criticality

reviews and other non-fiction

Over the years I've written reviews for The Guardian, Foundation, Interzone, Vector, Odyssey, Beyond and various other places. Most of my reviews these days are written for infinity plus and The Guardian (including contributing to the SF/F section of their 1000 novels everyone must read), and lots of my older reviews have been republished at the former site, so most of the links below lead to these two publications, except otherwise specified.

A note on identities
Just to complicate matters, I sometimes review under my other writing name, Nick Gifford. There's nothing underhand about this: it's simply that "Nick" writes fiction for young adults, so it makes sense to be him when reviewing other young adult fiction; and allowing Nick to review a few adult novels and art books helped plump up his CV in the early days!

recent reviews

Chris Beckett's The Holy Machine (written for The Guardian, but not published there due to a clash, published here July 2010); Mike Ashley's The Mammoth Book of Apocalyptic SF (The Guardian, June 2010); Adam Roberts's Yellow Blue Tibia (The Guardian, May 2010); Joe R Lansdale's The Best of Joe R Lansdale (The Guardian, April 2010); Michael Cobley's Seeds of Earth (The Guardian, February 2010); Stephen M Irwin's The Darkening (The Guardian, January 2010); Marianne de Pierres' Mirror Space (The Guardian, December 2009); Orson Scott Card's Ender in Exile (The Guardian, November 2009); Kit Reed's The Night Children (The Guardian, October 2009).

in-depth

Monterra's Deliciosa & Other Tales - a foreword to Anna Tambour's first collection, reproduced as part of the infinity plus introduces series. I talked my way into writing this one, as I was so pleased to have played my small part in bringing this exciting new writer to a wider audience. She's a one-off, and a good one.
Deep Future - a foreword to Eric Brown's collection of short fiction, published by Wildside's Cosmos imprint in January 2001; reproduced as part of the infinity plus introduces series. This might look a bit incestuous... Eric writes an introduction to my new collection, I write one for his. But then this is a logical extension of the fact that we work closely together, both on collaborations and on our solo work. I watch Eric's writing career as a friend, a collaborator, but also as a fan -- it was great to have the chance to explore these different perspectives in this foreword.

reviews

Brian Aldiss (editor): A Science Fiction Omnibus [The Guardian]
(review published: December 2007)
"This anthology may not quite change your world, but as a sampler of what SF can do it's hard to beat."
Lou Anders (editor): Sideways in Crime [The Guardian]
(review published: June 2009)
"The high standard of the anthology is reflected by the fact that three of its stories have recently been shortlisted for the Sidewise Award for alternate fiction."
MT Anderson: Feed
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: November 2003)
"Treads a very fine line between triumph and failure in the way Anderson has chosen to tackle his personally-invasive 1984-ish future."
Patricia Anthony: Flanders
(review published: February 2000)
"A ghost story of a kind, a dark fantasy of the dead. And if there's anywhere for ghosts, for young men dead long before their business with this world is complete, then it's the killing fields of the First World War ... If there's such a thing as the beauty of war, it's there in Anthony's prose: in the loving detail of awfulness, the vivid illustration of how low humankind can sink."
Tom Arden: Doctor Who Novellas: Nightdreamers
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: June 2002)
"Tom Arden captures the pantomime noir of Doctor Who to a T ... a warmly nostalgic chunk of high jinks."
Kelley Armstrong: The Summoning
[The Guardian]
(review published: July 2008)
"Armstrong's gushing prose has the storyteller's knack of compelling the reader to start just one more chapter, despite knowing there must be a better way to spend one's time than this."
Neal Asher: Prador Moon [The Guardian]
(review published: October 2008)
"...this punchy and very violent short novel from the Essex hard man of science fiction."
Mike Ashley (editor): The Mammoth Book of Apocalyptic SF [The Guardian]
(review published: June 2010)
"What emerges from most of these stories is that apocalypse is not so much about the end, but about new beginnings - that staple of SF, the blank canvas. In this volume, Ashley fills that canvas with consummate skill."
Iain M Banks: The Algebraist
(review published: January 2005)
"There's something very odd about this book, something I still haven't quite managed to work out."
Iain M Banks: Matter
[The Guardian] (review published: March 2009)
"Another fine addition to Banks's Culture series."
Paul Barnett: The Paper Tiger Fantasy Art Gallery
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: November 2002)
"In a field wedded to pushing and breaking boundaries, so much of the art is safe ... The Paper Tiger Fantasy Art Gallery demonstrates how this need not be the case."
