Boskone 49 Recap

This past weekend was Boskone 49, a science fiction / fantasy literature convention down in South Boston. After great experiences at ReaderCon the past couple of years, I decided to head down and partake in the fun for the spring, hitting up a bunch of panels and getting to meet up with people that I've largely talked to online over the past couple of years.

Stepping in the door (after a typical Boston driving experience) on Friday afternoon, I saw one of my former college professors, F. Brett Cox, and Lightspeed publisher John Joseph Adams, which was nice, before heading off to the first of several panels: Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror in the Classroom, led by Brett, where they talked at length about the recent acceptance of the genres in the academic field. Since Cyberpunk has become a subgenre, it's become relevant, but with the addition of several literary heavyweights, such as Michael Chabon and Margaret Atwood, it's become more acceptable.

Typically, short fiction seems to be one of the best ways to get the literary themes across, but novels and films are also well used. What everyone seemed to agree on was that students really took to the genre, regardless if they were fans: students seem to identify with it quite a bit more than other genres.

Someone on the panel had a great quote, one that applies to more than just learning, but also critical reviewing and thinking as well: "I get to look under the hood and see how this works."

The next panel was Occupy SF: Corporations in Science Fiction, which was a fascinating talk. Charles Stross opened with some interesting things to think about: what holds up value in an interstellar empire? Apparently, this is the topic of his next book, and it drove discussion a bit early on, with some discussions about the very nature of money and economics. In comparable situations, letters of credit have been used on Earth, but how does this work when distances across space can be hundreds, if not thousands of years? Stross also suggested that if we're going to use metals for currency, we should simply use plutonium: it literally burns a hole in our pockets, and if we have too much, we can simply blow it up.

Finally getting to the point of corporations, they were likened to that of a hive: individuals carry out instructions on the behalf of the corporate hive, for its own (and presumably theirs), betterment. This is fine, in theory, but when you have an unchecked capitalist model, it will simply consume itself, because people aren't good at looking and planning in the extreme long-term: corporations simply work to make money and continue their operations (good and bad).

Leadership followed this discussion, and the point to which we've gotten represents a major change in how corporations were led: a very good point was brought up about who leads these places and what governs them: corporate behavior rewards psychopaths, and interestingly, a set of objective rules are set up to govern success: the value of experience has been lessened, because the rise of the MBA degree essentially has made corporate leadership interchangeable. Top earners are promoted and valued, regardless of how they become those top earners. As someone in the audience commented, that undermines what the customers think of the corporation. Long-term, that matters, but not so much in the short term.

This was an enlightening talk, and it was one of a couple that were very, very thought provoking for me personally, and gave me some great, solid ideas for a couple of projects that I've got in the works.

Saturday morning, I started with SF As a Mirror on Society, which I came in for about half of. Fortunately, this time, I left my car in Cambridge and rode in on the T, which reminded me that I dearly miss public transportation. I wish that I could ride a bus, subway or train to work. As I entered, I came in on a discussion of the 'Other', and some discussion on how some of the neglected characters should be handled: essentially, not embellished.

Following that, it was off to lunch, with Theodore Quester and John Joseph Adams, the Lightspeed crew present at the convention. Good times.

Lunch went a bit long, and when I got back, I got into a panel a bit late: Robocop Futures. This was a fascinating panel. As I got in, there was some discussion on the the role of people in systems: increasingly, we're living in a world that's guided by policy, rather than human intervention. I was reminded of something that P.W. Singer talked about when talking about robotic systems: people in the loop. People are increasingly out of the loop, where they're able to defer responsibility.

This is connected to law policies: increasingly, there are mandatory sentences and policies. One of the panelists mentioned a case where a Briton was prevented from entering the US because of a tweet. In this instance, everybody involved knew that it wasn't a serious or credible threat: policy demanded that the airport report it to law enforcement, who was in turn forced to investigate it, despite knowing that it wasn't a serious or credible threat. In the same manner, mandatory minimums for certain crimes: people aren't able to use their judgment in the process.

This discussion ended up on automated systems, which parse our conversations online. Increasingly, we've found ourselves turning to automated systems that absolve us of responsibility. Fortunately, computers are pretty bad at making sense of human relations. At the same time, people in the system are the weaker links that can potentially be exploited.

After a short break, Table Top Games in the Digital Age was the next one, with Ethan Gilsdorf moderating. This one was really one of the bigger letdowns: I'd been hoping that there would be some discussion about how table-top gaming might make the jump into the digital age, but there was a lot of lamenting about how the day of face to face gaming seemed to be going by the wayside (from the audience as well). It felt very oppositional to me, rather than a group looking at what was both inevitable coming, but also how to work the social aspects into the gaming world. This was covered, but briefly.

The next panel was fascinating: War of the Worlds and Dracula, compared. Both novels are ones that I read a long time ago, back in college, and I've been meaning to revisit them at some point. Discussion started right off with a look at both novels as reactions to Britain's place in the world: essentially, they're both reverse colonization novels, with two different models that tapped into an undercurrent of fear from British society:

1. Invade, and replace the inhabitants with your own people.
2. Invade, and change the inhabitants into your own people.

As someone noted early on, the Martians did to the British what the British did to the Zulu: invade, use overwhelming force and wreck havoc. In addition to these two novels, there was an entire subgenre of invasion novels from around the 1870s, right around the same time that Germany had begun to gain power in Europe. Britain's place in the world had begun to fall, and that's expressed in these novels: it's not too unlike the Cold War between the USSR and US. Both novels feature bloodsuckers feeding on Englishmen.

Something that I realized shortly after that both novels relied on the inherent strengths within the British lifestyle and culture: The British prevailed because their very biology helped them in War of the Worlds, while Dracula was hunted down with modern technology, which again taps into the patriotic element of both books. It was a fantastic panel, one that I learned a lot from.

The panel on Cover Art was an interesting talk, and the last for the night, with representatives from Tor Books and Baen. Baen's was interesting, where they have a particular style to their covers, but it was interesting to see their rational behind the art. Tor had some great cover examples, and overall, it was fascinating to see everything that goes into the covers of a book, and how it's used as a marketing tool.

