The SPSFC started with 300 books and narrowed it down to 30 semi-finalists. I’ll be reviewing every semi-finalist, as well as several books from other group’s slush piles that looked interesting to me.
Jaigar awakens from cryo-sleep to find things aren’t exactly what he expected on the colony ship. He should be waking up after 30 years, ready to settle a planet; instead, the power is flickering, the ship appears damaged, and he and others who’ve awakened with him have to begin exploring the massive colony ship to try to survive.
The novel has a gripping opening, and the premise and action are quite well done. At times, it’s got shades of The Martian with the kind of “figure it out or die” scenarios that happen. Those are few and far between, though, as a lot of the action is more subtle and centered around questions of what happened, who or what is to blame, and how to survive.
Each of the characters has hints of intriguing background. Jaigar awakens concerned he’s going to be arrested by the official he sees. Others give some shadowy clues about their lives before. Clearly, the situation makes it tough for them to sit around and make small talk, but as a reader I would have liked to know more about the characters. Many of them seem interesting, but the payoff isn’t there in this first book. We as readers don’t get enough to full dig in to their stories, motivations, or even history as people.
The concept of waking up on a colony ship in which you don’t really know what to do or where to go for supplies or help is fascinating. I haven’t really seen it done this way before. It’s also not really something I’ve thought about. When all the people who know about where stuff is and how to use it on such a massive ship are out of commission, what can the characters do? This hook had me going through the rest of the book and was enough to sustain my interest. That said, it reads at times as though Turner, the author, is rationing out information in the slowest possible fashion to keep readers in the dark. The characters are almost ridiculous vague with each other, the plot has one major reveal, but has introduced so many dangling threads at that point that it left me wanting much more. It’s almost a frustrating experience, because I do want more, but was feeling impatient about how little was being given to me as a reader.
Destroyeris an exciting first-in-series read, but doesn’t answer many questions. It’s a thrilling read, but light on character background and content. I’m curious about what happens next, but also wanted more from the first book to hook me for the second.
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
I am very late to the Babylon 5 party. As it came out, I was a bit young for the show and the few times we tried to watch as a family, it was clear we had no idea what was going on. After several people bugged me, telling me it was the show I needed to watch, I grabbed the whole series around Christmas last year on a great sale. I’ve been watching it since, sneaking it in between the many things going on in my life. It quickly became apparent that I’d want to discuss the episodes with others, so I began this series of posts. Now I’ve finished the series, but am working my way through the movies, related works, comics, and books. Please don’t spoil anything from other works here!
9:Racing the Night
JMS sure likes the phrase “The Last, Best Hope,” doesn’t he? I appreciated this dream/flashback sequences that lets us get filled in on the extreme importance of Excalibur’s mission. Also I gotta say as cheesy as it is, I was delighted by the CG scene of Gideon flying through this abandoned city. It’s campy and insanely fun. But oh no! Not much time to think about that as some dude gets cut to pieces by a laser!?
And now we get space archaeology, too? As I said in the first-ish episode, this is one of my all-time favorite sci-fi tropes. I just love the sense of the vastness of space and time that happens when we get space archaeology. Someone having their internal organs pulled out seems like a bad sign on a planet that has no signs of living things despite clear evidence of massive civilization.
I loved our resident technomage’s one liner: “I thought you don’t hold a grudge…” “I don’t. I have no surviving enemies.”
This episode is full of cheesy stuff that somehow works because it’s hilarious and tongue in cheek. It’s also got some ominous parts, which it somehow manages to sell despite the silliness of some aspects of the episode. The big reveal here, that these aliens are dissecting everyone who shows up to try to find a cure, wasn’t terribly surprising, but it absolutely matches the theme of the whole thing. I loved it, to be honest.
10:The Memory of War
News from Earth is universally bad. Riots, food shortages, quarantines everywhere–it’s a disaster that just continues forever, apparently. Meanwhile, on Excalibur, they’ve found a planet that appears to have been ravaged by the Drakh plague or something similar. The crew thinks that it might show a way to fight the plague, but Galen warns them against touching down.
