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themiddleshelf.bsky.social
The Middle Shelf
@themiddleshelf.bsky.social
230 followers 100 following 100 posts
The Middle Shelf is a sci-fi and fantasy book review blog with an emphasis on diverse stories, novellas & stand alones. Posts by C. (they/them)

Reviews & review policy: http://www.themiddleshelf.org
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themiddleshelf.bsky.social
The Subjective Chaos Kind of Awards are back for 2024!
Find out all our wonderful nominees here: subjectivechaoskindofawards.wordpress.com/2024-2/
Congratulations to all!
Current year
FANTASY Nominees Vajra Chandrasekera, The Saint Of Bright Doors (Tor / St Martin’s Press) Salman Rushdie, Victory City (Jonathan Cape) Moniquill Blackgoose, To Shape A Dragon’s Breath (Del Rey) Shelle...
subjectivechaoskindofawards.wordpress.com
February 11, 2024 at 5:17 PM
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cherylmorgan.bsky.social
Issue #56 of Salon Futura is now online, featuring jinn-bots, Murderbot, lesbians in space, werewolves in Yorkshire, multiple Marvels, Welsh Arthuriana and much more: www.salonfutura.net/2023/11/issu...
Issue #56
This is the November 2023 issue of Salon Futura. Here are the contents.
www.salonfutura.net
November 27, 2023 at 8:11 PM
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quartzen.bsky.social
Thinking about -punk suffix discourse and this 1992 criticism of cyberpunk arguing that 80s cyberpunk's "[p]olitical potential is indeed lost in the iconography of all that Reagan himself represented," that "[i]ts slickness and apparent subversiveness conceal a complicity with ’80s conservatism"
Nicola Nixon- Cyberpunk: Preparing the Ground for Revolution or Keeping the Boys Satisfied?
www.depauw.edu
November 27, 2023 at 9:51 PM
themiddleshelf.bsky.social
@adragoninspace.bsky.social Hello! Puis-je faire appel à tes compétences professionnelles? Je recherche un manga sympa pour un gamin en 4è fan de One Piece. Aurais-tu un titre en tête qui correspondrait à ça? No worries si tu me dis que, franchement, tu n’as pas envie de penser boulot :D
November 29, 2023 at 5:18 PM
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stewarthotston.com
If you can afford it, IZ is a great place to explore new SFF. I've just subscribed today.
November 29, 2023 at 4:43 PM
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thehubble101.bsky.social
Thoughts on reviewing, criticism and awards. Several contexts for this post including the Octocon panel on reviewing and the Hugo Awards. #sciencefiction #fantasy
Politics and Literature: Reviewing, Criticism and Awards.
While this post builds on ideas I have been exploring on this blog over the last couple of years, it draws directly on three recent contexts. The first was a virtual panel I was on recently at Octocon...
prospectiveculture.wordpress.com
October 30, 2023 at 7:19 PM
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lunapress.bsky.social
Cover reveal time for Green New Worlds: A Quick Guide to #Sustainability Through SFF by Mexican Academics @wingedlion.bsky.social & Martha Elba González-Alcaraz.
Art by Mexican artist Alejandra Uría-Rangel: 'Opening Worlds'. www.lunapresspublishing.com/post/cover-r... 😍
October 22, 2023 at 9:29 AM
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thehubble101.bsky.social
Ursula Le Guin was born on this day in 1929. Here's the piece I wrote on her two years ago for Jacobin.
Ursula Le Guin’s Radical Utopias Still Resonate Today
Ursula K. Le Guin was born on this day in 1929. She used science fiction to explore the failures of capitalist society — and the alternative worlds we could build in its place.
jacobin.com
October 21, 2023 at 5:55 PM
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imyril.bsky.social
This year we’re diving into backlist space opera for our SciFiMonth read-along - will you join us as a gunrunner takes on the challenge of imperial politics?

