Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold

Three years have passed since the widowed Dowager Royina Ista found release from the curse of madness that kept her imprisoned in her family's castle of Valenda. Her newfound freedom is costly, bittersweet with memories, regrets, and guilty secrets -- for she knows the truth of what brought her land to the brink of destruction. And now the road -- escape -- beckons....A simple pilgrimage, perhaps. Quite fitting for the Dowager Royina of all Chalion.

Yet something else is free, too -- something beyond deadly. To the north lies the vital border fortress of Porifors. Memories linger there as well, of wars and invasions and the mighty Golden General of Jokona. And someone, something, watches from across that border -- humans, demons, gods.

Ista thinks her little party of pilgrims wanders at will. But whose? When Ista's retinue is unexpectedly set upon not long into its travels, a mysterious ally appears -- a warrior nobleman who fights like a berserker. The temporary safety of her enigmatic champion's castle cannot ease Ista's mounting dread, however, when she finds his dark secrets are entangled with hers in a net of the gods' own weaving.

In her dreams the threads are already drawing her to unforeseen chances, fateful meetings, fearsome choices. What the inscrutable gods commanded of her in the past brought her land to the brink of devastation. Now, once again, they have chosen Ista as their instrument. And again, for good or for ill, she must comply.

Paladin of Souls (2003)
Hugo Award and Nebula Award winner
a sequel to The Curse of Chalion
Book two of the Chalion universe fantasy series
Eos hardcover
456 pages
my rating : I haven't read it(!)
(other people in the book club rated this book an average of over 8/10)

The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold

On the eve of the Daughter's Day -- the grand celebration that will honor the Lady of Spring, one of the five reigning deities -- a man broken in body and spirit makes his way slowly down the road to Valenda. A former courtier and soldier, Cazaril has survived indignity and horrific torture as a slave aboard an enemy galley. Now he seeks nothing more than a menial job in the kitchens of the Dowager Provincara, in the noble household where he served as page in his youth.

But the gods have greater plans for this humbled man. Welcomed warmly, clothed and fed, he is named, to his great surprise, secretary-tutor to the Royesse Iselle -- the beautiful, strong-willed sister of the impetuous boy who is destined to be the next ruler of the land. But the assignment must ultimately carry Cazaril to the one place he fears even more than the sea: to the royal court of Cardegoss, rife with intrigues and lethal treacheries.

In Cardegoss, the powerful enemies who once placed Cazaril in chains and bound him to a Roknari oar now occupy the most lofty positions in the realm, beneath only the Roya himself. Yet something far more sinister than their scheming hangs like a sword over the royal family: a curse of the blood that taints not only those who would rule, but those who stand in their circle. The life and future of both Iselle and her entire blighted House of Chalion lie in dire peril. The only recourse left to her loyal, damaged servant is the employment of the darkest and most forbidden of magics -- a choice that will indelibly mark Cazaril as a tool of the miraculous...and trap him, flesh and soul, in a maze of demonic paradox, damnation, and death for as long as he dares walk the fivefold pathway of the gods.

The Curse of Chalion (2001)
2002 Hugo Award nominee
Book one of the Chalion universe fantasy series
Eos hardcover
442 pages
my rating : 8/10

Thirteen Orphans by Jane Lindskold

Their ancestors came to Earth as exiles from the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice, which had been mysteriously formed from the lost lore of Imperial China. Concealing their magic in the game of mah-jong, the Thirteen Orphans vowed to protect their adopted world from the strife they left behind.

Generations later, the war they thought long over has followed the Orphans to Earth. Scattered, their traditions in disarray, and with the magical abilities of some Orphans already disabled, the survivors must act quickly to defend themselves and those they love.

The Thirteen Orphans represent the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac -- plus the Cat. They are led by Pearl Bright, a gracious and vivacious older woman who is the avatar of the Tiger -- and who has the hidden claws and steely determination of her namesake. Pearl's outward confidence masks her inner concern, for she has no idea of the number or strength of her enemies and her forces are few and mostly inexperienced: the Dog, a former soldier who knew of his ancestry but never expected to learn or use magic; the Hare, a young mother who has rarely left the shelter of her family; the Rooster, a skilled magic-worker who has never gone into battle.

And college sophomore Brenda Morris, whose father is the Rat. Until a few days ago, Brenda had no idea that her father could do magic or that other worlds existed. Now, with her father's abilities stolen, Brenda and the other Orphans are stunned to discover that Brenda has some of the Rat's powers...though she has no idea, yet, what to do with them.

