My Favorite Books of 2023 Part 2: Science Fiction

By CDD20 on Pixabay

Many of the books listed here are by my favorite authors and were books I was planning to read for my “2023’s Reading Books by My Favorite Authors Challenge“.

My readings deviated from this challenge a lot though, by including the sequels of the Planetfall series by Emma Newman, two books of the Robot series by Isaac Asimov (an old favorite author of mine) and two sequels of Old Man’s War by John Scalzi.

I won’t be continuing the Favorite Authors Challenge now in 2024 because I will be focusing on other yearly challenges I will be soon posting here, one of them will be a “5 Star Prediction Challenge” where I will be reading 24 Books that will probably be five stars for me. This yearly reading challenge will include books by my favorite authors and books I am very optimistic about. 😉

Now, without much further ado, let’s talk about the books!

I) By Adrian Tchaikovsky

Children of Ruin (Children of Time #2)

Trust this brilliant author to reinvent his narrative colours with every book. He is a surprising writing chameleon (or octopus)! 🙂

Children of Memory (Children of Time #3)

I won’t say much not to spoil anything, but this whole trilogy(?) is a modern classic with deep and important themes and not an easy, but rewarding read exactly for this reason. I wonder if there will be more books in this series?

Dogs of War (Dogs of War #1)

Well written sci-fi with profound themes. This author accomplishes a new breakthrough with every book.

Firewalkers (Terrible Worlds: Revolutions)

Mind-blowing Sci-fi deserves 5 stars in my book!

***

II) By John Scalzi

The Last Colony (Old Man’s War #3)

This is my favorite series by this author!

Zoe’s Tale (Old Man’s War #4)

I could not put this book down!

Starter Villain

I finished this awesome book now; it was so funny! A five star for me without a doubt.

***

III) By Emma Newman

After Atlas (Planetfall #2)

Outstanding writing, mind-blowing sci-fi.

Before Mars (Planetfall #3)

The writing here is extraordinary, and this book shows a near future that is also way too possible to happen. This makes this series visionary in a very uncomfortable way and for this reason, it should be required reading in all schools.

Atlas Alone (Planetfall #4)

Amazing, a grand finale for this series! I wish there would be more sequels, though.

***

IV) By Isaac Asimov

The Caves of Steel (Robot #1)

Asimov is still one of my favorite sci-fi authors and I’ve waited too long to return to his books.

The Naked Sun (Robot #2)

This sci-fi book for me could only be five stars, because it is visionary, and it blew my mind.

***

V) Other Authors

System Collapse (The Murderbot Diaries #7) by Martha Wells

This was outstanding, and I could not put it down. I like the humor and the banter between Murderbot and ART. And Murderbot wanting just to have some quiet time to watch media with ART is so relatable.

Defiant (Skyward #4) by Brandon Sanderson

A beautiful last book for this series. I could not put this book down.

Death of a Clone by Alex Thomson

A fast read and a perfect mix of sci-fi and mystery. This book deserves more reviews and attention for sure!

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North

The writing was so infused with tension and suspense that, even with slow plot development, I could not stop listening to this audiobook. Claire North is a new favorite author!

And you, which was your favorite sci-fi book of the year?

Stay tunned for my next favorite books of 2023 blog post, where I’ll be talking about my favorite Horror, Mystery, Poetry and Historical Fiction books of the year.

Space Opera / Sci-Fi September 2021 Wrap-Up

We are now in the end of September and I’ll be soon posting my TBR for the #Victober and #Latin-x-athon; but let’s wrap-up the September Readathons first:

Space Opera September 2021

Space Opera September is run by Thomas at SFF180. Even if I didn’t participate in the Discord chat, I read four books for this Readathon and the last one of them was a buddy read.

1. Read a space opera novella -> Home (Binti #2) by Nnedi Okorafor
   Rating: 4 stars
   The story goes on in very interesting ways. I’ll be soon reading the third part of this original story, The Night Masquerade (Binti #3)

2a. Read two space operas written by women ->

Shards of Honor (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication Order) #1) by Lois McMaster Bujold
Rating: 5 stars!
I am really enjoying this series so far and will continue it. I like the writing style and the many layered characters and situations. This is the second book I read by Bujold that balances fun and important themes in a masterful way and I am to read more by this author for sure.

DarkShip Thieves (Darkship #1) by Sarah A. Hoyt
Rating: 2 stars
I must say that if I knew this author was a key person in the Sad Puppies voting campaign, I would not have picked this book, but as it is I won’t be supporting this author in the future.

