A WONDERFUL INTERGALACTIC ROMP stars washed-up British glampunks competing in a universe-wide music competition. So much fun! B PLUS

SPACE OPERA
Gallery / Saga Press
2018

A FAMILY HAUNTED BY MAGIC, generations of women with eerie powers, and a mystical wood add up to a complex fantasy tale. SOLID B

WHAT SHOULD BE WILD (HARDCOVER)
Harper
2018

SHIMMERING, BEAUTIFUL ESSAYS tell stories of love, loss, travel, and the impossible but necessary challenges of translation. A MINUS

FOR SINGLE MOTHERS WORKING AS TRAIN CONDUCTORS (THE IOWA PRIZE IN LITERARY NONFICTION) (PAPERBACK)
University Of Iowa Press
2018

A WONDERFULLY CRAFTED MEMOIR from a Salish Indian writer speaks her anger and grief at personal, family, and cultural suffering. B PLUS

HEART BERRIES|HARDCOVER
Counterpoint Press
2018

A LITANY OF NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES becomes a joyous though bittersweet hymn to the beauty of life and love. A MINUS

I AM, I AM, I AM (HARDCOVER)
Knopf
2018

KOWLOON WALLED CITY is the center of a near-future work of speculative horror. Great premise marred by unpolished prose. B MINUS

DESPAIR: SHADOWS UNDER KOWLOOON
S.R. Ravencroft
2018

SPACEFARING POLICE PROCEDURAL has an exciting denouement, rich worldbuilding, but a sluggish first act. SOLID B

ELYSIUM FIRE
Orbit
2018

A SKEWED TAKE ON NOIR set in a punch-drunk 1947 San Francisco, complete with the era’s sometimes-disrespectful slang. B PLUS

NOIR (HARDCOVER)
William Morrow
2018

A MEMOIR OF ILLNESS AND LOSS also celebrates love, friendship, and healing in warmly open-hearted prose. B PLUS

GUTS
Vine Leaves Press
2018

AN EXTRAVAGANT RIFF ON WILDE, where the demons are real, the drawing-rooms dangerous, and the loves among all genders. B PLUS

CREATURES OF WILL AND TEMPER (THE DIABOLIST’S LIBRARY) (PAPERBACK)
John Joseph Adams/Mariner Books
2017