Thirteen Orphans (2008)
Book One of The Land of Smoke and Sacrifice series
Tor hardcover
367 pages
my rating : 7/10

A Shadow in Summer by Daniel Abraham

The city-state of Saraykeht dominates the Summer Cities. Its wealth is beyond measure; its port is open to all the merchants of the world; and its ruler, the Khai Saraykeht, commands forces to rival the Gods. Commerce and trade fill the streets with a hundred languages, and the coffers of the wealthy with jewels and gold. Any desire, however exotic or base, can be satisfied in its soft quarter. Blissfully ignorant of the forces that fuel their prosperity, the people live and work secure in the knowledge that their city is a bastion of progress in a harsh world. It would be a tragedy if it fell....

Saraykeht is poised on the knife-edge of disaster.

At the heart of the city's influence are the poet-sorcerer Heshai and the captive spirit, Seedless, whom he controls. For all his power, Heshai is weak, haunted by memories of shame and humiliation. A man faced with constant reminders of his responsibilities and his failures, he is the linchpin and the most vulnerable point in Saraykeht's greatness.

Far to the west, the armies of Galt have conquered many lands. To take Saraykeht, they must first destroy the trade upon which its prosperity is based. Marchat Wilsin, head of Galt's trading house in the city, is planning a terrible crime against Heshai and Seedless. If he succeeds, Saraykeht will fall.

Amat, House Wilsin's business manager, is a woman who rose from the slums to wield the power that Marchat Wilsin would use to destroy her city. Through accidents of fate and circumstance Amat, her apprentice Liat. and two young men from the farthest reaches of their society stand alone against the dangers that threaten the city.

But in this city of power and intrigue, no one is without secrets. The price each of the city's protectors must pay to save Saraykeht may be greater than they can afford. And the Galts are not the greatest threat they face....

A Shadow in Summer (2006)
Book One of The Long Price Quartet
Tor hardcover
331 pages
my rating : 8/10

To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis

On the surface, England in the summer of 1888 is possibly the most restful time in history -- lazy afternoons boating on the Thames, tea parties, croquet on the lawn -- and time traveler Ned Henry is badly in need of a rest. He's been shuttling back and forth between the 21st century and the 1940s looking for a Victorian atrocity called the bishop's bird stump. It's only the latest in a long string of assignments from Lady Schrapnell, the rich dowager who has invaded Oxford University. She's promised to endow the university's time travel research project in return for their help in rebuilding the famed Coventry Cathedral, destroyed in a Nazi air raid over a hundred years before.

But the bargain has turned into a nightmare. Lady Schrapnell's motto is "God is in the details," and as the 125th anniversary of the cathedral's destruction -- and the deadline for its proposed completion -- approaches, time travel research has fallen by the wayside. Now Ned and his colleagues are frantically engaged in installing organ pipes, researching misericords, and generally risking life and limb. So when Ned gets the chance to escape to the Victorian era, he jumps at it. Unfortunately, he isn't really being sent there to recover from his time lag symptoms, but to correct an incongruity a fellow historian, Verity Kindle, has inadvertently created by bringing something forward from the past.

In theory, such an act is impossible. But now it has happened, and it's up to Ned and Verity to correct the incongruity before it alters history or, worse, destroys the space time continuum. And they have to do it while coping with eccentric Oxford dons, table rapping spiritualists, a very spoiled young lady, and an even more spoiled cat. As Ned and Verity try frantically to hold things together and find out why the incongruity happened, the breach widens, time travel goes amok, and everything starts to fall apart -- until the fate of the entire space time continuum hangs on a séance, a butler, and above all, on the bishop's bird stump.

To Say Nothing of the Dog (1997)
1999 HUGO AWARD WINNER
1998 NEBULA AWARD NOMINEE
Bantam Spectra hardcover
434 pages
my rating : 8/10

Palimpsest by Catherynne M. Valente

Between life and death, dreaming and waking, at the train stop beyond the end of the world is the city of Palimpsest. To get there is a miracle, a mystery, a gift, and a curse -- a voyage permitted only to those who've always believed there's another world than the one that meets the eye. Those fated to make the passage are marked forever by a map of that wondrous city tattooed on their flesh after a single orgasmic night.

To this kingdom of ghost trains, lion-priests, living kanji, and cream-filled canals come four travelers: Oleg, a New York locksmith; the beekeeper November; Ludovico, a binder of rare books; and a young Japanese woman named Sei. They've each lost something important -- a wife, a lover, a sister, a direction in life -- and what they will find in Palimpsest is more than they could ever imagine.

