My review of Timothy Zahn’s The Icarus Coda went up at Strange Horizons recently. This was an interesting one, as it’s the last volume in a series that I mostly haven’t read, but I enjoyed it.

Definitely related, at Worldcon I heard an anecdote from an author who had once done a signing with Zahn, and at one point he apparently said that he wished his long lines of fans were there for his original work rather than Star Wars. You can’t choose your legacy, and Zahn’s is definitely Star Wars.

But there is actually a Humble Bundle of some of Zahn’s original works available now, and I would recommend checking it out. My probable favorite of his original stuff, the Conquerors books, don’t appear to be in there, but the Blackcollar series and some other good ones are included.

Earlier this year, I reviewed Veronica Roth’s Polish-inflected fantasy novellas When Among Crows and To Clutch a Razor at Strange Horizons. According to the publisher’s website, these are now part of a series called Curse Bearer, which does seem to indicate that there might be more of them. In any case, and as someone who does have Polish heritage, I enjoyed these books and I would definitely read more of them.

I turned in my review of Kate Elliott’s newest novel The Witch Roads in…June? And then due to the vagaries of scheduling, it languished in the publication queue at Strange Horizons until this past week. The good news is, the follow-up novel The Nameless Land comes out in less than a month! Plenty of time for you to read this first book and then preorder the next one.

My review of Joan Slonczewski’s new novel Minds in Transit went up at the Ancillary Review of Books earlier this week. I enjoyed this book a lot; I’ve enjoyed all of Slonczewski’s books that I’ve read since they were a Guest of Honor at Wiscon years ago. I recently read their postapocalyptic Quakers in space book, The Wall Around Eden, and thought it was a minor masterpiece. Anyway, read Minds in Transit and the Elysium Cycle.

My review of Jared Pechaček’s The West Passage went up at Strange Horizons recently. It was one of my favorite books of 2024, and I fear I haven’t really conveyed so much of what I liked about it, but you should read it anyway.

Along with other reviewers, I offered up one notable book of 2024 at the start of 2025 in the Ancillary Review of Books. I’m delighted to see that Jared Pechaček is up for the Astounding Award at this year’s Worldcon, and you should definitely read The West Passage.

My review of Martha Wells’ reissued and revised Wheel of the Infinite went up at Strange Horizons a few weeks back. This is another excellent standalone fantasy novel from Wells that really showcases her strengths as a writer. I’m looking forward to Queen Demon.

My review of Sofia Samatar’s The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain is up at Strange Horizons. This is an excellent sci-fi novella that I recommend to everyone, but if you’ve spent time in the mines of academia, it will have particular (painful) resonance for you.