Intergalactic Mixtape #56
Hey!
There are lots of award news this week, as we enter into Hot Genre Award Summer. If you wanted opinions on the winners of the Locus, this is the issue for you. It’s also the month for lots of reviewers to be like, “you know, I’m going to publish 56 reviews this month and make Renay agonize over which of mine to include.” I love the energy, though.
A-Side
Critical Friends Episode 24: On Oeuvres
This episode of Critical Friends (transcript available as usual) discussed the tension between reviewing newer works by authors with large backlists. There’s a balance between reviewing the work as it stands, but with authors who have been writing for years, it’s difficult know when references to their older work would be most relevant. They tried to tackle the sticky subject of “canon”, too, and how these days it’s hard to contextualize works among their predecessors because space in review columns is limited. One of my favorite type of rec lists is someone reccing an author and going, “Okay, here’s the reading orders I would suggest if you like Trope A, Trope B, or Trope C.” (Or genre, or plot, or character type for trope—there are so many options!) There’s a lot of value in resisting the “new stuff only” (she writes, in her Look At All This New Stuff Newsletter). Our genres are deep and one never knows when they’ll find their new favorite author because that author wrote a book in their favorite genre ten years ago. Yes, that’s right: the answer is, once again, more recs so reviewers can focus on other things. :D
Suzan Palumbo and Kate Elliott: in conversation
This discussion between Palumbo and Elliott at Speculative Insight was excellent. Probably my favorite thing for authors to talk about is how their interests influence what they choose to write about and how they decide to structure their stories. Here the big thing was family and food and if you’ve ever read a Kate Elliott novel, you know there will be descriptions of delicious food and the world building to support the food that appears.
which SFF-relevant or adjacent newsletters do you read and love? (and a second, much vaguer question: what do you wish was out there that isn't?
This Bluesky discussion by Molly Templeton is full of recs of cool newsletters. My contribution was “people need to rediscover RSS”, because they could then curate their own “magazine” of things via the feeds they follow. That’s probably not what people want (the curation is the hard part, I know,), but it’s the best thing we have right now. I know newsletters and blogs aren’t the same, but I sure do treat newsletters like blogs regardless by slapping them into my RSS reader whenever I can, and it’s solved a lot of my problems.
Reviews/Discussions
And Side by Side They Wander by Molly Tanzer (Allison Pottern @ Ancillary Review of Books)
The Crystal Shard by R.A. Salvatore (Sean Guynes @ Genre Fantasies)
The Farthest Shore by Ursula K. Le Guin (Womble @ Runalong the Shelves)
The Fifth Head of Cerberus by Gene Wolfe (A Meal of Thorns Podcast)
The Heart of the Nhaga by Lee Young-Do, translated by Anton Hur (Trish Matson @ Skiffy and Fanty)
Hell's Heart by Alexis Hall (Bonnie McDaniel @ Red Headed Femme)
A Long and Speaking Silence by Nghi Vo (Gary K. Wolfe @ Locus)
A Long and Speaking Silence by Nghi Vo (Galen Strickland)
The Magic of Recluce by L.E. Modesitt, Jr (Joe Sherry @ Nerds of a Feather)
Nobody’s Baby by Olivia Waite (Liz Bourke @ Locus)
Nonesuch by Francis Spufford (Mark Yon @ SFF World)
Platform Decay by Martha Wells (Becky’s Book Blog)
Platform Decay by Martha Wells (Cheryl Morgan @ Salon Futura)
Radiant Star by Ann Leckie (David Tierney @ Ancillary Review of Books)
The Rainseekers by Matthew Kressel (Ian Mond @ Locus)
The Republic of Memory by Mahmud El Sayed (Alex Brown @ Reactor)
Sublimation by Isabel J. Kim (Tar Vol on)
The Subtle Art of Folding Space by John Chu (Niall Harrison @ Locus)
Transmentation | Transgression by Darkly Lem (Jake Casella Brookins @ Locus)
Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake (Hugos There Podcast)
Two Dooms by C. M. Kornbluth (Brian Collins @ SFF Remembrance)
The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden (Scott @ Too Many Fantasy Books )
Villain by Natalie Zina Walschots (Marlene Harris @ Reading Reality)
Villain by Natalie Zina Walschots (Narrated Podcast)
Villain by Natalie Zina Walschots (Sia @ Every Book a Doorway)
The Weathering by Artem Chapeye, translated by Daisy Gibbons (Abigail Nussbaum @ Locus)
Year of the Mer by L.D. Lewis (Alexandra Pierce @ Locus)
Your Behavior Will Be Monitored by Justin Feinstein (Jacqueline Nyathi @ Harare Review of Books)
Your Behavior Will Be Monitored by Justin Feinstein (Paul Di Filippo @ Locus)
B-Side
The Locus Awards were given out last weekend; you can watch the ceremony on their Youtube channel. Here’s some reviews/commentary about some of the winners from my archive; I’m very amused by the breakdown.
Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor: A Meal of Thorns Podcast; Alexandra Pierce; Tar Vol on; An Unofficial Hugo Book Club Blog
The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow: Liz Bourke; Bailey; Narrated Podcast; Galen Strickland; Stewart Hotston; Tar Vol on; Gary K. Wolfe @ Locus; Beth & Nils @ The Fantasy Hive; Mark Yon @ SFF World; Rob B. @ SFF World; Clara Cohen @ Nerds of a Feather; Elias @ Bar Cart Bookshelf; Dina @ SFF Book Reviews; Nick Hubble @ Strange Horizons; Bonnie McDaniel @ Red Headed Femme; Andrew Liptak @ Transfer Orbit; Bill Capossere @ FanLit; Cheryl Morgan @ Salon Futura; Grady Shelton @ SFF Insiders; Martin Cahill @ Reactor; Roseanna Pendlebury @ A Reader of Else; Paul Weimer @ Skiffy and Fanty
The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones: Tar Vol on; Camestros Felapton; Bonnie McDaniel @ Red Headed Femme; Womble @ Runalong the Shelves
Sour Cherry by Natalia Theodoridou: Roseanna Pendlebury @ Ancillary Review of Books; Gary K. Wolfe @ Locus; Jonathan Thornton @ The Fantasy Hive
On the Calculation of Volume III by Solvej Balle, tr. Sophia Hersi Smith & Jennifer Russell: Rachel Cordasco @ Ancillary Review of Books; Roseanna Pendlebury @ A Reader of Else
The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar: Kristen @ Fantasy Cafe; Bookforager; Womble @ Runalong the Shelves; Archita Mittra @ Strange Horizons; Rob Maslen @ The City of Lost Books; Susanne Salehi @ The Lesbrary; Danika Ellis @ The Lesbrary; Nick Hubble @ Prospective Cultures; Bonnie McDaniel @ Red Headed Femme; Kathryn Adams @ Pixelated Geek
On Literature Science Alliance, Angela talked about two Hugo finalists winning their respective Locus Awards and what that might mean. I think the Locus Awards still gives extra votes to subscribers? Whereas with the Hugo Award, you’re either a member of WSFS or not. As always, it will depend on who votes!
The Clarke Award also dropped their shortlist (the quotes have more commentary):
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman
The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami
Luminous by Silvia Park
There Is No Antimemetics Division by qntm
When There Are Wolves Again by E.J. Swift
The Salt Oracle by Lorraine Wilson
My immediate reaction was “Dungeon Crawler Carl??????” As I was telling my pals, it feels very anomalous to this award! It’s going to be a spicy Clarke Award season. Nicholas Whyte was ready with the shelf stats from the three big book social media sites for the finalists. Octothorpe dropped Episode #161 today, where John, Alison, and Liz talked about the finalists and I immediately poured it into my brain and get to include it here.
