Re: Pol Pot’s Beautiful Daughter

A xerox machine prints photos of the dead killed by Pol Pot until it drives away the people in the building. Right from the beginning I loved the mix of tradition and technology in the ghost story that opens “Pol Pot’s Beautiful Daughter (Fantasy),” by Geoff Ryman. After that, it says: Then we construct Pol […]

Re: The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs

I’m a sucker for folktales and stories about talking animals. My favorite Nancy Kress story stars a talking dog. So I sat up and listened when the dogs started to talk in “The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs of North Park After the Change,” by Kij Johnson. The title suggests that it’s going […]

Re: Ysabel

I started reading Guy Gavriel Kay because I had the feeling I was supposed to like him. The Fionavar books looked like just the thing for my Tolkien-warped brain. Well, I hated Fionavar, only making it partway into the second book. It got better once he stopped playing insert-the-Simarillion-reference and started writing his own ideas, […]

My 2007 Reading List

I plan to read the Nebula ballot, mostly out of a sense of obligation, but I’ve already read the one I was most interested in. I’m more excited about reading through my own list.