SEPTEMBER
9/2/08 REVIEW: Chuck Season 1
Review by Tom McMeekin
  | Chuck is like an ultra-modern Get Smart or the Pink
Panther series. Computer tech Chuck Bartowski is forced into the world of
espionage when the nation's secrets are downloaded into his head. |
AUGUST
8/1/08 through 8/31/08: ON HIATUS
ARWZ Magazine will be on hiatus from publishing during the month of August. However, we are still accepting and very much welcoming submissions of reviews, editorials, articles and interview proposals. And, of course, the forums are still active and open for business!
JULY
7/22/08 REVIEW: Dreamsongs: Volume II by George R.R. Martin
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | Readers looking for "A little of everything" will get immense satisfaction out of the variety of stories in Dreamsongs, Volume II. We've got screenplays, Wild Cards, short stories, novellas, a Hugo nominee, a World Fantasy Award winner, werewolves, madmen, freaks of nature, angels, time travelers and aliens. How can you go wrong with that? |
7/7/08 REVIEW: The Dresden Files TV Series on DVD
Review by Violet Kane
  | My general disinterest in detective stories and crime dramas has kept me away from the Dresden Files novels, written by Jim Butcher, but when the SciFi Channel television series (based on the novels, of course) came out on DVD, I was game to give it a try. |
JUNE
6/27/08 REVIEW: Personal Demon by Kelley Armstrong
Review by Violet Kane
  | I've been wanting to check out Kelley Armstrong's books for a while now, and so when I found the audiobook of Personal Demon on the shelves of my local library, I jumped at the chance. |
6/20/08 REVIEW: Dreamsongs: Volume I by George R.R. Martin
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | Mostly in chronological order, Dreamsongs includes much of his early works through the early 80s, such as "The Hero", which was sent in along with an application for conscientious objection to the conflict in Vietnam, "His Tower of Ashes" written after a bad college break-up, "The Way of the Cross and the Dragon" which was born while teaching at a Catholic School after years of being away from the fold, along with so many more tales from one of the most creative authors writing today. |
6/12/08 REVIEW: Mirror Mirror by Gregory Maguire
Review by Tom McMeekin
  | Mirror Mirror is a retelling of the fairy tale
of Snow White, which—like other books by author
Gregory Maguire—draws parallels between history and
legend. However, it is not entirely successful in its
endeavors. |
6/5/08 REVIEW: Girl in Landscape by Jonathan Lethem
Review by Violet Kane
  | Lethem tells a peculiar coming-of-age tell against a hybrid science fiction and frontier background. Though not entirely to my taste, this novel is definitely worth a read. |
MAY
5/27/08 REVIEW: The Virgin's Lover by Philippa Gregory
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Gregory contributes another installment to her series of fictionalized tales of the Tudor monarchy. It is yet another opportunity to show off her rare talents—to make a story even more engrossing because the audience knows how it will turn out. |
5/12/08 REVIEW: The Future Happens Twice by Matt Browne
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | There is really so much going on at once in this book, for the sake of brevity I'll stay with the basics. |
5/5/08 REVIEW: Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Austin Grossman pens an unevenly comedic tall of an alternative reality of superheroes and super villains, with Soon I Will Be Invincible. |
MARCH & APRIL
4/24/08 REVIEW: Moonlight created by Ron Koslow and Trevor Munson
Review by Tom McMeekin
  | The plot behind Moonlight is older than some of
the ancient vampires in the show, but it still manages
to be bloody good entertainment. |
4/21/08 REVIEW: Elric of Melnibone by Michael Moorcock
Review by Violet Kane
  | This sometimes neglected fantasy classic has the potential to reach a wider audience of new fans thanks to its recent audio release. |
4/14/08 REVIEW: Weed Species by Jack Ketchum
Review by Jeff Burk
  | If there is a Jack Ketchum (The Girl Next Door, Open Season, The Lost) book out there that does not destroy one's soul when read, I have not found it. |
4/7/08 REVIEW: Wagner the Werewolf by George W.M. Reynolds
Review by Lisa Schussler
  | As Reynolds was more widely read, in his time, than Dickens it is surprising to see that Wagner the Werewolf is the only one of his works widely available. |
3/31/08 REVIEW: A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L'Engle
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | As regular readers may recall from my previous reviews of L'Engle's Time Trilogy, these books were among my childhood favorites. I have found these audio productions to be a great way to revisit them, and the audiobook of Swiftly Tilting Planet is no exception. |
3/20/08 REVIEW: Stardust by Neil Gaiman
Review by Tom McMeekin
  | In Stardust, a fallen star in human form calls Tristran Thorn "a clodpoll ... and a ninny, a numbskull, a lackwit, and a coxcomb."