Stephen Baxter: The Web: Gulliverzone
(review published: August 1997)
"This one's fun."
Stephen Baxter: Traces
(review published: May 1998)
"There's much to admire in almost any Stephen Baxter story, but in certain stories there's everything to admire."
Stephen Baxter: Mammoth - Book 1: Silverhair
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: March 1999)
"Like Watership Down, Mammoth makes for pretty grim reading at times: no whimsical flopsy-wopsy bunnies here... Like Adams before him, Baxter gets it just right ... Books like this should be part of the National Curriculum for science."
Stephen Baxter: Moonseed
(review published: September 1999)
"Baxter's Moonseed is a powerful, gripping novel which sets the brain as well as the heart racing."
Stephen Baxter: Time
(review published: September 1999)
"I wouldn't go as far as they do on the cover - 'The millennium's last great SF novel' - but Stephen Baxter's Time is certainly a good one, albeit with slightly disturbing undercurrents."
Stephen Baxter et al: The Web 2028
(review published August 2000)
"Good light sf. Its greatest value, as with the first series, is that it introduces the next generation of readers to some of our best practitioners."
Stephen Baxter: Mammoth - Book 2: Longtusk
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: October 2000)
"...exploring the truth behind the legend, the many ways in which history is glossed over and polished in the re-telling ... a fine piece of paleoanthropological fiction, combining science-fictional speculation of the highest order with his customary meticulous research."
Stephen Baxter: Space
(review published: April 2001)
"In dismissing standard explanations for Fermi's paradox, Baxter has set himself an almighty challenge: he has to come up with a better explanation. He does so, admirably, as you might expect from one of the deepest thinkers in modern sf."
Stephen Baxter: Origin
(review published: August 2001)
"Part-survival adventure and part-anthropological-speculation story, which sidesteps tangentially towards discovery of the true nature of the universe. Come to think of it, there aren't many books you could sum up quite like that..."
Stephen Baxter: Deep Future
(review published: August 2001)
"For a work of futurology, Deep Future dwells an awful lot on the here and now ... There's a real sense that there are two books here: the Clarkeian futurology sitting a little uncomfortably alongside the analysis of space history."
Stephen Baxter: Flood [The Guardian]
(review published: July 2009)
"A fine addition to the British science-fiction tradition of disaster novels, reading like something John Wyndham might have written if he had tackled climate change on a global scale, laced with the kind of scientific rigour you would expect from Baxter."
Chris Beckett: The Holy Machine [written for The Guardian, but not published there due to a clash]
(review published here: July 2010)
"A very timely dystopia that marks Beckett out as an author to follow closely."
Michael Bishop: A Reverie for Mister Ray: Reflections on Life, Death and Speculative Fiction
"This book explores a whole range of fictional territories where each, in its way, is more real -- a magnified reality -- than the world around us.You couldn't hope for a more intelligent, engaging and downright companionable guide than Bishop."
Stephen Bowkett: The Web: Dreamcastle
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: August 1997)
"Bowkett's contribution to the Web series is concerned with the fuzzy borderland between the real and the virtual: what happens when you lose sight of the dividing line? What happens when someone deliberately muddies that distinction?"
Ray Bradbury: R is for Rocket and S is for Space (review published: December 2005)
"This is Ray Bradbury. You shouldn't need to know anything more than that."
Ray Bradbury: Ray Bradbury: Stories, Vols 1 and 2 [The Guardian]
(review published: December 2008)
"Collected in these two enormous volumes are classic works of speculative fiction."
Eric Brown: Blue Shifting
(review published: July 1997)
"Blue Shifting isn't a collected works, it's a greatest hits."
Eric Brown: The Web: Untouchable
(review published: October 1997)
"A slick, fast-paced story, with all the atmosphere and deeply wrought characters we have come to expect from Brown."
Eric Brown et al: The Web 2028
(review published August 2000)
"Good light sf. Its greatest value, as with the first series, is that it introduces the next generation of readers to some of our best practitioners."
Pat Cadigan et al: The Web 2028
(review published August 2000)
"Good light sf. Its greatest value, as with the first series, is that it introduces the next generation of readers to some of our best practitioners."
Alan Campbell: Scar Night [The Guardian]
(review published: May 2007)
For reasons of space, the closing line was dropped from the published review: "An unfeasibly good debut novel."
Orson Scott Card: Ender in Exile [The Guardian]
(review published: November 2009)
"The novel picks up thirteen year-old Ender Wiggin's story in the aftermath of the war he almost singlehandedly won against the alien Buggers... Unfocused and suffering from the need to pull together too many threads from connected stories, Ender in Exile will nonetheless be welcomed by the many fans of this series."