SPOILER ALERT
The plot with the “Mules” was entertaining, even if the reader mostly gets ‘told’ the key aspects of it. The heroine was very much a Mary Sue and Kit, the one dimensional love interest, had a weird back story where he had a quarrel which resulted in his ex-wife suicide, but that was quickly forgiven and forgotten once he got involved with the ‘perfect’ Mary Sue style heroine.
My problem with this plot is that I personally hate stories where it’s implied that there aren’t guys who fail at a relationship but only guys with the “wrong” woman as a partner, and that once they get a subservient enough young new partner their relationship will be then without any issues whatsoever.
None of the characters in the book was likable (which is Okay with me) or other than one dimensional (which isn’t). The villain was very one dimensional too and had a very unbelievable “let’s dominate the world” plan.
End of spoiler
I won’t be continuing this series.

3. Read a space opera published before you were born ->
   Tau Zero by Poul Anderson. First published in 1970.
   Rating: 4 stars.
   A very original premise and entertaining story. The only thing I didn’t like were the info dumps. And a couple of character dialogues didn’t age well too.

Sci-Fi September 2021

This is a Readathon on Twitter

In the last week of September I now feel tired of Science fiction and needing a break from the genre, which I will take next month. I still read three books for this Readathon though.

Alien Presence:
Axiom’s End (Noumena #1) by Lindsay Ellis
Rating: 4 stars.
I could not put this down, it was a really entertaining contemporary sci-fi. I will be continuing this series.

SPOILER ALERT

Why not five stars then?
I considered the interspecies romance in the end anti-climatic, it made the end less original and explained too many things too easily. I think that the story could have another reason for the alien to stay on Earth other than he ‘was in love with’ the main character. And it was sad that the genome died too. I am often too critical when romance gets in my books and I don’t like the ‘one-thousand-year-old-male-interest-with-the-naive-young-girl’ romance trope because it’s over used.

End of spoiler

Short Story:
You Have Arrived at Your Destination (Forward Collection #4) by Amor Towles
Rating: 3 stars.
An interesting premise but the end was too confusing. I might try to reread it eventually but I’m not a fan of confusing open endings.

Contemporary with sci-fi elements:
Jane, Unlimited by Kristin Cashore
Rating: 3 stars.
The structure of the story/stories here was quite different, I put this book down many times because it really read like a contemporary story with sci-fi elements (and that is way out of my reader’s taste even if I do try it sometimes).
It also didn’t work well for me because I expected more story world context to appear earlier in the book. I don’t like taking too long to understand how the story world works.
It might work for someone who likes contemporary YA more than me though.

I am now looking forward to my October cozy reads. And you?

My Favorite Books Of 2020 Part One: Science fiction

Image by Genty from Pixabay

I read 188 books this year! As far as I can remember this was the year of my life when I’ve read the greatest number of books.

A part of that, but not all, was due to lock down. This year I exchanged my Saturday’s going out shopping for reading, but in reality this staying-at-home trend was happening to me before lock down already and the pandemic just gave me a very strong reason to avoid crowds.
The truth is that I was already tired of the idea of shopping as a leisure activity and lock down gave an extra push to the idea of a no-buy or at least a ‘reduced-buy’ year, the few exceptions being books and of course, textile masks.

Therefore, due to the great number of books read, I’ll divide this year favorite’s wrap-up in two posts:

This first part will be all Science Fiction, Dystopia, YA Sci-fi and Space Opera books and the next will have my favorite books in other genres. Mostly fantasy, epic and historic, since I’ve been out of paranormal mostly for one year now, but with also the occasional romance, thriller and ever so rare contemporary.

Let’s start then,

Favorite Science Fiction books of 2020:

1) Meet Me in the Future: Stories by Kameron Hurley

I would like to thank NetGalley and Tachyon Publications for providing me with the arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.
This was a page-turner, interesting story collection. The stories were very original and I could not put it down. I surely will want to read more books by this author in the near future.
My favorite short stories were “Elephants and Corpses”, “When We Fall”, “The Red Secretary”, “The Fisherman and the Pig”, “Tumbledown”, “Warped Passages”, “Our Faces”, “Radiant Sisters,…” and “The War of Heroes”.

2) The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells

I read book #2 to book #5 of this awesome series this year and I really loved it, especially the fifth book, “Network Effect”, which was a novel and not a novella. I will surely continue reading the next sequels. All characters are so likable that I can’t wait for the next installment in this series.

3) Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang by Kate Wilhelm

This Post Apocalypse Dystopia with clones was brilliant and the best Sci-fi I’ve read for a long while, and I’m happy that I came across this book though the Lady Vaults Goodreads group, which is unfortunately now not active anymore. This was first published in 1976 but it has aged remarkably well. I’ll read more books by this author.

4) Binti (Binti #1) by Nnedi Okorafor

This was a very original Novella, and I’ll go on reading this series for sure.

Note: At a certain point I was upset at how people touched Binti’s hair all the time, and just felt like shouting: “Leave her hair alone for God’s sake!” Then I could understand why book titles like “Don’t touch my hair.” exist.

5) Falling Free (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication Order) #4) by Lois McMaster Bujold.

