James Nicoll Reviews

Andrea Hairston’s 2021 Master of Poisons is a stand-alone, secondary world fantasy.

The Arkhysian empire has a simple plan for success: 

• Relentlessly expand.
• Drain societies’ discards — criminals, heretics, and the unlucky (like magical adept Awa) — of blood to use in magic. 
• Do its best to ignore the long-term environmental and economic costs of its policies. 

Reality has no respect for society’s elite, thus the magic-induced environmental crisis now facing the empire.

Read more ➤

Andrea Hairston’s 2016’s Will Do Magic for Small Change is a historical fantasy. It is set in the same world as Redwood and Wildfire. It won a spot on the 2016 Tiptree Honor List.

Pittsburgh teen Cinnamon Jones deeply mourns her deceased brother Sekou. She treasures a book he once owned, an old leather-bound chronicle. But the book is more than a keepsake: it is magic. 

Read more ➤