However, author Neil Gaiman demonstrates he is none of these with his award-winning fairy tale. |
FEBRUARY
2/28/08 REVIEW: Dead Like Me Seasons 1 & 2 on DVD
Review by Violet Kane
  | The quirky Showtime series, Dead Like Me ran for two seasons, giving viewers a dose of dark humor with speculative sensibilities. |
2/21/07 REVIEW: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Review by Gordon Long
  | I just sat down and read the last book of the Harry Potter series, and I find I have grown out of Harry Potter. In fact, I probably grew out of him about halfway through the series, but my enjoyment of the characters and my insatiable desire to see what happens in the end of any story kept me going. Ultimately, I was disappointed. |
2/13/08 REVIEW: Armageddon's Children by Terry Brooks
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | When Brooks' newest prequel series recently showed up on bookshelves, being billed as a great starting place for new readers, I decided to give it a try. |
JANUARY
1/1/07 through 1/31/07: ON HIATUS
ARWZ Magazine will be on hiatus from publishing during the month of January. However, we are still accepting and very much welcoming submissions of reviews, editorials, articles and interview proposals. And, of course, the forums are still active and open for business!
DECEMBER
12/20/07 through 12/27/07: ON VACATION
12/18/07 REVIEW: The Drive-In by Joe Lansdale
Review by Jeff Burk
  | In his cult classic, The Drive-In, Joe Lansdale (Nightrunners, The Bottoms) makes the horror fan's ultimate dream into a surrealistic nightmare. |
12/13/07 REVIEW: Congo directed by Frank Marshall
Review by Doug Gogerty
  | When this film first came out, I avoided it. Sometimes bad press, etc. can negatively impact an impartial viewing of a movie. For instance, Waterworld and Ishtar aren't great movies, but they are not as bad as the press would make you believe. The problem with these movies is they were expensive to make, but were not good enough to bring in the box office dollars. The same can be said of Congo. |
12/11/07 REVIEW: Gaea: Beyond the Son by P.D. Gilson
Review by Joe Babinsack
  | The premise of near future space travel, and the first mission to a planet outside our solar system is a great one. Most of science fiction is based on the premise that the stars truly will be our destiny. The details in getting there are often overlooked: it's far easier to plunk down a story somewhere "in the future" and avoid all the messiness of getting there. |
12/6/07 REVIEW: Splinter by Adam Roberts
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | Will the world end in fire? Or in ice? How about a possibly sentient comet that communicates with earthlings before bashing into the planet and tearing it apart? And what does everyone do to pass the time after the world ends? |
12/4/07 REVIEW: Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | I am always interested to see how authors of predominantly mainstream fiction handle forays into science fiction. While Atwood has explored the speculative possibilities of the future in previous novels, she did not approach this novel with the acumen to tell a gripping tale. |
NOVEMBER
11/29/07 REVIEW: Battlestar Galactica Seasons 1 & 2 on DVD
Review by Roger Redmond
  | To begin with the obvious, this is not your parents' Battlestar Galactica. Some names remain the same, as do some of the most basic plot elements, but beyond that, this incarnation borrows from other science fiction and develops its own story and structure. |
11/27/07 EDITORIAL: Strike: In the end, fans will follow the writers to the edge of the universe
Editorial by Tom McMeekin
I don't like the fact that the Hollywood writers' strike will probably shorten this season for most of my favorite shows. And I think the strike is one of the nails in the coffin of network TV as we know it. However, I'm a writer at heart (if not a professional screenwriter, at least, not yet), and I support the writers' decision to walk out.
