Neal Stephenson takes a variety of different ideas and seemingly random subjects and does his best to weave them together into a coherent tale. These subjects include ancient Sumer, religious history, linguistics, virtual reality, viruses, sword fighting, and hacking, amongst others. They are all rolled into a story set in a bizarre future where the United States as we know it is no more and our current culture has been taken to absurd, and often entertaining, extremes. The US has become best known for its ability to deliver pizzas efficiently, the federal government has ceded much of the land to corporations/franchises, and couriers ride futuristic skateboards using magnetic harpoons to attach to vehicles on the freeway for a free lift.

​​​​​​​I have enjoyed every book in the 2 Riyria series (Riyria Revelations and Riyria Chronicles) and wrote a review 6 months back where I heartily recommend both of them. It is hard not to like any book with the main characters of Royce and Hadrian so the Death of Dulgath was an eagerly awaited addition to my audiobook library. With Tim Gerard Reynolds at the mic doing yet another excellent narration, listening to him voice Royce and Hadrian made me feel like I was back with old friends that I had not seen in a while. A welcome place to be.

Elantris, Brandon Sanderson’s first widely distributed book, is named after the ruined city of Elantris, which is the focus of the story. A standalone fantasy novel, the book won the Romantic Times award for best epic fantasy of 2005, was chosen by Barnes and Noble editors as the best fantasy or sf book of the year, and has been released in twenty languages. It is an excellent book and a stand alone story, despite the fact that Brandon does plan to eventually write a sequel. This book started the career of one of the best Fantasy writers alive today and you should not miss out on reading it.

​​​​​​​Humans have spread throughout the solar system which is ruled by the System government based on Earth. Ananke is a super secret System ship out on a trial run with a crew of three. Althea is the programmer primarily responsible for Ananke's unique computer software. She has a far greater attachment to the computer and Ananke than to her fellow crew mates. On their way to Pluto two intruders board the ship. One escapes and dumps a virus into the programming to frustrate their attempts to trace him. The other, Ivan, is held for questioning about their ties to a rebel terrorist Mallt-y-Nos. 

Pierce Brown creates a dystopian future where mankind has populated the solar system and created a hierarchical caste system of colors. Strict rules and roles are assigned to each color, some of which are: Reds who provide the manual labor, Pinks who master the arts of pleasure, Blues who pilot the starships, Obsidians who fight the wars, Silvers who run the businesses, and Golds who rule society. Darrow is born into this society at the bottom of the totem pole as a Red who works in the mines of Mars. As a Helldiver he risks his life manning a drill in the dangerous helium-3 mines but he accepts his role without question. He knows that mankind has ruined the Earth and helium-3 is needed to terraform Mars to provide humanity with a new home. He is proud of his work and understands that the Reds are sacrificing themselves to save humanity. There is only one problem - it is all a lie....

Alastair Reynolds tells a tale that is much larger in scope than it first appears to be. It all starts innocently enough with the crew of the Rockhopper doing what they do best, mining comets in our solar system, also known as "pushing ice." Then something unexplainable happens. One of Saturn's moons, Janus, breaks out of orbit and assumes a trajectory toward Spica, a star 240 light years away. Not only that, it is accelerating as it heads out of the solar system. This brings an abrupt end to the existing mission for the Rockhopper crew as they are the only ship capable of intercepting Janus for a few days before it leaves our solar system for good. They are a crew of miners, not explorers, but they are the only ones who can study Janus up close before it is gone so all of mankind turns its attention onto them.

I picked up Reamde because the story involved an online game world where hackers that target the players and it seemed like an interesting topic for a novel. That premise turns out to be just the tip of the iceberg and this tale veers in many different directions. The online game world of T'Rain is a multi-billion dollar MMO with millions of players and that success makes it an attractive target. A ransomware virus is created that holds a players virtual assets hostage and then all hell breaks loose, in game and out. The main characters wind up all over the globe as spies, terrorists, smugglers, and the Russian mafia all get entangled into the plot. Every step of the way Stephenson ups the ante and the plot almost seems to run out of control.

The Fold is an interesting sci-fi novel based on the theory of folding space in order to travel long distances quickly, hence the title. Unlike many other sci-fi books where folding space is used for space travel, this book takes place solely on earth and centers on a secret DARPA project where scientists have built the Albuquerque Door - a matched set of rings that allows anyone, or anything, to travel instantly between them. Clearly this is going to be mankind's greatest invention and it will change civilization forever; however, something about the door just doesn't add up.

The Girl With All the Gifts offers a refreshing angle on a tired genre and is quickly becoming a classic. M. R. Carey uses strong characters to tell an engaging story full of emotion where humanity struggles to survive in a world overrun by hungries (zombies). Human conflict is a pretty common thread woven into many apocalyptic stories as characters are typically more concerned with petty personal agendas than banding together to survive. This story is not much different in that regard except the agendas aren't petty and the disagreements are viewed from a unique perspective - that of a child hungry named Melanie.

During the 1800s, Arthur Conan Doyle, Mary Shelley, and Bram Stoker all created iconic literary characters. The newspapers were covering sensational murderers such as Jack the Ripper and "Burke and Hare" who killed to sell the bodies to anatomists. Roger Zelazny's last novel, A Night in the Lonesome October, is a whimsical tribute to these roots of the horror and detective genres. For obvious reasons, it's the perfect October read. When the full moon shines on Halloween night it's possible to open a gateway to the elder gods (Cthulu and friends). Clearly the Closers (those who don't want this to happen) have been successful so far but once again all manner of odd individuals are assembling to determine the fate of the world. Each player has an animal familiar who understands all that is said and done, although they can't speak to people until the event begins on Halloween Night.