a very depressing story about the consequences of human violence and our need of mutual destruction. Wonderful little gem but it’s pretty terrifying, chinese short stories usually are. 😛

Everyone from Themis Sends Letters Home by Genevieve Valentine 4*

What started out as what seemed a space colonization tale ended as something way different. This was probably even more depressing that the previous story. I didn’t really enjoyed the first part of the tale but when you realize it’s not what you expected at all, it became way more fascinating. Yes I know that this is an extremely vague blurb but you shoukd definitely go into this one blind.

Rusties by Nnedi Okorafor and Wanuri Kahiu 5*
Definitely my favorite of the issue, you should listen to the podcast of this because it’s going to turn this into a much more powerful experience. It’s about Nigeria, people, an AI revolution and love. It was so easy to relate with the main character and the writing was spectacular. The more I read Okorafor, the more I realize how much of a great writer she is.

Old Domes by JY Yang 3*

Great concept but the execution was a bit lacking. It’s based on the idea that each building has a guardian, a caretaker that needs to be put down if you want to destroy the building. It was interesting because it’s set in Singapore and this context is really important to the story but it could have been so much more in my opinion.

The Very Pulse of The Machine by Michael Swanwick 4*

What started as pretty meh really ended in a suprising way. I don’t want to say too much about this because the “twist” is so amazing that it shouldn’t be spoiled. Let’s just said it’s about an astronaut stranded on Io who starts to hear voices coming from her dead friend’s body. If that doesn’t intrigue you I don’t know what wrong with you ! 😛

Overall a very strong issue really focused on AIs which is not surprising for Clarkesworld. After a couple of meh months, I stopped my subscription but I might start it again if next year if the next issues are as good at this one!

 

 

Drowned Worlds, edited by Jonathan Strahan DNF

I have been reading this for months now and I really don’t care about this anthology. Out of the eight or nine stories that I’ve read, I only enjoyed two, the other ones were just meh or boring. I have tried to pick it up several times but it never managed to grab my attention and so far, having this one my Currently Reading shelf only has prevented me to start other anthologies because I absolutely wanted to finish this one.

The themes and ideas were interesting on the paper but the execution wasn’t there for me and I don’t want to force myself to finish it. The only two stories that I would recommend are The Last Gods by Sam J. Miller (because this guy can’t write a bad story and The Last Gods was excellent) and Destroyed By The Waters by Rachel Swirsky which was a beautiful story about love and loss.

I don’t have many stories left so I might try to finish this but not today or anytime soon.

 

That’s all for me today ! Don’t forget that you can read or listen for free to all the Clarkesworld stories mentionned here 😉

Book Review: An Accident of Stars by Foz Meadows

Genre: Epic Fantasy/ Portal Fantasy

Publisher: Angry Robot

Length: 496 pages

Format: eBook

Rating: 5 stars

Publication Date: August 2nd 2016

 

 

 

Publisher’s description

When Saffron Coulter stumbles through a hole in reality, she finds herself trapped in Kena, a magical realm on the brink of civil war.

There, her fate becomes intertwined with that of three very different women: Zech, the fast-thinking acolyte of a cunning, powerful exile; Viya, the spoiled, runaway consort of the empire-building ruler, Vex Leoden; and Gwen, an Earth-born worldwalker whose greatest regret is putting Leoden on the throne. But Leoden has allies, too, chief among them the Vex’Mara Kadeja, a dangerous ex-priestess who shares his dreams of conquest.

Pursued by Leoden and aided by the Shavaktiin, a secretive order of storytellers and mystics, the rebels flee to Veksh, a neighboring matriarchy ruled by the fearsome Council of Queens. Saffron is out of her world and out of her depth, but the further she travels, the more she finds herself bound to her friends with ties of blood and magic.

Can one girl – an accidental worldwalker – really be the key to saving Kena? Or will she just die trying?

 

Review

As I mentionned in last month Wrap-Up I wanted to read lighter books and since I didn’t make a TBR I had the complete liberty to read whatever I wanted (which is a bit unusual for me, I like to plan everything because it reassures me). Because of that I decided to randomly browse the books on my Kindle and I spotted An Accident of Stars that I pre-ordered months ago after reading Coral Bones, her fantastical retelling of The Tempest that I read as a part of the Monstrous Little Voices anthology.

I loved Coral Bones because of how Meadows portrayed female characters, gender and sexuality and I thought that reading about feminism in a portal fantasy could be quite interesting. The cover of An Accident of Stars is incredibly cheesy good lord, this book is fantastic.