11/19/07 through 11/23/07: ON VACATION
11/15/07 REVIEW: Transformers directed by Michael Bay
Review by David Murawski
  | Flawless computer graphics endow this intensely action packed movie. Long time comic book and cartoon enthusiasts will not be disappointed in this film. |
11/13/07 REVIEW: Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein
Review by Doug Gogerty
  | Heinlein's classic, Stranger in a Strange Land, suffers from some things that it cannot help. It will depend upon your own boundaries on whether you can get out of it what is actually there. |
11/8/07 REVIEW: Star Trek: TNG Season 5 on DVD
Review by Violet Kane
  | I have been re-watching the seasons of Star Trek on DVD, now over fifteen years since the original airing. Upon reaching Season 5, I realized that it contains some of the most memorable episodes in the series. |
11/6/07 REVIEW: Pushing Daisies created by Brian Fuller
Review by Tom McMeekin
 | Pushing Daisies is one of the most critically-acclaimed shows of the fall television season, and five episodes in it still holds its magic. |
11/1/07 REVIEW: Serenity directed by Joss Whedon
Review by Gordon Long
  | If you don't know the background, Joss Whedon's marvelous SF series, Firefly generated a small following of fanatic fans, but failed to appeal to a larger audience. |
OCTOBER
10/30/07 REVIEW: Pandora's Closet by Jean Rabe & Martin H. Greenberg (Editors)
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it. But at what cost? Pandora's Closet includes twenty or so short stories generally involving mythical objects or creatures that take over the lives of ordinary people. |
10/25/07 REVIEW: Tangerinephant by Kevin Dole 2
Review by Jeff Burk
  | Calling to mind Futurama by way of House of Leaves, Tangerinephant is the ambitious first novel from Kevin Dole 2. In the opening we meet Michael Tangerinephant, whose life has been falling apart due to being abducted by TV-addicted aliens, being the fall-man for a corporate scandal, and being in trouble with his prostitute girlfriend |
10/23/07 REVIEW: The Spiral Labyrinth by Matthew Hughes
Review by Roger Redmond
  | This is an enjoyable and quick read coming in at a slender 210 pages. The protagonist is one Henghis Hapthorn, a discriminator (read PI/detective) in a futuristic world of space travel and super speed, semi-sentient computer assistants. |
10/18/07 REVIEW: Shadow of the Hegemon by Orson Scott Card
Review by Violet Kane
  | I must say that I always look forward to reading Card, knowing that his books will be reliably entertaining. Shadow of the Hegemon is no different in this respect, but I do have one criticism... Why all the children protagonists? |
10/16/06 AUTHOR Q&A: Jennifer Fallon
Original Session: 9/18/06 to 9/24/06
  | Author Jennifer Fallon recently visited the ARWZ Community Forums to answer questions from fans and ARWZ readers in an Interactive Q&A. |
10/11/07 REVIEW: All Together Dead by Charlaine Harris
Review by Violet Kane
  | As Charlaine Harris is one of the major authors in the newly popular genres of urban and romantic fantasy, I knew after seeing her on the bestseller lists that she would be a must-read for any conscientious SFF magazine editor. |
10/9/07 REVIEW: His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | The buzz around this series has been so enthusiastic lately that I was anxious to get started on it, and ordered the first two books together. But now that I've read the first one, I'm still debating whether to continue on to the second. |
10/4/07 REVIEW: Dark Celebration by Christine Feehan
Review by Violet Kane
  | My first experiment in reading romantic fantasy wasn't very successful, but in the interest of fairness I decided to try reading a book by an author who has made her career on writing fantasy-style romances (rather than romance writers who have dabbled in fantasy). Christine Feehan was the natural place to start. |
10/2/07 INTERVIEW: Gary Wassner
Interview by Violet Kane
  | With the release of his newest GemQuest novel, Gary Wassner is one book away from the completion of his ground-breaking fantasy series. By combining traditional epic fantasy with an edgy character-driven sensibility, Wassner has captured a dedicated fan base and has proven that talent can shine in the small presses. I wanted to know more about Wassner's background and his creative process. |
SEPTEMBER
9/27/07 REVIEW: They Live directed by John Carpenter
Review by Jeff Burk
  | In 1988, to little fanfare, John Carpenter released They Live, a film that is now a cult classic and that many consider one of Carpenter's finest works. |
9/25/07 REVIEW: In the Company of the Courtesan by Sarah Dunant