SciFiMonth runs throughout November; the read-along will span the month, with 4 weekly discussions
deargeekplace.bsky.social Lisa @deargeekplace.bsky.social · Oct 13
SciFiMonth Read Along: Behind The Throne by K.B. Wagers deargeekplace.com/sci-fi-month...
October 16, 2023 at 5:52 PM
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bluebookballoon.bsky.social
New review - Maeve Fly by CJ Leede, out now from Titan Books to whom I'm grateful for an advance e-copy to consider for review. Not a book for the squeamish! 💙📚
bluebookballoon.blogspot.com/2023/10/revi...
Cover for book "Maeve Fly" by CJ Leede. A woman in a low cut dress, turned three quarters towards the reader. She has shoulder length hair. Her eyes are obliterated by a red daub. In front of and below her, several outsides eyeballs.
October 13, 2023 at 5:37 PM
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lunapress.bsky.social
The Last to Drown, by @rainewilson.bsky.social . Available to pre-order now. #LunaNovella 19 February 2024. www.lunapresspublishing.com/product-page...
October 12, 2023 at 4:24 PM
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julietemckenna.bsky.social
Readers! Start writing letters to publishing directors saying you do not want AI generated books/art/audio/translations. Tell them you value human creativity and skills. Say you want your purchases guaranteed AI free. Paper letters work best if you can afford the stamp. Let's see what they say?
tomlloydwrites.bsky.social Tom Lloyd @tomlloydwrites.bsky.social · Oct 10
Sadly, almost every large publishing group is coming back with a refusal to entertain any AI clauses. This isn't through a lack of trying, it's boards refusing to be constrained on the subject yet.

One group is willing to agree to no AI-training, but no more. Not even on AI-translations.
barnabyedwards.bsky.social Barnaby Edwards @barnabyedwards.bsky.social · Oct 10
Please, authors, have this clause inserted into your contracts. It prevents publishers using AI-generated voices to narrate an audiobook of your work. For further AI-prevention clauses relating to cover art and translations, visit the Authors Guild: authorsguild.org/news/ag-intr...
October 10, 2023 at 11:05 AM
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indrapramitdas.bsky.social
Still out: my mythic realist period (90s/00s) novella about the family behind the the Dragoners Club of Calcutta, a secret social club where one might sample the diasporic cuisine of another reality, including dragonflesh. Available in expensive signed, numbered hardcover limited ed and cheap ebook:
indrapramitdas.bsky.social Indrapramit Das @indrapramitdas.bsky.social · Jul 3
Out now: THE LAST DRAGONERS OF BOWBAZAR, my uncategorisable novella out about Ru, a 'boy from nowhere' growing up in 90s/00s Calcutta, facing the impossibility that his family may be migrants from another reality, & Alice, a neighbour from Chinatown who is pulled close to their secrets. Links below:
Cover of my novella The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar, painted by Tran Nguyen, showing a 'dragoner' of uncertain gender in colourful robes and a veil and headscarf, showing their eyes, long black hair flying, as they hold the neck of a dragon swooping down on their shoulder, its colouring white and speckled with varying shades of scarlet and burnt orange like the petals of a flower. Text reads the title of the novella, and my name (Indra Das).
October 10, 2023 at 2:33 PM
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lunapress.bsky.social
PRE-ORDERS are OPEN for #LunaNovella 2024! 🥳 Don't forget the bundle special deal! Available through the Luna store and all the usual places, PB and digital.
OUT 19 February 2024! @rainewilson.bsky.social @darkdreamything.bsky.social @clfarley.bsky.social
www.lunapresspublishing.com/product-page...
Luna Novella Bundle 19-21 | Luna Press Publishing
Release date: 19 February 2024Paperback and ebook from all the usual online retailers.The novellas is this bundle are also available on their own. Visit the respective pages in our stores for reviews ...
www.lunapresspublishing.com
October 9, 2023 at 3:51 PM
themiddleshelf.bsky.social
New review!

The Blue, Beautiful World by Karen Lord is a fascinating science-fiction stand-alone novel about first contact.
Not the easiest entry point in her work, but remarkably written and with a focus on cooperation and intelligence.

www.themiddleshelf.org/reviews/kare...