First of all, it opens up with Saffron Coulter an ordinary high school students being harassed by one of her classmates. No one seem to caresabout that even the school administrators because for them “it’s a normal behaviour for a young man”. Saffron can’t cope with how normalized sexism is but but unexeceptedly she receives help from a mysterious woman that she mistakes for a professor. In order to thank her, Saffron follows this woman but ends up falling through a portal and, of course, her life is turned upside down.

Just after reading this opening scene, I had a good feeling about this book. First of, I am in an engineering schooml which means that my school is composed of about 70% of men and I am surrounded by every day sexism. Most of the girls at my school do not think that “Women are terrible with computers”, “girls just want to work in biology” or “Why are you upset, do you have your periods?” are sexist remark but I do and everytime I heard them, it’s hard not to loose my shit. So when I started this book, I just thought “Well at least, I am not the only one to feel this way!”.

At first, the plot doesn’t seem particularly original, a crazy and treacherous man is on the throne and of course, one of the person who can help is our hero, Saffron. I don’t have anything against this trope but still, nothing new. What completely sold this book to me is how exciting it was, how much I could relate with all the characters and how much I wanted them all to succeed. This book followed several characters and I care for all of them, even the ones that were a bit annoying because I could understand why they were acting this way.

This is not marketed as YA but if I knew someone that had a 11 to 16 years old daughter, I would push this book into their hands. I mean, it could be enjoyed by everyone but I wish I could have read this when I was younger. This book doesn’t have any self-image issue, any love triangle, any angst, any of the things that are so in vogue currently in the YA genre.

This book does have several romances between person that love and respect each other a lot and it’s a pleasure to read. In this book you’ll find heterosexual, lesbian and polyamorous  relationships. One of the main point of this book is to show that, as long as everything is consensual, you can have relationships with anyone and that it shouldn’t be judge by anyone because it doesn’t concern them. The main character is openly bisexual (with a slight preference for girls) and it is never seen as problem for her because it doesn’t have any reason to be. She never once puts in question her sexuality because that’s a part of who she is and she finds it normal. I just wish more books were like that.

One of the other thing that I loved about this book is that An Accident of Stars is, without a doubt, an hommage to traditional epic fantasy yet with its own twists. For example, most of the characters in this books are female characters which is refreshing. However, it doesn’t mean that it is builds around a reverse sexism, the male characters in this novel are awesome and they are an important part of the story too.

The first quarter of this book could be a bit hard for some reader because it’s true that a lot of info is thrown at the reader. I didn’t mind it whatsoever because I’ve read my share of epic fantasy and I am pretty quick to adapt to strange new worlds (and to seek out new life and new civilization 😉 )  but I have seen this complain in several reviews on Goodreads, so I figured I would still mentionned it.

In my opinion, this book deserves a million of stars but that I might have been because it was the right time to read, it’s hard to “judge” five books, I don’t know about you but when I rate a book five stars, I always ask myself if I would still give it the same rating after a reread and of course, it’s hard to know. It’s why I first rated this a 4.5* but after a bit of reflexion, I can’t think to any reasons why I doesn’t deserve a five stars. So a five stars it is! 😉

Highly recommended.

 

Mini Reviews: Arkwright by Allen Steele & Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

I read those two books last month but I didn’t have the chance to review them, however, I have some things that I want to talk about so here I am with two mini reviews of Arkwright and Snow Crash! 🙂

Arkwright by Allen Steele

 

When I started this book, I was sure that I was going to give it five stars, it’s just so geeky that as a speculative fiction reader, you just cannot not like this book at least a little. First of all, it follows the family of a very successful science fiction writer named Nathan Arkwright who wants to send a generationship in space thanks to the money made with the books he sold. You get chapters relating the first WorldCon and Asimov, Heinlein and Clarke make sevreal appearances as actual characters and that’s just incredibly cool.

One of the main issue I had with this book was the pacing, I didn’t think it was very good because the story jumps from generation to generation of Arkwright family member and you don’t really get the chance to know any of them well. I like family saga when you actually care about the different family members, I didn’t really thought it was the case here. Also, their storyline all seem the same, Arkwright gorgeous male family member meets hot scientist and love ensues. It wasn’t really done well and it was a bit of a shame because Steele isn’t good at writing romance and during the entire book, he kept trying (and in my opinion, completely failing )and it really distracted me from the plot.

Speaking of the plot, the idea of this novel was great but I was a bit underwhelmed by the execution, I may have liked this a lot more if I hadn’t read Seveneves before because it often felt (especially in the last section) that Arkwright was a pale comparison… However, it wasn’t a bad book at all, it was very easy to read and all the geeky parts really resonated well with me. Overall it was a good book, it didn’t do all the things I expected but it was a fun ride with some unexpected twist. I will try other books by Steele!