On the surface of the planet, they encounter no one, but some startling possibilities about degradation of materials that they dropped down to the surface are immediately encountered in the form of their probes surviving but crumbling to pieces. Dureena uses her parkour abilities to nab a data crystal, and Eilerson decodes it to see a message from the former inhabitants of the planet apparently saying something about a death that comes at night. Then, the crap starts to hit the fan as a few of the security detail die mysteriously.
Then, the revelation: it was a techno-mage who created the “obscene” (using Galen’s word) thing that is causing so much destruction on the planet’s surface. Galen races to the planet to beat Nightfall and work against the techno-mage’s powers on the surface. Galen encounters a kind of AI techno-mage fragment from one who went against the order because he had a “price.” He developed the virus for one side in a war, which ultimately destroyed all of the people on the planet by having them all kill each other. The AI confronts Galen saying that he, too, has a price. Galen manages to find its power core and destroy it with his staff, but it looks as though the staff is lost in the aftermath.
On Excalibur, Galen reveals the importance of the staff to him and his deep disappointment with its loss. Dureena, however, went on one last shuttle trip and managed to miraculously get through millions of tons of dirt and stone and recover his staff. Because she’s awesome. Meanwhile, Dr. Chambers takes the inert nanovirus and reprograms it to be used to essentially become immune to the virus for limited time periods without contamination. I’m hoping this or something else will give us some resolution for the main plot of the show, but I don’t have huge hope to hold out for that. There’s only a few episodes left and we need to wrap up a lot of threads, and since it was cancelled I don’t think we’ll get it. But still, I think in my head I can just think they adapted this tech to eventually provide a cure.
This was an okay episode, but the core plot was a bit too thin to carry the entire episode. Without any real B-plot, it meant that the action scenes had to make up for the time gaps, and so it dragged occasionally. Overall, though, it gave us some more respect for Dureena and a little bit of flair from Dr. Chambers.
(All Links to Amazon are Affiliates Links.)
Links
Babylon 5 Hub– Find all my Babylon 5-related posts and content here.
J.W. Wartick- Always Have a Reason– Check out my “main site” which talks about philosophy of religion, theology, and Christian apologetics (among other random topics). I love science fiction so that comes up integrated with theology fairly frequently as well. I’d love to have you follow there, too!
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
I’m a judge for the first-ever SPSFC (Self Published Science Fiction Contest), but couldn’t help noticing the parallel SPFBO (Self Published Fantasy Blog-Off) contest happening. I always love finding some new indie authors and books, so I decided to read through the finalists of that contest and review them on my site. As always, let me know your own thoughts in the comments.
The Mortal Blade follows several characters on their journey in a city that has an eternal siege from green skinned goblins. The only thing holding back the hordes appears to be the intervention of a massive dragon, whom the people of the city revere and take care of. Characters include a shape-shifting assassin, a new ultra-powerful warrior who takes the fight to the horde, a fairly stuck up nobleman, and a down-on-her-luck solider hoping to not join the cleaning crew.
At first, the diverse array of views makes several chapters verge on baffling at times as readers have to re-orient themselves to the new characters. Each character, however, is interesting enough to carry the story on his or her own. Mitchell strips away a lot of the filler that some epic fantasies have–almost a necessity given the number of main characters he’s developing–and presents a no-frills approach to epic fantasy. This approach is clear in the world-building. For example, the city in which the plot takes place is intriguing, but Mitchell doesn’t info-dump about it, either through characters or narrative. Instead, readers learn about the city only through individual characters’ viewpoints. There are no massive walls of text describing the political mechanics going on behind the scenes. Instead, readers get only what they “see” through characters’ eyes. As a setting, it works because the question of the Eternal Siege looms over it, making the city interesting because of the sense of impending doom.
The “no-frills” approach also characterizes the novel more generally. Mitchell takes readers straight to the action time and again. This doesn’t mean there is no room for reflection or character development, but it does mean some of the standard trappings of epic fantasy like lengthy descriptions of the setting, characters’ clothes, etc. aren’t there. This is both a blessing and a curse, as it gets readers right into the thick of things time and again, but also makes it hard to slow down and orient oneself as one reads it.