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | This novel does what readers expect from any good historical—it transports them to another time and place to challenge the imagination to experience the lives of characters in a distant past. |
9/20/07 REVIEW: Book of Imaginary Beings by Jorge Luis Borges
Review by Mervi Hämäläinen
  | This is a collection of 116 imagined creatures, just like the title says. Borges has collected them from various mythologies and writers from Ancient times to the beginning of the 20th century. There are fantastical creatures from Kafka, C. S. Lewis and H. G. Wells as well as Pliny, the Eddas and Ovid. |
9/18/07 REVIEW: Off Armageddon Reef by David Weber
Review by Violet Kane
  | Many authors are increasingly mixing science fiction and fantasy genres in effort to create intriguing worlds more nuanced and complex than either genre offers alone. David Weber, on the other hand, is just trying to write two novels at the same time. |
9/13/07 REVIEW: The Hammer and the Cross by Harry Harrison
Review by Sabrina Spiher
  | The Hammer and the Cross posits an alternate history in which an army of spiritual Vikings, close followers of the Norse religion of the Way, led by a freed English slave and joined by other English freedmen, carve out a kingdom in opposition to the rest of England and the Catholic Church. |
9/11/07 REVIEW: Firefly directed by Joss Whedon
Review by R.T. Hughes
  | From the imaginative mind of Joss Whedon, creator of TV's Buffy: The Vampire Slayer and Angel, comes the 14 episode sci-fi western Firefly. Leaving the quantum phase mechanics and deflector arrays to the various Star Trek series, Whedon combines his gift for witty dialog with in-depth characters for a series that is both exciting and comical. |
9/6/07 REVIEW: The Rent Tent by Anita Diamant
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | From the genres of family saga and biblical epic comes The Red Tent by Anita Diamant. This historical fiction novel tells the stories of the wives of biblical patriarch Jacob, as they experienced life, death and birth. |
9/4/07 REVIEW: Ammonite by Nicola Griffith
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | This book asks questions and gives theories and ideas on so many levels that I don't even know where to start. Like many other modern science fiction authors, Griffith uses her writing to ask hard questions. Questions that authors of 20 or 30 years might not have been able to get away with. |
AUGUST
8/30/07 REVIEW: Morrigan's Cross by Nora Roberts
Review by Violet Kane
  | The recent trend toward paranormal romance and romantic fantasy is difficult to ignore, and so despite my misgivings about the romance genre, I decided to pick up a romantic fantasy to see what all the fuss was about—where better to start than with the reigning queen of the romance novel, Nora Roberts? |
8/28/07 REVIEW: Hurricane Moon by Alexis Glynn Latner
Review by Mike Brendan
  | Interplanetary colonization is not a new theme to SF. It's been resurrected as of late, with Allen Steele's Coyote one of the most prominent titles. Latner makes a similar contribution with her forthcoming novel Hurricane Moon. |
8/23/07 REVIEW: The House by Edward Lee
Review by Jeff Burk
  | There are few authors in the world of horror as "hardcore" as Edward
Lee. Known for his extreme use of bloody violence, perverted sex, and every other manner of obscenity; Lee has developed his own cult-like following of avid readers. |
8/21/07 REVIEW: Warlord by Jennifer Fallon
Review by S.K. Slevinski
| In the third and final installment of her Wolfblade prequel trilogy, Jennifer Fallon delivers on reader expectations by offering a well-plotted conclusion that—true to form—doesn't neglect character development. |
8/16/07 REVIEW: Star Brigade: The New Renaissance by C.C. Ekeke
Review by Mervi Hämäläinen
  | The book begins in the year 2394. Humanity has spread throughout the galaxy and met many intelligent species, some of them friendly, some less so. |
8/14/07 REVIEW: Majestrum by Matthew Hughes
Review by Violet Kane
  | With his latest novel, Majestrum, Matthew Hughes proves that readers can trust him to provide a fantastic blend of magic, technology, humor and mystery, and all in tale that's both warmly traditional and brightly unique. |
8/9/07 REVIEW: Revenge of the Elves by Gary Wassner
Review by Andrea Johnson
| Imagine hundreds of threads going into a loom. Multiple strand braids are created, separated, rebraided, the web is formed. Colors are blended, fade, and are recreated, exposing a secret pattern, one this loom was not designed to create. From a distance, this is GemQuest. |
