For Us, the Living by Robert A. Heinlein Heinlein is one of my favorite authors. He has been for years. I would read and re-read his books no matter where I was and always found something to love, whether it was Pixel the cat or the doors that dialate or Friday killing a man in the first paragraph of her book. So, when I saw For Us, the Living available years after his death, I knew I had to buy it. Perhaps Virginia Heinlein had found an old manuscript or maybe this was an unpublished work from his early years. Whatever, I had to have it. If you are a true Heinlein fan, you will recognize many of the subjects that he would cover later in his books and stories like “The Roads Must Roll”, Time Enough for Love, and The Cat Who Walks Through Walls and so on. What’s interesting to me is that this book was written before any of them, and before his “juveniles” and other stories. He wasn’t making up the ideas he had about money and society, in fact his ideas and discussion about economy and socialism are based on Social Credit, an economic theory. It’s clear why this book was banned from being published, as it’s very rough. In many spots, Heinlein sounds more like he’s preaching than he sounds like he’s telling a story. But even with that it becomes clear that he’s got a lot to tell in this story. And the fact that many of his later stories seem to come from this book is not surprising, as there’s a lot here. If you’re a Heinlein fan, you should read this book.

Broken Angels by Richard Morgan After I finished Altered Carbon I wanted to read every book I could find by Richard Morgan. While Broken Angels is not the gripping story that Altered Carbon was, it was still interesting and enjoyable, and true Science Fiction, which there seems to be a lack of in US bookstores these days. This is the continuing story of Takeshi Kovacs, a mercenary who can change bodies, or sleeves, when his current sleeve is too damaged. His mind and memories are stored in a computer to be re-downloaded. But this story is less about that, than it is about corporations and how they manipulate people. Kovacs joins a group of archaeologists who have possibly found the ultimate prize that will make any government all-powerful or any corporation who can control it as rich as they wanted to be. But power corrupts, as they say, and ultimate power… But that would be giving things away. This is a surprising book. I thought I had the whole book figured out and then right near the end Morgan changes the rules one final time. It was fun and interesting. But if you’re looking for the clarity and diamond-hardness that Altered Carbon brought, then you should look again. This is not a book so much about science as it is about how people use those discoveries, for good or ill. But it’s set in a war-zone and Kovacs is a mercenary, so expect action and excitement throughout the book. I read it in about 2 days and then turned around and read it again as there is so much to miss the first time through.

Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan

This is possibly the best pure Science Fiction book I’ve read in a long time. One of my big frustrations at U.S. bookstores right now is the massive preponderance of The Lord of the Rings clones. And if I can avoid those, I’m looking at Harry Potter clones. So, when I had the chance to go to a bookstore in London, I found Altered Carbon a welcome relief.

A Fistful of Sky by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

I first read A Fistful of Sky about two years ago, when it first came out. But they fooled me with the new cover and so I bought and read it again. Luckily, there is nothing to complain about in reading it again, it’s a fun story with a lot to enjoy.

This is the story of Gypsum, middle child in a family of witches who has not come into her powers. By the time she’s 20, everyone assumes that she doesn’t have any powers, and she becomes something of the Cinderella in her household. Because she doesn’t have powers, her siblings (and even her mother sometimes) boss her around and use magic to force her to do what they want her to do.

Survival by Julie Czerneda
There aren’t a lot of SciFi books about biology. So it’s interesting to read one. I first found Czerneda with her book A Thousand Words for Stranger. I was hooked. So of course, when I saw Survival I knew I had to read it. In this story, Mac is a biologist studying salmon in a wilderness preserve in the Pacific Northwest. She is a very insular person, has never been off-world, and has never wanted to. She just wants to study her salmon and be left alone. But she’s not left alone. Instead, she’s dragged into an interstellar war that’s been going on since before Earth knew we were not alone in the universe. The concepts and ideas come thick and fast, as you may expect from better science fiction. And since Czerneda is herself a biologist, she brings the personalities of the scientists in the story to life in a way that only someone who works with them would know. As with all of her stories the aliens in this story are very well thought-out. That makes the whole thing that much more interesting. But unlike her earlier stories, the reason I enjoyed this one so much was because of her human characters. Mac herself is very fun and believable, and the other humans she meets are as well thought out as the aliens. I enjoyed this book so much that when it turned out that my copy was missing something like 30 pages, I didn’t want to stop reading. So I just skipped ahead and kept reading in the car while we headed back to the bookstore to get a more complete copy. I missed some crucial parts, but nothing I couldn’t figure out and the rest of the book was worth it.

