Publishers Weekly: [A] tech-driven debut about love, fate, and change.
Jan 102023
Jan 052023
Library Journal: This is a thrilling combination of traditional SF space travel and forward-thinking examinations of what “humanity” will mean in the future. With its blend of science fiction and social justice concepts, this will appeal to advanced teen and adult readers alike who enjoy progressive science fiction.
Dec 142022
Entertainment Weekly: Making their adult fiction debut, Wibberley and Siegemund-Broka, a couple turned writing duo turned husband and wife, have crafted a book about two writing partners, Katrina Freeling and Nathan Van Huysen, who are themselves in denial about their romantic feelings for each other all while they write about other complicated couples. It’s a meta mind-trip that sets the stage (or the page, rather) for a meditation on writing, the power of prose, and the terrible cost of fear. Few books this year understood so deeply the thrall of books, and the freedom of only revealing one’s truest self in the pages of fiction. The Roughest Draft is an angsty tale of two emotionally blocked writers figuring out how to be honest with each other, but it’s also an ode to the ways in which stories can expose our vulnerabilities if we let them.
Dec 062022
Publishers Weekly: Romance readers will have a blast.
Nov 292022
Kirkus: The world presented here is rich and complicated, [and] the love story, plus plenty of jaw-dropping space scenes, will reward readers.
Nov 232022
Booklist: Divya’s latest (after Machinehood, 2021) is full of twists and turns to keep readers glued to the pages, with rich worldbuilding that will truly invest them in the character’s fates. MERU transcends genres and will appeal to fans of science fiction, philosophy, and fantasy.
Nov 152022
Publishers Weekly: Readers won’t be able to turn the pages fast enough.
Nov 032022
Publishers Weekly: Empathy convincingly overcomes anxiety in this thoughtful, inventive, and impressively understated space opera from Divya, [who] filters the immensity of outer space through the lens of close personal relationships, crafting compassionate and responsible characters (whatever their physical forms may be) that will surely win over readers.
Nov 012022
Library Journal: With their collection of 23 stories, previously published across the genre fiction landscape and one original to this volume, Khaw (Nothing but Blackened Teeth) presents a book that is a terrifying joy to read. Many of the entries invoke fairy tales and/or mythologies from all over the world. They are lyrical, brutal, and intensely unsettling and mostly center women—quite often as the monsters. While not long, the stories are immersive, with lush and detailed settings, intriguing characters, and beguiling and beautiful lines. The original tale, “How Selkies Are Made,” and “And in Our Daughters, We Find a Voice” are two water-infused, stellar examples, but every story will dig into the reader, threatening to never let go, especially because each ends perfectly.
VERDICT Khaw’s critical acclaim and popularity are skyrocketing, and this collection showcases exactly why. It allows readers a chance to swim around in their unique brand of intensely unsettling tales, submerging themselves in a larger pool of their beautiful but horrific waters. For fans of the dark speculative stories by Angela Slatter, Nadia Bulkin, and Samanta Schweblin.
Oct 282022
Publishers Weekly: Butcher, the son of bestseller Jim Butcher, puts a fun twist on hard-boiled urban fantasy thrills in his debut. Hero Grimshaw Griswald Grimsby is a failure who was scrubbed from the Auditor program of the Department of Unorthodox Affairs and now uses his meager magical talents to entertain children at Mighty Magic Donald’s Food Kingdom. Despite his paltry skill set, Grimsby is implicated in the murder of powerful Auditor Samantha Mansgraf, who, in her last moments, used her own blood to scrawl his name. Mansgraf’s retired ex-partner, Leslie Mayflower, aka the Huntsman, rapidly concludes that Grimsby would have been no threat to Mansgraf, but as the Hunstman isn’t magical himself, he reluctantly brings Grimsby along to search for clues in Mansgraf’s lair outside of Boston. Together, this unlikely duo find reference to a mysterious Hand and face off against mechanical/magical constructs, succubi, and Department personnel on their way to solving the crime. While not a true coward, Grimsby’s understandable fear in the face of players who are all more powerful than he is makes him an accessible hero (“He tried to steel himself, but it ended up feeling more like tinfoiling himself”). This is sure to capture genre fans.