Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold My rating: 5 of 5 stars Read for the 12 in 12 Challenge, the Military Spec-Fic Challenge, the Women of Genre Fiction Challenge, the Read the Sequel Challenge, and the Space Opera Challenge. This book won the 1992 Hugo and Locus Awards. This is not the first time, nor even […]
Read More Book Review: Barrayar by Lois McMaster BujoldBy David Barnett Two centuries. Two hundred years. That’s how long we’ve had science fiction. From the birth of Frankenstein, to the death of Ursula K Le Guin. Two hundred years. This was originally meant to be just the story of Frankenstein, written by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and published on 1 January 1818. But this week, with […]
Read More If Mary Shelley Invented SF, Why Are So Few Female SF Writers Known?By James Davis Nicoll Once more into the past, this time armed with a more comprehensive list of women who debuted in the 1970s¹. In fact, my list has become long enough that I am going have to tackle the authors letter by letter, moving forward. In this case, I am looking at women authors […]
Read More Fighting Erasure: Women SF Writers of the 1970s, Part IIIt was 1984 when I received my first Dungeons & Dragons boxed set for my birthday. Veteran gamers will remember this red-book set with its dice that had to be coloured in with a crayon to see the numbers. I was so excited! I had heard about this game and as a fantasy/sci-fi reader, there […]
Read More D&D is for Boys: Or, Why I’m Always the DMBy Bluestockings As I settle in for a cup of tea and a good old fashion hate-watching of Fifty Shades of Grey, I’m absolutely shocked and appalled and genuinely disturbed by what’s happening in the gaming community just North of our town of Toronto. While I had no intention of getting involved, shit happens. Two […]
Read More The Hated Ones: We Just Wanna Have FunBy Misty Vander ‘Shh. Breathe.’ I exhaled a breath of stale air into the crowded lobby of the local hotel. My partner sensed my hesitation beside me and squeezed my hand encouragingly. With a small tug, he urged me onwards. “Let’s go, I don’t want to be around these neckbeards any longer than I have […]
Read More Honey, Let the Real Gamers PlayBy James Davis Nicoll You may have been annoyed by recurrent comments from a certain surprisingly flammable Waterloo-region reviewer. He complains about the erasure from SF memory of women writing SF back in the 1970s—but has that reviewer ever bother to name names? Suggest books? I think not. It is time to confront the erasure directly. […]
Read More Fighting Erasure: Women SF Writers of the 1970s, A Through FThis is one of my favourite novels of all time, one that actively whetted my interest in science fiction. Just FYI. 16 I first found Dawn, about fifteen years ago, in my local library. I hadn’t heard of Octavia Butler. I’m not sure why I picked Dawn up. It was probably the post-apocalyptic blurb; I’ve always been drawn to […]
Read More Starting with the Womb: Octavia E Butler’s DawnEpisode 2 – Space Opera: livestreamed February 18, 2018. #SpecWomenChat is a livestreamed panel discussion featuring women who work in, and write, SFF. Our Panel: Ann Leckie has worked as a waitress, a receptionist, a rodman on a land-surveying crew, a lunch lady, and a recording engineer. The author of many published short stories, and […]
Read More #SpecWomenChat Episode 2 – Space OperaDownbelow Station by C.J. Cherryh My rating: 5 of 5 stars Read for the 12 in 12 Challenge, the LGBTQ Speculative Fiction Challenge,, the Military Spec-Fic Reading Challenge, the Women of Genre Fiction Challenge, the Grand Mistresses of Genre Fiction Challenge, the Hard Core Sci-Fi Challenge, the Read the Sequel Challenge, and the Space Opera […]
Read More Book Review: Downbelow Station by C.J. Cherryh