Stepan Chapman: The Troika
(review published: April 1998)
"In novels like this ('novels like this' - what am I saying? There are no novels like this!)..."
Stepan Chapman: Dossier: a collection of short stories
(review published: July 2001)
"These are tales that in past generations would have been read around the camp-fire... The language is simple, yet the simplicity of telling is often illusory, drawing the reader into dark twistings of the imagination."
Brian Clegg: A Brief History of Infinity
(review published: review published: December 2003)
"Brian Clegg has just had me revisiting areas of mathematics I haven't even considered since university. And I enjoyed it."
John Clute: Appleseed
(review published: November 2001)
"John Clute, with his wealth of experience and genre knowledge, may not get everything right first time out (it would be asking a lot to expect Appleseed to meet the critical standards Clute himself sets), but one thing is sure: he won't get it wrong for lack of thinking or effort."
Michael Cobley: Seeds of Earth [The Guardian]
(review published: February 2010)
"Merciless alien invaders, lost human colonies, mysterious secrets of the ancients... a gripping science-fiction adventure that combines the traditions of the field with a deft contemporary touch."
Peter Crowther: Futures
(review by Keith Brooke and Nick Gevers; review published: May 2001)
"Novellas by four of the UK's leading sf authors put together in what is possibly the most handsome genre publication in recent memory."
Peter Crowther: Cities and Infinities
(review by Keith Brooke et al; review published: May 2003)
"British sf is flourishing and Peter Crowther has played an important part in this, providing opportunities for some of our best authors to work at a length that is generally assumed to be hard to publish successfully."
Marianne de Pierres: Mirror Space [The Guardian]
(review published: December 2009)
"In Mirror Space stuff happens, then something else happens and then it all pulls together, and then... the reader must wait for volume four."
Philip K Dick: Flow, My Tears, the Policeman Said [The Guardian]
(review published: March 2007)
"...suddenly Dick is tugging at the thread again, unravelling Taverner's and the reader's perceptions as only he can."
Philip K Dick: Minority Report
(review published: September 2002)
"There are three Dicks at loose in this collection: the dazzler, the pedestrian and the downright weird."
Paul Di Filippo: A Year in the Linear City
(review published: June 2002)
"Fiction of the highest order ... an author who genuinely comes close to defying all attempts at description."
Chris Dolley: Resonance
(review published: January 2006)
"Resonance is a tremendously accomplished book for a first published novel and immediately raises Dolley into the ranks of writers to watch."
Gardner Dozois (editor): The Best New SF 10
(review published: November 1997)
"Gardner Dozois' annual gathering of his favourite short sf has become something of a benchmark for the genre..."
Gardner Dozois (editor): The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 11
(review published: February 1999)
"Gardner Dozois has earned our trust: he does the job more reliably than any of the others who have tried over the last two decades..."
Gardner Dozois (editor): The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 13
(review published: February 2001)
"Another year, another selection from Gardner Dozois, another hefty must-read."
Gardner Dozois (editor): The Mammoth Book of Best New SF 17 (review published: July 2005)
"A fine anthology, easily matching the high standard set by earlier volumes in the series. So what's the problem?"
Hal Duncan: Escape from Hell!
[The Guardian] (review published: January 2009)
"Too grittily realistic to be satire, too funny to be straight adventure romp... a gripping and stylish read from one of the most talented new fantasy writers to emerge in a long time."
Steven Erikson: Gardens of the Moon
(review published: November 1999)
"Steven Erikson could become a giant one day, an epic-writer with something to say, and that would give fantasy a refreshing kick up the backside... where he struggles is with portraying the broader picture: in portraying the detail convincingly, he leaves the reader struggling to piece it all together into a coherent whole."
Ian C Esslemont : Night of Knives [The Guardian]
(review published: May 2008)
"There is a lot going on here; as one character says of events, 'There is too much for any one person to get hold of,' which is both a strength and the potential downfall of this novel, a challenge Esslemont's page-turning storytelling fights valiantly from start to finish."
Maggie Furey: The Web: Sorceress
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: February 1998)
"Furey ties up the Web series in compelling and exciting manner: Sorceress is a helter-skelter adventure romp that's hard to put down."
Maggie Furey: The Web 2028
(review published August 2000)
"Good light sf. Its greatest value, as with the first series, is that it introduces the next generation of readers to some of our best practitioners."