On Sunday, Joshua Bilmes (Agent), David G. Hartwell (Editor), Patrick Nielsen Hayden (Editor), John Scalzi (Writer) and Toni Weisskopfgot (Editor / Publisher) together for their Top Ten Tips for the Prospective Writer, which was a interesting talk for anyone who is looking to become a professional author. There were actually more than ten tips, but they were all good ones. In short form:

• Be a good writer.
• Get used to sucking. You're at the beginning of a journey through incompetence. Keep writing until you don't suck.
• Divest yourself of attachment to writing times/locations: set aside a time, and write where ever. You'll have a new excuse everywhere you go to not write.
• A writer can do anything, provide its not what he's supposed to be doing.
• Write every day. Now is a good time to write.
• Two things: you can be a writer, then you can be a published author.
• Treat it like a job: be professional about it, and commit to it.
• Write to entertain someone else, not you.
• Know your audience.
• Who's going to be your first audience? Your editor and publisher.
• Give yourself space with no other intention other than to learn. Write so that you know how to put together a story.
• Publishers want to see a manuscript that you care about: they don't want to see your nanowrimo novel.
• Acknowledgments are a good roadmap.
• Understanding the industry are extraordinarily important. You have a better chance sending things to the right people. However, it is a moving target: trends change quickly. Urban fantasy was big four years ago. Much smaller now. If something's hot, it's too late.
• Write the book that you'd like to read.
• Half of your money that you earn goes to taxes.
• There will be people who are better than you and some who are worse. Publishing isn't fair.
• Publishers will put money where they think they'll get a return.
• Workshops are good, but make sure that you apply the advice that you get. Do some work shopping and then stop. The same workshop will ultimately give you the same advice over and over again.
• Your submission manuscript that's accepted is your final one: you're in the pipeline, not your writing workshop. Don't make drastic changes.
• Wheaton's law: don't be a dick.
• Scifi has an unusual amount of flow between pro and fan. Be nice to others.
• Esteem of your peers: nice to have it, but it's not essential.
• Don't be distracted by non-paying things that don't help you.
• If you enjoy it, you should do it. Don't do it if you don't like it.
• Write the best that you can, understand that everyone else is writing the best that you can, and don't crap on people. Admire the good works of others.
• Learn how to apologize and learn how to do it sincerely.

Good primer of advice there from some people who know that it works.

I got to wander around a little, before ending up at John Scalzi's reading, where he read from his upcoming novel Red Shirts and his non-fiction book, 24 Frames into the Future.

Redshirts sounds hilarious, and I'm glad that I've been watching Star Trek, because it's got a lot of inspiration from that particular franchise. It'll be interesting to see what Trek fans think once it's published. John's got a very fun style when it comes to panels, and this one was rapt with attention and a healthy dose of dry wit. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to stick around, due to a death in the family. I didn't get my copy of Fuzzy Nation signed, but that's okay: I got my copy of Rule 34 signed by Charles Stross, and The Warded Man by Peter Brett (which I'm going to read soon!), which was very cool.

With that, it was a good convention: I'm not sure I had as much fun as Readercon, but it was a good time, where I got to meet up with some very cool people: Myke Cole, F. Brett Cox, Peter Brett, John Scalzi, Charles Stross, Ian Tregillis (who's book Bitter Seeds is now on my to-read list), John Joseph Adams, Genevieve Valentine, Theodora Goss, Irene Gallo, and a whole bunch of others that I'm forgetting. Already, I can't wait to go back next year.

2011 Reading Census

This year has been an interesting reading year for me, fluctuating between a bunch of really, really good books, and a couple that really sucked out any interest that I had in reading at that time, with a number of books in-between that I thought were fun reads. Here's what I got through in 2011:

1- Grey, Jon Armstrong (1-8) 2- The Dervish House, Ian McDonald (1-21) 3 - Hull Zero Three, Greg Bear (1-23) 4 - Hunger Games, Suzanne Clarke (2-1) 5 - The Lifecycle of Software Objects, Ted Chiang (2-4) 6 - At The Queen's Command, Michael A. Stackpole (2-19) 7 - Mossflower, Brian Jacques (2-20) 8 - Embedded, Dan Abnett (3-7) 9 - Kraken, China Mieville (3-9) 10 - Leviathan Wakes, James A Corey (3-17) 11 - Little Fuzzy, H Beam Piper (3-28) 12 - Fahrenheit 451 Graphic Novel, Ray Bradbury (4-13) 13 - Yarn, Jon Armstrong (4-13) 14 - Welcome to the Greenhouse, Gordon Van Gelder (4-19) 15 - Fuzzy Nation, John Scalzi (4-25) 16 - Spectyr, Philippa Ballentine (4-26) 17 - Soft Apocalypse, Will McIntosh (4-27) 18 - Blackout, Connie Willis (4-30) 19 - Locke & Key, Joe Hill (5-8) 20 - Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins, (5-22) 21 - Deathless, Catherynne Valente (5-27) 22 - Embassytown, China Mieville (6-18) 23 - Hex, Allen M. Steele (7-2) 24 - The Gravity Pilot, MM Buckner (7-4) 25 - A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin (7-15) 26 - The Big Roads, Earl Swift (7-19) 27 - Spellbound, Blake Charlton (8-2) 28 - The Magician King, Lev Grossman (8-4) 29 - Bright's Passage, Josh Ritter (8-5) 30 - Grave Peril, Jim Butcher (8-13) 31 - Spook Country, William Gibson (9-6) 32 - Machine Man, Max Barry (9-10) 33 - Crisis in Zefra, Karl Schroeder (9-15) 34 - Halo: The Fall Of Reach, Eric Nylund (10-1) 35 - Germline, TC McCarty (10-5) 36 - The Windup Girl, Paolo Bacigalupi (10-16) Audio 37 - Halo: Glasslands, Karen Traviss (10-29) 38 - Red Herring, Archer Mayor (10-20) 39 - Ganymede, Cherie Priest (11-11) 40 - Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card (11-20) 41 - Ready Player One, Ernie Cline (11-26) 42 - Open Season, Archer Mayor (12-5) 43 - Seed, Rob Zeigler (12-11) 44 - Rule 34, Charles Stross (12-??)

In the pipeline: X-Wing: Rogue Squadron, by Michael A. Stackpole, All You Need Is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka, Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam by John A. Nagl and The Unforgiving Minute: A Soldier's Education by Craig M. Mullaney. Rogue Squadron is something I'm going to finish up sometime this weekend, and All You Need is Kill is somewhere behind that. The other two are a bit denser, and while they're interesting, they're taxing to get through.

Interestingly, this was the first year where I really read books electronically. I've dabbled with it in the past, ever since I bought an iPad, but this year, I made the jump and read a small percentage digitally: 7 in all: Grey, Lifecycle of Software Objects, Embedded, Little Fuzzy, Crisis in Zephra, Ender's Game and Open Season. Add in Game of Thrones, with which I alternated between my paperback and ecopy, and that's 19%, or just under a fifth of my book pile existed on a hard drive somewhere, rather than a bookshelf.

An interesting thing about eBooks: there's really only a single novel that I read in which I felt really took advantage of the book’s digital nature: Crisis at Zephra. This novel, a short novella, really, was published by the Canadian Military, and incorporated a lot of data about new and upcoming technologies, and trends in said technology. I was limited in that I was reading on a wifi only iPad when I was away from the internet, which left me unable to click on the links scattered throughout the text, with explanations as to what the terms, technology and theory meant. This, I think, is where eBooks will eventually head: less reading experiences, and more immersive and interactive ones.

