For our fifth year of the Subjective Chaos Kind of Awards, we have stacked our judging panel – and consequently our shortlists – with excellent folk. I’ll be reading and reviewing in batches, starting today with two novellas that focus on very different takes on time travel.
bite-size
Five years ago, C of The Middle Shelf floated the idea of a jury-based award given by a panel of bloggers to their pick of the best works of genre fiction each year. Fast forward to 2022 and our fifth annual Subjective Chaos Kind of Awards will be bigger and more chaotic than ever, with more categories, more nominees and more opinions. Buckle up, it’s time to say hello to our 2022 panel and subjective shortlist!
Welcome back to Bite-size Reads, my 2022 challenge to read (some of) the amazing anthologies on my shelves. Today I’m looking at the final batch of stories from Sinopticon, a curated collection of Chinese SF translated and presented by Xueting Ni.
Generations past, the robots of Panga achieved sentience and were unhappy with their lot. When humanity gave them their freedom, they disappeared into the wilderness. Now, they are ready to make contact again – and a restless young tea monk will be asked the biggest question: what makes humanity happy?
Welcome back to Bite-size Reads, my 2022 challenge to read (some of) the amazing anthologies on my shelves. Today I’m looking at my second batch of stories from Sinopticon, a curated collection of Chinese SF translated and presented by Xueting Ni.
A young scholar explores and documents the House, an endless palace of vestibules, halls and statues lapped by ceaseless tides. As he tries to makes sense of his world, he finds himself increasingly driven to keep secrets from the Other. Does his only friend – the only other living person in the House – really have Piranesi’s best interests at heart?
Welcome to Bite-size Reads, my 2022 challenge to read (some of) the amazing anthologies on my shelves. I’ll be chiming in every couple of weeks with thoughts on the stories I’ve recently enjoyed – starting today with tales from Sinopticon, a curated collection of Chinese SF translated and presented by Xueting Ni.
It’s the last day of SciFiMonth (sniff), but before we call curtains I’ve got one last interview to end the month with a bang. Chris Farnell is the author of Fermi’s Progress, a series of linked novellas about Earth’s first – and last – FTL spaceship and its ongoing mission to try and stop blowing things up…
2020 was challenging in many ways, but one thing it had in spades was a glut of really damn good SFF releases. The brave panellists for the 2021 Subjective Chaos Kind of Awards have been screaming through the summer as we winnowed down our epic shortlists to find our finalists. Drumroll, please…
Welcome to 2021: more subjective and more chaotic (yes I mean later) than ever – but we’re still giving out some kind of awards! Our shortlists are as enticing as ever, and we have a new category added to our roster this year: along with Short Stories (returning from last year) we’ll be picking a Best Debut in addition to the usual genre, series and novellas categories.
Do you need an Escape Pod in your life? Sure you do. Escape Pod is the Hugo-nominated podcast for the very best SF audio fiction in the universe – but to celebrate its 15th birthday, Escape Pod is crossing the streams and entering print for the first time. And thanks to Titan Books, I’ve got a copy to give away!
It’s been nearly six months since we shortlisted our 48 nominees for the 2020 Subjective Chaos Kind of Awards. After a spring and summer we could never have predicted, we’re ready at last to announce our finalists. Drumroll, please…
“Mad” Malago Browne and Pierre “Polecat” de Fermat are wanted for the crimes of murder, arson, robbery and acts of pernicious arithmetic. Welcome to a re-imagined West that sets a new bar for being wild…
Wherever there are people, there are secrets. Even aboard a space slug crewed by itinerant nuns on a mercy mission. In the face of lies and betrayal, what is the truest service one can render to God?
The Blazing World is a 17th century portal fantasy that reflects on natural philosophy with unexpected feminist and polyamorous leanings. Time to meet Frankenstein‘s convention-defying grandma.