Carrie Vaughn: the Heirs of Locksley

The second novella in the Robin Hood duology.

Publication year: 2020

Page count: 128

Publisher: TOR

Format: ebook

Four years after the events of the Ghosts of Sherwood, Robin of Locksley and his family are at the coronation of the 13-year-old King Henry III. Robin notices that the boy is surrounded by old men and encourages his son John to make friends with the young King. He also sends his children to swear fealty so that they can make an impression on the King.

When the King realizes who the children are, he decides to have an archery contest. Robin’s kids Mary and John participate. John has his father’s easy manner and charms the crowd but Mary is uneasy with the attention that she gets because she’s the only woman participant. Her excellent shooting annoys one noble in particular.

This is a delightful tale of Mary and John, who are the POV characters. Mary is a very practical young woman while John is more flamboyant and delights in making mischief.

This was a quick and fun read. Unfortunately, the plot requires a couple of coincidences and it is quite light otherwise, too. The previous novella ended in quite a bloodthirsty way. This one is more lighthearted. I recommend reading the first novella first, however.

I would like to read more of these but unfortunately, it seems that Vaughn only wrote these two.

 

Carrie Vaughn: the Ghosts of Sherwood

The first novella in the Robin Hood duology.

Publication year: 2020

Page count: 112

Publisher: TOR

Format: ebook

Mary is the eldest of Robin of Locksley and Marian’s three children. However, she’s not sure if she believes the stories about them. The Locksley manor is at the edge of Sherwood Forest and goes there alone. In the woods, she sometimes sees a ghostly figure. Her parents are away, at King John’s court so Mary is in charge of the manor. Now, her parents are coming back.

Marian and Robin are at King John’s court. As much as they hate the King, he is the legal monarch and they try to serve him as best they can. But the King doesn’t like them. However, one of his most loyal knights makes a marriage offer between Mary and the knight’s eldest son. Robin is ready to agree, but Marian wants her daughter to decide.

When Robin tells Mary about the offer, she wants time to decide. She isn’t sure what to do. She has guessed that because her father is a Baron, her fate could be a political marriage. Her brother and sister join her. Suddenly, they are attacked and kidnapped.

The novella has two POV characters: Mary, the eldest child, and Marian. They’re both level-headed women. Mary doesn’t know what she will do in the future while Marian knows that she wants to stay home with her children. But when the kids are kidnapped, she’s determined to get them back. Mary is very clever.

I enjoyed this novella. Robin and Marian are older than in the tales but they are still similar to the legends.

 

Seanan McGuire: Where the Drowned Girls Go

Seventh novella in the Wayward Children fantasy series.

Publication year: 2023

Page count:150

Publisher: TOR

Format: print

Cora Miller used to be a mermaid. She returned to her birth world months ago but didn’t fit in. She went to Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children where the other students had all gone to different worlds and returned. Cora and her friends had a joint adventure in a world that left scars on her. She’s afraid that the Drowned Gods from that other world are calling her back. She wants to forget that she ever left.

So she asks the headmistress Eleanor West if she can go to the other school for kids who have returned from another world: the Whitecrest School. Except in Whitecrest, the children are taught to forget their otherworldly experiences and embrace the real world as the only one. Cora craves that.

Eleanor reluctantly agrees and Cora travels to the other school, without telling her friends. At Whitecrest everything is different: the kids aren’t friends because that would be weakness. Cora is overweight and she’s bullied. At first, she’s determined to thrive. But then she realizes that something is seriously wrong.

This was the conclusion to Cora’s story. Unfortunately, I haven’t read the other books with her. Still, this was a good story. It examines what it means to be a hero and what you do when all choices are bad.

Cora is a determined girl who knows what she wants. She’s been overweight her whole life and is used to others looking down at her because of it. The only time when she wasn’t bullied for her weight was at Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children so she misses it and her friends.

Like the other books in the series, this story is at the same time horrible and wonderful. All the other children had gone through the experience of going to another world. Some worlds were great, others horrible. Most of them were heroes in that other world and they all have problems trying to fit into the real world. The school aims to destroy their individuality and make them bland. Unfortunately, the secondary characters aren’t very deep. Almost all of them are bullies.

I did enjoy this story but probably would have enjoyed it more, if I had read the previous books with Cora.

 

T. Kingfisher: What Moves the Dead

A horror novella. The first story in the Sworn Solider series but can be read as a stand-alone.

Publication year: 2022

Page count: 169 + author’s note

Publisher: Titan

Format: print

Alex Easton is a retired soldier from Gallacia. When they get a letter from their childhood friend Roderick that his sister Madeline is dying, Alex hurries to the remote countryside of Ruravia where Madeline and her brother live in their ancestral Usher manor. Near the manor, Alex meets Miss Potter who is very interested in fungi but because of her sex, she’s forbidden to join the Royal Mycology Society. The manor itself is decaying and so are the Usher siblings. Madeline is gaunt and can barely walk while Roderick is jumpy. Roderick has called a Doctor to care for Madeline but Doctor Denton is puzzled and can’t help her.

