Tag Archives: Science Fiction

QUICK REVIEW: The Regression Test – Wole Talabi

First published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in 2017, Wole Talabi’s short story The Regression Test is a deceptively dark tale exploring human involvement with artificial intelligence. In an ugly corporate conference room, Titilope Ajimobi takes part in a regression test designed to ascertain whether an AI has deviated too far from the original human source of its thought patterns. As the person who knew the human subject best, it’s her role to pose a series of questions that will determine whether the AI is still recognisable – as her mother, who’s been dead the last 40 years.

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The Mimicking of Known Successes – Malka Older

Set on a colony encircling Jupiter in a distant future, Malka Older’s genre-blending novella The Mimicking of Known Successes opens with Investigator Mossa looking into the disappearance of a university scholar assumed to have jumped or been pushed from a remote transit platform, thereafter presumably perishing in the gas giant’s freezing, punishing atmosphere. Back at the university she recruits her once-girlfriend Pleiti, also a scholar, to assist with her investigation, the two of them attempting to understand what might have prompted an almost universally disliked man to disappear. The deeper they dig the more the mystery thickens, becoming more dangerous than they could have expected, while their unexpected reunion inevitably stirs up old memories and emotions once thought laid to rest.

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Finally! Series I’m Going to Start (At Last)

Like pretty much everyone else, I find there are always too many books I want to read and not enough time in which to read them, so I inevitably end up having a bunch of books that I really, really want to read…but never get around to. With that in mind, in 2023 I’m planning on making an active effort to look back at books that have been on my TBR list for a while but which I haven’t managed to get to. In particular, I’ve picked out 10 trilogies or series which I haven’t yet started but have been meaning to, and I’m going to at least make a start on each one. Ideally I’d like to read the whole trilogy/series (or at least whatever’s been published so far) in each case but I might not manage that, so the plan is to read at least the first book from all 10.

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ToW Advent 2022 – Collected Recommendations

After 24 days of brilliant guest posts, insightful author interviews and compelling original fiction (and a few roundup posts from me), the Track of Words Advent Calendar has come to an end for its second year running. If you’ve been following the series from the start, I really hope you’ve enjoyed at least some – if not all – of the content, while if this is your first engagement with the series I’d strongly recommend you skip to the main article and check out all the great posts there! Either way, now we’ve reached the end of the Advent Calendar I want to say a massive thank you to everyone who contributed to the series, without whom it would have been a quieter and much less interesting month on Track of Words!

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TBR: SFF Books Coming in 2023

Last year I put together a TBR list of science fiction and fantasy books I was particularly looking forward to reading in 2022, and yep…I thought I’d do the same this year! It’s always fun to look ahead and think about what looks particularly exciting, and it’s useful to have a list like this to refer back to as the year progresses. From last year’s list, only nine of the ten books have actually been published yet, so I’ve cheated a bit and included the unpublished one from 2022 on this list too. Of those nine though, I did read seven (and a half)…which is pretty good going I think, and I’d say that they mostly (if not entirely) lived up to expectations.

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Lavie Tidhar – Paradigm Shift

Hello and welcome to Track of Words, where today I’m absolutely delighted to welcome the fantastic Lavie Tidhar with a guest post taking a broad view over the science fiction genre as a whole – a sort of sci-fi state of the nation. A genre-spanning author of so many fantastic books, and editor of the wonderful The Best of World SF anthologies (both of which are available now from Head of Zeus), I can’t think of anyone better placed than Lavie to speak about current trends in SF fiction and publishing. If you’re at all interested in science fiction, whether as a reader or a writer, there’s bound to be food for thought in this excellent post.

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Showtime – Original Fiction by J.S. Collyer

Hello and welcome to this original short story here on Track of Words – Showtime, kindly contributed by the fantastic J.C. Collyer. Author of the Orbit trilogy and several excellent Black Library short stories (in particular, look out for In the Name of Victory in the Inferno! Presents: The Emperor’s Finest anthology), I’m a real fan of J.S. Collyer’s writing, so I couldn’t be happier to be publishing one of her original short stories. This is a deceptively dark science fiction story, set in a circus, with no creepy clowns but a decidedly sinister ringmistress and a very, very dangerous act. Enjoy!

“There is no audience like a Metropiline audience. They’re the best. And deserve the best.”

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Author Spotlight: David Goodman

Hello and welcome to this Track of Words Author Spotlight interview, where today I’m joined by the brilliant David Goodman to talk about Clarkesworld-published short stories, turning cool concepts into full, engaging stories, the different challenges of writing short fiction and novels, the realities of submitting novels, and loads more! I’ve read and loved both of Dave’s short stories in Clarkesworld Magazine, and I was hugely impressed by their depth of world building, great (and unusual) characters and smart themes, and how they remained very human and relatable despite their sci-fi nature. I can’t wait to read more of Dave’s writing, and I jumped at the chance to chat to him for what turned out to be an in-depth and (I think) incredibly interesting interview!

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Best SFF Books of 2022

Every year I put together an article talking about the best science fiction and fantasy novels I’ve read over the last twelve months (here’s 2021’s article), and this year is no different – welcome to my Best SFF Books of 2022 article! Over the years I’ve tweaked how I approach this task, and this year I’ve decided to keep it nice and simple. No honourable mentions, no exhaustive top 20, just the 10 books that I’ve enjoyed reading the most in 2022. As usual, I’ve restricted myself in this to books published in 2022, so you won’t find any old classics here (or even books published only a year or two ago) – just great books that were released this year. The only criteria I went by were that they had to be SFF books (or SFF/horror crossover) – whether aimed at adults or a YA audience – and they had to be books that I enjoyed so much I would wholeheartedly recommend them.

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Ren Hutchings – Why We Love Ragtag Crews

Hello and welcome to this Track of Words guest post, where I’m joined by the fantastic author Ren Hutchings to talk about ragtag crews in fiction, and why they’re so popular. Ren’s brilliant novel Under Fortunate Stars is one of my absolute highlights of 2022 (you can read my review of it here), a gripping space opera full of great characters and exploring some really smart ideas, so I was delighted when she agreed to write this guest post. If you too like a good character-driven science fiction (or any fiction, really) novel then read on to explore some of the reasons why these sorts of character groupings are so much fun, check out the list of recommendations at the end for more books to look out for, and make sure you pick up a copy of Under Fortunate Stars!

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