The Short: I just read an Advance Reader Copy (ARC) of Murmuration, a novel by TJ Klune, November 17, 2026 Tor. It’s great speculative fiction in the form of a psychological thriller about lo…

The Short: I just read Consider Her Ways & Others, a John Wyndham collection, 1961 Michael Joseph. I am not sure if I have ever read any other Wyndham collections. I was not surprised that my f…

The Short: Analog made 14 out of 15 short fiction finalists for the 2025 Analytical Laboratory readers poll available online. I recommend twelve out of 14 stories, with “Heat Death”, a …

The Short: A recent comment by my wetland and watershed scientist brother about the history of the protected watersheds that provide water to New York City (the Croton, Catskill and Delaware waters…

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The Short: I read an advance reader copy of Wole Talabi’s new SF/thriller novel The Fist of Memory, October 27, 2026 DAW Books. It’s a great novel with riveting characters and a breakne…

The Short: I read The Hidden Girl and Other Stories, Ken Liu, 2020 Saga a few years ago. It includes a good Preface by Ken Liu and eighteen short stories and novelettes, and one excerpt. It’s…

The Short: I loved the horror/comedy novel The Porcelain Sisters, by Daryl Gregory, October 2026 Tachyon. It involves twin sisters, one “real” and one porcelain. Isabel is the porcelain…

The Short: I just read an ARC of In Her Exquisite Clutches: A Mystery, by Auston Habershaw, March 2027 Tachyon. Think obsessive art collecting dragon and her henchman trying to solve the biggest ar…

The Short: The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2021, Veronica Roth editor & John Joseph Adams series editor, 2021 Mariner Books, includes twenty works of short speculative fiction, sp…

The Short: I attended at least one gathering and several panels relating to science fiction in the Czech Republic at the 2025 Seattle Worldcon. I obtained and read FROM THE LAND OF ROBOTS AND GOLEM…

The Short: I just read Fold Catastrophes, a Peter Watts collection, September 2026 Tachyon, which will be available in print and ebook editions. In addition to the eleven works of short fiction (on…

The Short: A “fix-up novel” is a book made up of previously published, related stories, often including one or more new stories, bridging material, or revisions to make it more coherent…

The short: I finally read the most recent collection by Theodora Goss, “Letters from an Imaginary Country”, 2025 Tachyon Publications. It includes a great Introduction by Jo Walton, six…

The Short: I just read The Big Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy, Ellen Datlow editor, 2025 Open Road Integrated Media (a re-issue of the 2008 Del Rey/Ballantine The Del Rey Book of Science Ficti…

The Short: I love the Lydia Duluth stories by Eleanor Arnason, although they have not been collected yet. Lydia Duluth is a location scout for an interstellar movie company; interesting things happ…

The Short: In my non-expert but also non-lay opinion, the MyShake app and its underlying ShakeAlert system are useful to me.  It is useful and even essential for improving my personal saf…

The Short: After reading five pastiches of Jane Austen’s novel Pride and Prejudice including several works of speculative fiction, I ended up rereading Pride and Prejudice as well for the fir…

The Short: The Best of Ian McDonald, 2016 PS Publishing, came out in two different editions of SF/fantasy/horror, a deluxe edition with twenty-one stories and one with ten stories. My e-book versio…

The Short: I continue to think that the novella (17,500 to 40,000 words) is the perfect story length for speculative fiction, and I’m not the only one. Looking at one aspect of how healthy an…

I have been seeing more than a few posts recently on Nextdoor (a neighborhood-centric network and social media and whatnot) recently by people in my area who are outraged by how much their water is…

The Short: I finally read Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora, Sheree R. Thomas editor, 2000 Aspect/Warner Books. It includes 29 works of short fiction and seven…

The Short: Uncertain Sons and Other Stories, by Thomas Ha, 2025 Undertow Publications, is an impressive first collection. My favorites were the great “The Brotherhood of Montague St. Video&#8…

I read a lot of speculative fiction which includes settings I know and settings I don’t know, from areas near where I live to galaxies and universes far, far away. I have heard that one of th…

The Short: Most of us don’t typically think about finding novels included in speculative fiction anthologies. After reading about two of them in 2025, I decided to write about them. I found n…

The Short: I just read Tales from the Territory, a Travis Baldree collection, Fall 2026 Subterranean Press. It includes five works of cozy fantasy short fiction. Information online suggests there w…