 

 

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

 

As you may know, I read and completely adored Anathem by Stephenson in October, because of that, I decided to pick up Snow Crash on a whim and let’s just say that it is veeeeeery different from Anathem.

Snow Crash is supposed to be a parody of cyperpunk but since I haven’t read enough of this genre, I had trouble identifying those elements. In a way, it reminded me of Ready Player One, it is set in a future world where people can access a virtual reality thanks to their computers where you can be anything. Our hero, Hiro Protagonist, is both a total looser and a cool dude, he’s both the best swordfighter in the world, and an unemployed hacker who works as a pizza delivering guy.

If you find this weird , this is just the beginning, Snow Crashis an utterly crazy book and I can’t say that I ever read something quite like it before. As always with Stephenson, it is filled with really interesting and well researched theorical paragraphs, in this book, the main themes explored are Sumerian culture, language and the theory of conciousness.

It was a fun read but I still have trouble finding out if I liked it or not, this is so over the top that most of the time when I was reading, I was like “Why am I reading this? Just what the heck is happening?”. I actually almost DNFd this book a couple of times because of that, I’m glad I didn’t but still, it shows how weird it was!

I don’t know if it’s something that I want to recommend or not, if you’re intrigued you should go to the library or download a sample somewhere and if you like the prologue, you’ll probably enjoy it since it really sets the tone for the entire book!

 

Have you read any of those two books? Did you like them?

T5W: Books You Want To Finally Read in 2017

Top 5 Wednesday was created by gingerreadslainey and  is now hosted by Sam from Thoughts on Tomes if you want to know a little bit more about them you can check the Goodreads group here

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It’s a great topic but a hard one since I basically want to read all the books in 2017! 😛 However, I do have a couple of books that have been on my TBR for quite a while now and that I keep meaning to read as soon as possible and then completely forget about them when it’s time to pick up a new read!

• Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds

I have included this book in several TBRs and I have almost started it a couple time, I really want to read it and I’ve heard great things about this series so I don’t know what’s preventing me from starting it. Hopefully next year will be the year where I finally start this series!

• Words of Radiance by Brandon Sanderson

I read The Way of Kings more than a year ago, I liked it but I wasn’t blown away by any means so I don’t really feel the urge to pick up its giant sequel. However, Words of Radiance has been on my shelves for a while now and the third book is coming up next year so I think 2017 is the right year to continue on. If I don’t like this book, I’ll just have to DNF it and give it away and at least it won’t pick up dust on my shelves!

• Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel

This book came out in 2014 and everyone and their mother raved about it. I’m always wary of the hype but now that it has died now a little, I feel very much in the mood to give it a try, I mean reading about a theatre troupe performing in a post-apocalyptic sounds like a neat thing to do.

• Reaper’s Gale by Steven Erikson

I read 20% of this book this year but I did not manage to finish it because I found it pretty boring. However, since it’s the seventh book in the Malazan series, I don’t really want to give up on this series after investing so much time in it. I’ll try this book again sometimes next year when I feel like I could read it without falling asleep.

• Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie

This book sounds like something I would love to bits and I just really want to binge read this trilogy. I’ve read one short story by Leckie and it was excellent so I can’t wait to experience one of her longer works!

 

What is your top 5 books that you want to finally read next year? 🙂

 

November Wrap-Up and December Reading Plans

November is over which means that December is upon us and that 2016 is close to an end! November was a pretty terrible month, (and I won’t even talk about the American elections…) I had a ton of exams which was very stressful and I completely failed a math test because of a panic attack (and it’s not like maths were important when you are in an engineering school…) so I am going to have to work extra hard if I want to pass which is an extra pressure I did not need because I am usually very stressed out anyway.

Moreover, I didn’t have the best reading month, most of what I read were three stars and Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson was definitely not the right book for me to read right now so I am going to put it aside for now. It’s very good but incredibly depressing and I really do not need this just now. Anyway, here are the things I read this month!

• Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel ★★ 1/2
• Arkwright by Allen Steele ★★★
• Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson ★★★
• Frozen Tides by Morgan Rhodes ★★★
• Interzone #266 ★★★★

 

Favorite Read of the Month

 

Interzone is my favorite SF magazine without a doubt, their stories are amazing and I always manage to discover some new great authors in each of their issue. I will review this asap!

Currently Reading and December Reading Plans

I am currently reading several books at the same time and I don’t seem to make any kind of progress on any of them except for Dracula by Bram Stocker that I’ve never read before, it feels very old but it’s funny to see how it compares with the “modern vampire”. I don’t know what I’ll be picking up next month but it will probably be lighter reads or rereads, I really want to have a good reading month and finish 2016 with some very good books! 😉

How was your month ?