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Reviews in Project: Miscellaneous Reviews (358)

Til every battle’s won

Station Six

By S. J. Klapecki  

20 Jul, 2023

Miscellaneous Reviews

1 comment

S. J. Klapecki’s 2023 Station Six is a near future science fiction novella.

Lunar Module Construction — LMC — offers the army of workers on Station Six the opportunity to work hard enriching CEO Maximilian Ashe and LMC shareholders. In return they get almost enough money to sustain worker life. Life is tenuous at best. It’s about to get even worse. Impending automation will render most of the workforce redundant.

The workforce will probably be moved to another LMC station. The next location could very easily be worse. What are powerless workers to do?

Organize!


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Sheer Confusion

Mutant Pride  (Cute Mutants, volume 1)

By S. J. Whitby  

15 Jun, 2023

Miscellaneous Reviews

3 comments

2020’s Mutant Pride is the first novel in SJ Whitby’s Cute Mutant superhero series.

Teen Dylan Tayler has always felt like a screw-up. Now it’s worse. Her pillow is talking to her. Other inanimate objects are waking up around her, suddenly becoming animate and chatty1. As this continues, Dylan (a long-time fan of X‑Men comics) is becoming increasingly sure that she’s a mutant and must have a superpower.

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Now That We’re Done

Mammoths at the Gates  (Singing Hills Cycle, volume 4)

By Nghi Vo  

4 May, 2023

Miscellaneous Reviews

2 comments

Mammoths at the Gates is the fourth installment in Nghi Vo’s Singing Hill’s Cycle. Reviews of the previous three stories may be found here, here, and here.

Cleric Chih returns home to the Singing Hills abbey. Some say one can never go home again. In the case of Cleric Chih, one can go home. Sometimes, however, there is a pair of royal mammoths waiting for one.

Royal mammoths being able to easily flatten the gates and the monastery within, their presence is a matter of concern.

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Walk Me Home

The Iron Children

By Rebecca Fraimow  

2 Mar, 2023

Miscellaneous Reviews

2 comments

The Iron Children by Rebecca Fraimow is a stand-alone science fantasy novella.

Having tolerated Cesteli independence for decades, the Levastani empire is determined to reabsorb their break-away province. Cesteli is sparsely populated and their resistance seems doomed to failure. But … Cesteli has a supply of godstone. Godstone makes command plates possible; command plates allow a commander of a squad of metal-skinned cyborg soldiers — Dedicates — to act as one. Dedicates deal handily with opposition. Cesteli may be able to win this war.

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Gotta Have Faith

The Thousand Eyes  (Serpent Gates, volume 2)

By A. K. Larkwood  

23 Feb, 2023

Miscellaneous Reviews

0 comments

2022’s The Thousand Eyes is the second and final book in A. K. Larkwood’s secondary-universe sword-and-sorcery Serpent Gates duology.

Having survived the thrilling events of The Unspoken Name, retired divine sacrifice Csorwe, her lover (the scholar-mage Qanwa Shuthmili), and their duelist pal Talasseres Charossa have become murder-hobos for hire, protecting the inquisitive as they foolishly commit archaeology in a multiverse filled with things about which mortals are happier not knowing1.

Currently, their employer is one Dr. Ilver Tvelujan, an ambitious historian with an underdeveloped sense of self-preservation. Tvelujan won’t be making past the next paragraph.

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Flood Waters Rise

Sounding Dark  (Calpurnian Wars, volume 1)

By Jo Graham  

24 Jan, 2023

Miscellaneous Reviews

1 comment

2021’s Sounding Dark is the first volume in Jo Graham’s Calpurnian Wars series.

Interstellar great power Calpurnia eschews subtle hints when brute force will do as well. Thus, the initial indications that the matter of Eresh is once again occupying an autocrat’s mind come when two Eresh ships are ambushed and annihilated by a Calpurnian task force.

Arriving too late to intervene, the officers and crew of Steel Nine search for survivors. They find one. However, the survivor is neither from Eresh nor Calpurnia. Bister is Tainted, born and raised on the interdicted world of Inanna, around which the space facility Eresh orbits. They have no business being in space.

This is not Bister’s most unusual characteristic.

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Wait and See

The Keeper’s Six

By Kate Elliott  

29 Dec, 2022

Miscellaneous Reviews

5 comments

Kate Elliott’s 2023’s The Keeper’s Six is an upcoming (in only one month!) fantasy novel. 

Although few on Earth are aware of this, Earth is but one minor realm among many. Venture through the alien and deadly Beyond and any number of other worlds may be accessed. Although Earth is a primitive backwater, it is the source of a few goods that are available only on Earth. Thus, it has its own Keeps, through which Earth may be accessed and trade items acquired. The Keeps allow intermittent contact with the other worlds scattered through the Beyond.

Esther and the other members of her magical Hex used to wander the Beyond. Forbidden to do so in punishment for her transgressions, Esther is stuck on Earth. Crisis will force her to break the terms of her sentence.

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In Search of a Hidden Truth

The Foreign Exchange  (Mambo Reina, volume 2)

By Veronica G. Henry  

30 Nov, 2022

Miscellaneous Reviews

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The Foreign Exchange is the second volume in Veronica G. Henry’s Mambo Reina modern fantasy series.

Evangeline Vangie” Stiles discovers unexpected deposits in the family bank account. Vangie asks her husband Arthur for an explanation, but Arthur is cagey about the source and purpose of the money. Vangie is alarmed and turns to her hairdressing client Mambo Reina for help.

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So This is Oregon

The Secret Skin

By Wendy N. Wagner  

18 Oct, 2022

Miscellaneous Reviews

0 comments

Wendy N. Wagner’s 2021 The Secret Skin is a stand-alone horror novella.

June Vogel of the Oregon Vogels escaped wealth (and exacting, impossible expectations) for the austere but rewarding life of a spinster artist. Escape proves temporary; her brother Frederick asks for her help. Having found a suitable replacement for his late wife Blanche, Frederick intends to enjoy a honeymoon with his new bride, Lillian.

That leaves the matter of Abigail. Who is to care for Frederick’s daughter while he is having fun? Not a nanny, for those tend to flee the family estate as soon as they can.

Duty overrides preference and prudence. June packs her things and journeys to the Vogel Estate, Storm Break.


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