This is a retelling of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher. I haven’t read it and it doesn’t seem to be necessary. While the other Kingfisher stories I’ve read combine horror with fantasy and humor, this tale leans more heavily toward horror. However, I’m glad I finished it.

I thoroughly enjoyed Alex, his manservant Angus, and Miss Potter. The story is told from Alex’s 1st person POV. Alex doesn’t like Americans so they rib the American Doctor quite a bit. Alex, Roderick, and the Doctor are all former soldiers and have both physical and mental scars from it.

The atmosphere is strong. Alex doesn’t believe in the supernatural so they look for a natural explanation for everything. In a longer story, it could have slowed down the pacing but not here.

I enjoyed the story a lot.

 

C. L. Polk: Even Though I Knew the End

A stand-alone historical fantasy novella with a lesbian protagonist.

Publication year: 2022

Page count: 136

Publisher: TOR

Format: ebook

Helen Brandt is a magical detective in 1940s Chicago. She’s also a lesbian in a loving relationship with Edith. The 40s aren’t kind to people who are different than the norm but Helen has more to hide than most people.

When Helen’s main client, Marlow, sends her to do an augury on a murder site, she stumbles on a mystery: mystical symbols that aren’t familiar to her. Then two members of the Brotherhood of the Compass show up. The Brotherhood controls magicians and they know that Helen is a warlock, a rogue magic user. And one of them is Helen’s little brother whom she hasn’t seen in years.

Helen goes back to Marlow and refuses to investigate more. However, Marlow gives her such an enticing offer that she must take it. Soon, Helen realizes that she’s on the trail of a serial killer who is also a demon.

This was a bitter-sweet story that had a lot going on. I enjoyed Helen and Edith’s relationship. It’s so rare to see a happy established couple. Edith is a sweet young woman who feeds birds but has a secret of her own. While Helen’s brother wasn’t a deep character, it was also very nice to see her love for him.

The fantasy side was very interesting and I’d love to see more stories set in this world. We also get to visit a speakeasy and an insane asylum.

I really enjoyed this novella and I’m going to read more from this author.

 

Adrian Tchaikosky: Ogres

The third novella in the Terrible Worlds series but it is really a stand-alone.

Publication year: 2022

Page count: 159

Publisher: Orbit

Format: ebook

”You were always trouble.

Inevitable, really. And you weren’t to know it, but you were following a particular trajectory. The Young Prince is always trouble. A youth, misspent in bad company and oafish pranks, ways when adulthood comes rapping at the door, is more prized than any number of young paragons. People remember, but fondly. He was always trouble, they think, shaking their heads and smiling a little. But look at him now.“

Torquell is a big and strong young man. He’s always in a bit of trouble in a roguish, charming way. He’s also the son of his village’s headman so he gets away with pretty much anything. He’s even friendly with the outlaws who live in the forest.

Then the village’s true ruler comes to collect his taxes. Sir Peter Grimes is affable enough but he, and all of the rulers, are ten foot ogres. They eat food the humans can’t eat. They’re free to do as they please. Sir Peter’s son Gerald isn’t happy that he has to travel slowly, by car, in the backwater country. So when he has a chance to humiliate Torquell, he takes it. But Torquell’s temper rises and he strikes the young ogre. Torquell knows that he will get in trouble for it. So, he runs.

He runs to the outlaws in the forest. Some of them support his actions but some are horrified. Torquell returns to his home later the same night. To his horror, he finds out that his father has been executed. Gerald gloats about it, so Torquell takes a cleaver and kills the ogre. He must flee again.

Several times I thought I knew where this story was going but it went another way almost every time. It’s a dark and depressing story, an examination of slavery.

It starts in a Middle Age type village but the ogres use advanced technology which, of course, looks like magic to the humans.

As you can see from the quote, it’s written in second person and present tense, but I got used to it quickly. It also clearly has a narrator who is writing things down later and hinting at things to come. I know some people can’t stand that sort of writing.

This was a depressing story (the series isn’t called Terrible Worlds for nothing) but worth reading if you can get over the writing style.

“But when you’re property, it doesn’t matter if your owner treats you well or badly. The ownership is all. We don’t split hairs about who is a better slave master. And you would have been the best owner of all, and that still isn’t enough reason to keep you alive once you’ve decided that owning people is fine, just so long as it’s you that owns them.”

 

Alix E. Harrow: A Mirror Mended

The second fantasy novella in the Fractured Fables series.

Publication year: 2022

Page count: 128

Publisher: TOR

Format: ebook

Zinnia Gray grew up as the Dying Girl: she was born with an illness that will killed her on her 21^st birthday. But on her birthday, she was yanked into a fairy tale, the Sleeping Beauty. Five years later, Zinnia is still alive and she has saved forty-nine Sleeping Beauties from their fates. However, she’s getting tired of seeing others’ Happy Ever Afters, when she can’t get her own. When she stays too long in one universe, her illness tries to kill her again. Also, her best friend, Charm, is now happily married and Zinnia can’t face her, either. So, she jumps from one universe to the other.

