Hey!

This week there’s award news, lots of book promotion as we arrive fully in Winter 2026, and I’ve been catching up on my podcast feed. I’m also trying to build a rec list of favorite SFF/H books read in January 2026 (doesn’t have to be new), so if you’re got one, slide it to me.

Here are the books I’ve acquired in the last week. We’re slowly thawing out, so I was able to raid my library and pick up some preorders I made last year.

A-Side

The Washington Post cuts third of its staff
I normally don’t discuss world news, because ugh, why face the Horrors more than I have to? But this is relevant because WaPo had a book section. Charlie Jane Anders had a book column I followed, which is gone with the rest. American oligarchs are losers who buy things to ruin them. Charlie Jane does have a newsletter where she talks about books, Happy Dancing, and I’m hoping she’ll move some of her work over there. If you followed her WaPo book coverage, give her a follow (the RSS feed is the URL to the newsletter followed by /rss).

The 2025 Locus Recommended Reading List
The Locus reading list is out, along with their survey/poll. I was excited to see The Raven Scholar on the Fantasy list, but alas, The Witch Roads was not present. It’s a tough field due to our Fantasy Ascendency moment. This award is wild: it’s either very predictable or not at all, like last year when The Man Who Saw Seconds by Alexander Boldizar came out of nowhere (at least it was for me) to take the SF trophy. Remember, if you’re a Locus subscriber, you get double votes. This may be how they finally get me to subscribe.

dyson spheres are a joke
I bookmarked this video because someone said it mocked Sam Altman and I’m always down to listen to people drag the man who will, I fear, drag the U.S. economy (and most of us with it) straight to hell. It turned out to be way more educational than I thought! It insults Altman’s intellectual rigour (rad), but it also does a close reading of the original dyson sphere paper and gives some cultural context around it. Having that context explains why Altman sounds like a complete bozo. Dyson spheres are for space operas, not 21st century infrastructure planning, and anyway, the way these tech bros imagine them in service to capital is boring.

Reviews/Discussions

An Arcane Inheritance by Kamilah Cole (Alex Brown @ Reactor)
Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz (Fiction Fans Podcast)
Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz (Andrea Valeiras Fernández @ SFRA Review)
The Blackfire Blade by James Logan (Bill Capossere @ FanLit)
The Blackfire Blade by James Logan (Nils Shukla @ The Fantasy Hive)
Blood for the Undying Throne by Sung-Il Kim, translated by Anton Hur (Luna Gauthier @ Cosmic Circus)
City of Others by Jared Poon (Christine D. Baker @ Nerds of a Feather)
Cry, Voidbringer by Elaine Ho (Stewart Hotston)
The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami (Tar Vol on)
Fool's Assassin by Robin Hobb (Clara Cohen @ Nerds of a Feather)
The Isle in the Silver Sea by Tasha Suri (Kim B. @ The Lesbrary)
Jade Legacy by Fonda Lee (Dina @ SFF Book Reviews)
No Man’s Land by Richard K. Morgan (Alexandra Pierce @ Locus)
On Sundays She Picked Flowers by Yah Yah Scholfield (Jim Mcleod @ Ginger Nuts of Horror)
The Poet Empress by Shen Tao (Only the Best Fantasy Novels)
Positive Obsession: The Life And Times of Octavia E. Butler by Susana M. Morris (Womble @ Runalong the Shelves)
Positive Obsession: The Life And Times of Octavia E. Butler by Susana M. Morris (Alvaro Zinos-Amaro @ Locus)
The Red Labyrinth by Ben Peek (Roseanna Pendlebury @ Ancillary Review of Books)
This’ll Make Things a Little Easier by Attila Veres (Rachel Cordasco @ SF in Translation)
The Villa, Once Beloved by Victor Manibo (Maya Gittelman @ Reactor)
The Works of Vermin by Hiron Ennes (Phoenix Scholz @ Strange Horizons)

B-Side

If you love the Ignyte Awards, you can apply to be a longlist judge by February 14. The Golden Poppy Book Awards were announced. The SFF Award, named after Octavia E. Butler, went to Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz. If you’re interested in seeing what other folks were saying about the books on this award list, I pulled reviews from the archives for myself and my fellow nerds.