Smoke and Shadows by Tanya Huff This book was not, by any means, a difficult book to read. It took about 2 days (with time off for working) and was fun. However, often throughout the book I got the sense that I was missing something. I thought I had read the other books about these characters, but the main character, Tony Foster, wasn’t familiar to me. Normally, it wouldn’t bother me at all, but there were a lot of references throughout the book to other stories that I wasn’t familiar with. This is the story of Tony Foster, protege of Henry Fitzroy, vampire detective. But really, Henry was nothing more than the hired muscle. Instead, the main action was played by Arra, a reluctant wizard, and Tony, a young production assistant for a third- (no second-) rate production company. When shadows start moving by themselves, Tony is the only one to notice. And when they start killing people, he steps up to the plate to save the day. Why is it that most urban fantasy always seems to be little more than mind-candy? This book is very enjoyable, a fun read, and quick, but there isn’t much substance. Guessing what happens isn’t terribly difficult, and even the quasi- “twist” isn’t all that twisted. The only real morals I got out of this book were that Vampire straight-to-syndication TV shows are not generally very good, most actors are pompous idiots, except for the misunderstood co-star who is “a better actor than anyone gave him credit for”. I spent long segments of the book speculating if Lee was meant to be Spike (from Angel) and wondering if there were a Vampire Slayer in the background somewhere. If you’re looking for something deep, you should keep moving, but if you’re looking for a fun read that is easy on the mind and a good romp, then Ms. Huff delivers the goods. I enjoyed this book, but probably won’t be reading it again any time soon.

Zulu Heart by Steven Barnes Book two in the series, this is a second look into an America where Africa conquered the world, and enslaved the whites. I don’t know enough about African culture to know how much of what I know and what I read is true and how much is just stereotyping. But that didn’t deaden my enjoyment of this story. In this episode, Kai has grown up a little more and has to deal with the death of his uncle, father, and older brother. Aidan has his freedom and has built a home for himself and his family along with a number of other freedmen. But in order to stop a war, Aidan has to go back into slavery to help his childhood friend Kai. That was what I struggled with the most in this book. Why would Aidan, even for the love of a childhood friend, be willing to go back into slavery? Many other characters asked him the same question, often many times. I, along with them was not totally convinced by the answer he gave. A lot of the book felt like it was re-running episodes in US history, only with the skin color changed of the primary participants. It got me very interested in both African history and history from the Civil War era. But the real strength of this book is the way I was sucked into thinking about the characters. After the first few pages, I never gave a thought to the color of the skins and instead was cheering and dismayed for everyone. This is a book that will make anyone take a long look at the US culture and how it was built on slavery and really start questioning it.

The Morgaine Saga by C. J. Cherryh DANG! That’s all I can really say. This book was three books in one, but it took me about as long as it takes me to read like 6 or 8 books. It was very slow reading. It follows a man who has indentured himself to a half-elven woman (okay I’m embellishing, but that’s what she felt like) who’s only goal in life is to close the gates to Elfland in all the worlds she can. Granted, it’s set as SF (so Elfland is incorrect), but her race are taller than humans, paler of skin, wield what appears to be magic, and appear through a portal into worlds of men. What I noticed was that as the main character began to understand his liege more the books became more understandable. It was a slow and often painful process, but by the end I felt like I almost knew what was going on. It’s sad, I think I should have just quit reading it, as it was a lot to comprehend while also studying Negotiations and International Management. But I stuck it out and finally finished it on Monday night.