8/7/07 REVIEW: The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold
Review by Violet Kane
  | I always hear good things about Lois McMaster Bujold, but so far I've had only disappointing experiences with her books. The Curse of Chalion was no exception. |
8/2/07 REVIEW: The Boleyn Inheritance by Philippa Gregory
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | In The Boleyn Inheritance Philippa Gregory offers up an independent sequel to her historical novel, The Other Boleyn Girl, giving fans a tale of lesser known historical figures that is just as compulsively readable as her first Boleyn novel. |
JULY
7/31/07 REVIEW: Children of Chaos by Dave Duncan
Review by Mervi Hämäläinen
  | Children of Chaos is the first book of a duology and establishes well the world and the characters in it. Dodec is a dodecahedral world where the habitable Faces are surrounded by ice and mountains, which makes moving from one Face to another difficult at best. |
7/26/07 REVIEW: Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card
Review by Violet Kane
  | In this first volume of his Shadow series, Card revisits the Ender's Game storyline and endeavors to recapture the audience of that original novel for which he is best known. |
7/24/07 REVIEW: Brasyl by Ian McDonald
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | Coming on the heels of McDonald's hit River of Gods, Brasyl is part cyberpunk, part historical narrative, part bladerunner, part parallel universe epic, and part introduction to a culture most Americans know nothing about. |
7/19/07 REVIEW: Warlock: A Novel of Ancient Egypt by Wilbur Smith
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | One of my favorite settings for historical fiction—besides medieval Europe, of course—is Ancient Egypt. But I'll be damned if I can find many historicals or fantasies set in that milieu. So I was excited to pick up Warlock, a novel set in Ancient Egypt by a successful and established author of historical fiction. |
7/17/07 INTERVIEW: Matthew Stover
Interview by Violet Kane
  | Whenever I pick up a new and promising book, my hope is always that it will be a compulsively readable, can't-put-it-down, stay-up-past-my-bedtime, page-turning experience. The more intellectual side of me hopes that it will also be a book with enthralling characters, which drive the story forward and challenge the reader. The last new author to do it? Matthew Stover. |
7/12/07 REVIEW: Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Review by R.S. Gibson
  | This short novel originally published in 1912 tells the tale of how Tarzan came to be marooned on the shore of Africa how he was raised among the great apes and of his first experiences of the civilized world. How he then discovers his true heritage as a wealthy English aristocrat but then nobly renounces that heritage to protect the woman he loves. |
7/10/07 REVIEW: Dzur by Steven Brust
Review by Mervi Hämäläinen
  | I'm very particular about reading a series in chronological order, preferably from the point of view of the main character(s). So far, I've read only three series out of order because I didn't get my hands on them in the correct order and I wanted to read them the instant I got them. The Vlad Taltos series is one of those three and I'm delighted to see a new book out. |
7/5/07 REVIEW: Pattern Recognition by William Gibson
Review by Violet Kane
  | Pattern Recognition found its way to my reading list as do most books for review on ARWZ. There was a combination of motivating factors—it was written by one of the greats of SFF literature, it was available on audiobook... What I did not expect, however, was to enjoy it as much as I did. |
7/3/07 REVIEW: SideShow by Sheri S. Tepper
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | This is the last book in a loosely held together series that takes place in a futuristic universe. |
JUNE
6/28/07 REVIEW: A Wind in the Door by Madeleine L'Engle
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | This book may very well be responsible for my love of reading SFF and my desire to write SFF, and so after its recent release on Audio CD, I was anxious to revisit this novel. |
6/26/07 REVIEW: Forbidden Planet directed by Fred M. Wilcox
Review by Doug Gogerty
  | Forbidden Planet is one of the iconic science fiction movies of the 1950's. |
6/21/07 REVIEW: Meq by Steve Cash
Review by Mervi Hämäläinen
  | The book starts in 1881 on a train where the main character, a twelve year old Zianno Zezen, and his parents are traveling to St Louis. |
6/19/07 REVIEW: Pan's Labyrinth directed by Guillermo Del Toro
