Harbour by John Ajvide Lindqvist ‘The sea has given and the sea has taken away.’ Harbour is Lindqvist’s third supernatural novel. This one is set on the fictional island of Domaro in the Swedish archipelago, where Anders and Cecilia have a holiday cottage. One winter day, the couple set out with their six-year-old daughter Maja …
Category: Science fiction and fantasy
A Matter of Time
The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov The possibility that we might visit our planet’s history – and maybe influence it – is the most tantalising of all fantasies. Perhaps, instead, we might travel into the future and, as observers, discover whether our descendants are still reading books, or watching films. What new mythologies can …
Conscious!
Emily Eternal by MG Wheaton 'I sweep across the world like the break of dawn.' Emily Eternal combines cutting edge technology, speculative science and scientific fantasy in a racy thriller that doubles as a crazy love story. At the same time, it digs into the human psyche searching for answers to age-old questions. Does free …
Secret Societies and Ghostly Terror
The Midnight Palace by Carlos Ruiz Zafon translated by Lucia Graves ‘Never mind the number of candles on your birthday cake,’ writes Zafon in his introduction to The Midnight Palace, ‘for those in the know, it’s what lies beneath them that matters’. Zafon’s first four published novels were intended for young adults. The Midnight Palace, …
The Robots of Dawn
by Isaac Asimov A Review 'And all turned to grey - and he was drowning. He could not breathe. He struggled desperately to open his clogged throat, to call to Daneel for help -' Looking back, I notice that I reviewed Asimov's Robots and Empire in May last year, and The Naked Sun in December …
Rotherweird
by Andrew Caldecott A Review Rotherweird is indeed an apt title for this strange and original novel. A mix of history, mystery and magic, it is clearly fantasy from the outset, though the real fantastical element takes a while to appear. Rotherweird is a town in rural England, one that has been cut off by …
Alice!
A look back at the life of a famous child - I haven't done any blogging for a week or two because I've been on holiday, first in the New Forest, then in Belgium and the Netherlands. Wherever I go, I can't help looking for literary connections. A few years ago, at Winchester, it was …
Norse Mythology
by Neil Gaiman 'The highest and the oldest of all the gods is Odin.' 'Thor, Odin's son, is the thunderer.' 'Loki drinks too much, and he cannot guard his words or his thoughts or his deeds when he drinks.' I came late to Neil Gaiman's fiction and have not read many of his books - …
Cut Off
Unchosen Love by Ursula K LeGuin This, the third story in the collection The Birthday of the World, is set on a planet called O, where ideas of sex and family are even more bizarre than on Gethen or Seggri. [See my two previous posts, here and here.] 'When I explained our concept of incest …
Sixteen To One
The Matter of Seggri by Ursula K LeGuin 'Their gender inbalance has produced a society in which .... the men have all the privilege and the women have all the power.' The Matter of Seggri is the second story in LeGuin's collection The Birthday of the World. It depicts a planet where the ratio of …
Bookheathen Scribblings 