The big idea behind The Ballad of the Bone Road started out as several small ideas. The names Brix and Bellefeather made their way into my head and struck me as the perfect names for […]

‘In its bare reality, decolonization reeks of red-hot cannonballs and bloody knives. For the last can be the first only after a murderous and decisive confrontation between the two protagonists. This determination to have the […]

MILES CAMERON:In 2018, I was sitting at a small SFF con in London with Alistair Reynolds, one of my favourite all-time Science Fiction authors, and I confess I was being a bit of a fan […]

Howard Andrew Jones died a year ago, on January 16, 2024. He was only 56 (and could have passed for 36!) He was one of the undersung stars of the modern day sword and sorcery […]

Here’s another review I did for the late great science fiction site SF Site, which gave me a huge leg up in my book reviewing career. This was one of my earlier reviews for them, […]

Here is a quick and dirty look at the books I read in 2025, and how they fit into various categories. To some extent, these categories simply track some of my personal interest: how many […]

Here’s another review I’m reposting after the demise of the outstanding old SF/F review site, SF Site. Note that for the most part I’m leaving these reviews unchanged. This was first published in 2001, when […]

Review: A Christmas Carol and Other Holiday Treasures, by Charles Dickens by Rich Horton Charles Dickens wrote five novellas, of almost equal length (about 30,000 words) in the 1840s. The most famous of these by […]

I call some of my reviews “Resurrected Review”, typically when I grab something from my old blog or SFF Net newsgroup and republish it here. This one is even more truly resurrected — it’s one […]

Review: The Horse Without a Head, by Paul Berna by Rich Horton At an estate sale recently, whose deceased owner clearly had interesting taste, I saw a copy of The Horse Without a Head, for […]

Here is another review I first wrote for SF Site, back in 2010. With the demise of SF Site, I am slowly reprinting some of those reviews at this blog. Uncle Bones, by Damien Broderick […]

Reality is both objective and subjective, but what if reality could be fundamentally changed just by enough people thinking about it really hard? Author Theodora Goss is here today not only to present her newest […]

Here is another review I first wrote for SF Site, back in 2010. With the demise of SF Site, I am slowly reprinting some of those reviews at this blog. Uncle Bones, by Damien Broderick […]

Stick out your tongue and say “ahh!” for author Caitlin Starling’s newest gothic novel, The Graceview Patient. Follow along in her Big Idea as she recounts all of her real-life experiences in the wild world […]

With my last column written in 2025, I wanted to highlight some works of excellent speculative fiction that might normally get overlooked. If I were going to list the best pure best of science fiction […]

All work and no play makes author Juliet Brooks write a Big Idea about how the US should have better worker’s rights and conditions. In her newest novel, A Fae In Finance, her main character […]

Review: Lies and Weddings, by Kevin Kwan by Rich Horton Kevin Kwan is likely best known for his first novel, Crazy Rich Asians (2013), which became a successful film in 2018. I haven’t read that […]

Old Bestseller Review: The Love of Monsieur, by George Gibbs by Rich Horton My original focus on this blog was popular fiction of the first half of the 20th Century — at best, obscure popular […]

Two Classic Movies: My Man Godfrey and The River by Rich Horton Here’s an informal look at two movies I watched recently, both classics. These are My Man Godfrey, from 1936, and The River, from […]