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | This is the first film I've seen to combine the dark, artsy quality I've come to expect in foreign films with the typically American drive for escapism and dazzling special effects. |
6/7/07 through 6/14/07: ON VACATION
6/5/07 ARTICLE: William Girdler: 70s Horror Icon Director
Review by Nickolas Cook
  | One of the lost icons of this time in American cinema was William Girdler. In the span of seven short years, he made nine feature films, most of them in horror, before his untimely death at the early age of thirty. |
MAY
5/31/07 REVIEW: Cetaganda by Lois McMaster Bujold
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | In Cetaganda, Lois McMaster Bujold creates an interplanetary world of court intrigues where empires rise and fall on genetic codes. I just wish she'd picked a different story to accompany it. |
5/29/07 REVIEW: The Prestige by Christopher Priest
Review by Violet Kane
  | The Prestige is an atmospheric novel that evokes an age of Victorian storytelling—I just wish that Christopher Priest had used a less Victorian story structure. |
5/24/07 REVIEW: Encyclopedia of the Undead by Dr. Bob Curran
Review by Lisa Schussler
  | Who do those eyes at your window belong to? Is that really just the wind rustling the curtains? Dr. Bob Curran brings us closer to the dark beings that have haunted man for thousands of years. With thorough cultural research, Curran helps us get to know vampires, werewolves, ghouls, and many other monsters. |
5/22/06 AUTHOR Q&A: Kate Elliott
Original Session: 10/17/06 to 10/23/06
  | Author Kate Elliott recently visited the ARWZ Community Forums to answer questions from fans and ARWZ readers in an Interactive Q&A. |
5/17/07 REVIEW: The Acts of King Arthur and his Noble Knights by John Steinbeck
Review by R.S. Gibson
  | The first book which John Steinbeck read and fell in love was Sir Thomas Mallory's Le Morte De Arthur. In later life Steinbeck would write to his literary agent that he was convinced that the Arthurian myth contained important universal truths and symbols. |
5/15/07 REVIEW: Zipporah by Marek Halter
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | The second in Marek Halter's Canaan Trilogy, which details the fictionalized lives of biblical matriarchs, Zipporah: Wife of Moses lacks much of the appeal of its predecessor. |
5/10/07 REVIEW: Dream of the Dragon Pool by Albert A. Dalia
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | At first blush, Dream of the Dragon Pool seems a rather simple narrative following the poet Li Bo on his journey into exile after being expelled by the royal court. Stopping at an ancient dream temple, Li falls into a dangerous quest that he must complete, or face the anger of the spirits. |
5/8/07 ARTICLE: Films of the Fantastic at the 9th San Francisco Independent Film Festival
Article by Peter Wong
  | As a fan of films of the fantastic, I recently discovered a welcome alternative to watching yet another tiresome science fiction shoot-'em-up with ray guns. It's the small but decidedly quirky San Francisco Independent Film Festival. Every February, this film festival unapologetically screens fantasy and horror films. At Indie Fest, the originality of vision matters more than the presence of A-list talent or large budgets. |
5/3/07 REVIEW: Hidden Empire (Saga of the Seven Suns book 1) by Kevin J. Anderson
Review by R.S. Gibson
  | Hidden Empire is the first volume in Kevin J Anderson's Saga of the Seven Suns. In the future, mankind has made it to the stars with the aid of the benevolent aliens of the Idirian Empire who gave man the secret of FTL travel. As mankind has expanded across the galaxy the Idirian Empire, although still powerful, has become stagnant and begun a long gentle decline. |
APRIL
4/26/07 REVIEW: Xenocide by Orson Scott Card
Review by Violet Kane
  | This third novel of the original Ender series exists, along with its predecessor Speaker for the Dead, in the shadow of Orson Scott Card's multi-award-winning science fiction classic Ender's Game. These successor novels deserve more attention. |
4/19/07 REVIEW: Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler
Review by Violet Kane
  | As a sequel to Butler's Parable of the Sower, this novel recreates all of the best parts of its predecessors. As a stand alone, new readers will find this book absorbing on its own. |
4/12/07 REVIEW: 2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C Clarke
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | 2001: A Space Odyssey is a quick history of the first age of man. |
4/5/07 REVIEW: Wolf in Shadow by David Gemmell
Review by R.S. Gibson
  | Set in a post-apocalyptic world, this novel follows the struggles of a few good men and women to build a better world in a land plagued by lawless men and an ancient evil stirring in the North. |