But this time, when she looks into a mirror, ready to jump again, the face that looks back isn’t her own. That beautiful evil woman pulls Zinnia into her story. For the evil woman is Snow White’s Evil Queen and she will do anything to prevent her fate. The Evil Queen imprisons Zinnia and then asks for help. Zinnia is intrigued, against her better judgment.

This was a great continuation of the first novella, “A Spindle Splintered”. However, Harrow doesn’t give much background information so you should read the first novella first. This story has many of the elements I loved in the first novella: the humor, the snarky dialog, and twisted fairy tales. This time we get Snow White and I really enjoyed the different spins on it.

However, I didn’t see why Zinnia and Charm fell out. That felt forced.

Otherwise, I enjoyed this story almost as much as the first one.

 

Kris DeLake: Killer Advice

A stand-alone spacestation murder mystery novella.

Format: ebook

Publisher: WMG Publishing

Page count from GoodReads: 120

Publishing year: 2012

Kris DeLake is Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s romance pen name. However, this novella has no romance.

Grissam Hunsaker runs a run-down, very remote space station that pretends to be a resort for the rich. However, very few people find the place. So, when Hunsaker gets the message that a passenger ship is coming in just sixteen minutes, he’s annoyed. The Vaadum Resort and Casino has minimum staff and it takes a lot longer to prepare for over twenty guests. But the Presidio was in trouble and needed a place to dock, fast. The passengers are shocked, not just by the fact that their ship had a fire, but also because someone has murdered two of them.

Susan Carmichael is on the run and doesn’t want anyone to know. She just wants to leave the station and continue her journey. But when one more of the passengers is killed, she realizes nobody is safe.

Richard Illykova is the ship’s newest employee and the lowest on the pecking order. He works on the ship to pay for his passage. But when people start to die, he must rely on his skills from his former work: as an assassin.

This was a fun, short murder mystery. The characters are interesting and very different from each other. The mystery kept me guessing.

This is apparently a prequel to her Assassins in Love series but can be read as a stand-alone.

 

John Scalzi: Travel by Bullet

The third novella in the Dispatcher urban fantasy series.

Publication year: 2022

Format: Audio

Running time: 3 hours, 43 minutes
Narrator: Zachary Quinto

Tony Valdez is a dispatcher: he kills people as humanely as possible. In this world, the vast majority of people who are intentionally killed, come back. The killed person disappears and so does any blood spatter. Clothes and all other items are left behind, though. The person reappears where ever they feel safest, usually at home. Also, any injuries suffered in the last couple of hours disappear.

The pandemic changed the dispatchers’ jobs a little because hospitals must have them on call now. The compassion act gives the right to families to dispatch a loved one. Unfortunately, most don’t know how it works; it’s not an instant cure. Tony works in a local hospital, usually with families.

Now, his fellow dispatcher and friend Mason is brought to the ER close to death. He jumped out of a moving car and right in front of another car. He’s asking to speak with Tony. The surgeon in charge thinks it’s best to dispatch him but Mason refuses. He tells Tony that he’s involved in something really dangerous and no place is safe for him. Tony assures him that Tony’s apartment is safe, and Mason slips something into Tony’s hand. Then Mason is dispatched.

When Tony returns home, Mason is waiting for him. But Mason refuses to tell Tony anything, saying it’s too dangerous. Soon, the police come asking for Tony, and people break into his apartment.

This was a very good addition to the series and I enjoyed it a lot. The story feels more modern because of the pandemic and some other things which I won’t spoil here. However, the plot is more complicated than in the previous novellas.

Detective Nora Langdon returns from the previous stories. She doesn’t fully trust Tony which makes her smart. I enjoyed Tony and Langdon working together. They’re friends but they know they have their differences. I’m hoping Scalzi will write more of these short crime stories.

 

John Scalzi: Murder by Other Means

The second novella in the Dispatcher urban fantasy series.

Publication year: 2020

Format: Audio

Running time: 2 hours, 18 minutes
Narrator: Zachary Quinto

Tony Valdez is a dispatcher: he kills people as humanely as possible. In this world, the vast majority of people who are intentionally killed, come back. The killed person disappears and so does any blood spatter. Clothes and all other items are left behind, though. The person reappears where ever they feel safest, usually at home.

Austerity politics has hit Tony personally and he has to take on private jobs. This one seems simple enough: a businessman needs to be on the other side of the world before a business opportunity goes sour. So, his lawyer contracts Tony to kill him. Tony hesitated but takes the job.

When he goes to deposit his payment to the bank, four robbers burst in. One of them knows Tony, calling him by name. Apparently, their exit plan is simple: one robber kills the others. Except that one robber stays dead. The remaining robber shoots the body several times and when he runs, the police are already outside and shoot him, too. Now, the police have a corpse as a lead. Also, Detective Nora Langdon thinks it’s a stupid strategy since the robbers couldn’t have taken their loot.

Turns out that Tony knew the dead robber, so he’s now a suspect. Also, people he knows start to die permanently and everything points to Tony.

This was a great continuation to the Dispatcher. It’s a neat little mystery and many of the characters from the first story return. It builds on the premise of the previous story.