Best Releases of 2010

I've read eighteen books released this year. Of those, four stood out as head and shoulders above the rest.  Each of these books is something I would recommend to any genre fan.

So let's get to some books, shall we?

Review here.

The Halfmade World excelled in just about every category I can think of to judge fiction. The world is immersive, well thought out, and interesting, and the characters that populate it are both larger than life and crippled by flaws. Liv is ineffective and, for much of the novel, incapable of surviving on her own. Creedmore is narcissistic and self pitying. Lowry is an automaton, unwilling to acknowledge that he’s walking right off a cliff. Gilman's created a focused work that feels epic, a fascinating cast of characters, and a gripping plot. I’d compare The Halfmade World to the other releases of the year, but there’s really no need. 2010 has a clear winner, and it’s standing right here.

Review here.

Like The Halfmade World, Terminal World uses a personal struggle to illuminate vast, world changing events. Admittedly, none of Reynolds’ characters here have the sheer power of Gilman’s in the above book. But Reynolds has never been a character writer, even if his characters have grown immeasurably. I read Reynolds books to be wowed by concepts and shifts in scale, to be awed by creations I could never have conceived of. The ideas in Terminal World will blow your mind. The Spire’s varying levels of technology allow clear demarcations within the text, and Reynolds gets to play in a half dozen different playgrounds. Every level is exquisitely rendered, from the opening to the steampunk to the endless wastes. Reynolds’ tone is no less variable, ranging from pure fun to awe to terror, and all in the same ten pages. If he’d wanted to end the book with the characters’ view of the Swarm below them and call it a day, I think I would have still walked away trying to pick my jaw up off the floor.

Review here.

The Folding Knife shares a limited cast with the prior two books, but it differentiates itself by not really being about the imagined world at all. Oh, Basso is in charge of the country, but we really only care about the Vesani as far as Basso feels like being compassionate that day. Parker’s newest novel is cynical, witty, and incredibly deep. It would be easy to make a novel about a single, narcissistic antihero who gets his way and have it be off putting and tensionless, and it’s true that the secondary characters here show a disappointing lack of depth, but Basso himself is humanized by his flaws and fascinating for his peculiar morality. If I were to pick an Epic Fantasy read of the year, it’s undoubtedly this.

Review here.

Apartment 16’s cast is uneven, and the climax is ultimately disappointing. On the other hand, the book’s atmosphere is oppressive enough to smother you on a sunny beach in Florida. Nevill invites the reader along as he splits his characters’ world in two and sends Seth down the dark path. Watching the main character gradually recede from humanity is a painful experience, and it’s only made more so by his occasional intersections with the world that we recognize. This is a dark and uncompromising read that will stay with you long after you’re done with it.

HONORABLE MENTIONS

Review here.

Abraham's short fiction proved as multifaceted as his novels. Leviathan Wept is a varied and powerful work, capable of terrifying you with one story and warming your heart with the next. The collection was brought down slightly be a few slightly weaker stories as it went on, but this is still an essential read.

Review here.

Thomas Ligotti's first nonfiction work is as insidious as his short fiction. The ideas presented in The Conspiracy Against the Human Race are interesting and well argued, if not always persuasive. I didn't put this in the upper list because I've no idea how one can conclusively state that a book of philosophy is "better" than a book of fiction, but this is a work that had to be mentioned in any proper summation of the year.

Habitations of the Blessed is a stunningly original novel that's atypical down to its very structure and framing. This is very much the first book of a longer work, and it's difficult to draw conclusions about Valente's world and its ramifications from just what's here. Still, the barrage of exquisitely bizarre imagery that Valente unleashes makes this a must read for any fans of fantasy fiction or gorgeous prose.

DISCLAIMER

Some people seem to have a rather skewed impression of what Best Of lists actually are. I know that it says Essential Reads on top of this post, but you know what? I’m aware that those are not necessarily the ultimate, objective books of 2010. They are simply my favorite released books of 2010. That does not mean that I have read every book released in 2010 (or even every book I want to read in 2010), or that I have used some sort of unbiased criteria to determine these. The complete list of 2010 releases I've read is as follows, provided to give my picks context and to explain the absence, of, say, That Book You Love That I Haven't Read on my list.