Neil Gaiman: Coraline [The Guardian]
(review published: April 2009)
"Enchanting and creepy by turns, Coraline is a very grown-up fairy tale for all ages, a story that reads as if Alice's Adventures in Wonderland had been rewritten by Lemony Snicket in a particularly dark and twisted mood."
Fred Gambino: Ground Zero
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: October 2001)
"He is an artist of vivid colour and fantastically dramatic perspectives ... Gambino's future is so bright, you really do need shades, so dramatic that you're there."
David Garnett (editor): New Worlds
(review published: August 1998)
"This is certainly the Real Thing."
Kathleen Ann Goonan: The Bones of Time
(review by by Nick Gifford; review published: June 1999)
"The Bones of Time opens with two tragic losses and ends in too much of a wham-bam hurry ...a good and entertaining novel, but if Goonan would just relax and trust her obvious talent she would be capable of far more."
Colin Greenland: The Plenty Principle
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: March 1998)
"Few writers would risk such a flouting of genre rules, and few are as skilful as Greenland when they do it."
Jon Courtenay Grimwood: Lucifer's Dragon
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: April 2004)
"A high-octane, streetwise, technologically-sophisticated thriller. Violent, passionate and thoroughly seedy, Lucifer's Dragon makes for a cracking good read."
Jon Courtenay Grimwood: Pashazade [The Guardian]
(review published: September 2008)
"Grimwood writes rich and pacy prose, combining science fiction, thriller, and hard-boiled crime fiction with a vivid, sultry setting steeped in highly believable alternate history."
Joe Haldeman: The Forever War
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: April 1999)
"The definitive version of ... one of the finest polemical works in science fiction. Through relentless extrapolation of a single science-fictional idea, Haldeman illustrates the grand futility of warfare..."
Joe Haldeman: Forever Free
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: April 2002)
"This novel, a direct sequel to The Forever War, was always going to suffer by comparison with its award-laden predecessor, a book described by Peter Hamilton as 'near perfect' and in my own earlier review as 'one of the finest polemical works in science fiction'."
Peter F Hamilton: The Nano Flower
(review published: July 1997)
"His most accomplished yet."
Peter F Hamilton: The Reality Dysfunction
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: July 1997)
"It's a hell of a book - any other writer would have mined all the ideas contained in The Reality Dysfunction for three or four novels."
Peter F Hamilton: The Neutronium Alchemist
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: January 1998)
"Hamilton improves with every novel."
Peter F Hamilton: The Web: Lightstorm
(review published: February 1998)
"With Lightstorm he turns his hand to young adult sf in the shared world of the Web series but unfortunately the result is something of a disappointment."
Peter F Hamilton: A Second Chance at Eden
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: November 1998)
"Peter Hamilton's first collection of short fiction spans his career: from an early small press story, through a first professional sale to a brand new story and novella, with three other stops along the way... not only is 'A Second Chance at Eden' an effective and satisfying mystery, it's also a pivotal piece of backfill in the Night's Dawn future history. A major achievement..."
Peter F Hamilton: The Naked God
(review published: January 2000)
"A book like this barely needs reviewing: it's here, it's up to the standard the author has set himself and it neatly ties up the series ... you hardly need advising to buy this book."
Elizabeth Hand: Glimmering
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: December 1997)
"This claustrophobic novel doesn't play by the conventional rules of science fiction and ultimately fails because of this."
Noel K Hannan: Shenanigans
(review published: September 2000)
"It could be argued that it's too early for a single author collection to be published ... but then Noel K Hannan has rarely opted for the conventional route."
David A Hardy: Aurora
(review published: May 2004)
"A novel which occupied my thoughts when I wasn't reading, and kept me reading longer than intended."
Charlaine Harris: Dead Until Dark and Living Dead in Dallas: two Sookie Stackhouse novels
(review published: November 2004)
"The stories are real page-turners -- so much so that, on finishing Dead Until Dark, I immediately started on its sequel."
Robert Holdstock: Celtika
(review published: June 2001)
"In Celtika, Holdstock takes the grist of so much modern fantasy product and re-shapes it to his own ends. It could easily be seen as a safe move and yet could just as easily be seen as a big risk..."
Robert Holdstock: The Iron Grail: Book Two of the Merlin Codex
(review published: September 2002)
"Both the novel in its own right and the series of which it forms the second volume clearly rank among the finest works of Robert Holdstock ... It is, quite simply, one of the books of the year."
Tom Holt: Wish You Were Here
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: March 1998)
"The novel's packed with superb comic writing -- an often jaundiced and cynical humour that's closer to Tom Sharpe than the standard comic fantasy yardstick, Terry Pratchett."