The short: I read the new Michael Swanwick collection, The Universe Box, February 2026 Tachyon Publications. It includes an Introduction by Swanwick and 19 works of short fiction from 2012 to 2026.…

The Short: I sloppily read Book 2 of K. J. Parker’s Loyal Opposition Trilogy, Sister Svangerd and the Devil You Know, May 12, 2026 Orbit, out of order. I loved it anyway, although it probably…

The short: I’ve been a fan of science fiction by Algis Budrys for a long time. Looking recently, I was surprised that I did not find a “Best Of” or “Selected Short Fiction&#…

The short: I recently read The Martian Trilogy (John P. Moore, Amazing Stories, Black Science Fiction, and The Illustrated Features Section), including three related 1930 short stories by John…

The Short: My top nominations for the 2026 (2025) Hugo Awards are: Best Novel: a tie between the superlative Slow Gods, by Claire North (Catherine Webb), Orbit, and Death of the Author, by Nnedi Ok…

The Short: I read an advance reader copy of Rabbit Test and Other Stories, Samantha Mills, scheduled for April 21, 2026 release by Tachyon Publications. This first collection by Samantha Mills incl…

The Short: I read The Best of World SF: Volume 1, Lavie Tidhar editor, 2021 Ad Astra/Head of Zeus, a few years ago. It’s a fairly hefty anthology of mostly reprinted world SF, with a generous…

The Short: I recently read “Hellhounds of the Cosmos”, a novelette by Clifford D. Simak, Astounding June 1932. It’s not very good, although I am not sorry I read it. This made me …

The Short: Radiant Star by Anne Leckie, May 2026 Tor, is the sixth Ancillary Universe novel. I love this great science fiction story of isolated planet Aaa, religious and cultural conflicts, a wate…

The Short: I just read an Advance Reader Copy (ARC) of The Best of Adrian Tchaikovsky, scheduled for release on February 28, 2026, Subterranean. It’s noted as available in hardcover and e-boo…

The Short: The Best of Lucius Shepard, 2008 Subterranean Press, is in print in e-book and hardcover. It includes 18 short works of speculative fiction, ranging from short stories to novellas. It&#8…

The Short: I read Hwarhath Stories: Transgressive Tales by Aliens, an Eleanor Arnason collection, 2016 Aqueduct Press, a few years ago, and it stuck with me. It includes 13 Hwarhath stories, and a …

The Short: I finally read Mildred Clingerman’s posthumous collection The Clingerman Files, Mark Bradley editor, 2017 Size 5 1/2 B Publishing. This reprints the contents of her collection A Cu…

The Short: I just read Harmattan Season, a novel by Tochi Onyebuchi, 2025 Tor. I loved it. To quote Gary K. Wolfe’s review at Locus Magazine, it’s a “hardboiled political/historic…

The Short: We recently got a new puppy. We love him, but he has turned our life upside down as expected. This led me to think about both a) how much I love SFF that features dogs, and b) how the ad…

Welcome to the Locus Recommended Reading List… We saw some fabulous books come out last year and are so pleased to let you know about them! Our recommendations are compiled annually by the Locus re…

The short: After some discussion at the Science Fiction Book Club on Facebook of how satisfactory the results of the 1990 Locus Poll SF novels is viewed today, I decided to take a whack. Here is my…

The Short: Cyberabad Days, 2009 Pyr/Prometheus and Gollancz, by Ian McDonald, is a seven story collection in his India 2047 series. The Pyr/Prometheus edition also has a worthwhile introductory ess…

The Short: I just read The Hard SF Renaissance, Kathryn Cramer & David G. Hartwell editors, 2002 Tor. It’s a brick of a book, 41 stories and 960 pages. By a hair, my favorite story was &#…

The Short: When our water bill blows up in a surprising way, there are a number of basic possibilities. These include: We have a large leak that is not spurting all over the place where we can see …

The Short: I read the Harlan Ellison collection The Beast That Shouted Love at the Heart of the World, 1969 Avon, recently when I wanted to read his story “White on White”. Although hor…

The Short: I recently read the Alastair Reynolds collection Belladonna Nights and Other Stories, 2021 Subterranean Press. It includes 16 short stories and novelettes. It also includes an Introducti…