I've also been doing a bit more with book reviews, on a number of different sites: SF Signal, The Functional Nerds, Kirkus Reviews, and my own blog, with a total of 15 books (34%) read for a review. In this instance, I've written reviews for a number, but these are books that were given to me by either the website that I wrote the review for, or sent by an author or publicist for my own purposes, even if a review wasn't necessarily expected or promised. Just under a full third of my reading this year was subsidized by someone else, for review purposes. Of those books, I had a bit of fun, although my reviews weren't universally positive. The caveat to this, of course, is that a majority of my reading, (29 books in all - 65%) are for my own pleasure, and a minor attempt to whittle down my own to-read list. I've got a feeling that I'll never destroy the growing pile.

I've always described myself as a science fiction fan, rather than a fantasy one, and in years past, I've typically read more fantasy than science fiction. This year? I read 27 Science Fiction books (61%), 11 fantasy books (25%), 2 mystery novels (4.5%), 2 YA novels (4.5%), and 1 each of history and steampunk (2%). This year was certainly more science fictional than years past, which I'm happy about.

Interestingly, while I describe this year as being up and down, when looking over the list as a whole, there's only four books that I really didn't like. I thought just under half (20) were good, while just under a quarter (10%), were okay - decent, but nothing that really wowed me. 10 books in all really blew me away (22%). Of the books that I read this year, the more memorable were the really great ones, and of those, three really stood out for me: The Magician King, by Lev Grossman, Soft Apocalypse, by Will McIntosh, and The Dervish House, by Ian MacDonald. (See my top 10 list for the full number of ones that impressed me this year.) These books are astonishing reads, and I really hope that we'll see The Magician King and Soft Apocalypse get the attention they deserve: Grossman has gained a considerable amount of acclaim, but McIntosh's first novel feels like it's under the radar a bit, the underdog of the year. If you haven't read it: I can't recommend it highly enough. The Dervish House was nominated for a Hugo, but somehow ended up at the bottom of the polls. Still, it's nice to see it nominated.

Of the really bad books, these all stand out as ones that I had the most trouble getting through: Seed, by Rob Zeigler, The Gravity Pilot by M.M. Buckner, Deathless, by Catherynne Valente and Hex, by Allen M. Steele. I believe that the reason why they stand out so much is because they were all books that I had high hopes for: Seed was lauded as the successor to Paolo Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl, and utterly failed at that, The Gravity Pilot looked interesting, and didn't work, Deathless was wonderfully written, but was a book that I simply couldn't get into, and Hex was part of Steele's Coyote universe, which started off so well, and has fallen so far with this book. There were some others, like Jack Campbell's Beyond the Frontier: Dreadnaught, which was so abysmally written that I couldn't even get through the first chapter, and Sarah Hall's Daughters of the North that I had a lot of trouble getting into and didn't finish.

Everything else in the middle was entertaining, and some excellent novels: Susanne Collins' Hunger Games was an excellent read, although the sequel was a bit too much of the same for my liking. I haven't reached #3, Mockingjay, and I'm awaiting that one's release in paperback. China Mieville's Embassytown was interesting, a little flawed, but brilliant all the same, although I have to say that I liked Kraken quite a bit more. Leviathan Wakes was a lot of fun to read, and a promising start to a new series, while John Scalzi's Fuzzy Nation was something I tore through in just a couple of hours on a plane. I finally got in on A Game of Thrones, and it lives up to the hype, somewhat. I even broke out of the SF/F genres, and picked up the fantastic The Big Roads, by Earl Swift, which was a fascinating look at the construction of roadways in the US. Karen Traviss's entry into the Halo universe was also a fantastic one, and it's dragged me in to that particular expanded world, as I picked up several other Halo novels, which will likely get read next time I'm on a Halo kick. I re-read Mossflower after Brian Jaqcues passed away, as well as Ender's Game, and found both books really lived up to my memories of them. Ernie Cline's Reader Player One was a fun, entertaining book, but it was lacking in other departments. Finally, I had a chance to go back and revisit Paolo Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl, which lives up to my first impressions wonderfully.

So, why quantify my enjoyment? I've generally been accused from people of taking things like this too seriously, in reviewing films or books that should be 'just for fun'. I've never subscribed to the ‘turn your brain off while you read/watch/listen’ train of thought, because I think that does a disservice to the author. Certainly, there's books or films that I've done that with, enjoying them because they were written to be enjoyed. But, distilling a year's worth of reading down into some easy statistics?

A couple of reasons: one, it helps me better understand my own interests by grounding them in reality. As mentioned, I firmly describe myself in the science fiction camp, but over the past couple of years, I've generally been surprised when I've read more fantasy than science fiction. My interests are all over the place, and I don't generally remember at a glance what I've read as a whole. I was a little surprised that I hadn't finished more than a single history book this year, despite the intense work that I did on various history projects: I've read portions of numerous historical texts, mainly about World War II and military history (including a couple that are still technically on the reading list), but never finished them, or needed to finish them. This might also be me forgetting to stick a book onto the 'Read' List.

Reading is an important part of what I do. I typically read at night, before I go to bed (increasingly, if I'm using my iPad, or at the beginning of the day, when I can get through 10-15 pages while I'm waiting for my computer to load up at work. Weekends usually mean a lot of time to blow through something, and when I was on public transportation for two trips earlier this year to Washington D.C. and Belgium, I read a lot: three books for each trip (for the DC trip, that was one book for the airplane, one for the second day on the train, and the third for the flight home, all in a couple of days.) Better understanding my own reading habits help me to read more, I think, and while it's not quantity over quality, I've got a massive backlog of books that I've bought. Looking over my list from this year, I had a total of 6 books - 13%! - came off of that list, which currently numbers around 100. These are all books that I've owned for more than a year, while a huge number of books that I picked up this year were released this year, and this also comes as a bit of a surprise.

My thoughts going into 2012 is that I’ll be whittling down the to-read list. There’s a lot of books that I do want to get to in the near future. Off the top of my head, I can think of a number that are edging up the list: George R.R. Martin's second entry in the Song of Ice and Fire, Clash of Kings is most certainly going to make it onto the list when the next season hits, the entire X-Wing series by Michael Stackpole and Aaron Allston will get re-read prior to the next novel in the series, Mercy Kill. I also want to revisit Timothy Zahn’s Icarus Hunt. I've also been wanting to begin David Louis Edelman's Infoquake, finish out William Gibson's Bigend trilogy with Zero History and get into Neal Stephenson, Iain M. Banks, and generally blow through a bunch of paperbacks and history books that I've had for a couple of years. Hopefully, I'll be able to get through a portion of that, and hopefully, I'll slow down the growth of my own library - we're running out of shelf space (again).

