Henry L Lazarus                                                                                                                                                HOME
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Science Fiction for April 2022
by Henry L Lazarus
    Fantasy and Science Fiction can provide many examples of the crazy news we are all reading. Most of them do not come with happy endings.
Centuries from now three generation ships fleeing an Earth controlled by AI’s are approaching the Breaking Day (hard from DAW) that will slow their approach to their new, and hopefully habitable world. Ravi Macleod, an engineer in training, is the first of his criminal minded family to enter the officer ranks. Then he is sent to the rear of the craft to check on the long dead engines and suddenly starts seeing a hallucination of a girl. Adam Oyebanji has a very complicated situation to reveal that eventually would mean life and death to the ships. This is a very exciting tale and I hope gets nominated for an award. Lots of fun.
John M. Ford was someone who I met every time he visited Philadelphia. He died in 2006 and Tor has published Aspects (hard cover) and unfinished piece of what could have been a major work. It’s still fascinating, Varic, Coron of the Corvaric Coast, is a rising star in Parliament. In the last days of the current session he meets  Lady Longlight who needs Parliamentary help against bandits. Together they visit Strange House for holiday until a crisis calls Varic back to the Capitol.  Lady Lightfoot returns home with  Palion Silvern, a Sorcerer. What makes the tale fascinating is that every so often what seems so early 20th century Earth quickly turns into something alien. Absolutely fascinating despite the lack of ending.
 Luanne G. Smith has a fun Victorian England of Sister witches. Edwina and Mary Blackwood have odd talents for witches. Edwina can spot valuables lost on the river bank and the sisters earn a living in their little shop selling these refurbished trinkets. Then one day they come upon Ian Cameron almost dead from a head injury. He is a private detective hunting a missing son of a major sorceror. Unfortunately The Raven Spell (paper from 47North) by Blackwood sister’s has erased most of his memory. It doesn’t help that there’s a serial killer on the streets that may be the man Ian is hunting. Nice fun with a sequel promised.
Fans of The Expance will be absolutely blown away by Allen Stroud’s fractal series. In the second tale Resilient (hard from Flame Tree Press),  Captain Ellisa Shann and her crew are in control of their captured ship Gallowglass. Meanwhile in a Diehard type situation a group has taken control of Phobos station (yes the Martian moon) and plans horrible things. Natalie Holder  who has the ability to jump into a prepared body, finds herself trying to survive and somehow stop them. Doctor Emerson Drake called from Mars to assist in what was originally thought to be an asteroid mining disaster, finds himself the only survivor of his group and way out of his depth. Very exciting and I look forward to the tale in this universe.
Ropa Moyo is a gutsy fifteen-year-old using her real talent to talk to ghosts to hustle money to support her grandmother and sister.  The problem she solved on The Library of the Dead (hard from Tor which I Haven’t read) got her an unpaid internship at the Magical Society of Scotland in Edinburgh. A case of a boy in a coma at Our Lady of Mysterious Ailments (hard from Tor) leads her to a secret society at one of the four colleges of Scientific magic. T. L. Huchu has a nice series set in a modern version of Scotland with magic. An ancient Scottish disaster of a seventeenth century colony in Panama which led to Scotland joining England and the formation of the Bank of Scotland, leads to a treasure seeker which Ropa thinks she can milk for money, and a vengeful ghost. I look forward to sequel adventures.
Sylvain Neuvel continues the tale of the alien Kibsu that have been in hiding on Earth for thousands of years. The Female always has a clone for a child for a hundred generations. Their intention is to take humanity to the stars. The male usually comes with identical brothers all convinced that the females had stolen a key from them.  Until the Last of Me (hard) takes place mostly during Voyager II’s trip through the solar system. Mia and Lola are hunting for a missing object base on a poem written on a bow found in a Chinese museu, The current males have found an ancient  Persian priestess who may have left a key in her tomb. Things go very bad in the end and I suspect at least one more tale to complete the series.
Glynn Stewart’s twelfth tale of a future in which starships are teleported by mages follows some of the secondary characters of the series as they are part of an expedition going Beyond the Eyes of Mars (ebook from Faolan's Pen Publishing)  into an unexplored portion of the galaxy to find the hidden league colonies. The league killed mages and used their brains to jump their starships. After the League retreated to their hidden colonies, they woke the brains up, making them true starship brains. One of them is horrified at what the league is doing and is looking for allies to start a mutiny. Both sides come together to face a truly evil enemy. Great series.
I rushed to read Arthur Mayor’s eighth tale of Raven, high school student by day and superhero by night. Legacy (ebook) ends the three book tale of an impossible night. Ryan’s mother was kidnaped and had to be rescued numerous times. Worse she knows his hero identity. There’s a nasty plot with a gas that turns people into Zombie-like killers. And a lot of super villains far more powerful than he is. His small group have to somehow learn to work together and keep out of the reach of the SSA. Very exciting. I’m glad for some resolution, though obviously the story continues.
    Dr. Henry Lazarus is a retired Dentist and the author of A Cycle of Gods (Wolfsinger Publications) and Unnaturally Female (Smashwords).Check out his unified field theory at henrylazarus.com/utf.html that suggests fusion generation requires less energy because only one