This book proved that a story with important themes can be an entertaining page-turner too. And now I understand why so many people recommend the Vorkosigan Saga which I intend to go on reading for sure. This book is the start of the chronological order of the Vorkosigan Saga.

6) Skyward (Skyward #1) by Brandon Sanderson.

This was awesome, and I’ll be continuing this series soon. Brandon Sanderson has been one of my favorite authors this year and I plan to read all his books eventually. I have other two books by him among my next post’s favorite fantasy books too.

7) Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty.

This was a great science fiction mystery story, with clones in a futuristic Locked-room mystery story, and the Audiobook narration was five stars too!

8) Starfarers (Starfarers #1) by Vonda N. McIntyre.

I really liked the writing style of this book and will surely go on reading this quartet. I read the fourth book a long time ago, but even knowing how it will end I am still interested in this story’s characters journey.

9) Chilling Effect (Chilling Effect #1) by Valerie Valdes.

I liked that Captain Eva Innocente was unapologetically foul-mouthed in Spanish when life yet again didn’t give her a break. This made me laugh and it was so very much relatable.
A very humorous an entertaining space opera by a Latinx author! I’ll be reading the next book in this series, Prime Deceptions, next year for sure.

10) The Nemesis (The Diabolic #3) by S.J. Kincaid.

This was a great finale for this trilogy, with all the feels, twists and suspense until the very last page. After this, and the awesome Insignia trilogy, Kincaid has become an auto-buy author for me.
The Audiobook narration by Candace Thaxton was also unforgettable and a five stars experience.

And lastly:

11) The Song Rising (The Bone Season #3) by Samantha Shannon.

This starts with a slow pace but it builds up, escalates into high stakes and it pays off in so many well developed and well written ways! Impossible to put down. I’m in this series bandwagon now for sure. I can’t wait for the next book in this series, “The Mask Falling” to be released in February 2021.

Stay tuned for the second part of this wrap-up still now in December! (I hope…)

The second anniversary issue of Far Horizons, with my story: “The Exchange”

 

Far Horizons Magazine republished my sci-fi, time-travel story “The Exchange” in it’s second anniversary edition.

Check it out!

Click to access april-2016-issue1.pdf

 

My top 10 books of 2015

Top Fiction Books

 

 1. Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James

I would surely recommend this book to anyone who has read Pride and Prejudice, even if you aren’t into the Mystery genre. P.D. James is an awesome writer. This book is what I would call a “modern classic”. It is also a fun, surprising book. The kind you won’t manage to stop reading and you will feel sad when you finish because you can’t dwell longer in its world with its great characters.

 2. The Martian by Andy Weir

This book is lots of fun, its main character is one of the funniest I ever met while reading. It deserved to be the 2014 Goodreads Choice Winner.

 

 3. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

If you lived during the 80’s and liked games this is the golden book for you. Back then I wasn’t the geekiest around, but even though this book brought back a world of memories while having a page turning story.

 

4.  Magic Rises (Kate Daniels #6) by Ilona Andrews

This great series gets better with each new book. Kate is a kick-ass heroine and the plot is surprising, with great characters and settings. In my case it made me to stay awake until  midnight to read it. A totally fun read that hooks the reader until the end. I found this one of the best books of this great urban fantasy series.

 

5. The Spirit of a Witch (The Briley Witch Chronicles #1) by Sarah Jane Avory

I found this book lots of fun. The protagonist reminded me a bit of detective Monk. Briley is a different kind of hero, refreshing and fun due to being most of the time humanly uncertain, almost until the last minute, when her ingenuity saves the day. I also loved Smokey because he really sounded like a cat. I recommend this book to anyone who likes fantasy stories with witches. And to anyone who understands how great is to befriend a cat.

Top writing Books

6. Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne, Dave King

This is an objective, goal oriented book for revising your manuscript. The checklists are quite useful and the explanations surely helpful. I recommend it as revision reference.

 

7. Mastering Showing and Telling in Your Fiction (Busy Writer’s Guides #4) by Marcy Kennedy

This book is very helpful, with direct and goal oriented tips for finding balance between showing and telling in your writing. I will use it while revising my first draft and I definitely recommend it.

 

8. How to Write Dialogue (Busy Writer’s Guides #3)  by Marcy Kennedy

A great guide on writing and revising your manuscript’s dialogues. The “take to the page” sections are a great resource while revising.

 

 

9. Characters, Emotion & Viewpoint: Techniques and Exercises for Crafting Dynamic Characters and Effective Viewpoints(Write Great Fiction) by Nancy Kress

This book is part of a great series on how to write a fiction book. It has detailed information on Point of View and Characters, two important aspects of fiction writing.

 

10. She Sat He Stood: What Do Your Characters Do While They Talk? by Ginger Hanson 

This book is a good solution against the talking-heads problem on dialogue. I enjoyed it. Writers can benefit from thinking like settings-designers and prop masters while creating their settings.