It’s been a fun year, with a lot of good stories all around. It looks like 2012 will be just as much fun.

The Best Books of 2011

2010 was a good year for reading, and this year, while it had some significant downs, also had its share of really great reads. I'll be posting a full list of the books read in 2011 in the next week or so, but in the meantime, here's the books that I most enjoyed this year:  

1 - Soft Apocalypse, Will McIntosh

My absolute favorite read of the year was Will McIntosh's debut novel, Soft Apocalypse. Already the recipient of a Hugo award, this book is one that I hope will follow suit. A bleak and outstanding look at what the future might hold, McIntosh weaves a tale that's outstanding in its character growth and understanding of how the world works on massive scales. It's tragic and heartbreaking on one hand, and unmistably beautiful on the other. (Review)

2 - The Magician King, Lev Grossman

I didn't think that Grossman would be able to top The Magicians, and I was wary of it earlier this year: Where the first one could be described as the anti-Harry Potter, I have a hard time seeing how this one could play out. It turns out, it played out very well: Grossman not only topped the first book, he created a story that was brilliant in all regards: further building up the characters from the last book, and making the stakes from this book much higher, darker and deeper than I thought possible. The story is simply stunning. (Review)

3 - Leviathan Wakes, James A. Corey

Leviathan Wakes is a book that grabbed me at the cover and refused to let go. I've long had a soft spot for space opera, and this book really fits the bill, with an exceptional world within our solar system. There's a bit of everything in this story: military action, detective fiction, weird science and space Mormons. I already can't wait for the followup, Caliban's War, due out next June. (Review)

4 - Rule 34, Charles Stross

I'm currently in the middle of this book, but I'm confident of it's place here. I met Stross at ReaderCon in 2010, where he told me that his next book opens with a man getting murdered by a viagra enema. It's set in the same world as his prior novel, Halting State, and in a way, the book is a cross between the J.J. Connolly's Layer Cake and William Gibson. (Review to come at the Functional Nerds)

5 - Embassytown / Kraken, China Miéville

I loved Miéville's book, The City and The City, and the 2 books that I read from him this year both deserve a place on this (Kraken was a 2010 release). Both are wholly fantastic books: an alternative, weird London in one, and a totally alien world in the other. Miéville is a master at fully understanding the worlds, and both are fantastic examples of a brilliant story meshed with a perfectly conceived setting. (Review / Review)

6 - Spellbound, Blake Charlton

Charlton did a nice job with his first novel, Spellwright, and his second is a worthy followup that expands and builds upon his world in grand fashion. I loved his understanding of magic: this book is almost a science fiction novel, running on a bit of a slightly different frequency. It's a great addition that builds on the first novel, and I can't wait to see what happens next. (Review)

7 - Halo: Glasslands, Karen Traviss

I've long loved the Halo franchise, and I got into it hardcore: bought several other books, bought and played through Reach, Combat Evolved and got my wife hooked on the armored folks. This novel has a great story to it, which is sort of par for the course for Traviss, revolving around the end of the Human-Covenant War, continuing the storyline into new territory. I'm excited to see where she goes with it. (Review)

8 - Fuzzy Nation, John Scalzi

John Scalzi embarked on a bit of an experiment with Fuzzy Nation: it's a literary reboot of H. Beam Piper's Little Fuzzy. It's a fun read, with an pointed, relevant message. The book is a quick read, and it's got about the same level of substance to it, but it's a hilarious read, one that had me laughing out loud throughout the couple of hours that I read it. (Review)

9 - Machine Man, Max Barry

Max Barry's Jennifer Government was a book that showed me that great science fiction could be really funny and ridiculous at the same time. Max Barry returns with Machine Man, partially written online, and falls with much of the same level of humor that Jennifer Government held. It's ridiculous at one level, but then, when you look at our increasingly technology filled lives, it's not so far fetched. (Review

10 - At Queen's Command, Michael A. Stackpole

I've long been a fan of Michael Stackpole's books, going back to the X-Wing Series and some of his other fantastic novels. He's now back, under the Nightshade Books banner with an alternate history novel that reimagines the early days of the British colonies in the Americas with magic, zombies, necromancers and dragons. It's a fun, vivid read. (Review)

Other Notables: A couple of additional books that I enjoyed were Ganymede by Cherie Priest, Germline by T.C. McCarty and Ready Player One by Ernie Cline.

Currently Reading

It's been a while since I've stepped back and taken stock of what I've been reading, and with the end of the year rapidly approaching, there's a whole handful of books that I'm currently in the middle of or about to start up. Hopefully, I'll get through this short list by the end of the year, and begin building a list of anticipated books for 2012. (Although, like last year's list, it was only somewhat helpful.)

Currently Reading:

Ganymede, Cherie Priest. The 4th book in Priest's Clockwork Century series, we're dropped into the Louisiana area, slowly working our way across the US south east. Already, I like this book quite a bit more than Dreadnought, and while it's not quite as interesting or as much fun as Boneshaker was, I'm enjoying it when I have time to read. It's a good addition to the series, and I'm interested in how characters from several of the stories have begun to appear, making me wonder if the series isn't so open-ended as I first thought.

All You Need Is Kill, Hiroshi Sakurazaka. Earlier this fall, I was looking for some international military science fiction stories (i.e., not stories written from a perspective outside of the United States'), and seem to have found a good entry for modern-day Japan in this one. A bit like Groundhog Day with power armor and aliens, it's entertaining, and it's helping to confirm a couple of ideas that I've been working on in my head. Exciting stuff with this one, and I can't wait to see where it goes.

Learning to Eat Soup With A Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam, John Nagl. My first non-Science Fiction / Fantasy / Fiction book in a little while, Nagl's book is a case study in counterinsurgency docrine and military pedagogy as it relates to military readiness and tactical continuity. Comparing the US experience in Vietnam and the UK experience in Malaya, it's a book that I wish that I'd read a while ago, while taking my Master's. It's short, but very dense, and very important for anyone who wants to understand how the modern military works.

Coming Up:

Ready Player One, Ernie Cline. A friend and classmate of mine turned me to this one. Written by Fanboys writer / director Ernie Cline, this book is absolutely loaded with geeky references throughout. The first couple of chapters were up for free a while ago, and when I had a spare moment last month, I'd downloaded the PDF and read it on my iPad in a single sitting, and have been wanting more ever since. I'm restraining myself from having this one jump the line, but it might very well do that soon.

Seed, Rob Zeigler. Paolo Bacigalupi's debut novel The Windup Girl is quite possibly one of the more pivotal books that I've picked up recently that's defined my view of science fiction. Seed looks to be in a similar vein of a near future of ecological destruction. I don't know that it'll be better, but it certainly looks as interesting.