Mitchell weaves an interesting tale here that ultimately brings some characters together while also bringing up additional plot threads and broader conflicts. This city has quite a bit going on in it, and I was all-in from the beginning to several excellent hooks tied to each character’s story arc. Doing some more research on the series, I found that this book is the first book in the series, but part of a much larger series that has been ongoing before it. I will definitely be reading more, but not sure where I’ll start next.
The Mortal Bladewas a fun–even refreshing–read. The characters give readers a great vision of a powerfully wrought setting. Meanwhile, the fairly relentless action and use of magic makes it feel like a fully-realized fantasy world. Recommended for fans of epic fantasy, especially if they like urban fantasy settings.
All links to Amazon are affiliates.
Links
Fantasy Hub– My hub for links to posts about fantasy works on this site. Hugo and other Award nominees, vintage fantasy, indie books, and more!
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
The SPSFC started with 300 books and narrowed it down to 30 semi-finalists. I’ll be reviewing every semi-finalist, as well as several books from other group’s slush piles that looked interesting to me.
In the future, U.S. citizens are required to have AI tech riding around in their heads in order to identify themselves, make purchases, and more. A subculture has developed around an art deco style. They wear colors, accessories, and push back against tech requirements. Reed, our protagonist, has a newly-updated (against his choice) AI that has named itself “Mazarin,” acknowledging Reed’s love of the color blue. Reed is a hep cat art deco guy who struggles to fit in at work. Mazarin encourages him to find dates, go out with friends, and embrace himself for who he is.
Let’s get this out of the way: Mazarin Blues is a relentlessly stylish, book. It’s a hep cat in between dust jackets. Hess has clearly thought about the idea of this art deco subculture quite a bit, and, for this reader at least (with little knowledge of art deco/etc.), the slang, style, and records that go with it were totally believable. The development of this subculture is the primary piece of worldbuilding in the book, and it absolutely shines all the way through. The world is absolutely believable, and the development of the subculture makes sense contextually. Even the aspects of the world that hint at the government control and conspiracy theories about rogue AIs are woven intricately together into a cohesive whole.
The story itself is a kind of slice-of-life narrative that follows Reed as he looks for love, Mazarin as the AI seeks to figure itself out, and a broader plot of how the Beta AIs are driving some owners to horrible acts or self-harm. Reed is a fantastic protagonist who makes mistakes, has flaws, and sometimes gets things figured out. Mazarin is an intriguing AI, and there are enough twists in the plot to keep the narrative moving.
This story, though, isn’t the kind to whip through in an afternoon. It’s one you want to sit down with a mixed drink and savor over the course of several evenings. You can feel the essence of the world and story as you read. Queer representation is found throughout the story, and they never feel like placeholders are checked boxes. They’re all people, living their lives within the world Hess has created.
Mazarin Bluesis a stylish, character-driven science fiction story that delivers a wonderful experience. It’s got great vibes all the way through, and makes you relate to its main characters. Highly recommended.
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
[This book is one of my group’s official semifinalists.]
New Seattle is an exclusive city in the midst of a frozen wasteland. The population is brutally controlled to ensure the society can continue to thrive, by whatever definition of thriving the elites have chosen. Many simply work to create goods and services for 10,000 people who dominate the culture of New Seattle through their brands. Delilah is foremost in brands, a walking symbol of epic marketing, thoughtfulness of pose and expression, and more. And… she’s dead.
Our story follows Scottie as she comes of age in this society and tries to form her own brand so that she won’t (potentially) be kicked out into the (literal, deadly) cold. It’s an absolutely fabulous premise to start off with. The story is told largely from Scottie’s perspective, and purports to tell us about what happened to the eponymous Delilah. I was super interested in finding out more about the world and the mystery of what happened to Delilah.
Unfortunately, after a promising start, the novel started to drag. Large portions of the middle section turned into discourse about what individual gems could mean, various discussions of brands, and more. Rather than letting the characters build the world, the world was relayed through lengthy info dumps. I typically don’t mind info dumps, so long as they’re punctuated by action or major character moments, but the middle section of the book read to me like it was an info dump followed by more people sitting around talking followed by an info dump (rinse/repeat). It made the book slow down to a crawling pace. Realistically, a lot of this could have been cut while still keeping the core plot engaging.