Stuart Hughes: Ocean Eyes
(review published: July 1997)
"Why should I complain, when Hughes has just knocked my prejudices into touch with powerful and moving horrific fiction?"
Charlie Huston: Already Dead
[The Guardian] (review published: February 2007)
"Skilfully interweaves a hidden vampire Manhattan with the city we think we know in a pacy, gripping read."
Shaun Hutson: Dying Words
[The Guardian] (review published: August 2007)
"Sure, you could tear holes in the logic of the characters' actions, you could wish for artful prose and clever descriptions, but if you want pacy, explicit, edge-of-the-seat storytelling, Hutson is always a good bet."
Simon Ings: Headlong
(review published: February 1999)
"...those brave adventurers who dared to become more than human have become redundant, a dead end on the techno-evolutionary trail. What do you do when your head's full of useless sockets, when you've been superseded by AIs, when you've been dumped back into a world where you can't function properly...? A seriously good book."
Stephen M Irwin: The Darkening [The Guardian]
(review published: January 2010)
"Comparisons with Stephen King are far too frequent in reviews of horror fiction, but in the case of Stephen M Irwin's The Darkening, such a reference is valid... More than just a scary story - which it is - The Darkening is packed with vivid settings and wonderful characters. Irwin's will be a career to follow closely."
Gwyneth Jones: Rainbow Bridge [The Guardian]
(review published: April 2007)
"The author's style, full of ricochets and suggestion, treads the line between frustrating the reader and giving a kaleidoscopic view of a fragmented future..."
Graham Joyce: The Web: Spiderbite
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: October 1997)
"A terrific, high-paced romp."
Graham Joyce: Smoking Poppy
(review published: September 2002)
"Smoking Poppy is a quest novel in the best possible sense of the description ... a fine piece of work."
Graham Joyce: TWOC
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: July 2005)
"A very adult teen book, or a very teen adult book. And it's bloody good."
Dick Jude: Fantasy Art of the New Millennium
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: January 2000)
"Sometimes you get a review copy you just can't put down, from the moment you tear open the wrapping. This beautifully produced guide to the approaches of ten leading cover artists is such a volume: a book to dip into, a book to idly flick through, a book to read from cover to cover."
Tracy Knight: The Astonished Eye
(review published: April 2002)
"This book is, indeed, more interesting than a summary may lead you to believe, but it is also less satisfying than it might have been."
David Langford: The Leaky Establishment
(review published: May 2001)
"A wonderfully intelligent and funny Civil Service defence research establishment romp ... a bemused comedy of the blasé, the misguided, the incompetent, the blundering..."
Joe R Lansdale: The Best of Joe R Lansdale [The Guardian]
(review published: April 2010)
"Let this volume of superb short work introduce you to the uncensored, unfiltered and really quite mad world of Joe R Lansdale. He is a writer deserving of a wide and appreciative audience."
James Lovegrove et al: The Web 2028
(review published August 2000)
"Good light sf. Its greatest value, as with the first series, is that it introduces the next generation of readers to some of our best practitioners."
James Lovegrove: Untied Kingdom
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: April 2003)
"This is a novel in the grand tradition of usually-British post-collapse fiction ... a subtle and deft tale of collapse, a carefully crafted story of descent into a barbaric future."
Ian R MacLeod: The Light Ages
(review published: August 2003)
"The backdrop for Ian R MacLeod's rather good new novel is immediately familiar, immediately establishes a rough date, and yet also immediately other."
Ken MacLeod: The Cassini Division
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: May 1998)
"You could describe The Cassini Division as socialist military post-cyberpunk sf. Or you could simply describe it as a fine novel. I'll settle for the latter."
Ken MacLeod: The Web 2028
(review published August 2000)
"Good light sf. Its greatest value, as with the first series, is that it introduces the next generation of readers to some of our best practitioners."
George RR Martin: Dreamsongs [The Guardian]
(review published: October 2007)
"...the ideal way to discover one of genre fiction's finest writers."
George Mann: The Mammoth Encyclopedia of Science Fiction
(review published: October 2001)
"Presented as an encyclopedia, TMEoSF is hardly encyclopedic ... a good book, and one I will use often, despite its eccentricities."
George Mann (editor): The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction: Volume 2 [The Guardian]
(review published: March 2008)
"Highlights include Dan Abnett's brilliantly deadpan version of humankind's first encounter with visiting aliens, a mischievous story that defies all established science-fiction convention..."
