Working backwards again, still in my Kindle Paperwhite.
Low-budget art. This creature tries to seduce the protagonist. No, seriously. You’re welcome for the visual.
Ship of Destiny, Frank Chadwick. Baen bundle. The sleeper winner of the last few weeks, it wildly surpassed my expectations—which were lowered in large part by the unbelievably bad cover art. (Something about judging books and covers…) Decently-paced, strong writing for the genre and introduced some serious topics under the space opera fun. Read again factor: Fairly high.
Padre Prequel: Damascus Road, David Gatward. Free direct download. I’m not sure how I stumbled on this novella, but it was reasonably fun reading—think of it as horror for the religious. Entertaining but not compelling. Read again factor: Unlikely.
Peak Performance: Elevate Your Game, Avoid Burnout, and Thrive with the New Science of Success, Brad Stulberg and Steve Magness. Tour d’horizon of recent (2017) literature and research on human performance, resilience and related topics. Excellent and focused. Will be subject of a stand-alone article. Read again factor: About as close to certain as you can get.
Mr. Wells & The Martians: A Thrilling Eye-Witness Account of the Recent Invasion, Kevin J. Anderson. Another excellent read from the author of the two Clockwork Lives steampunk novels I read earlier this year. Frothy but oddly satisfying, quick and entertaining. Read again factor: Strong maybe.
Write Like Hell: Horror and Dark Fantasy, Vol 1., Mitchell Luthi, et al. Anthology of short pieces. None of it was great and none of it was awful, and it doesn’t take itself too seriously. This is horror as light beer: less filling and tastes…”great” might be too strong. Read again factor: Surprisingly definitely maybe.
Gateway to Rust & Ruin (Empires of Steam & Rust), Robert E. Varedman. More steampunkery, this time in a clockwork-and-zeppelin infested alternate World War I world. Air pirates in dirigibles, Einstein’s evil brother, and a hole in the dimensional whatever that leads to a mirror universe that’s literally rusting away. I liked it enough to finish, probably not enough to read more of the series. Read again factor: Bottom of the stack.
Simple and effective. This is SO the cover the book deserves.
Come to Me, Sin Soracco. Fascinating story of santeria devotees in modern San Francisco. I expected to not like this after trying to read Edge City, but this was awesomely well done and, shockingly, very original. Read again factor: High.
Voyager, Harper Voyager USA. Excerpts from 15 upcoming SFF novels. The God Hunter andThe Witch With No Name were both good, but the strongest piece was Black Dog, about a collection agent for the Grim Reaper. The set was weighted down by several genre pieces I just couldn’t get into (faeries and the fae and a…bard?) but wasn’t a waste of time. Read again factor: Just north of zero, but not much.
Vows and Other Tales of the Macabre, Arjay Lewis. I wasn’t a fan of Lewis’ Fire In The Mind but this was a good read, and had some very creative stories. Very dark, in general, either in the setting or thematically. Read again factor: Strong maybe.