Rule 34, Charles Stross. I really enjoyed Charles Stross's Halting State, and this loose sequel is something that I've been looking forward to picking up. Stross has a great understanding of how science fiction and the future work: it's not the technology, but the people and systems that they construct, and I think Halting State was a good example of this line of thinking. Hopefully, this one will be just as interesting.

I'm With the Bears: Short Stories from a Damaged Planet, Bill McKibbon. McKibbon is a fellow Vermont resident, and has been very active lately in protesting a major pipeline that's under consideration. This anthology of short stories looks at what happens if he fails. I'm very interested in the current and growing trend of eco-fiction that's coming to bear, and this looks to be a good addition.

How Wars End: Why We Always Fight the Last Battle, Gideon Rose. Megan's stolen this one from me and is enjoying it, and it's a topic that's ever more relevant as we approach the troop-withdrawal deadline at the end of the year.

Who Fears Death?, Nnedi Okorafor. This is the last book on an ever-long list, but it's one that I've had my eyes on for ages now. I've heard literally nothing but good things about this story, and it's good to see more non-US perspective stories coming out.

Geek Things of 2010

This was possibly one of the best years that I’ve had in a long time. There were geek things abound, in all facets of life: in literature, film, current events, science, music and people. 2010 was a fantastic year for me. In roughly chronological order, here are the notable geek moments of the year:

This year seems to have been the year for newly-published authors. Nora Jemisin exploded out of the gate with her book The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, the first of a trilogy in an excellently conceived of world, one where gods and humans interact and where there are consequences for those who were chained, and those who held the chains. I was particularly blown away by this book, and look forward to diving into book two: The Broken Kingdoms sometime in 2011.

Canadian Science Fiction author Peter Watts became a bit of a martyr in the eyes of many in the science fictional world when he was thrown into jail for resisting arrest at a border crossing earlier this spring. News of his imprisonment and the details of his predicament spread like wildfire, spurring outrage. Watts has since been convicted and released, and won't be able to travel into the U.S..

I trooped in February with the 501st in New York City to support a product launch. What a surreal day: who would have thought of the combination of Star Wars, Snoop Dogg and Adidas?

The long-running UK show Dr. Who saw its latest rejuvenation in the form of Matthew Smith this year, along with show runner Steven Moffat, who's penned some of the best Dr. Who episodes that I've seen in the latest run. I only was able to catch a couple of the new episodes, but what I saw, I really liked.

One of the films that was a sure train wreck from the trailers was Clash of the Titans. It's decent, mindless monster porn with action and special effects, but for a regular movie? It was pretty bad, and the slapped together 3D helped show audiences that it's a stunt on the part of movie studios to rake in more money per ticket. Where 2009 saw Avatar as the big bright moment for 3D, 2010 saw that it was only good when natively filmed with the extra dimension, rather than slapped on with additional CGI.

Another new author broke into the ranks of the published, author Blake Charlton, with his first novel, Spellwright. While the novel wasn't perfect, it was enjoyable, and I've had the good fortune to talk extensively with him over the course of the year (while he splits writing time with his medical education). This book in particular draws upon Charlton's own experiences with Dyslexia, which allows the book a unique feel when it comes to the mechanics of world building and magic. Bring on book two, Spellbound, due out this year. !

One of my favorite authors from high school / camp, Karin Lowachee, returned from several years of absence for a new book titled The Gaslight Dogs, one of the better Steampunk books that I've read thus far. Set in an unconventional world to the North, Lowachee weaves together some interesting characters and settings in an entertaining novel. I eagerly await the sequels for this planned trilogy.

Earlier this year marked a major uproar when amazon.com attempted to flex its muscles against Macmillan publishers, who had been pushing for higher prices for its new hardcover books. Amazon pulled the books from the publisher, which outraged a lot of people - authors who found that their books weren't being sold for a couple of days before they were all put back into place.

April 20^th saw a massive explosion on the Deep Water Horizon oil rig when a plume of natural gas came up the well that they were drilling. The resulting oil spill lasted for three months and involved a major engineering and environmental effort to cap and contain the oil spill. Undoubtedly, the effects will be seen for years to come in the environmental and economic health of the region. The containment of the well itself is an achievement in and of itself, with an apt description of the process as similar to the Apollo 13 rescue.

Vermont singer/songwriter Anaïs Mitchell gained quite a lot of attention with her concept album Hadestown, a post-apocalyptic folk opera retelling of the legend of Orpheus. It's a mouthful, but an extensive cast of notable singers (such as Bon Iver and Ani DeFranco) join her in an impeccable work of music, story and art. This album was absolute perfection.

In July, at the urging of a former college professor, I drove down to ReaderCon, a regional science fiction convention that boasted an impressive list of authors and fans. Unlike most of the conventions that I've been to, this was devoted extensively to literature, and while there, I was able to meet a number of authors that I've long admired (and learned of there) such as Charles Stross, Allen M. Steele, Elizabeth Hand, Blake Charlton, Paolo Bacigalupi, David Forbes, N.K. Jemisin, and quite a few others. I had an absolute blast this year, and I'm eagerly awaiting the trip next year. Hopefully, I'll be able to visit some other similar cons this year.

I didn't catch this until later in the year, but Predators was a film that was released that had been one that I'd wanted to see in theaters. Where the first film was an 80s action film with too much brawn and no brains, this film was a smart, dynamic science fiction thriller, one that vastly improved the franchise. As io9 said, it's the perfect B movie. I'm inclined to agree.

While it was a sparse year for good genre films, one stood easily out amongst the others: Inception. It was a fantastic balance between action and story, with a thought-provoking storyline that dips its feet into the science fiction pool just as much as needed to push the story forward, exploring the mind and the possibilities of imagination. It’s on my slowly growing list of top science fiction films ever.

1B1T proved that Twitter could be more than mindless, as Wired Magazine ran a poll to see if they could get all of twitter reading the same book. The result? Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, broken down into an easy reading schedule – it made for a great excuse to re-read the book and talk to a number of people on a global scale.

Another new author, Charles Yu impressed me with his short story collection, Third Class Superhero this past spring and doubly so over the summer with his book, How To Live Safely In A Science Fictional Universe, a brilliant time travel story that stands out from most books that I read this year. Yu's book becomes part of the story itself, and can easily be compared to the works of Douglas Adams with its dry humor.

Last year, Paolo Bacigalupi blew me away with his novel The Windup Girl, and this year, his follow-up YA novel Ship Breaker could easily fit into the same post-oil world. Global warming is rampant, people are exploited, and with that in the background, there's a very basic and interesting story that pulls the reader through. Bacigalupi's a guy to watch, and this book demonstrated that he's no one hit wonder.