Paul McAuley : Cowboy Angels [The Guardian]
(review published: June 2008)
Unfortunately, space constraints meant the last line of my review was dropped: "A page-turning thriller of history, fate and quantum physics."
Jack McDevitt: Moonfall
(review published: September 1999)
"With Moonfall, the self-proclaimed ultimate disaster novel, no-one would accuse Jack McDevitt of committing literature."
Ian McDonald: Brasyl
[The Guardian]
(review published: August 2008)
"There are few if any science-fiction writers currently working who display the kind of flair, intelligence and sheer pizzazz that is par for the course with Ian McDonald."
Ian McDonald: Chaga
(review published: July 1997)
"What can I say? This is the kind of novel that makes other writers wonder why they bother."
Ian McDonald: Kirinya
(review published: September 1998)
"Where Chaga seduced, Kirinya gets you drunk and confused and then it sneaks up and mugs you. And leaves you wanting more."
Stephanie Meyers: The Host [The Guardian]
(review published: August 2009)
"...veers too often into either melodrama or sheer tedium... little more than a half-decent doorstep-sized chunk of light entertainment."
Sasha Miller: Ladylord
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: August 1997)
"Is it fair to patronise what is, in fact, a compelling, exciting and, not to put too fine a point on it, good read?"
Michael Moorcock: The Best of Michael Moorcock [The Guardian]
(review published: May 2009)
"This collection illustrates the breadth of Moorcock's talent... A long-overdue retrospective."
Michael Moorcock: Behold the Man
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: January 2000)
"Speaks far more eloquently of human compassion and folly and anger than 99% of the claptrap that would be approved of by modern Christianity. One of the great works of twentieth century literature."
Christopher Moore: The Stupidest Angel: A Heart warming Tale of Christmas Terror [The Guardian]
(review published: December 2008)
"Pacy and engaging, this is a comic fantasy crammed with sharp and funny one-liners from the man who has previously come up with the memorably titled Island of the Sequined Love Nun and The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove."
James Morrow: Shambling Towards Hiroshima
[The Guardian] (review published: February 2009)
"A smart and wry portrayal of a 1940s Hollywood that never quite existed... Few authors could successfully combine politics, humour and the line 'We can thank our lucky stars that Hitler never got the lizard', but Morrow pulls it off with aplomb."
Andy Murray: Phobic [The Guardian]
(review published: June 2007)
"...horror stories set in a world of mobile phones, the internet and computer gaming, fears induced by climate change, child abduction and the sheer terror of going to Ikea and not finding a single thing you want... a patchy but rewarding anthology."
Nemonymous 3
(review published: May 2003)
"Another fine issue, with four stand-out stories and many that display strengths in a variety of ways."
Stan Nicholls (with Simon Archer): Gerry Anderson: the authorised biography
(review published: January 1998)
"After reading this book, I was left with the impression that I knew a lot of what Gerry Anderson has done, but I certainly didn't know the man himself."
Stan Nicholls: Bodyguard of Lightning
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: May 1999)
"In the beginning there was a badly drawn map with silly names in a hard-to-read font... anyone going into this novel with their prejudices on full alert isn't going to be particularly surprised by what they find."
KJ Parker: The Company [The Guardian]
(review published: September 2009)
"It's hard to like a book peopled by characters who are ruthless, selfish, insensitive and ready to betray even those closest to them, and yet who simultaneously lack the charisma or attitude to be true antiheroes... a story of unpleasant people being not very nice to each other that is compelling and leaves the reader wanting more."
Robert Phillips (editor): Nightshade: 20th Century Ghost Stories
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: October 2002)
"A far more radical selection than its packaging might imply ... I found a good number of hits and misses in this book, instead of the predictable mediocrity of so many theme anthologies."
Postscripts: #1, Spring 2004
(review published September 2004)
"Lived up to my high expectations: an excellent magazine/anthology with some knockout stories and fine non-fiction."
Postscripts: issues 3 & 4
(review published: September 2005)
"It's great to find a magazine that publishes such a diversity of genre and style in every issue, to such a high standard."
Postscripts: issue 5
(review published: March 2006)
"The best fiction magazines can be relied on to include, if not bad stories then stories that just don't work for you, stories you don't get..."
Terry Pratchett: The City Watch Trilogy and Guards! Guards! (graphic novel version)
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: February 2001)
"One way of rating a Terry Pratchett novel is on the frequency of jokes and passages you simply have to read aloud to whoever is nearby ... some are breathtakingly funny and clever, while others are simply well crafted entertainments ... Not at all bad."