Shine

Daniel Abraham – Leviathan Wept

Iain M. Banks – Surface Detail

Justin Cronin – The Passage

Ian C. Esslemont – Stonewielder

Felix Gilman – The Halfmade World

N.K. Jesmin – The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms

Thomas Ligotti – The Conspiracy against the Human Race

China Mieville – Kraken

Adam LG Nevill – Apartment 16

K.J. Parker – The Folding Knife

Alastair Reynolds – Terminal World

Patrick Rothfuss – The Adventures of the Princess and Mr. Whiffle

Brandon Sanderson – The Way of Kings

Brandon Sanderson/Robert Jordan – Towers of Midnight

Sam Sykes – Tome of the Undergates

Cathrynne M. Valente – Habitations of the Blessed

Jeff VanderMeer – The Third Bear

Alastair Reynolds - Terminal World

And in that time, before the gates of paradise were closed to them, men and women were as children. And so plentiful were the fruits and bounties of paradise that they lived for four-score years, and some lived longer than that. And in that time the Earth was warm and blue and green and many were its provinces.

Alastair Reynolds’s latest novel is the easy equal of anything the man’s yet written. Terminal World contains many elements familiar to Reynolds readers; in many ways, Terminal World is the culmination of several trends that have popped up in almost everything that Reynolds has written. Despite those, Terminal World is an outlier in the Reynolds catalog, and if you need proof, let's just look at the covers. Spaceship, spaceship, spaceship, spaceship, spaceship... dirigible?

One of the main differences is Terminal World’s extremely focused narrative. Revelation Space didn’t have an astronomically large number of point of views, but they were scattered over awe inspiring distances in both space and time. Chasm City, as well as many of Reynolds’s other work (Absolution Gap, for instance), features two plot threads that don’t come together until the very end of the novel. Since then, however, Reynolds has been making a conscious effort to streamline his stories. In Terminal World, we see the world only through the eyes of Doctor Quillon and a few one off characters. The change is marked. As opposed to something like Redemption Ark, where Clavain and the other main characters were the ones guiding the story, we see events from the periphery a good amount of the time. That’s not to say that Quillon isn’t important, of course, but he’s only one player amongst many. This close focus adds tension to several parts, but can also occasionally lead to a plot without a clear goal.

As a result of Quillon’s dominance, Terminal World is a very personal novel. To that end, it’s a definite plus that the characterization is generally excellent. At times, Reynolds’s characters seem in danger of falling into standard archetypes, but the traditional climaxes, expected from page one, are absent and the illusion always gives way to something deeper. A good example is Meroka. She has good reason to despise Angels; Quillon is an angel of sorts. I don’t think that anyone will be shocked by knowing that she finds out what he is, and that she hates him for it. In that phase of their relationship, she gives Quillon the following speech:

And you’re wrong about me, if you think there’s forgiveness deep down inside, if only you can find it. Truth to tell Cutter, there’s only more hate. That’s what I am. Clinical-grade hate, all the way through. Keep digging, you’ll only come out on the other side.

Amusingly written, but not particularly surprising. Surely, they are going to have a tearful reunion at some point, right? Well…no. Reynolds characters often tread familiar paths, but they do so without the usual road signs. Melodramatic declarations and epiphanies often allow authors to point out the change in characters without having to make the characters actually change. In Terminal World, the characters never go through one hundred and eighty degree reinventions. Instead, their personalities and friendships evolve subtly and naturally.

Thematically, Terminal World deals with many of the same issues that Reynolds has always dealt with, namely man’s struggle to adapt and survive in a vast and uncaring world. In this case, the endless emptiness of space is replaced with the Zones, different areas that each dictate a different level of technology, or, in extreme cases, prohibit all life.

Reynolds’s prose and worldbuilding here is primarily set to evoke wonder and awe. Moments like the first vision of the Swarm were powerful enough to make me put down the book for a few seconds and just revel in the image. The majority of the book is built like that, with the effect of making the contrasting scenes all the starker. Fleeing in a train that feels like it’s going backwards in time, the delicious strangeness of the scene is stabbed through by the appearance of hellish hunter angels. The variety between the feel of scenes set in Neon Heights and Horsetown, let alone the hellish wastes, is nothing short of amazing.