Apple launched their new device and product category this year, the iPad, and when a really good deal came through earlier this year, I bought one, something that I wasn't expecting to do. So far, it's easily the best thing that I've bought all year long. It's an amazingly good computer, and it works very well with what I've long used a computer for, while being more convenient than a laptop. It's a multi-purpose device that I've been able to use extensively over the course of the year, for writing, reading, web work, music and games. For my first Apple early adoption, it's come off far better than my first iPod.

This year's Hugo Awards presented a rare event: a tie for Best Novel: Paolo Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl and China Mieville's The City and The City (more on that in a moment) both received the award in addition to every other award that they scooped up along the way. (Quite a few!). Moon also picked up the movie award.

The animated Star Wars Clone Wars TV show has been popular, but for me, up and down in quality. The opening episode was impressive, but from everything that I've seen beyond that, it's become an exceedingly boring show. When the ads point to the passage of an arms bill in the Republic senate as the exciting bits, you should probably reevaluate. Hopefully, it'll get a bit better soon.

When it came to television shows that disappoint, LOST came to an end is year with a finale that ended the show, but one that didn't wow me like it should have. There was too much lost when it came to possibilities, and it felt more like an ending and an epilogue that wasn't needed.

Masked is a superhero anthology, featuring a number of authors taking on the super powered and the caped. I've yet to finish it, and while I've been enjoying most of it, there are only so many stories of a Batman clone before I have to question the need for the story to be included.

One of the better anthologies that I read all year, Stories: All New Tales, edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio is an impressive book that looks to the idea that stories should be things that demand that you turn the page to find out what happens next. This collection of stories, which boasts an impressive list of contributors, is one that I really enjoyed reading through - there's a bit of every genre here, from science fiction to fantasy to horror to crime fiction. Worth picking through and reading for all of the excellent stories.

Military science fiction stories are fascinating reads - I've read a number of them this year, and by far, the most thought-provoking was Adam Robert's New Model Army. The premise is one that's very modern: what happens when the wiki-culture moves into warfare? While I think that a lot of what would have happened in the book would never come to pass, it does have some interesting ideas behind it, and by far, was one of the better books that I read all year.

Iron Man 2 would have done well to capitalize on the military science fiction stories that the first was known for: a tight, interesting and well conducted special effects spectacular. The trailers looked awesome, but the film just fell flat: it was overblown, nonsensical at times, and not nearly as good as the first one. It did have its good parts, such as Sam Rockwell's zany character, and some fun action scenes.

Kirby Krackle completely rocked my world this year. Their sound is pretty basic when it comes to the actual music, but they rocked it pretty well. In a world where there a few songs that are so passionate about Green Lantern or zombies, their album E for Everyone really stood out for me, and it's an awesome bit of music to bounce around to. These guys are the new voice of fandom.

The first big cancellation from SyFy earlier this year was Caprica, which launched with a great cast of characters and a whole lot of potential, this precursor to Battlestar Galactica was a show that really needed to be trimmed down and to find its focus a bit. Numerous storylines, characters and themes all running together worked well, but the writing was on the wall early on: the show could have been just as good or better than BSG, (and was, at points), but its ratings couldn't sustain it. It's a real shame: the show could have been better than BSG.

In it's second season, Stargate Universe continued to impress me, and it's recent cancellation has me far more upset than the axing of any other television show that I've watched (even Firefly, although I saw that post-cancellation). A step up for the franchise as a whole, this season of Universe was brilliant, well acted and had a lot going for it, and I hope that the next ten episodes will see some good closure and storytelling. Still, maybe it'll be one of those shows that was awesome and never had a chance to get bad, much like Firefly.

One of the absolute best books that I read this year was China Miéville’s The City and The City, which was up for a number of awards this year, including the Hugo. I picked this up after the hype started to go, and it lived up to, and exceeded my expectations by a long margin. Wonderfully plotted in a well thought-out world, Miéville crafts a murder mystery with a fantastic background, and puts to paper one of the best books of the year.

The mathematician who was responsible for some major advances in mathematics and theory died earlier this year, Benoit Mandelbrot. Also the subject of a Jonathan Coulton song: Mandelbrot Set.

Stephen Moffat ruled the Dr. Who universe for a while now, but I liked his take on Sherlock Holmes far more. Set in the modern day, Sherlock is a retelling of the story, with Martin Freeman as Dr. Watson and Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes. A far better take on the character than Robert Downey Jr.'s in the film adaptation (which was also quite fun), Sherlock was fantastic from start to cliff-hanger. I already can't wait for Series 2.

In the wake of Sherlock, Martin Freeman was selected to play Bilbo Baggins in Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit, which is finally moving forward, along with what looks like a great cast. It’s still a shame that Guillermo del Toro isn’t directing though.

Zombies have been all the rage for a while now, and (no pun intended) have been done to death. The Walking Dead falls into a couple of categories with me. The pilot episode was fantastic - one of the better takes on a man waking up to find civilization gone, but it's a story that really doesn't add much to the canon, and while it had its interesting points, it's something that I'm more or less indifferent to. We'll see how Season 2 goes.

While Zombies have been very popular, 2010 saw a bit of a decline in the hysteria over Vampires, while Steampunk came in as a solid genre. The Steampunk craze has gotten some major attention: Sherlock Holmes took on a couple of Steampunkish elements, while Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion) in the show Castle became a convert as publishers such as Pyr and Tor have published a number of books in the genre. It's something that's here to stay, that's for sure.

When it comes to Pyr books, one of their offerings for the year that I read earlier this was Ian McDonald's River of Gods, which took place in a futuristic India. The Dervish House is his latest book, taking place in a futuristic Turkey. I haven't finished the book yet, but I'm loving its rich attention to culture and interconnected storyline.

Going back to geek music, a friend of mine, John Anealio, turned me towards Marian Call earlier this year at ReaderCon, and when she came through Vermont on her 49 state tour this year (an impressive feat in and of itself), I was able to catch her at Montpelier's Langdon Street Cafe for a geeky set of music and a couple of quick words with Marian. She's a lovely singer, one who's popular for all of the right reasons. Geek music was something that I focused on quite a bit this year, putting together a playlist that's almost 700 songs long, and while doing so, came across a strange trend with some of the more higher-profile stuff that trends more towards Geek Pop music. Songs like G33ks and G4m3r Girls by Team Unicorn were almost unlistenable earworms, laundry-lists of popular geek things without the real soul of "geek" stuff to begin with. It'll be interesting to see if there's more of it as geek stuff gets more and more popular.

Speaking of John Anealio, he's someone to keep an eye on, and someone that I befriended earlier this year at ReaderCon. John's an excellent geek musician, with some fantastic songs released earlier this year, such as 'Stormtrooper for Halloween' and 'I Should Be Writing'. Kirby Krackle might speak for fandom, but Anealio speaks for the fans themselves. I can't wait to see what he comes up next.