The ending was good, with a surprisingly hopeful upturn. I liked it, and it left me as a reader feeling better about having read the book, but it also felt a bit like too little, too late. The promising start with its interesting world and thrilling potential never seemed fully realized. The story of Delilah’s demise went to the side while characters seemed to flounder.
I hugely enjoyed the beginning of All the Whys of Delilah’s Demise, but some of my enjoyment fizzled out by the end. I would be interested in sampling another work in this world by the author, but would want more action and dynamic world building.
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
We’re now in the round of semi-finalists for the Self-Published Science Fiction Contest (SPSFC), and I’m reading and reviewing all of the semi-finalists! Check out my SPSFC Hub for all my posts and reviews for the contest.
Aster Vale loves doing street art, competing in an interplanetary game that ranks the art based on quality, danger of getting caught, and other details. She dreams of moving up the ranks as Wildflower, her screen name in the game. Isaac, a wizard for hacking, is on the same luxury liner she’s on board as they head towards Vega. Rel is a genetically-engineered soldier whose mission is to stop that liner before it can reach Vega. Why? It would mean extinction for his people.
A Star Named Vega is an incredibly fun space adventure story. Aster was immediately compelling to me as a character, and Isaac quickly grew on me. They each had such shenanigans and fun throughout the novel that it was hard to not crack a smile at times. Rel, our erstwhile antagonist/protagonist (question mark) is compelling as well.
The world-building is both narrowly focused and expansively broad, and I liked how focused the plot was to go along with it. The characters live in our far future, largely dominated by AIs who take care of humanity’s every needs. The inevitable dark side can rear its ugly head here, but Roberts balances the setup for a kind of dystopic plot with the many benefits of this near-utopian society. Of course, some of that plays into the main plot, so I don’t want to spoil too much of it. The takeaway here is that Roberts deftly balances questions about ‘What Could Go Wrong’ with ‘What If It’s Worth It’? in ways that I found unexpected and unique. I’d honestly have liked even more along those lines going on.
Roberts also builds some political intrigue and family drama into the book. I thought this was exciting, especially given the hyper-focused setting of the novel. It’s difficult to balance broader possibilities when the story is taking place on a star cruiser, but Roberts does it here and it makes the world feel very lived-in and real despite the narrow focus.
The novel starts as a kind of young adult, perhaps even juvenile fiction feel, but the amount of content going on behind the scenes and the way stakes are raised steadily from the beginning make it an ultimately satisfying read for readers of any age. I ended up hugely enjoying it, and I would think most of my readers here would as well.
Ultimately, A Star Named Vegais a delightful romp. Yes, there are darker things at the fringes, but the characters make the journey fun–and often funny as well.
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
The SPSFC started with 300 books and narrowed it down to 30 semi-finalists. I’ll be reviewing every semi-finalist, as well as several books from other group’s slush piles that looked interesting to me.
Captain Wu is the eponymous character in this delightful space adventure. She’s a smuggler and a tough fighter, and she’s assembled a motley crew of like-minded individuals who travel with her across the stars. They’re quickly on the run, though, as they get some cargo that might be a bit too dangerous for them to have wanted to carry if they’d known about it.
I loved this book. I fell in love with the characters fairly quickly. It’s got real found family vibes, but there’s also actual family as Captain Wu’s granddaughter shows up. What? Her granddaughter? Yes, the lead character here is a grandma, not some teenager with a chosen one quest (okay, I actually quite enjoy chosen one narratives, but only reading them would get boring eventually). The diversity in this book isn’t just diversity of orientation, race, or species, but also age, which is somehow almost rarer than some of the other ones. It’s a wonderful thing to see characters from different generations interact, and do some in such winsome and often hilarious ways.
Most of the plot involves Wu &co. racing across the stars, sometimes a step ahead of their pursuers, sometimes a step behind. It checks a lot of the boxes for what you’d expect from a space adventure, but like many of those you’ve enjoyed, it is wonderful not because of originality, necessarily, but because of the very well the story is told. You’re going for the crew through and through, and they grow on you more as the book goes on.
There are some great action scenes here, too. One especially memorable scene has a character in a spacesuit trying to blast off a grappling hook with a “potato gun.” I’ll let you imagine the details, but there’s more to it than that. There’s a kind of fierce inventiveness that carries the book even as some of the “trope” boxes get checked. It’s a great way to balance the sometime predictability of the novel with some humorous and delightful moments.