MARCH
3/29/07 REVIEW: Micah by Laurell K. Hamilton
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Regular readers of ARWZ will recall that my first foray into Laurell K. Hamilton's world of Anita Blake was not a largely successful one, however, I felt a responsibility to give her a second chance. |
3/22/07 REVIEW: I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
Review by Murray Graham
  | It is a classic SF scenario—our hero Robert Neville is the last survivor of a plague that has infected earth's population and turned everyone into blood hungry monsters. |
3/20/07 REVIEW: The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | In The Other Boleyn Girl, Philippa Gregory brings new life into the much retold story of Anne Boleyn's rise and fall in the English court by turning to the infamous queen's sister Mary as storyteller. |
3/15/07 REVIEW: Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | This is Robinson's first novel in his Mars series about the colonization and terra-forming of Mars into a new Earth. The novel takes place over the course of about 50 years. |
3/13/06 COLUMN: Viewing List: War of the Worlds
Article by Doug Gogerty
  | In 1898, H.G. Wells wrote one of his many science fiction classics. This particular story sprang from the scientific observations of the day. The idea that canals existed on Mars became the basis for many Martian stories. Wells's War of the Worlds was one of the first. |
3/8/07 REVIEW: Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman
Review by Violet Kane
  | Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman's recent collection of short stories, will find a welcoming audience among devoted Gaiman fans. However, if you've never read Gaiman, there are much better places to start. |
3/6/07 REVIEW: The Alchemist by Paolo Coehlo
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Paolo Coehlo's The Alchemist comes to audio in an excellent production read by actor Jeremy Irons. The book itself is a charming tale, and while not inappropriately billed as fantasy, it reads much more like a fable or a children's novel. |
FEBRUARY
2/22/07 REVIEW: Empire by Orson Scott Card
Review by Violet Kane
  | Politics have always played a central role in the fiction of Orson Scott Card, but in his newest novel, Empire, Card creates a near-future America where the political landscape is a familiar one—at least until the story gets going. |
2/20/07 REVIEW: Aftermath by Charles Sheffield
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | Everyone has heard the line: "Repent! The end of the world is near! God is angry!" But what happens when the world ends because of natural causes? |
2/15/07 REVIEW: Across the Nightingale Floor by Lian Hearn
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | This book is the first of Lian Hearn's Tales of the Otori series, and its appeal is clear. Set in feudal Japan and fueled by magic and imagination, this novel fills a gap in the current fantasy field which is still over-populated with medieval European style fantasy. The storyline, however, does not veer far from fantasy tradition. |
2/13/07 INTERVIEW: Matthew Hughes
Interview by Violet Kane
  | No writer exemplifies the sort of creativity and range increasingly available in alternative reality genres today better than Matthew Hughes. |
2/8/07 REVIEW: A Scanner Darkly by Philip K. Dick
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Audio productions of Philip K. Dick novels are much too rare, and so this recent treatment of A Scanner Darkly is a most welcome addition to any science fiction audio library. |
2/6/07 REVIEW: The Last Kingdom by Bernard Cornwell
Review by Violet Kane
  | If you're a fan of epic fantasy who has been reluctant to make the jump to try historical fiction, you may be worried that you'll get bogged down in a stuffy tale of top hats and petticoats. Never fear with Bernard Cornwell's The Last Kingdom. Fans of epic fantasy will find a story of battles, bloodlines and clan feuds. |
2/1/07 REVIEW: Man of Two Worlds by Frank and Brian Herbert
Review by Andrea Johnson
 | I don't often enjoy books that have been written by two authors. I can usually tell where one author stopped and the other began, so it seems choppy to me. But this is a book written by two people who know each other better than most. Yes, I could tell who wrote which parts, and it's funny in a way, but it's still a damn good book, and a damn fun read. |
JANUARY
1/30/07 POETRY: The New Evolutionary Wars
by Thomas B. White
All pedestrians are lizards / disguised in trousers and skirts
