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Alan Dean Foster’s 1974 Star Trek Log One is the first volume in Foster’s Star Trek Log series. Foster’s Log s to were to Star Trek: The Animated Series as Blish’s Star Trek Original TV Series Adaptations were to the original series: prose novelizations of scripts. This allowed people who never saw the show to enjoy the show in print form, which in turn allowed the Trek people to squeeze a little…
Cassandra Khaw’s 2026 Find Me Where It Ends is an upcoming fantasy novella of existential despair. Antigone’s family has a rare gift. Or perhaps it is a curse. Impending death appears to them as a dog, a different dog for each member of the family. Whether this is a gift or a curse depends on how one feels about the timing of the dog’s manifestation. …
Vonda N. McIntyre’s 2026 The Curve of the World is an alternate-history novel. One thousand years after Knossos was warned of an impending tsunami in time to save the inhabitants , the descendants of the Minoan Cretans — the Idaeans — are thriving. Skilled shipwrights and savvy navigators have allowed the matriarchal Idaean traders to explore much of the world. But not all of the world. …
Kim Bo-Young’s 2020 A Plagued Sea is a stand-alone horror novella. The 2026 English translation is by Sophie Bowman. Despite the crowds, professional bodyguard Mu-young and her beloved niece Hyun manage to make the train to Haewon. Time with her aunt, away from her obsessive, controlling mother, is precious to Hyun. Thus, despite her better instincts, Mu-young ignores the alert about a quake near…
Steven L. Peck‘s 2012 A Short Stay in Hell is a stand-alone Borgesian horror novella. Soren Johansson died of brain cancer at age forty-five, leaving a widow and four orphans. A devout Mormon, he had no doubt he would be reunited with his family in the afterlife. An afterlife did await. However, Soren discovers he made one slight miscalculation. …
Robert Holdstock and Angus Wells 1978 ’s Swordsmistress of Chaos is the first volume in their Raven secondary universe fantasy sword and sorcery series. The Raven books appeared under the house name Richard Kirk 1 . Guided by a mysterious Voice, beautiful Su’uan flees across the desert from cruel slave-owner Karl ir Donwayne… straight into the waiting arms of a slightly less cruel slave dealer,…
Silvia Park’s 2025 Luminous is a stand-alone near-future science fiction novel. Robots are commonplace in re-unified Korea. As designs improve, more and more roles once reserved for humans are relegated to the robots. Some of these are service jobs. Others are more intimate. Robots can be made in the form of sex partners or to resemble dead siblings. Cho Jun and Cho Morgan, children of…
1983 ’s On a Pale Horse is the first volume of Piers Anthony’s series Incarnations of Immortality . In a world where magic is real, certain abstractions incarnate as persons. This book is about Death. …
Mizuki Tsujimura’s 2021 Yami-Hara is a mosaic horror collection. The 2023 English translation is by Stephen Paul. The common thread in the stories? The Kanbara family, and their curious knack for helping others turn into their worst possible selves. …
1985 ’s The Kif Strike Back is the middle volume in a three-book-arc in C. J. Cherryh’s Chanur series. Events in Chanur’s Venture having transpired not entirely to Pyanfar Chanur’s liking, Pyanfar is enticed to set course for Mkks station. This is almost certainly a trap. …
Destinies, Summer 1980 is the third issue in the second volume of Jim Baen’s Destinies science fiction bookazine. As it happens, I have previously mentioned this specific volume . Not that Jim Baen was not going to get my money, but in 1980 , putting Heinlein’s name on the cover made it a definite sell. …
Sunyi Dean’s 2026 The Girl with a Thousand Faces is a stand-alone historical fantasy. Kowloon Walled City, August 1975 : Mercy Chan is a ghost-talker. Here ability to talk to the many ghosts of Kowloon Walled City makes her very useful to triad leader Cobra Lily. Soon, Mercy will be Kowloon’s bulwark against disaster, which is fair since Mercy is ultimately to blame for the impending calamity. Not…
Dominic McDowall and Pádraig Murphy’s 2026 Warhammer: the Old World Roleplaying Game is a secondary-universe tabletop fantasy roleplaying game (TTFRPG). The core rules are divided between Warhammer: the Old World Roleplaying Game, Player’s Guide 1 and Warhammer: the Old World Roleplaying Game, Gamemaster’s Guide 2 . You may want to tack “ black comedy” in front of that word “ fantasy” up…