Captain Wuis a hugely enjoyable space adventure. I highly recommend it to readers.
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
The British Science Fiction Awards often highlight books that don’t even make it onto awards lists dominated by American authors. I hoped it would help round out my reading a bit, and haven’t been disappointed!
The 2011 winner was The Islanders by Christopher Priest. It won the BSFA award for best novel, but didn’t show up on the Hugo or Nominee shortlists.
Christopher Priest is rapidly becoming an author I seek out to read. I read The Prestigea few years back when I discovered the movie had been based on a book. I’d never heard of Priest before that, but as I go back and explore vintage sci-fi, I see his name time and again. The Islanders isn’t exactly vintage yet, having been published in 2011, but I could see it living as an acknowledged classic for years to come.
If I had one word to describe the book, I’d call it a maze. It’s written like a kind of travel gazette introducing readers to the Dream Archipelago, a group of islands that contains some apparent temporal and spatial anomalies (or does it?). It’s organized alphabetically by island, and after a couple islands, readers will wonder if it is only the a fictional travel gazette after all. But then we get introduced to some characters, and begin to wonder about a murder, and artists, and the narrator who is relaying these islands to us. Why do they include islands they don’t care about? Wait, who wrote the introduction? Oh!
I found myself flipping back and forth in the book as I continued more deeply into the story, and discovering that some names got repeated and hints of events taking place could be uncovered with some effort. The main plot of the story centers around a murder, a murderer, and lovers. But that main plot occupies perhaps a quarter of the text of the novel, much of which is dominated instead by vignettes of the islands and asides about literary, scientific, and artistic works. However, as you read the book, you discover that each of these may have mysteries embedded therein as well.
I’m not at all convinced I managed to tease out even a tenth of the threads interwoven throughout the book. What connection do the snippets of art have with the broader story going on? What, exactly, is “tunneling” and how might it have impacted the mystery in some way? I have many, many more questions, and I know I’ll be coming back to find out more.
The Islandersis an unforgettable maze of a novel. I believe I’ll be thinking about this one for a long time, and there’s no question it’s worth revisiting to see if one can extract more from its pages. I recommend it.
(All Amazon Links are Affiliates.)
Links
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
I’m a judge for the Self-Published Science Fiction Contest (SPSFC), and wanted to spotlight some of the authors in the contest! Specifically, I’ll have interviews from my team’s semifinalists. Without further adieu, to the interview!
First off, tell us a bit about your background. What got you into science fiction?
It’s a combination of my own interests and my parents during my childhood. My parents used to read to me as a kid, so I grew up with a love of books. I read things on my own and then as a family, we were definitely into science fiction movies and TV shows. There are the standard things we watched as kids like the DC Animated Universe written and/or directed by Bruce Timm (i.e. Batman: The Animated Series, Superman: The Animated Series, Batman Beyond, Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, and Static Shock), and then the Marvel animated shows like the 90s Spider-Man and X-Men, and then things like Transformers: Beast Wars and pretty much anything on WB Kids or Toonami at the time.
I also loved anime as a kid and into my teens, so pretty much most of the 2000s Toonami anime lineup, I grew up watching every day. I am a huge Batman fan, first and foremost. I’ve met Kevin Conroy and gotten a photo op and autograph from him and I have the Bat signal tattooed on my right shoulder in his honor. All those different things are what got me into science fiction and I still enjoy it very much to this very day.
It’s incredible to see how you got into science fiction and how much of that journey we share. Batman: The Animated Series is one of my all-time favorites, and I recently bought the whole series to re-watch it all. Toonami was my jam and got me into anime and certainly some flavors of sci-fi I didn’t know existed. Thanks for that trip down memory lane!
Your work includes a lot of diverse main characters, both protagonists and antagonists, like Dr. Kamala Anjali, Kazuma Okegawa, Yagami Sugimoto, and Misaki Fujioka. Is their inclusion in the story related to being a BIPOC (Black Indigenous Person of Color) in the science fiction genre?