Kit Reed: The Night Children [The Guardian] (review published: October 2009)
"Written for a teen audience, The Night Children combines the satirical bite of Reed's adult work with the brooding intensity of her 'Kit Craig' psychological thrillers... a twenty-first century fairy tale of the darkest variety."
Alastair Reynolds: Galactic North [The Guardian] (review published: November 2007)
"A perfect illustration of how the author sets intimate stories against huge backdrops and somehow pulls it off."
Alastair Reynolds: Revelation Space
(review published: May 2000)
"I've long suspected that, good as Reynolds is as a short story writer, he was always going to be far more comfortable with the space afforded by book-length fiction. Revelation Space bears out this expectation admirably."
Chris Roberson: Here, There and Everywhere (review published: February 2006)
"Here, There and Everywhere is a lot of fun, but it's more than just that ... I liked this a lot."
Chris Roberson (editor): Adventure: volume one (review published: February 2006)
"...didn't quite excite me as much as I had anticipated."
Adam Roberts: Yellow Blue Tibia [The Guardian]
(review published: May 2010)
"A convoluted - sometimes frustratingly so - puzzle of a story, continually wrong-footing the reader on a road-trip to Chernobyl in the fateful year of 1986... a writer who manages to combine intellectual challenge and sheer entertainment as few others can"
ARRR Robert's (sic): Doctor Whom, or E.T. Shoots and Leaves [The Guardian] (review published: July 2007)
"Pieced together like a fine watch this is not, which is precisely the point of its clever construction..."
Kim Stanley Robinson: Antarctica
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: October 1998)
"...a big, fat and very good novel of the near future that shapes up to be a thriller but is never quite comfortable with the form..."
Kim Stanley Robinson: The Martians
(review published: June 1999)
"Not, by any means, a bad book. Just a bad Kim Stanley Robinson book ... a writer indulging himself, a writer being indulged."
Kim Stanley Robinson: Short, Sharp Shock
(review by by Nick Gifford; review published: July 2000)
"A fabulation of life, love and beauty transplanted into the alien; a dreamy picaresque ... A story that will haunt you, long after you finish reading."
Kim Stanley Robinson: The Years of Rice and Salt
(review published: February 2002)
"A utopian tale, on the surface, but more a tale of seeking utopia, of constructing it one block at a time and enjoying those moments of domestic happiness -- the years of rice and salt of the title -- along the way."
Bruce Holland Rogers: Short-short-stories-by-email
(review by by Keith Brooke; review published: July 2005)
"Very few combine the mastery of the short-short story form with an ability to produce in such a varied range of style and subject -- Bruce Holland Rogers is really several writers in a single package."
Robert Silverberg: The Alien Years
(review published: July 1998)
"With this novel Silverberg asks old questions and toys with our expectations of how they should be answered... one of the all-time greats, just doing his thing."
Robert Silverberg: The Book of Skulls
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: February 2000)
"Four students head south, following the trail one of them found in an ancient manuscript, the Book of Skulls. If what the manuscript says is true then two of the friends will be granted eternal life ... a heavily-padded novella, but few can pad as interestingly, as eloquently, as Silverberg."
Dan Simmons: The Terror [The Guardian] (review published: January 2008)
"...sometimes the detail generates incredibly rich and evocative storytelling; at others it's like reading a textbook."
John Sladek:
The Steam-Driven Boy
(review published April 2006)
"One of the finest, most incisive, comic writers the genre has seen."
Jeff Somers: The Electric Church [The Guardian] (review published: September 2007)
"An exhilarating example of powerful and entertaining storytelling."
Brian Stableford: Year Zero
(review published: August 2000)
"It's clear from very early in this novel that Molly's fantastical exploits are not to be taken at face value. She lives in a world of extravagantly paranoid delusions, or perhaps extravagantly strange encounters ...a story crammed with hope."
Steph Swainston: The Modern World [The Guardian]
(review published: November 2008)
"An impressive illustration of how fantasy does not have to be imitation Tolkien... a fascinating if somewhat fragmented novel."
Michael Swanwick: Bones of the Earth
(review published: January 2006)
"This is an intelligent, playful, sophisticated book, one that manages that tricky challenge of making the reader want to stop and think and at the same time to turn the page, turn the page."
Michael Swanwick: Jack Faust
(review published: October 1997)
"No-one can accuse Michael Swanwick of lack of ambition: his latest novel compresses the history of the last five centuries into only a decade or so of the sixteenth century."