Another outfit to keep an eye out for is Symphony of Science, which continued to release a number of tracks of auto tuned scientists (namely Carl Sagan) with a wonderful collection of music that speaks to science and the wonders of the universe.

One of the films that I'm practically drooling over in anticipation for is Battle: Los Angeles, which can best be described as Independence Day meets Black Hawk Down. The early buzz from San Diego Comic Con was good, and the trailer showed that there was going to be some excellent looking action. The film is due out in March of 2011, and I really hope that it'll live up to my expectations.

While I panned iFringe when it first came out, but I've grown to love it and really rued my words: with Stargate Universe off the air, it's easily the best science fiction show on TV right now, and while its ratings have dropped and it's been moved to Friday nights, I'm hoping that the show will continue onwards. This season has seen less of the blood and gore, but has an excellent alternate universe storyline that's heating up. I can't wait for new episodes starting up later this week!

One of the coolest things to happen in the realm of space exploration happened was the Deep Impact Probe, launched on 2005 to take a look at the 9P/Tempel comet. The probe released an impactor earlier this year and took a number of high resolution pictures as it passed by and analyzed the impact to see what it was made of.

The other top book of the year was easily Joe Hill's second novel, Horns, mixing popular culture, horror iconology and religious allegory together in a story that absolutely gripped me and blew me away while I was reading it.

It was a sad day in December when Leslie Nielsen passed away. Airplane is one of my favorite comedies, while Forbidden Planet is easily one of my favorite science fiction films. He will certainly be missed. Right on the heels of Nielsen was Irvin Kershner, who directed the greatest of the Star Wars films, The Empire Strikes Back. It's a shame that his work was never quite matched with the franchise. Ironically, his film was one of 25 preserved by the Library of Congress's National Film Registry.

On December 9th, the private space firm SpaceX made history when it launched it's Falcon 9 rocket into orbit carrying a dragon capsule. It became the first private firm to orbit the earth and safely return, joining a small number of countries who have accomplished the same thing.

When it comes to dragons, a film released this year that I only just caught was How To Train Your Dragon, a great kids film with a fun story and some good graphics. At the same time, I can also recommend Toy Story 3 for many of the same reasons - excellent storytelling and a positive end for that franchise.

Wikileaks occupied most of the news coverage for the last part of the year as they released thousands of diplomatic cables in addition to their leak of classified military dispatches written over the course of the Iraq / Afghanistan war. The leaks demonstrated the power of the internet: and the necessity to keep secrets a bit more secure. Given the lack of ability of the British government to keep track of their own files, I'm surprised that they haven't been the target of more leaks.

I first saw the original Tron earlier this year in anticipation for Tron: Legacy, and I came out of the theaters with a film that met my expectations. It was a blockbuster that was fun, but it could have been so much more than it was. With Disney working on sequels and a television series, I'm not sure that the franchise is going anywhere, but box office results have been somewhat lax, given all the advanced hype and marketing for the film.

That ends out the year. It’s been an impressive one, and one that marked a couple of milestones for me: I’ve written, talked to, read and watched so much in the speculative fiction genre, and I’m loving the immersion. There’s a long list of people to thank for it: Annalee Newitz, Charlie Jane Anders, John DeNardo, John Anelio, Patrick Hester, Aiden Moher, Blake Charlton, Charles Yu, Paolo Bacigalupi, David Forbes, Jim Ehrman, N.K. Jemisin, John Scalzi, David J. Williams, Christie Yant, John Joseph Adams, Karin Lowachee, Megan Messinger, Bridget McGovern, Brit Mandelo, Scott Eldeman, Blastr, everybody at io9, SF Signal and Tor.com, people who commented and e-mailed me because of what I wrote and everyone who encouraged my writing and reasoning over the year. Most of all, Megan, for everything. It’s been the best year for me to date, and I’m looking forward to an even better 2011.

ReaderCon 21

This past weekend was consumed with a convention called ReaderCon, which was hosted down in Burlington, MA. As a member of the 501st, I've attended several different types of conventions before, but out of all of them, I think that this convention was one of the best ones that I've ever gone to, and already am looking around for comparable ones to attend. Far from the costuming and media cons that I've visited in the past, ReaderCon lives up to its namesake: it's all about speculative fiction literature.

Never was this more apparent when I arrived on Friday morning and picked up my badge. Patrons in the lobby were engrossed in books, reading away, waiting for the first day's events to start. There was quite a few panels and discussions throughout the weekend, and I was particularly interested in a select number of these, for the content of the panel, but also because of some of the people that were attending: Blake Charlton, Paolo Bacigalupi, Allen M. Steele, Samuel Delany, Charles Stross, Elizabeth Hand, Brett Cox (My Gothic Lit professor) and Nora Jeminsin, just to name a couple. The entire participants list numbered over two hundred people, but those names were ones that I had particular interest in meeting, as I've read all of their books.

Over the course of the weekend, I attended a number of panels: New England: At Home to the Unheimlich, about the propensity of horror writers to be influenced by the region, Influence as Contagion, about films and expectations, Citizens of the World, Citizens of the Universe, Global Warming and Science Fiction, about new directions for the genre to take, New And Improved Future of Magazines, Folklore and its Discontents, Science for Tomorrow's Fiction, How I Wrote The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, and How to Write for a Living, to speak nothing of the hours that I spent in the bookstore looking over what was for sale, and carting away my own, large, expensive pile of books.

The highlight though, was getting to meet a couple of authors whom I've befriended or talked to as I've worked for SF Signal and io9 over the past year or so, Blake Charlton, Paolo Bacigalupi and Nora Jeminsin. These three authors were ones who have just delivered their first novels, recieving quite a bit of acclaim (Bacigalupi has already received the Nebula award, the Compton Crook and Locus awards for Best First Novel, and apparently, is on the short list for the John Campbell Award for his book The Windup Girl) Meeting these guys was just amazing, because not only did they sign my books, I got to talk to them extensively about their books and science fiction, and generally have a good time. Along the way, I also met SF/F author David Forbes, whose book I picked up at the conference, as well as geek musician John Anealio, whom I've talked to online (I was on his podcast at one point) and who's music I really like.

This convention seemed to be much in line with what the science fiction scene seemed to be back in the 1970s when there wasn't much beyond the literature scene for science fiction and fantasy materials. That's largely changed with the introduction of blockbusters, with major Comic Cons springing up all over the place, which get a little tiring beyond the autographs and vendor tables. ReaderCon offered a stimulating experience for me, with a number of panels and opportunities that really got me thinking and interacting with a lot of other fans of the genre.