Yes, certainly. One of the first things I did before I even decided to write Of Cinder and Bone was survey the science fiction landscape. One thing that I think is distinctly lacking in American science fiction is people of color as the main leads instead of simply rounding out a mostly white cast cast or being the Token Minority. And those times you do have POC, it’s often only black characters in anything mainstream, and they’re often still in the minority (no pun intended) in the stories. I noted that Indian and Middle Eastern characters in particular don’t show up that much in American mainstream science fiction, so that motivated me very much with Dr. Kamala Anjali. I feel extremely passionate about writing her because the American lens of India and Pakistan (Kamala is biracial) is extremely skewed and I thought she would be an excellent main character. I also took great care to make sure Kamala was also not just The Love Interest. She is her own person with her own agency and her own important to both Jack and the story.
As for the Japanese characters, I noticed that from an American perspective, Japanese characters really only ever show up in American mainstream fiction in the context of martial arts films and sometimes in crime dramas. While it’s true I did lean a bit into the yakuza stereotypes for Kazuma Okegawa, overall, I wanted to dive into the richness of what Japan has to offer by setting half of the book in Tokyo and its surrounding areas. I especially find the Japanese language absolutely fascinating. It’s one of my favorite languages, hence why my pen name is Japanese, and I featured it heavily in the book to give it some more exposure in the science fiction genre, but in a way I hope is organic.
The end goal of having Kamala and the others as main leads is to avert some common stereotypes about people from those cultures and backgrounds and to show the world from another perspective.
I think that one of the biggest strengths of Of Cinder and Bone is its characters, and it’s wonderful to see your inspiration for them. What inspired you to write the book itself, and how did you think about the background for dragons?
Thank you! Famously, I’ve said in interviews before that the two biggest inspirations for the Of Cinder and Bone series are film-based: Jurassic Park (1993) and Reign of Fire (2002).
I’m sure the inspiration from the classic, amazing Jurassic Park is pretty apparent. I have seen that film so many times not only for the action-horror elements, incredible practical effects, and all around incredible atmosphere, but what I found over the years that I really liked was the conversations that they have about Man vs. Nature and Man vs. God. The lunch scene in particular is one of my favorite exchanges in the movie, even with there being more awesome, iconic moments in the rest of the film. I liked the argument that just because you have the ability to create life from something selected by nature to be eliminated doesn’t necessarily mean you should do it. Especially not for the sake of profit. I love the theme being discussed so well by the characters. I decided to play with that idea in another sense–exploring what happens if we instead tried to create life for an extinct creature that was unfairly hunted to extinction, not chosen by nature not to continue. As always, though, greed and disregard for life took over and there were horrible consequences, but the series also explores that there were some good things that come of Jack and Kamala’s resurrection project as well.
The other inspiration is from a rather ridiculous, over the top, largely forgotten movie called Reign of Fire. Few people remember it, but it always stuck out to me even 20 years ago as being one of the only times a Hollywood film explored dragons in the context of actual science fiction and not fantasy. We all know famous fantasy dragons like Draco from Dragonheart or Smaug from The Hobbit movies, but Reign of Fire took an actual scientific approach to their dragons and I was intrigued by the idea of what it would be like to have these enormous invasive species walking around in modern times. At first, I had planned to do a post-apocalyptic story like the one in Reign of Fire, but as I began writing the first book, I realized I actually didn’t want to do it. In Reign of Fire, the dragons are essentially monsters. They do not coexist with any other species on the planet, not even their own, as we see them later cannibalizing one another when food begins to run out after they scorched the Earth. The conversation I wanted to have in my series is summed up by a line from Jack later in the first book: “Just because something’s dangerous doesn’t mean it has no place in the world.” And so I scrapped the idea for a dragon apocalypse and wanted to write about the idea that dragons were indeed invasive, but not necessarily evil or deserving of being hunted to extinction. I thought approaching it from a conservationist angle would be a cool idea to explore.