Jeffrey Thomas: Punktown
(review published: May 2001)
"The Ministry of Whimsy, publishers of Stepan Chapman's mightily impressive, Philip K Dick Award-winning The Troika, have done it again. Jeffrey Thomas's Punktown, a collection of stories ... is a seriously sleek and stylish piece of work. Noir fiction close to its best."
Jeff VanderMeer: The Hoegbotton Guide to the Early History of Ambergris, by Duncan Shriek
(review published: February 2000)
"Intriguing and captivating from the outset ... Necropolitan Press is to be praised for bringing out such an excitingly different work."
Jeff VanderMeer: City of Saints and Madmen
(review published: March 2002)
"In a publishing age where it can be so easy for a writer of talent to make the safe commercial bets -- or, more accurately, to avoid the greatest commercial risks -- those individuals who doggedly plough their own furrows should be cherished."
Jeff and Ann VanderMeer (editors): Fast Ships, Black Sails [The Guardian]
(review published: November 2008)
"Pirates and plunder aplenty, along with spaceships, dragons, mermaids and sorcery." Note: the original draft of this review was more positive than the edited version that appeared.
Jeff and Ann VanderMeer (editors): The New Weird [The Guardian] (review published: 23 February 2007)
"...the common element being the author's willingness to 'surrender to the weird', to use the conventions of pulp fiction to commit literature, and to apply literary sophistication to genre landscapes." (Not quite sure whey they changed my "commit" to "locate" in the published version, changing the sense of this sentence, but hey ho...)
Jeff VanderMeer: Shriek: an afterword (review published: June 2006)
"Jeff VanderMeer's a smart-arse of a writer ... but we shouldn't allow ourselves to be distracted... one of the finest writers of genre fiction currently operating."
Jeff VanderMeer: Shriek: an afterword [The Guardian] (review published: 27 January 2007)
"When so much fiction published as fantasy is formulaic and dull, VanderMeer offers a refreshing reminder that genre fiction can still be challenging, intelligent and downright fun."
Jeff VanderMeer: Why Should I Cut Your Throat?: Excursions into the Worlds of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror
(review published: November 2005)
"I'm a fan, and, in its scattergun, tangential way, Why Should I Cut Your Throat? has brought me closer to a fine, fine writer."
Gordon van Gelder (editor): The Very Best of Fantasy and Science Fiction: Sixtieth Anniversary Anthology [The Guardian]
(review published: August 2009)
"The word 'classic' could justifiably be applied to many stories in this volume, which, as a tribute to the magazine and an introduction to some of the finest authors of fantasy, SF and horror, is a landmark anthology."
Stephen Walker: Danny Yates Must Die
(review by by Nick Gifford; review published: September 1999)
"... isn't as bad as it initially threatened to be, it's just not all that good either."
Ian Watson: The Jonah Kit
(review published: July 2002)
"Don't read the back cover, okay? This fine if slightly flawed novel has stood up to the ravages of time well, but it stands up to the ravages of its blurb writer with less success."
Tim White: Chiaroscuro
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: July 2001)
"What I didn't notice on that long-ago first encounter with White's work was the subtlety with which he manipulated what had first struck me as exaggeration in his work: as well as over- there was under- too."
Conrad Williams : The Unblemished [The Guardian]
(review published: April 2008)
"The ruined London of the closing chapters of this stark, gripping novel will stay with you long after you have finished"
Neil Williamson and Andrew J Wilson (editors): Nova Scotia: New Scottish Speculative Fiction
(review published: September 2005)
"Much of Nova Scotia isn't particularly Scottish speculative fiction, but merely good SF written by Scots."
Robert Charles Wilson: Mysterium
(review published: August 1997)
"A thoroughly rewarding experience."
Robert Charles Wilson: Bios
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: September 2000)
"Bios is an interesting and, at times, thrilling and moving piece of writing, but it also comes as close as Wilson ever does to disappointing."
Nick Wood: The Stone Chameleon
(review by by Nick Gifford; review published: October 2005)
"A book with merit and which will probably work well with a young audience, but which might have been far more."
Sean Wright: The Twisted Root of Jaarfindor and Dark Tales of Time and Space
(review by Nick Gifford; review published: November 2005)
"High-paced adventure with plenty of twists and turns ... a real discovery."
John Wyndham: The Day of the Triffids
(review by by Nick Gifford; review published: December 2001)
"Put the moral issues aside and these books can't help but entertain and grip. I've read many bad novels in this genre, but have always been entertained ... a defining novel of the post-disaster genre, and one of the all-time greats of British sf."

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