One of the main feelings you get from reading Terminal World is that of a world with tremendous depth. Everything that we’re shown feels like a part of something much larger, and it’s something that the very limited point of view only emphasizes. As opposed to some settings that feel like a city prop for a play, vibrant when in use and husks of wood when not mid performance, this is a world that feels like it exists round the clock. I can picture people living their lives in Horsetown, and I can picture running in fear from Skullboys even when the camera’s far in the air in another part of the world. I’m praying for a sequel to this world at some point, though I’m unsure just how likely it actually is.

Terminal World’s ending is one of its few weak points. With a few notable exceptions, Reynolds’s endings have always been hit and miss. Now, it seems to me that you can have two kinds of ambiguous endings. You can have the kind where a character’s personal goals are accomplished, but the grander struggle goes on, or, to inverse that, one where the character’s life is still in flux, but the greater battle is done. Both can, and obviously have, been done to great effect. Unfortunately, Terminal World’s ending is ambiguous in both ways, leaving the reader with the feeling that the movie cut out in the final five minutes.

Still, complaining too much about a slightly disappointing ending after reading such a marvelous book feels petty, and the ending does not, after all, come anywhere near damaging the rest of the book. Terminal World is one of Reynolds’s finest works yet. It has everything that has made him such an excellent writer over the years, as well as a whole host of new things, almost all of which succeed brilliantly. If you are even remotely interested in Reynolds (or just good science fiction), you owe it to yourself to read this.

Up and Coming (and Essential?) in March

To be fair, this is out already, but I didn’t think to start this feature until now, and the book was released in March, so I’m doing it anyway. Spellwright is a high magic debut that seems like a much lighter, easier read than a lot of the other books coming out this month. That being said, it seems to set itself apart with its focus on disabilities (written by an author with firsthand experience). For a better idea of the work as a whole, I’ll refer you over to Aidan’s review.


The description sounds interesting, but what’s really got me excited about this (besides the Reynolds tag) is Wert’s review. Reynolds doing New Weird? Hell yes. Ever since the conclusion of the Revelation trilogy (and barring the Prefect), Reynolds writing and world building seem to have gotten steadily less oppressive, and this seems like the culmination of that shift. I’ve also always thought that Reynolds was often great with character, so it’s going to be good to read a book in which he capitalizes on that. As for when it comes out, try tomorrow (the 15th). Yes, that’s right. If you haven’t ordered this yet, and if you like Science Fiction, I don’t know what the hell you’re waiting for.


Billed as a cross genre anthology and focusing on fightin’ men, Warriors features more than enough huge names to get almost any genre fan salivating. Stories from Hobb, Beagle, Williams, and a lot more. Oh, and some Martin fellow has his third Dunk and Egg story in there. Though I don’t think that there’re any reviews out there yet, you can get a pretty good idea of what’s inside over at Westeros and Wert’s done a piece on the Martin story. The whole thing’s coming out on Tuesday (the 16th). UPDATE: Wert's posted a full, and glowing, review of the collection here.


Anyone who listens to Writing Excuses should have a pretty good idea of who Dan Wells is. I Am Not A Serial Killer’s been out for a while in Britain, but it’s first coming out in America on the 30th. Don’t let yourself be put off by the YA tag, this book is precisely written and has some great atmosphere. And that’s not mentioning the superb characterization of serial killer-obsessed lead John Wayne Cleaver. I’m not crazy about the direction the book starts to go in at around the halfway point, but I think that’s mostly a case of me and Wells wanting different things out of the story. If you want to head over to the Horror side of Speculative Fiction, this is something you should definitely check out.

UPDATE

I should point out something about the above list (and the feature in general): It's quite personalized. So, basically, I'm not claiming to represent every book coming out this month. The ignored ones almost all fall into the following category: Books that, for some reason or other, I have no interest in. I could, of course, throw up some cover art and paraphrase the amazon blurb, but what's the point? If you know of the book, and if I have nothing new to contribute to it, I'm sure I'm just saving both of us time.

Those that do not are ones that I have some ulterior motive for ignoring. And, by ulterior, I mean marginally paranoid. I wouldn't feel safe posting about Hobb's Dragon Haven, for instance...what if it contained some insidious spoiler about what awaits me in Ship of Destiny?