2021 ’s Though I Am an Inept Villainess: Tale of the Butterfly-Rat Body Swap in the Maiden Court, Volume One is the first tankōbon for Satsuki Nakamura, Ei Ohitsuji, and Kana Yuki’s manga adaptation of for Satsuki Nakamura’s secondary universe series of the same name. The 2022 English translation is by Margaret Ngo. To ensure a reliable supply of qualified queens, the five great families of a…
2005 ’s Conventions of War is the third volume in Walter Jon Williams’ Dread Empire’s Fall series. Conventions concludes the first arc. The interstellar civil war over who shall inherit the Empire now that the last Shaa 1 is dead grinds on. On one side, the hyper-traditionalist Naxids, who feel that being the first to be conquered by the Shaa entitles them to rule. On the other side, the…
Lawrence Sanders’ 1976 The Tangent Objective is the first volume in the Tangent thriller duology. Wedged between Ghana and Togo, tiny Asante is a seemingly unremarkable African nation. Independent since 1958 , the former French colony is home to eight hundred thousand people. The nation is being bled white by its ruler, King Prempeh the Fourth — the Avenging Leopard of Bosum-twi! — and his family.…
Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s 2026 The Intrigue is a stand-alone period-piece thriller. As long as he had his career conman father to guide him, the man known to some as Ulises Linares prospered. The old man is dead, leaving twenty-nine-year-old Ulises to fend for himself. Thus far, Ulises has not done well in his illicit career, although he has at least managed to elude the Widow Aguirre’s angry sons.…
Ann Leckie’s 2026 Radiant Star is a stand-alone science fiction novel. Radiant Star takes place in Leckie’s Imperial Radch setting. Although he was not aware of this fact when he was growing up, Jonr of the planet Aaa is the chosen one. Although not in the messianic sense. Jonr was chosen as the payment for a debt that Jonr’s parent Zaved ran up during Zaved’s unsanctioned wanderjahr. Despite…
My Dress-Up Darling, Volume Three is the third tankōbon in Shinichi Fukuda’s romantic comedy manga series. This tankōbon is titled Sono Bisuku Dōru in the original Japanese. Dress-Up was serialized in Square Enix’s seinen manga magazine Young Gangan from January 2018 to March 2025 . Returning home, straitlaced student/aspiring doll-maker Wakana Gojo is astonished to discover a naked Sajuna Inui…
Poul Anderson’s 1958 “ The Last of the Deliverers” is an economic science fiction story. Uncle Jim is the town’s beloved eccentric, a lingering reminder of an era fading into history and myth. Uncle Jim is a Republican. He might be the last Republican in Ohio. Or possibly, the United States of America. Or the world. …
Eleanor Arnason’s 1978 The Sword Smith is a stand-alone picaresque fantasy (fantasy? See several paragraphs down…) novel. Having tired of the king of Eshgorin’s management style, blacksmith Limper tendered his resignation. Accompanied by the diminutive dragon Nargri, Limper sets out to find new, more satisfactory employment. Alas, the king’s management style includes a disinclination to accept…
C. L. Polk’s 2026 The Feywild Job is a stand-alone secondary-universe romantasy. More specifically, it is a Dungeons & Dragons/Forgotten Realms tie-in novel. Half-elf Saeldian would like to escape from a life of endless abuse at the hands of her mother’s current husband, Mr. Wheeler. Salvation comes in the form of a pact with the Archfey Osalor. In return for something Saeldian will hardly miss,…
Philip K. Dick’s 1959 Time Out of Joint is a stand-alone science fiction novel. Ragle Gumm lives in an unremarkable Eisenhower-era town, a mostly pleasant backwater. In fact, the town is so unremarkable that if someone were to ask Ragle the name of his town or the state in which it resides, he might not be able to answer. Aside from a plague of late- 1950 s life (mild marital dissatisfaction),…
Cho Yeeun’s 2023 Teddy Bears Never Die is a stand-alone horror novel. Sung Ryu’s English translation is 2026 . Amoral entrepreneur Youngjin rents space in the Rainbow Apartments to Hwayoung at a very reasonable rate. He expects some consideration in return… and yet the young woman refuses to join any of Youngjin’s criminal schemes. He has no choice but to threaten to hike Hwayoung’s rent until she…
Mildred Wirt Benson ’ s 1930 The Secret Of The Old Clock is the first of the Stratemeyer Syndicate’s 175 + Nancy Drew mystery novels. Like all of the Nancy Drew books, Secret was credited to the fictitious Carolyn Keene. Sixteen-year-old Nancy Drew is a paragon who elevates River Heights simply by residing there. Wise beyond her years, pretty Nancy has managed the Drew household since her…