Literary Frontiers: Boneshaker

by Cat Connolly

Literary Frontiers is a series in the blog which gives us the chance to offer our perspective on both new and established science fiction and speculative fiction books. The series will publish around twice a month, or whenever one of us can finish and post one of our most recent reading projects. I guess that means once this November.

The selection this time is Cherie Priest's Boneshaker, nominated for a Hugo award and the winner of the Locus award for best science fiction novel. The piece is a masterpiece of Steampunk that did more than its part to breathe life into the genre.

The review follows after the (steam-powered) jump.  

Literary Frontiers: Rosemary's Baby

by Sara Crow

Literary Frontiers is a series in the blog which gives us the chance to offer our perspective on both new and established science fiction and speculative fiction books. The series will publish around twice a month, or whenever one of us can finish and post one of our most recent reading projects.

The selection this time is, appropriately for the Halloween, Ira Levin's Rosemary's Baby. Not exactly sci-fi, but can certainly fit into the fantasy/speculative fiction arena, at least with a little wiggling. Horrific urban fantasy? Sure. Okay, so I bent the rules a little because of the season. So sue me.

The review follows after the jump. Just be careful what doors you open: you may not be able to close them again.

Wonder Woman's Origin: Here We Go Again!

by Sara Crow

According to a post on io9 last week, DC Comics will be giving Wonder Woman a father in their November issue, and he will be none other than the head honcho of one of the most notoriously knotted family trees in mythological history: Zeus.

Dun, dun, duuuuun... More after the break!

Literary Frontiers: 1000 Steampunk Creations

by Cat Connolly

Literary Frontiers is a brand new series in the blog which gives us the chance to offer our perspective on both new and established science fiction and speculative fiction books. The series will publish around twice a month, or whenever one of us can finish and post one of our most recent reading projects.

This week's book is 1000 Steampunk Creations: Neo-Victorian Fashion, Gear & Art by Dr. Grymm. The review is available after the jump.

Literary Frontiers: Oryx and Crake

by Sara Crow 
(Find me on Goodreads!)

 Literary Frontiers is a brand new series in the blog which gives us the chance to offer our perspective on both new and established science fiction and speculative fiction books. The series will publish around twice a month, or whenever one of us can finish and post one of our most recent reading projects.


The selection for our inaugural post is Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. I'll be making my way through Year of the Flood before the holiday season. Atwood is currently working on her final book in the series, which at this point will be entitled MaddAddam, and we'll be reviewing that title when it's released as well.


The review is available, just for you, after the jump (to Warp?)! Make it so!

Isabel Samaras: The Geeky Glory of the Classic Form

by Sara Crow

While wandering through my favorite quirky odds and ends shop a couple years ago, I glanced at a shelf and had to do a double-take. At first, I thought I'd glimpsed an image of classic art--a renaissance painting whose title dangled on the edges of my memory. It was an image of a lone woman in an outdoor scene, holding a silver platter, a fire dancing on its surface. A goldfinch looks on from a nearby branch. I looked again. This wasn't just any woman--this was the Bride of Frankenstein! At that moment, I fell entirely in love with Isabel Samaras's work and have been crazy about it ever since.

This is what I'd seen.
Song of the Goldfinch, by Isabel Samaras

Warning: "Adult" images after the break. You've been warned. So no bitching if you see boobies, 'kay? We're all big kids here.

Be a Woman.

by Sara Crow

I found this poem while I was doing research for the section of my book that takes place in Topeka. While I was zipping through the microfiche of mid-19th-century newspapers at the Kansas Historical Society, I came across this awesome poem in the Quindaro Chindowan, No. 52, Saturday, June 12, 1858. Yes, 1858. Feminism didn't start in the 20th Century, darlings! ;)

Clarina Nichols, Associate Editor of the
Quindaro Chindowan.

Be a Woman.
Oft I’ve heard a gentle mother,
As the twilight hours began,
Pleading with a son, of duty,
Urging him to be a man.
But unto her blue-eyed daughter,
Though with love’s words quite as ready,
Points she out this other duty,
“Strive, my dear, to be a lady.”

What’s a lady? Is it something
Made of hoops, and silks, and airs,
Used to decorate the parlor,
Like the fancy rugs and chairs?
Is it one who wastes on novels
Every feeling that is human?
If ‘tis this to be a lady,
‘Tis not this to be a woman.

Mother, then, unto your daughter,
Speak of something higher, far,
Than to be mere fashion’s lady –
“Woman” is the brighter star.
If ye, in your strong affection,
Urge your son to be a true man,
Urge your daughter no less strongly
To arise and be a woman.

Yes, a woman – brightest model
Of that high and perfect beauty,
Where the mind, and soul, and body,
Blend to work out life’s great duty –
Be a woman – nought is higher
On the gilded list of fame,
On the catalogue of virture,
There’s no brighter, holier name.  


Be a woman – on to duty,
Raise the world from all that’s low,
Place high in the social heaven
Virtue’s fair and radiant bow.
Lend thy influence to each effort,
That shall raise our nature’s human.
Be not fashion’s gilded lady,
Be a brave – whole souled – true woman.

[ALPHEUS.