TIA for the RS!
Karen Lord, The Blue, Beautiful World
Karen Lord, The Blue, Beautiful World , Del Rey, 2023. Audiobook available. The Blue, Beautiful World is a fascinating science-fiction stand-alone novel about first contact.
www.themiddleshelf.org
October 8, 2023 at 5:03 PM
themiddleshelf.bsky.social
A propos of nothing, two books that might interest you and the link to my reviews:
- The Book of Disappearance by Ibtisam Azem: www.themiddleshelf.org/reviews/ibti...
- Unholy Land by Lavie Tidhar: www.themiddleshelf.org/reviews/lavi...
Ibtisam Azem, The Book of Disappearance
Ibtisam Azem, The Book of Disappearance , Syracuse University Press, 2019. Translated by Sinan Antoon. The Book of Disappearance is an extraordinary novel that gripped me from the start and that I...
www.themiddleshelf.org
October 8, 2023 at 10:21 AM
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bogiperson.bsky.social
Updated the intersex #ownvoices books list with a whole BUNCH of new books! Now over 50 titles! Happy #IntersexAwarenessMonth!

Thank you to everyone who sent me ideas :)

www.bogireadstheworld.com/intersex-own...
Suddenly a database! All the intersex #ownvoices books | Bogi Reads the World
www.bogireadstheworld.com
October 6, 2023 at 9:54 PM
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lunapress.bsky.social
Learning Monkey and Crocodile.
“Nick Wood’s short stories are powerful, impassioned visions of worlds and worldviews remade by way of redemptive engagement with the spirits of the earth and the earth of the spirit.” Nick Gevers
❤️ Cover by John Cockshaw.
www.lunapresspublishing.com/post/nick-wo...
October 6, 2023 at 4:22 PM
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runalongwomble.bsky.social
New Review And Happy Publication Day - I really enjoyed An Inheritance of Magic by Benedict Jacka that explores magic in a different way!
An Inheritance of Magic by Benedict Jacka — Runalong The Shelves
www.runalongtheshelves.net
October 5, 2023 at 6:32 AM
themiddleshelf.bsky.social
New review!
In The Green Man’s Quarry by Juliet McKenna it’s as always a pleasure to meet with Dan & the gang. Cooperation! British folklore! Vengeful mermaids! All that & more in this new adventure!

www.themiddleshelf.org/reviews/juli...

TIA for the RS
Juliet McKenna, The Green Man's Quarry
Juliet McKenna, The Green Man's Quarry , Wizard's Press Tower, 2023. Welcome to your yearly review of the latest instalment in the Green Man series by Juliet McKenna!
www.themiddleshelf.org
October 1, 2023 at 4:58 PM
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stewarthotston.com
My review of The Creator - a film likely to be misunderstood.
Review: The Creator (updated)
Starring John David Washington, Gemma Chan, Ken Watanabe, Madelaine Yuna Voyles Directed by Gareth Edwards 20th Century, in cinemas now In a war against AI, ex-special forces agent Joshua is sent to k...
scifibulletin.com
October 1, 2023 at 12:10 PM
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wtpress.bsky.social
We are starting a newsletter. The first issue will be out in early Ocotober. To keep up with news from us and our authors, sign up at the link below. wizardstowerpress.com/newsletter-s...
Newsletter Sign-Up
Newsletter Signup for news and special offers! The information you provide on this form will only be used to provide you with updates and personalized marketing. We will send you occasional emails …
wizardstowerpress.com
September 27, 2023 at 5:11 PM
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tachyonpub.bsky.social
Happy #birthday to the enigmatic and acclaimed Birdverse creator @rblemberg.bsky.social
Happy birthday to the enigmatic and acclaimed Birdverse creator R. B. Lemberg - Tachyon Publications
A queer, bigender immigrant from Eastern Europe and Israel, R. B. Lemberg is best know for their Birdverse, a complex, culturally diverse world with many LGBTQIA+ characters and different family confi...
tachyonpublications.com
September 27, 2023 at 3:14 PM
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bethanmay.bsky.social
Did you read my interview with Jen on the Hive yesterday? I asked her which of her characters she'd fuck marry and kill...

I did also ask her serious questions about her fantastic new fantasy Talonsister!

fantasy-hive.co.uk/2023/09/inte...
September 23, 2023 at 6:16 PM