The Aurealis Awards finalists are out. In a wild twist, I’ve heard of more of the novellas/novels than usual. Does this mean Australian authors are breaking through more or am I just following more Australian reviewers/critics? Either way it’s great! The panel for the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction is out and stacked. Anyone can nominate starting March 1st. Hugo Award nominations will open soon, according to the convention. If you’re a WSFS member, bookmark the rec sheet and get ready. In “Renay loves watching new folks get into the Hugo Awards” news, Bailey did a video about books she’s hoping make the list and stuff she’s considering for nomination.

At Prospective Cultures, Nick Hubble has some thoughts on the BSFA Awards longlist. Roseanna, who I mention at least once an issue because she’s a) great and b) prolific, shared her award eligibility post. Because I’m very biased and Correct, I believe she should get a nod for Best Fan Writer for the Hugos for her review of Remember You Will Die by Eden Robins (I bought the book because of her) and all her long form essays.

The Winter 2026 issue of SFRA Review dropped. Ancillary Review of Books posted their call for essays and reviews of books out in May. The Full Lid warns us away from Mercy, a recent big movie release featuring AI. I think everyone should go see Iron Lung or Send Help instead, which seem like more interesting horror/thriller films. At The Fantasy Hive, the team chose their favorite books of January 2026. Gizmodo has the upcoming book lists for February.

Sword & Laser dropped Episode #527. Antimatter Podcast discussed the first two episodes of Starfleet Academy in Episode #219, the third in Episode #220, and the fourth in Episode #221. A Meal of Thorns discussed Imaro by Charles R. Saunders. Shelved by Genre continued their readalong and discussion of Tolkien’s work with chapters 9 - 14 of The Hobbit.

At Strange Horizons, Amritesh Mukherjee examines the first season of Murderbot. Sam Reader compiled a rec list of weird post-apocalyptic novels. I can confirm that Viscera by Gabrielle Squailia is both deeply weird and…moist. This book surprised me so much that I still think about it to this day. At Pages Unbound, their weekly discussion topic was cozy fantasy, and they had lots of thoughts, plus linked to some other folks tackling the subject.

In short fiction, Paula Guran took a look at short fiction from New Edge Sword & Sorcery Magazine, The Sunday Morning Transport, and Reactor. Over at Transfer Orbit, the new Table of Contents for February is up, plus updates to the column for January. Wole Talabi shared Ten(ish) of the Best African Speculative Short Fiction Stories of 2025.

Over at Reactor, they debuted the cover for The Eagle in the Mountain, the sequel to Caskey Russell’s The Door on the Sea. Lots of excerpts popped up this week: Way of the Walker by Salinee Goldenberg; Enchanting the Fae Queen by Stephanie Burgis; A Spell for Drowning by Rebecca Ferrier; and After The Fall by Edward Ashton.

Miles Cameron has a Big Idea column at Whatever for his book, Artifact Space. John Scalzi did a talk at Ann Arbor’s Downtown Library with Chris Kluwe. Lavanya Lakshminarayan, author of the Flavour Hacker series, was on Breaking the Glass Slipper. The Nerd Daily has interviews with Molly O’Neill, author of Nightshade and Oak; Greer Stothers, author of Apparently, Sir Cameron Needs to Die; and Justin C. Key, author of The Hospital at the End of the World. Key was also over at Largehearted Boy for his Book Notes feature, if you like author’s discussing the music that inspires them. A.C. Wise was on the Nerd Count Podcast. The Fantasy Hive interviewed Isla Jewell, a pen name for Delilah S. Dawson, about her new book, Books and Bewitchment.

For more great SFF links, don’t miss last week’s Wombling Along.

Art recs: tiger creature by Jessica; wake up babe new rat purse just dropped by Alex Plante; pigeons! by Aubo; Godzilla doodle by RJ Palmer; xiao long mao & wonton mao by Birdie Tam; Brother Gregor is concerned by ascalaphid; Remnants by maru; basking in the sun by Adam; Oh Lord, return me to dust by AJ; Still hibernating by citrus sapling; himmel flower by Alina

Outro

That’s it for this week! Have a great weekend. — Renay