James Nicoll Reviews

Journey with twenty-one speculative fiction authors through the fractured borders of human migration to examine assumptions and catch a glimpse of the dreams, struggles, and triumphs of those who choose – or are forced – to leave home and familiar places. Who straddle borders within our worlds – and within us.

Migration. A transformation of time, place, and being …

We are called drifters, nomads. We are expatriates, evacuees, and pilgrims. We are colonists, aliens, explorers; strangers, visitors – intruders, conquerors – exiles, asylum seekers, and … outsiders.

An American father shields his son from Irish discrimination. A Chinese foreign student wrestles to safeguard her family at the expense of her soul. A college graduate is displaced by technology. A Nigerian high school student chooses between revenge and redemption. A bureaucrat parses the mystery of Taiwanese time travellers. A defeated alien struggles to assimilate into human culture. A Czechoslovakian actress confronts the German WWII invasion. A child crosses an invisible border wall. And many more.

Stories that transcend borders, generations, and cultures. Each is a glimpse into our human need in face of change: to hold fast to home, to tradition, to family; and yet to reach out, to strive for a better life.

Featuring Original Stories by Vanessa Cardui, Elsie Chapman, Kate Heartfield, S.L. Huang, Tyler Keevil, Matthew Kressel, Rich Larson, Tonya Liburd, Karin Lowachee, Seanan McGuire, Brent Nichols, Julie NovÁkovÁ, Heather Osborne, Sarah Raughley, Alex Shvartsman, Amanda Sun, Jeremy Szal, Hayden Trenholm, Liz Westbrook-Trenholm, Christie Yant & Alvaro Zinos-Amaro

With An Introduction by Eric Choi & Gillian Clinton

Edited by Susan Forest & Lucas K. Law

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Simple Suggestions for Avoiding World-Destroying Disaster. Or Not.

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Man brought life to the Moon…

And Man has the power to render the Moon barren again. As warring factions struggle for domination through control of essential resources — water, minerals, oxygen — the young Lunar republic becomes a political pawn. Just as Earth exerts its pull on the tidal waters of the Moon, it also commands the tide of events. And only two people can prevent the total destruction of the Moon’s atmosphere — Galvanix, a man of science… and Taggart, a woman of war.

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Fighting Erasure: Women SF Writers of the 1970s, Part VI

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Tanyana is among the highest ranking in her far-future society – a skilled pionner, able to use a mixture of ritual and innate talent to manipulate the particles that hold all matter together. But an accident brings her life crashing down around her ears. She is cast down amongst the lowest of the low, little more than a garbage collector. But who did this to her, and for what sinister purpose? Her quest to find out will take her to parts of the city she never knew existed, and open the door to a world she could never have imagined.

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The Solar System turned out to be a lot less friendly than we expected. Dreams of Martian canals and Venusian jungles died in the harsh light shone by Mariners and Veneras and Voyagers. But what we did get was an array of worlds of awesome majesty, one that’s enough to scare off 99% percent of would-be explorers — but not you. Using the Cepheus Engine core rules or other similar game systems, the Into the Dark setting book lets you play OSR SF adventures in the near-future of the Solar System as we understand it now. Europa. Titan. Pluto, points beyond? They all will kill you if you make one mistake, and they won’t even register that you’re there when they do it. You’re going to go anyway.

Look for more World Building Consortium products soon! Pre-made settings ​“with a difference” for OSR games of all types.

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AKA BRP:

Because I so very much need another ongoing review series.

As previously established a year ago today, Runequest was an important part of my early roleplaying experience. Parent company Chaosium distilled the essential details of the game engine into a system they called Basic Roleplaying. Both under Chaosium and the game companies who licensed the BRP engine, the BRP rules have been at the heart of many roleplaying games over the decades. 

I own many of them. Too many to review in a reasonable amount of time. What I can do is focus on a specific subset: science fiction roleplaying games that use the BRP game engine. Once a month or so, I will review one of those SF RPGs. It should only take me two or three years to work through the lot! 

My current list of candidates is as follows:

• BRP Mecha

• Chronicles of Future Earth

• Cthulhu Rising

• Elfquest

• End Time

• Fractured Hopes

• Future World

• Hawkmoon

• High Colonies

• Laundry

• Luther Arkwright

• M‑Space

• Mission to Epsilon

• Mutant

• Once Men

• Operation Ulysses

• Outpost 19

• Other Suns

• Ringworld (Already reviewed)

• River of Heaven

• Rubble and Ruin

• Star Wars (RQ6)

• Swords of Cydoria

• Worlds Beyond

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April

22 books read. 12 by women (55%), 10 by men (45%).

Works by POC: 6 (27%)

Year to Date

86 books read. 46 by women (53%), 34 by men (40%), 2 by NB (2%). 4 by persons whose gender is unknown (5%).

Works by POC: 36.5 (42%)

And now, the meaningless table.

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At Sigma Station, a remote mining facility and luxury hotel in deep space, a group of tourists boards a small vessel to take in the stunning views of the Horsehead Nebula.

But while they’re out there, a mysterious ship with devastating advanced technology attacks the station. Their pilot’s quick thinking means that the tourists escape with their lives — but as the dust settles, they realise they may be the only survivors …

Adrift in outer space on a vastly under-equipped ship, they’ve got no experience, no weapons, no contact with civilisation. They are way out of their depth, and if they can’t figure out how to work together, they’re never getting home alive.

Because the ship that destroyed the station is still out there. And it’s looking for them…

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From the writer whose name is synonymous with the science of robotics comes five decades of robot visions-36 landmark stories and essays, plus three rare tales-gathered together in one volume. A collection of 18 of Asimov’s ( Foundation ) robot stories. The earliest tales here, written from 1940 to 1960, remain among the most-loved in the field, the best being ​“Little Lost Robot,” about a robot who obeys an order to ​“get lost.” ​“The Bicentennial Man” (1976) about one robot’s desires and efforts to be first free, then equal, is the quintessential robot-as-man’s‑mirror story. The book concludes with brief essays offering companionable commentary on the history of robots in fiction, the Frankenstein complex, the origin of Asimov’s famous Three Laws and the author’s own surprise at the emergence of robots during his lifetime.

Review
​“This collection offers 18 stories about robots as well as brief essays in which Asimov comments on robots in fiction, the Frankenstein complex, his famous Three Laws and the development of actual robots. ​“The earliest tales here, written from 1940 to 1960, remain among the most-loved in the field.” —Publishers Weekly

“Classic stories with new material, both fiction and fact, that puts the whole theme together in a larger context.” —Poul Andersen

About the Author

Isaac Asimov authored over 400 books in a career that lasted nearly 50 years. As a leading scientific writer, historian, and futurist, he covered a variety of subjects ranging from mathematics to humor, and won numerous awards for his work.

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