Six Months, Three Days by Charlie Jane Anders

People who can see the future are fiddly characters to use. Especially if they can see their own immediate future. Continue reading →

The Rats in the Walls by H.P. Lovecraft

A week or so ago I was at Necronomicon, a four day convention in Providence devoted exclusively to the works Continue reading →

The Long Sheet by William Sansom

By this point you might have noticed that I’m fond of high concept stories, of big glittering ideas that would Continue reading →

Understand by Ted Chiang

Characters who are smarter than the smartest human are notoriously difficult to write well. It’s relatively easy to get away Continue reading →

Catskin by Kelly Link

The previous fantasy I discussed may have gone to odd and surreal places, but it did so one after another Continue reading →

The Music from Behind the Moon by James Branch Cabell

Lately I’ve been enjoying Philip Pullman’s new translation/distillation of Grimms’ Fairy Tales, one tale before bed for fifty nights running. Continue reading →

The Tugging by Ramsey Campbell

One of the things Campbell excels at is capturing the atmosphere of a grotty run-down urban environment populated by grey Continue reading →

Portraits of his Children by George R.R. Martin

A standard piece of advice to new writers is that you shouldn’t write more than one novel, or a few Continue reading →