Palimpsest (2009)
2010 HUGO AWARD NOMINEE
Bantam trade paperback
367 pages
my rating : 6/10

Julian Comstock by Robert Charles Wilson

In the reign of President Deklan Comstock, a reborn United States is struggling back to prosperity. Over a century after the Efflorescence of Oil, after the Fall of the Cities, after the Plague of Infertility, after the False Tribulation, after the days of the Pious Presidents, the 60 stars and thirteen stripes wave from the plains of Athabaska to the national capital in New York City.

In Colorado Springs, the Dominion sees to the nation's spiritual needs. In Labrador, the Army wages war on the Dutch. America, unified, is rising once again.

Then, out of Labrador come tales of a new Ajax -- Captain Commongold, the Youthful Hero of the Saguenay. The ordinary people follow his adventures in the popular press. The Army adores him. The President is...troubled. Especially when the dashing Captain turns out to be his nephew Julian, son of the falsely accused and executed Bryce.

Treachery and intrigue dog Julian's footsteps. Hair's-breadth escapes and daring rescues fill his days. Stern resolve and tender sentiment dice for Julian's soul, while his admiration for the works of the Secular Ancients, and his adherence to the evolutionary doctrines of the heretical Darwin, set him at fatal odds with the hierarchy of the Dominion. Plague and fire swirl around the Presidential palace when at last he arrives with the acclamation of the mob.

....As told by Julian's best friend and faithful companion, a rustic yet observant lad from the west, this tale of the 22nd Century asks -- and answers -- the age-old question: "Do you want to tell the truth, or do you want to tell a story?"

Julian Comstock (2009)
2010 HUGO AWARD NOMINEE
Tor hardcover
416 pages
my rating : 6/10

WWW: Wake by Robert J. Sawyer

Caitlin Decter is young, pretty, feisty, a genius at math -- and blind. Still, she can surf the net with the best of them, following its complex paths clearly in her mind.

When a Japanese researcher develops a new signal-processing implant that might give her sight, she jumps at the chance, flying to Tokyo for the operation.

But Caitlin's brain long ago co-opted her primary visual cortex to help her navigate online. Once the implant is activated, instead of seeing reality, the landscape of the World Wide Web explodes into her consciousness, spreading out all around her in a riot of colors and shapes. While exploring this amazing realm, she discovers something -- some other --lurking in the background. And it's getting smarter...

WWW : Wake (2009)
2010 HUGO AWARD NOMINEE
Ace hardcover
368 pages
cover photos by Steven Biver, John Lund
my rating : 6.5/10

The City & The City by China Miéville

When a murdered woman is found in the city of Besźel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad. But as he investigates, the evidence points to conspiracies far stranger and more deadly than anything he could have imagined.

Borlú must travel from the decaying Besźel to the only metropolis on Earth as strange as his own. This is a border crossing like no other, a journey as psychic as it is physical, a shift in perception, a seeing of the unseen. His destination is Besźel's equal, rival, and intimate neighbor, the rich and vibrant city of Ul Qoma. With Ul Qoman detective Qussim Dhatt, and struggling with his own transition, Borlú is enmeshed in a sordid underworld of rabid nationalists intent on destroying their neighboring city, and unificationists who dream of dissolving the two into one. As the detectives uncover the dead woman's secrets, they begin to suspect a truth that could cost them and those they care about more than their lives.

What stands against them are murderous powers in Besźel and in Ul Qoma: and, most terrifying of all, that which lies between these two cities.

The City & The City (2009)
2010 HUGO AWARD WINNER
Del Rey hardcover
312 pages
cover art by FWIS
my rating : 8.5/10

The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi

Anderson Lake is a company man, AgriGen's Calorie Man in Thailand. Under cover as a factory manager, Anderson combs Bangkok's street markets in search of foodstuffs thought to be extinct, hoping to reap the bounty of history's lost calories. There, he encounters Emiko...

Emiko is the Windup Girl, a strange and beautiful creature. One of the New People, Emiko is not human; instead, she is an engineered being, crèche-grown and programmed to satisfy the decadent whims of a Kyoto businessman, but now abandoned to the streets of Bangkok. Regarded as soulless beings by some, devils by others, New People are slaves, soldiers, and toys of the rich in a chilling near future in which calorie companies rule the world, the oil age has passed, and the side effects of bio-engineered plagues run rampant across the globe.

What Happens when calories become currency? What happens when bio-terrorism becomes a tool for corporate profits, when said bio-terrorism's genetic drift forces mankind to the cusp of post-human evolution?...