1/25/07 REVIEW: Stories from the Steel Garden by Jesse Gordon
Review by Nickolas Cook
  | My first impression was that Jesse Gordon's newest novel, Stories from the Steel Garden, could be definitively stacked in the social science fiction category, an underused sub-genre, and one from which stems most classic science fiction. But upon completion, I found it, instead, to be part socio-political tract and part Quantum Physics exposition. |
1/23/07 REVIEW: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | With the conceptual vision of science fiction and the imaginative exploration of fantasy, Madeleine L'Engle's classic story of science, friendship and love moves into the future with a worthy audiobook production. |
1/18/07 REVIEW: Da Vinci Code on audiobook
Review by Violet Kane
  | In recent years, Da Vinci Code has become the defining example of "bestsellerism" in contemporary fiction. You know the type—page-turning thrillers with movie adaptation written all over them. |
1/16/07 ARTICLE: Top 10 Fantasy Worlds
Compiled by ARWZ Editors
  | Over a hundred fictional worlds vied for placement on our latest list, the Top 10 Fantasy Worlds, and the victor enjoyed the largest margain of victory yet in our Top 10 projects. |
1/11/07 REVIEW: Elantris by Brandon Sanderson
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Brandon Sanderson's debut novel, Elantris, changes up the fantasy form to give fans of political fantasy a plotline that combats genre cliché. |
1/9/07 REVIEW: Lincoln in the Basement by Jerry Cowling
Review by Saundra Kane
  | Lincoln in the Basement is a well-written and creative alternative history set during the American Civil War. |
1/4/07 REVIEW: The Shards by Gary Wassner
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | If The Twins was as introduction, and The Awakening continued the prelude, then The Shards begins the battle to defeat evil, and save the world. |
1/2/07 INTERVIEW: Guy Gavriel Kay
Interview by Violet Kane
  | What happens when an email from your all-time favorite author shows up in your inbox one summer day at the library? |
DECEMBER
12/28/06 REVIEW: Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Fans of vampire fiction don't need to read a reviewer's commentary of Anne Rice's landmark novel, however, this book may hold some unforeseen surprises for fans of other alternative reality genres who may be reluctant to make the jump. |
12/26/06 REVIEW: The Dead Zone Season 2 on DVD
Review by Violet Kane
  | After a great debut season, The Dead Zone proves that it can keep up the good work, even if nothing much changes from beginning to end. |
12/21/06 REVIEW: The Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. LeGuin
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | If you've been tempted to jump in and ride the fantasy tidal wave summoned by recent blockbuster movies, or if you're looking for an imaginative story to read to your older child, The Wizard of Earthsea is a perfect choice. |
12/19/06 REVIEW: The Original Masked Superhero by Isabel Allende
Review by R.S. Gibson
  | This fine novel by the Chilean author Isabel Allende covers the formative years of Diego De La Vega. It tells of his growth from childhood to a young man and how the original masked avenger Zorro came to be. |
12/14/06 REVIEW: The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
Review by Violet Kane
  | The first book of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, The Golden Compass is an ambitious mix of elements, which is not wholly successful. |
12/12/06 REVIEW: Ysabel by Guy Gavriel Kay
Review by S.K. Slevinski
 | Magic, modernity and truly compelling character conflict make this novel the first must-read of 2007 for anyone who loves to get lost in literature. |
12/7/06 REVIEW: The Awakening by Gary Wassner
Review by Andrea Johnson
  | The magic and wonder continues in Book Two of Wassner's GemQuest series, The Awakening. No need to be nervous about sequels. This isn't so much a sequel as it is a continuation of an epic story of good versus evil, love, loss, triumph, and the cruelest kind of betrayal. This is epic fantasy at its best, and on so many levels. |
12/5/06 REVIEW: The Last Battle by Chris Bunch
Review by Violet Kane
  | Re-released today in paperback from Roc, The Last Battle is the third book of Chris Bunch's Dragonmaster trilogy. It is a fast-paced adventure, but otherwise unremarkable. |
NOVEMBER
11/30/06 REVIEW: Rome Season One on DVD
Review by S.K. Slevinski
  | Rome is character-driven storytelling at its zenith, as it takes a well-trod story and makes it intricately engaging. |
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Reviews