My Best (And Favorite) Books of the Decade

I told myself that I wouldn't jump in on this best of the decade that everyone else has been doing on just about every online printed source, but after seeing a couple of very good and a couple more very confusing ones, I went through my bookshelves and pulled out several books that were my favorite, and in my opinion, best genre books of the past ten years.

The Windup Girl, Paolo Bacigalupi This book was released earlier this year, and while I was unfamiliar with Mr. Bacgalupi's shorter fiction, I was singularly impressed with his first novel, The Windup Girl. I've already reviewed the book in length here, but in retrospect, this will likely stand up as one of the best genre books in the past ten years. The Windup Girl is not only well written, it's well conceived, which is just as important, I think, for a future world. Bacigalupi puts together a compelling, terrifying and ultimately believable near future, with relevance and everything that good science fiction should be.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, Suzanna Clarke Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell was one of the books that took me a long time to get into and to finish - I stopped and started it several times since I got it, but was never able to really get into it before I actually made the time to read. It's a challenging book, with an older style of writing. Once I had gotten into the proper mindset, I was pulled right into Suzanne Clarke's alternative world of Wizards, Napoleonic War and fate, and loved every minute from that point on. Clarke dispels with the very common notion of sword and sorcery fantasy novel by setting it in a far more relatable London, and approaches the subject matter in a far different manner than other books of the genre.

American Gods, Neil Gaiman American Gods is another novel that I had to take my time to read, stopping and starting a couple times before really getting into the proper mindset that was required for Gaiman's world. This sort of mythological story is an interesting concept, where belief begets creation, and there is a conflict brewing between the old and the new, with the protagonist, Shadow, caught in the middle. The story is a profound one, and one that I'll likely return to someday.

Soon, I Will Be Invincible, Austin Grossman Where a couple of the novels on this list have been akin to great feasts of old, Soon, I Will Be Invincible is a modern day family dinner, a bit rushed, fairly complete but really good. Author Austin Grossman creates an entire superhero mythology, split between a hero and villain, in a modern day setting. Where a number of comic books have stagnated, with the same characters recycled year after year, we are party to a mythology that is put together with the benefits of a realistic society. Grossman's superheroes are just as messed up as the rest of us, and this is where the book is an incredible amount of fun, because it's like the Marvel Universe, but all grown up.

The Magicians, Lev Grossman Lev Grossman is the brother of Austin Grossman, and like his twin brother, he takes what was a well tread-upon world and tweaks it to become more relatable in The Magicians. Here, rather than superheroes, we are treated to wizards, and a magical academy. The style here is very different, and while there are similarities to Harry Potter and the Chronicles of Narnia, they act more as references and influences than they do style and feel. Grossman's Brakebills College is realistic where Rowling's Hogwarts is not, and imagines the fantasy world as one akin to ours.

The Lies of Locke Lamora, Scott Lynch I learned of Scott Lynch through a friend of mine, and when I picked up his debut fantasy novel The Lies of Locke Lamora, I was already pretty excited, and was impressed with Lynch's style of storytelling - his fantasy world is different from the typical sword and sorcery take that a lot of fantasy novels seem to have taken on. Like other authors on this list, he has put together an incredibly well conceived world, one that was vibrant, dangerous and interesting all at the same time. Lynch's follow-up novel, Red Seas Under Red Skies was just as good, and I'm eagerly awaiting the third installment of his series, The Republic of Thieves.

Altered Carbon, Richard K. Morgan Altered Carbon debuted with quite a bit of buzz, when it was released. Richard K. Morgan's first book about a noir mystery in a conscious/body swapping sounds like something out of the worst dregs of B-movie Science Fiction, but the result is a dark, exciting and intelligent SciFi thriller that I think of as Blade Runner, but more violent. The first of the Takeshi Kovacs trilogy, Morgan weaves together a complicated and twisting futuristic tale, one that had me guessing throughout the book.

The Amber Spyglass, Philip Pullman Where Harry Potter was the real fantasy show stopper of the decade (and for good reason), I've always thought that Philip Pullman's Golden Compass trilogy (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife and the Amber Spyglass) was a bit marginalized. Pullman's fantasy tale is more than that - it pulls in elements of science fiction and alternate worlds to put together an epic story that goes from a childhood fantasy adventure to discovering the nature of existence itself, while a war between two sides of that sort of question rages on across multiple universes. The Amber Spyglass, the conclusion to the series, is heavy with meaning, questions and utter brilliance, and is far above and beyond most genre books to begin with.

Coyote, Allen M Steele Allen M. Steele's Coyote was first serialized in Asimov's Science Fiction magazine, and is still a joy to read after several sit-down sessions. Grounded in quite a lot of hard science fiction, Coyote tells the story of a near future colony of humans who steal a massive space ship from their fascist American government and find themselves on Coyote, the moon of a distant planet that was deemed a good candidate for colonization. The story follows several characters as they learn to exist on this hostile new world, in a story that is very reminiscent of the origins of America. The follow-up books in the series are good, but this is easily the best. While the story isn't groundbreaking, it is a great deal of fun, covering a number of popular themes, chief of which is exploration and discovery, which helps to remind me why I love this genre so much.

Halting State, Charles Stross Charles Stross is one of the preeminent science fiction writers of our time, and his novel Halting State demonstrates that he's really clued in to what might happen in the next couple of years. Halting State is a book that I've talked about before, but what makes this stand out for me for the past decade is Stross's understanding of how the future might work, from technology to politics to economics, all of which are brought in for this story, expertly woven into the actions of the protagonist, and really make this a stellar read.

City of Pearl, Karen Traviss Karen Traviss has been making a name for herself with the tie-in world with Star Wars, Gears of War and Halo, but this first book in her own universe outshines them all. City of Pearl is a wonderfully realized book, the first in a six book series that puts together first contact, interstellar politics and warfare, environmentalism and bioethics. Spanning the course of several hundred years and across a couple of planets, this book puts all of that in with a number of intriguing characters and well conceived plot lines. The bonus is Traviss's cynical attitude towards humanity, which makes this book a bit of a break from most of the human-centric stories that I've read.

Think about this, I think that this is a good list to have put together. In a very big way, the past decade has been the most formative when it comes to my tastes in books, music and movies, and where my interests in Science Fiction, Fantasy and related genres really came from. This decade marked my high school years, where I not only transitioned from a Star Wars only diet of reading material to the larger classics: Dune, Ringworld and Foundation, to name a few.

While I got most of my base from these classics, most of the books that I've picked for this list are far from the classics - at points, they take a lot of the best themes and turns them on their heads, realizes a number of well conceived notions in new light and makes the genre something new and interesting to read. While reading these books, I've come to realize that the field of science fiction is not one to be left mired in the b-movie territory that long characterizes it; it is a dynamic and interesting field, one that will continue to thrill fans in the future.