The Windup Girl (2009)
2009 NEBULA AWARD WINNER
2010 HUGO AWARD WINNER
Night Shade books hardcover
359 pages
cover art by Raphael Lacoste
my rating : 8.5/10

Elantris by Brandon Sanderson

Elantris was beautiful, once. It was called the city of the gods: a place of power, radiance, and magic. Visitors say that the very stones glowed with an inner light, and that the city contained wondrous arcane marvels. At night Elantris shone like a great silvery fire, visible even from a great distance.

Yet, as magnificent as Elantris had been, its inhabitants had been more so. Their hair a brilliant white, their skin an almost metallic silver, the Elantrians seemed to shine like the city itself. Legend claimed that they were immortal, or at least nearly so. Their bodies healed quickly, and they were blessed with great strength, insight, and speed. They could perform magics with a bare wave of the hand; men visited Elantris from all across Opelon to receive Elantrian healings, food, or wisdom. They were divinities.

And anyone could become one.

The Shaod, it was called. The Transformation. It struck randomly -- usually at night, during the mysterious hours when life slowed to rest. The Shaod could take beggar, craftsman, nobleman, or warrior. When it came, the fortunate person's life ended and began anew; he would discard his old, mundane existence and move to Elantris. Elantris, where he could live in bliss, rule in wisdom, and be worshipped for eternity.

Eternity ended ten years ago.

Elantris (2005)
Tor fantasy hardcover
496 pages
cover art by Stephan Martiniere
my rating : 7/10

A Scattering of Jades by Alexander C. Irvine

The great fire of 1835 has burned most of New York City's wooden downtown. Like many people, Archie Prescott thinks he has lost everything. His home is a smoldering ruin, his dead wife's body at his feet. And next to her is a child's corpse he assumes was his daughter. It seems like the end of everything.

But it is only the beginning.

Goaded into action by New York Herald publisher James Gordon Bennett, Archie runs afoul of one of P.T. Barnum's former sideshow workers, Riley Steen. With the help of an ancient book translated by Aaron Burr, Steen has resurrected a chacmool. This ageless Mesoamerican avatar plans to use the blood of Archie's still-living daughter to bring about the end of humanity.

Meanwhile, Steven Bishop guides tourists through the Mammoth Cave in Kentucky. Steven, a slave, wants nothing more than a world where the color of his skin doesn't deny his humanity. His fateful first meeting with the chacmool leads him to believe that the promise it offers may bring him to such a world.

In the midst of ancient magic and murderous conspiracies, Archie finds himself with the power to save the world or drown it in sacrificial blood...but first he has to stop mourning his daughter and undertake a grim cross-country journey to save her.

A Scattering of Jades (2002)
Tor paperback
406 pages
cover art by John Jude Palencar
my rating : 8/10

Expiration Date by Tim Powers

Young Koot Parganas is growing up in Los Angeles in the 1990s, but his parents won't let him do anything normal. His weirdo parents venerate the spirits of the dead Mahatmas. At the age of eleven, Koot has disobeyed his parents, broken into a plaster bust of Dante, stolen the small glass vial concealed inside it, and set in motion events that will change his own life, and everyone else's.

For trapped in the vial was the preserved ghost of Thomas Alva Edison, and there is no telling what power the possession of that ghost could confer. The exposure of Edison's ghost lights up a beacon for those who can see such things.

Koot is pursued through the dark underside of the city, aided by allies as strange as his enemies: a bum and his dog; a man concealed by the ghostly mask of Houdini; a psychiatrist-sorceress; and a former television child-star who has been dead for several years, but who is not yet ready to leave his body or abandon his revenge on the woman who murdered his godfather.

Expiration Date (1995 UK, 1996 USA)
Tor hardback
381 pages
cover art by Michael Koelsch
my rating : 8/10

The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell

After the first exquisite songs were interpreted by radio telescope, U.N. diplomats debated long and hard whether and why human resources should be expended in an attempt to reach the world that would become known as Rakhat. In the Rome offices of the Society of Jesus, the questions were not whether or why but how soon the mission could be attempted and whom to send.

The Jesuit scientists went to Rakhat to learn, not to proselytize. They went so that they might come to know and love God's other children. They went for the reason Jesuits have always gone to the farthest frontiers of human exploration. They went for the greater glory of God.

They meant no harm.

It is the story of a charismatic Jesuit priest and linguist, Emilio Sandoz, who leads a twenty-first-century scientific mission to a newly discovered extraterrestrial culture. Sandoz and his companions are prepared to endure isolation, hardship and death, but nothing can prepare them for the civilization they encounter, or for the tragic misunderstanding that brings the mission to a catastrophic end.