In Hugo discussion, Dina ranked the Novelette finalists and reviewed The Human Division by John Scalzi, nominated in Best Series. Why yes, I am encouraging her to read everything all at once. I’m guilty of nothing but passion. Tar Vol on reviewed Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite in early May and Kathryn Adams reviewed Cinder House by Freya Marske, both nominated for Best Novella. Nicholas Whyte wrote about the elibility conversations going around for Best Related Work. An Unofficial Hugo Book Club Blog went back to 1992 to look at the films nominated for Best Dramatic Presentation. At Five Books, Sylvia Bishop shared some thoughts about the Nebula finalists for Best Novel. The Nebulas will be given out this weekend, and you can watch online via their Youtube channel. Will Death of the Author continue its winning streak?
The other big news of the week was the Nuremberg 2028 bid ending their run for Worldcon. It does seem like the Nuremberg folks want to bring Worldcon over to their neck of the woods, they just want some additional time to prepare. It must have been a hard decision, but I hope they bid again! It’s still not a bad idea to vote in site selection; you’re becoming a 2028 WSFS member early and providing the Brisbane bid advanced resources so they can prepare the best event.
The Fantasy Hive crew picked their favorite reads for May. Transfer Orbit has a list of 15 new SFF books out in June. For even more new books, Gizmodo has a list of 90 titles in all genres. Reactor has a big list of June fantasy titles. S.L. Dove Cooper shared the first column for new aspec book releases. Future columns will look at one month at a time, it seems, but this one includes previous months in 2026. Ancillary Review of Books posted their Call for Reviews & Essays for September 2026. Dina at SFF Book Reviews has her The State of SFF column out for June. Kila Writes has a big list of queer SF out in May. The Fantasy With Friends discussion for the week was, “What are some of your favorite fantasy tropes?”
In short fiction, Brian Collins reviewed “Always” by Karen Joy Fowler. Tar Vol on reviewed and chose favorites in issues of Adventitious and Lightspeed. Maria Haskins read and recced stories from PodCastle and Beneath Ceaseless Skies at Locus. [RECORDED], a found footage anthology, launched on Backerkit recently. I love the idea of this a lot. Common Bounds 3 is getting close to their crowdfunding goal. Emmie Christie shared her favorites from May. If you want some dark/horror recs, flameswallower on Tumblr has their May faves. Andrew Liptak has his Table of Contents column up for June, with updates to the May version. It’s great if you want to keep up with SFF short fiction!
Stewart Hotston shared some thoughts about The Sheep Detectives. Leah Schnelbach reviewed Backrooms at Reactor, and y’all, the FOMO is incredibly strong for me on this one. I comforted myself with second half of the short film series Back in the Backrooms. I’ll miss you, Greg. Phantasmag shared a list of books to read after watching Backrooms. I expected more of these types of rec lists than I’ve been seeing, but the film is still pretty new so I will be patient.
Martha Wells was interviewed by Tube Talk about everyone’s favorite fake soap opera, The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon, and the way it works in the canon of The Murderbot Diaries. Isabel J. Kim has a Big Idea column about her new novel, Sublimation. Kim was also interviewed on Youtube by Gryftkin, in the latest issue od Clarkesworld, and on the SFF Addicts podcast. Naomi Kritzer also has a great interview in the June Clarkesworld. If you’re excited about The Sixth Nik by Daniel Kraus, you can read an excerpt on Reactor.
For more SFF links, don’t miss last week’s Wombling Along!
Art recs: fluffy cats by Joy; Jiji (Kiki’s Delivery Service) by Bryan Mon; hey, cool screensaver by miski; Summer lizard by Victoria Maderna; oort cloud drawing by parker parrella
Outro
This week I wrote about Platform Decay by Martha Wells. It’s the eighth entry in the series and I loved it (even though Network Effect remains my favorite, because of The Magic of Friendship). It’s hard writing about books that are deep into a series, so I had to come at it from a different angle. Raise your hand if you’re going to do a complete series reread with Kevin R. Free in 2026 to incorporate your experience of Platform Decay.
Recent Reading:
(Last) The Girl-Thing Who Went Out for Sushi by Pat Cadigan (I got a late night urge; it’s still a banger)
(Now) Sweep of Stars by Maurice Broaddus
(Next) Ode to the Half-Broken by Suzanne Palmer (B&N 100% lost my preorder that I placed in October 2025)