And I’m back in the room! Kinda… Busy day today but will definitely finish off the Qs by evening.

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The Book That Held Her Heart is published in the US today and in the UK the day after tomorrow. It ends The Library Trilogy.

You can read all about my work in this handy Guide to Lawrence.

The Library Trilogy is accompanied by a collection of short stories, Missing Pages and there’s a standalone “associated” book called The Bookshop Book that will be published … “soon”.

Next year, I’ve got book 1 of a new trilogy coming out, something darker and more violent and closer to The Broken Empire – this one’s called The Academy of Kindness and opens with Daughter of Crows (I wanted to call it Hag) – has a strong Furies theme to it.

In other news the 10th SPFBO (SPFBOX) finishes at the end of the month and the finalist board is hotting up!

I’ve been a scientist, author, carer for a disabled child, and master …

As you may have seen in the recent Hugo Finalists post, our humble little Bingo challenge received enough nominations to make the 2025 ballot! This is an enormous honor and we are flattered to stand alongside great fellow nominees like Camestros Felapton, Heather Rose Jones, Jenny Nicholson, Jordan S. Carroll, Abigail Nussbaum, Chris M. Barkley, and Jason Sanford. 

We’d like to give our most heartfelt thanks to all who decided we were worthy of nomination. When we made our eligibility post a few months ago, we truly had no idea what our chances were. There were folks who candidly told us we were undeserving and that we were asking for disappointment by even suggesting we might be eligible. Words cannot express how touched we are to know that Bingo is so loved and valued that it could make it even this far. We still don’t know whether we’ll win or not (especially with such great competition) but just getting to this stage is more than we dared to hope for.

Bingo creator lrich1024 …

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I only gave season 3 a chance out of circumstance as a friend was watching it, but it’s been a very nice surprise. They are actually adapting the books well now, and several moments from the books are done EXCELLENTLY here.

Is there still some weird cringe there? Sure, but overall it’s been great.

Would absolutely hate to see it get cancelled here. If you have some time, give it a chance, it will not disappoint.

As a reader, lots of older, classic fantasy works have a different vibe than modern fantasy, and I’ve been pondering the differences lately. Works by Tolkien, Lewis, Beagle, and others feel different from Sanderson’s and Rothfuss’s works, for instance. These are all very different books of course, but all older works have a marked similarity in overall tone. What do you all think? Is it due to the writing style, language use, and dialogue? Do influences from fairytale and folklore present differently in older stories? Is modern fantasy burdened by complex magic systems?

I’ll also take any recommendations for newer fantasy that “feels” more classic!

A breakdown of books being removed for DEI purposes. It’s so all encompassing that one can say it is targeting culture itself. Your thoughts?

As usual many of this year’s shorter works are online for free and you can read them at the below links.

Best Novelette

• “The Brotherhood of Montague St. Video” by Thomas Ha
• “By Salt, By Sea, By Light of Stars” by Premee Mohamed
• “The Four Sisters Overlooking the Sea” by Naomi Kritzer
• “Lake of Souls” by Ann Leckie in Lake of Souls
• “Loneliness Universe” by Eugenia Triantafyllou
• “Signs of Life” by Sarah Pinsker

Best Short Story

• “Five Views of the Planet Tartarus” by Rachael K. Jones
• “Marginalia” by Mary Robinette Kowal
• “Stitched to Skin Like Family Is” by Nghi Vo
• “Three Faces of a Beheading” by Arkady Martine
• “We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read” by Caroline M. Yoachim
• “Why Don’t We Just Kill the Kid in the Omelas Hole” by Isabel J. Kim

If you enjoy the works published by these online outlets I highly recommend sharing some of your hard-earned ducats.

Congratulations to the crew of the r/Fantasy 2024 Bingo Reading Challenge. They are Finalists in Best Related Work.

https://seattlein2025.org/wsfs/hugo-awards/2025-hugo-award-finalists/

Hey all! Each year I spend some free time crunching data from all the major awards and summarize what that means for the science fiction and fantasy genres. I cover the top books from the 2024 award season (synthesizing all major awards), how they fit into the greatest novels of the past 50 years (since awards became a big thing in 1970), and analyze the overall popularity of fantasy vs. science fiction over-time.

Big update to the algo this year is the inclusion of The Ursula K Le Guin Prize for fiction.

This year’s is more delayed than I’d like (typically I pull this together over the christmas holiday), but honestly have felt a bit discouraged by all the award controversy from the past year or two. But alas the show must go on; and given books are subjective anyways, it’s all just for the love of the hobby.

Further, the recent announcement of the 2025 Hugo nominees got me excited to spend a few all-nighters pulling this together. I’ll summarize 2025 at the end of the year …

I started the Mars Trilogy recently and while the science and world building is extremely cool, I don’t like many of the characters. Does this get better? I really want to read them but annoying characters really eat into my desire to finish a book. This may be a me problem but thought I’d put it out there anyway.

I’ve recently entered a personal Sci-fi renaissance, here are my thoughts on books I’ve read since last summer:

Tales of the Dying Earth, Jack Vance (1950, 1966, 1983, 1984) - ⁹⁄₁₀. Melancholic, witty, original. Mankind’s transient hopes, dreams and ambitions are beautifully contrasted with the enormity of the sun’s impending death. Cugel (main character of two of the books) is such an entertaining character, never a dull moment!

The Fifth Season, N.K. Jemisin (2015) - ⁵⁄₁₀. Fantastic worldbuilding wasted on a story and characters that can only be described as “juvenile”. The book lacks different perspectives; the bad guys are cardboard cutouts that serve only to define the main characters in a suppressed-minorities-style. Lots of eye-rolling during this read.

The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula Le Guin (1969) - ¹⁰⁄₁₀. Exquisite and thought-provoking stuff about gender, loved the descriptions of the environments. Very economically written at just over 300 …