The Sparrow (1996)
Villard hardcover
cover art by Giotto di Bondone (14th century)
405 pages
my rating : 9/10

Eragon by Christopher Paolini

One Boy...One Dragon...A world of adventure.

When Eragon finds a polished blue stone in the forest, he thinks it is the lucky discovery of a poor farm boy; perhaps it will buy his family meat for the winter. But when the stone brings a dragon hatchling, Eragon soon realizes he has stumbled upon a legacy nearly as old as the Empire itself.

Overnight his simple life is shattered, and he is thrust into a perilous new world of destiny, magic, and power. With only an ancient sword and the advice of an old storyteller for guidance, Eragon and the fledgling dragon must navigate the dangerous terrain and dark enemies of an Empire ruled by a king whose evil knows no bounds.

Can Eragon take up the mantle of the legendary Dragon Riders? The fate of the Empire may rest in his hands....

Eragon (2002)
Knopf hardcover
cover art by John Jude Palencar
497 pages
my rating : 7/10

Kiln People by David Brin

In a perilous future, disposable duplicate bodies fulfill every citizen's legal and illicit whim. Life as a 24-hour "ditto" is cheap, as Albert Morris knows. A brash investigator with a knack for trouble, he's sent plenty of clay duplicates into deadly peril, them "inloaded" memories from copies that were shot, crushed, drowned...all part of a day's work.

But when Morris tackles a ring of crooks making bootleg copies of a famous actress, he trips into a secret so explosive it incites open warfare on the streets of Dittotown.


Kiln People (2002)
Tor paperback
cover art by Jim Burns
567 pages
my rating : 8/10

Moon Called by Patricia Briggs

Werewolves can be dangerous if you get in their way, but they'll leave you alone if you are careful. They are very good at hiding their natures from the human population, but I'm not human. I know them when I meet them, and they know me, too.

Mercy Thompson's sexy next-door neighbor is a werewolf.

She's tinkering with a VW bus at her mechanic shop that happens to belong to a vampire.

But then, Mercy Thompson is not exactly normal herself...and her connection to the world of things that go bump in the night is about to get her into a whole lot of trouble.

Moon Called (2006)
Book one in the Mercy Thompson series
Ace paperback
cover art by Daniel Dos Santos
288 pages
my rating : 7/10

Matter by Iain M. Banks

In a world renowned even within a galaxy full of wonders, a crime within a war. For one man it means a desperate flight and a search for the one -- maybe two -- people who could clear his name. For his brother it means a life lived under constant threat of treachery and murder. And for their sister, even without knowing the full truth, it means returning to a place she'd thought abandoned forever.

But the sister is not what she once was; Djan Seriy Anaplian has changed almost beyond recognition to become an agent of the Culture's Special Circumstances section, charged with high-level interference in civilizations throughout the greater galaxy.

Concealing her new identity -- and her particular set of abilities -- might be a dangerous strategy, however. In the world to which Anaplian returns, nothing is quite as it seems; and determining the appropriate level of interference in someone else's war is never a simple matter.

Matter (2008)
A Culture Novel
Orbit USA hardcover
cover art by Debra Lill
593 pages
my rating : 7.5/10

To Reign in Hell by Steven Brust

The time is The Beginning. The place is Heaven. The story is the Revolt of the Angels -- a war of magic, corruption and intrigue that could destroy the fragile fabric of the universe, plunge it back into chaos, from which all thing come.

To Reign in Hell (1984)
Ace fantasy paperback
cover art by Steve Hickman
268 pages
my rating : 6/10

Gridlinked by Neal Asher

Gridlinked is a fast-paced science fiction adventure mixed with a dash of cyberpunk and a splash of espionage. Earth Central Security agent Ian Cormac is a legend, a protector of the Polity, hundreds of worlds connected together by instantaneous transport via "runcibles." Unfortunately, he's burnt out, "gridlinked" to the net so long his humanity has nearly drained away.

Now he must go cold turkey as he's sent to investigate a thirty-megaton runcible disaster on the planet Samarkand. With the runcible out, Cormac must get there by ship to investigate the disaster. But he has incurred the wrath of psychopath Arian Pelter, who trails him across the galaxy with the decidedly homicidal android Mr. Crane at his side.

And deep beneath Samarkand's surface are mysteries better buried.

It's not only humans who know the meaning of hate.

Gridlinked (2001)
Tor trade paperback
423 pages
my rating : 8/10