Sequel

Waiting on Wednesday: Bear Head

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Welcome to Waiting on Wednesday, a weekly meme linking Waiting on Wednesday by Breaking The Spine and Can’t Wait Wednesday by Wishful Endings

| Waiting on Wednesday: August 26 |

Bear Head

Book Two of Dogs of War

by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Mars. The red planet. A new frontier for humanity, a civilisation where humans can live in peace, lord and master of all they survey.

But this isn’t Space City from those old science-fiction books. We live in Hell City, built into and from a huge subcontinent-sized crater. There’s a big silk canopy over it, feeding out atmosphere as we generate it, little by little, until we can breathe the air.

It’s a perfect place to live, if you actually want to live on Mars. I guess at some point I had actually wanted to live on Mars, because here I am. The money was supposed to be good, and how else was a working Joe like me supposed to get off-planet exactly? But I remember the videos they showed us – guys, not even in suits, watching robots and bees and Bioforms doing all the work – and they didn’t quite get it right…

To be published by Head of Zeus on 07th January 2021

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Friday Firsts: To Be Taught, If Fortunate

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Welcome to Friday Firsts – a weekly meme created by Tenacious Reader. First paragraphs. First impressions. A new favourite?

| Friday Firsts: July 17 |

To Be Taught, If Fortunate

A Novella

by Becky Chambers

Science Fiction | 136 Pages | Published by Hodder & Stoughton in 2018

| First Paragraphs |

If you read nothing else we’ve sent home, please at least read this. I ask knowing full well that this request is antithetical to what I believe in my heart of hearts. Our mission reports contain our science, and the science is by far the most important thing here. My crew and I are a secondary concern. Tertiary, even.

But all the same, we do have a lot riding on someone picking this up.

You don’t have to rush. The file will have taken fourteen years to reach Earth, and assuming that we have the good luck of someone reading it right away and replying straight after, it’d take that file another fourteen years. So, while we can’t wait around forever, the urgency – like so many things in space travel – is relative.

Amazon | The Book Depository | Goodreads

| First Impressions |

Hot off the heels of finishing the second novel in Becky Chambers’ Wayfarers series, A Closed and Common Orbit, I decided to embark on her stand-alone science fiction novella, To be Taught, If Fortunate.

Having read several disparate reviews for this novella, I have decided to read it with no expectations either way and let myself be carried along whether good, bad or ugly. Having said that, I have developed a somewhat unreserved love for Chambers’ writing and the opening paragraphs are so very intriguing and, as always, so beautifully written that I can’t help but feel like I will love this novella all the same!

What are you currently reading? What were your first impressions?

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Friday Firsts: A Closed and Common Orbit

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Welcome to Friday Firsts – a weekly meme created by Tenacious Reader. First paragraphs. First impressions. A new favourite?

| Friday Firsts: July 10 |

A Closed and Common Orbit

Book Two of the Wayfarers Series

by Becky Chambers

Science Fiction | 385 Pages | Published by Hodder & Stoughton in 2016

| First Paragraphs |

Lovelace had been in a body for twenty-eight minutes, and it still felt every bit as wrong as it had the second she woke up inside it. There was no good reason as to why. Nothing was malfunctioning. Nothing was broken. All her files had transferred properly. No system scans could explain the feeling of wrongness, but it was there all the same, gnawing at her pathways. Pepper had said it would take time to adjust, but she hadn’t said how much time. Lovelace didn’t like that. The lack of schedule made her uneasy.

‘How’s it going?’ Pepper asked, glancing over from the pilot’s seat.

It was a direct question, which meant Lovelace had to address it. ‘I don’t know how to answer that.’ An unhelpful response, but the best she could do. Everything was overwhelming. Twenty-nine minutes before, she’d been housed in a ship, as she was designed to be. She’d had cameras in every corner, voxes in every room. She’d existed in a web, with eyes both within and outside. A solid sphere of unblinking perception.

Amazon | The Book Depository | Goodreads

| First Impressions |

It has been far too long since I finished The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. Four years in fact; and despite it being one of my favourite science fiction reads of the 2015/2016 period, I still hadn’t picked up A Closed and Common Orbit. Following a timely reminder by The Earthian Hivemind that this series existed, I quickly bought a copy and placed it on the top of my ever-increasing book pile.

And I am so happy that I did.

In just a few short paragraphs I was fully absorbed into a landscape I thought I had forgotten. Familiar names, familiar faces; the events of the previous novel slowly unfolding in my head. The character driven plot was the highlight of the first novel and I find it unlikely that this sequel will disappoint.

I truly cannot wait to get lost with the Wayfarers, or at least Lovelace and Pepper, once again.

What are you currently reading? What were your first impressions?

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