As for the background of the dragons themselves, oh boy. I did a mountain of research before I began the first draft and I’ve done several more mountains of research as the books continue. Hell, just for the fifth book coming out April 22nd, the research document is a whopping eighteen pages long. Single spaced. The dragons in the books are all put within the context of reptiles, so I studied alligators, crocodiles, lizards, snakes, komodo dragons, chameleons, you name it. For the later books (mild spoiler alert), feathered dragons with more avian traits are introduced, so then I had to do research for birds of prey. I studied to see the different physical traits they’d have if they were real, the types of foods they’d eat, their mating habits, and then I added in some environmental science to study the most likely place each type of dragon would inhabit. That’s how some of the dragons ended up with endemic names like the Nordic sea serpent or the Japanese viper dragon. It is a lot of hard work, but I honestly love it. I’ve learned so many cool things about reptiles and birds of prey and I truly hope it comes through in the books. Especially with Of Claws and Inferno. My sister-in-law, who reads the advanced copies before my books come out, joked that this book is the most National Geographic of the series. I really went hardcore on the animal and environmental science with this book, trust me.
You can definitely see all the research and inspirations you cite throughout the first book. At this point, I’m sure readers are eager to sink their teeth into it! How many books do you have planned for the Of Cinder & Bone series, and do you have an end in mind? And, for our readers, what are the best ways to follow you and find out about your works?
It’s very unlike me, but I actually don’t know when the series is going to end? Of Claws and Inferno ends in a sort of open-ended way for that very same reason. I have a three book deal with Falstaff Books with the first book tentatively scheduled for February 2023, so I know I’ll be working on those until 2025. With my debut urban fantasy series, I knew for certain it would be a trilogy and then the short story anthology and the novella were added on later as bonus content. I’m going to take some time as I write the new science fiction novels for Falstaff Books to decide if the series will end with Of Claws and Inferno or if it will continue. My early hunch is that it will continue, but it might be after a time jump of a substantial amount. The first two books in the series occur back to back, but then Books 3-5 take place close to a year apart each. If I write another one, I think it would be with a larger time skip of multiple years to catch up with the gang to see what’s changed, but we’ll see. All I can say is stay tuned for now. Once I figure it out, I’ll definitely be forthcoming about my plans.
-The Black Parade series: The Black Parade is my debut urban fantasy/paranormal romance novel. It tells the tale of Jordan Amador–a cranky waitress with a drinking problem who lives in Albany, New York–who happens to be a Seer, or someone who can see and hear ghosts, angels, and demons. She accidentally killed a Seer and has to help 100 souls crossover into the afterlife in two years or she’s going to Hell. Her hundredth soul comes in the form of a handsome but annoying poltergeist named Michael. His peculiar ability to touch things and interact with his environment tips her off that there’s something special about him, and as she starts solving his case, she stumbles across a much bigger plot by the archdemon, Belial, to take over the free will of innocent people.
There are five books in that series: The Black Parade, The Deadly Seven: Stories from the Black Parade series, She Who Fights Monsters, Back to Black, and The Holy Dark. All of them can be found here and on all other sales platforms as well. The first book has been positively reviewed by Publishers Weekly and by New York Times and USA Today bestselling urban fantasy author, Ilona Andrews. It is also permanently free to download on all sales channels.
-Black Panther: Tales of Wakanda anthology: This is a 2021 release by Marvel Comics and Titans Books featuring yours truly and 17 other incredibly talented black and African/African-American authors writing about the world of Wakanda. My story is called “Ukubamba” and it’s about Okoye searching for a kidnapped girl. Go here to get a copy in ebook or hardcover: https://titanbooks.com/70432-black-panther-tales-of-wakanda/
-Terminus and Terminus II anthologies: There are both anthologies with science fiction and fantasy stories based in Atlanta, Georgia published by MV Media LLC. My stories are “My Dinner with Vlad” and “Hunted,” both about a werewolf named Cassandra Moody, who is the original Wolfman’s daughter. In the first story, she’s taking Dracula, known to her simply as Vlad, out into Midtown Atlanta for a night on the town and they both run headlong into trouble. The second story, “Hunted,” is Cassandra about five years later out for a midnight stroll through the woods and she realizes she’s being stalked. Grab copies here: https://www.mvmediaatl.com/all-products
Science Fiction Hub– I have scores of reviews of Hugo nominees, Vintage Sci-Fi, modern sci-fi, TV series, and more! Check out my science fiction related writings here.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies/scifi/sports and more!
Eclectic Theist 