Fiction Unbound attended MileHiCon and Unbound Writers Lisa Mahoney and CS Peterson contributed to its fund-raising anthology, “Adventures in Zookeeping".
Read more
Fanatics Destroy Democracy in Real Life and in "The Fate of the Tearling"
Fiction Unbound interviews Erika Johansen about the role of religion in a democracy, the rise of powerful women protagonists, and more.
Read more"Cyber World": Cyberpunk Is Dead. Long Live Cyberpunk.
Think cyberpunk is passé? Think again. Nisi Shawl, Paolo Bacigalupi, Saladin Ahmed and others reboot the genre in this collection of tales of humanity's tomorrow.
Read more"Illuminae": Not Your Parents' YA
Star-crossed lovers, interstellar corporations run amok, biological warfare, artificial intelligence with a god complex ... what could possibly go wrong?
Read more"The Dark Forest": Cixin Liu Takes Humankind to the Brink of Annihilation
Paradoxes and chains of suspicion abound in the second book of Cixin Liu's Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy.
Read more"A Torch Against the Night"
Chaos reigns in the second book of Sabaa Tahir's dystopian fantasy series.
Read moreFables of Reason, Time and Its Discontents, and a Nonlinear Journey: More From "The Big Book of Science Fiction"
Further appreciation of a century of science fiction from around the world. (Part 2 of 2.)
Read more"The Big Book of Science Fiction"
A century of science fiction stories from around the world, collected in an anthology so expansive our editors need two weeks to fully appreciate it. (Part 1 of 2.)
Read moreOn Mirror Play and Why Steven Millhauser Is Good for Breakups
Authors love to taunt troubled characters with mirrors.
Read moreThe Art of Unembarrassed Fiction: Alexander Chee's "The Queen of the Night"
Go big or go home when you're writing about opera.
Read moreSabaa Tahir: Hope in a Dark Universe
How far would you go for family and freedom? Sabaa Tahir pits hope against darkness in An Ember in the Ashes.
Read moreTime-Travelers, All of Us: Ben Lerner’s 10:04 and the Suffering of the Tangible
Guest contributor Alexander Lumans looks at author Ben Lerner's novel 10:04 and how everything will be as it is now, just a little different in.
Read moreThe Last Days of Magic: Come for the Fairies, Stay for the Research
A decentralized recounting of the English and Catholic conquest of Ireland and its faeries, Celts, and native religions as told through the stories of dozens of characters.
Read moreSublime Scale in Cixin Liu’s "The Three-Body Problem"
An ambitious masterpiece of Chinese science fiction, reviewed.
Read moreMan Is Wolf to Man
Cromwell is the hero of his own life. Flawed, sure, and antihero most definitely, but hero nonetheless. This strong point of view is an asset in humanizing Cromwell, who is often seen as the cunning right hand to a fickle, sex-crazed violent king -- a role that would typically be characterized as a villain.
Read moreThe Story of "The Story of My Teeth"
Mexican novelist Valeria Luiselli's critically acclaimed work of dental fabulism is a sophisticated if remote pleasure.
Read moreMilitary Space Opera: New Adventures in the Vast Space of a Subgenre of a Subgenre
Military space opera sends carefully-crafted heroes on bold interplanetary adventures where ethical choices are not always black and white. Complex plots explode with military action, side love interests and high consequences for war's losers, while its themes often explore the consequences of bigotry and prejudice.
Read moreThe Future of the Princess: Marissa Meyer's Lunar Chronicles
In The Lunar Chronicles, Marissa Meyer re-imagines four classic princesses and their associated princes. With the five-book series now complete, it's time to unpack these princesses and see what patterns, new and old, have emerged in their heroic journeys.
Read moreMorning Star Deserves Several Stars
Morning Star is everything a final book in a series should be: compelling, surprising, heartbreaking, hopeful and ultimately pretty damn satisfying.
Read more"Slade House": David Mitchell's Horror-Fantasy Hybrid
David Mitchell appropriates the tropes of horror fiction to pose questions about greed, privilege, and power.
Read more