The through-lines of The Universe Box are therefore few and far between. Moreover, Swanwick's imagination falls off-center of the bell curve of fantasy; he continually zags when the average writer zigs. Plots are wholly unpredictable and prose is dynamically effective. Overall, the collection is a varied set of stories that are definitively not mainstream—readable, engaging, yes, but anything except derivative or monotone.
Ascendancy is an Ashes product that sits in the Ashes Reborn (v1.5) model. It is both supplementary to and complementary of the Ashes Reborn core set, and all the hero expansions, deluxe or otherwise, that go with it. The box is intended for both Ashes veterans and players who just want to try the game. I'll start with the latter.
For new players, Ashes Ascendancy is a two-player starter set that contains all of the cards, tokens, and dice to play a complete, proper, unabridged game of Ashes. There are two heroes, two dice types, and all the cards two players need to build full decks. The Ascendancy box also contains the board, tokens, dice, and cards needed to play the solo/cooperative version of Ashes for two players. Whether it's PvP or PvE, Ascendacy covers the full play experience in a small/medium box.
Another thing that is finite (although it doesn't feel that way the past decade) is speculative fiction titles.
Over the past sixteen years, I have explored a vast-vast amount of what we might call senior speculative fiction—books and writers published before 2000. I've read 1,155 books published prior to the millennium, the overwhelming majority being science fiction and fantasy. It's a lot. What's more, every year the feeling gets stronger the amount is approaching comprehensive. Which is where the seed for this blog post takes root.
Our Man in Havana tells of a British vacuum salesman named James Wormold living in the titular city in the 1950s. (Bear in mind this period is just prior to Castro's communist rule.) A bit of a pushover, Wormold's sales are limited, to put it nicely. His wife is estranged and his relationship with his entitled teen daughter Milly isn't any better; she plays him like a fiddle getting what she wants. Wormold's moping, plodding life takes a major turn, however, when British intelligence identifies him as potential agent. Needing money to pay for Milly's excesses, Wormold acccepts, and his life as an unlikely spy is born.
In no particular order, the following books stand a chance of being remembered, and possible even re-read, years from now:
Fairyland by Paul McAuley – A criminally overlooked work of cyberpunk, Fairyland may also be Paul McAuley's best novel. Descriptions, plotting, and setup are all strong in telling of the next generation of humanity we ourselves may spawn. While there are elements of body horror due to the subject matter, McAuley maintains focus on the larger meaning, almost one of neanderthals looking at the emergence of homo sapiens type of scenario. Where most books approach this from a mental/intelligence perspective, McAuley maintains a wholly biological/zoological perspective, which makes things interesting.
Grendel by John Gardner – I cast a wary eye to retellings; they can be cash grabs or cheap political criticism as much as legitimate commentary on the source material. Grendel is wholly the latter. It holds a mirror to Beowulf and in the process excellently captures the human condition. Told through the eyes of the monster rather than the hero, readers get a psychological snapshot of the avarice and pain the monster possesses, in the process gettign a different view to heroism and humanity.
2025 has ended. Time to look back at the books published and consumed this year, here in the bustling offices of Speculiction. But first some comments on the meta.
In parallel with broader social phenomenon, the female influence on speculative fiction is huge, if not the majority. Female authors are performing extremely well on the market. Female authors are performing extremely well in awards and recognition. And women in general have a strong foothold on the largest media platforms associated with the genre: content creators, YouTube, awards committees, Locus, etc. Compared to speculative fiction of the 20th century, the gender pendulum has swung to the other side. We're living in a time women hold clear power in the field.
In keeping, neoliberal (neomarxist?) politics continue to heavily influence speculative fiction. While I think we've seen the peak, and are moving past the peak, there is no shortage of token homosexuals, ethnicity tagging, or females wielding indomitable power in spec fic. There is no shortage of weight being thrown behind books which agree with the neoliberal agenda, from the authors themselves to the content of their work. And yes, the number of girls holding swords on book covers has not abated. Finding recommended books which do not go out of their way to highlight the left's virtues is difficult.
The Adjacent is a patchwork quilt. (It's probably more an Escher tesseract, but that metaphor proved difficult to sustain.) The first patch is a near-future in which journalist Tarent covers a Europe degraded by climate change and social upheaval. As the book opens (patch appears?), Tarent is mourning the death of his wife who was killed under mysterious circumstances. Only a burned black triangle remains on the ground where she had been standing, something Tarent reflects on during his return journey to the Islamic Republic of Great Britain. In the second patch, an illusionist named Tommy Trent joins Britain's World War I effort. As an airman, he attempts to use the tricks of his trade to disguise warplanes. The third patch takes elements of the first two and changes the colors. The fourth patch takes the first three and changes the pattern. The fifth patch...
Naturally, I was interested in the HBO series when it came out two years ago, and watched. Season 1 captured Part 1 well. The producers (mostly) focused on the key scenes, and skipped those which, while fun in-game, were not critical to the umbrella story. They had a good CGI budget to render the world in great approximation to the game. And episode to episode progression held suspense. Season 2 came out this year, and it's clear the wheels are starting to come off, creating a different kind of trolley conundrum.
The Banished Immortal follows the tried and true template of many a biography: chronological order, birth to death. Given Li was born in the 8th century, a time of patchy recorded history, Ha Jin acknowledges he is working with an incomplete picture. He also acknowledges a debt to the biographers who came before him in filling that window of time. What he does not acknowledge, however, is what new information is being brought to the table—what have the years of Li Bai research brought to life since the other Li Bai texts were published?
Star Wars: The Card Game is a TCG / CCG type experience but within FFG's LCG model (fixed releases as opposed to random). The top-down view is classic: players construct decks and bring them to the table to duel with an opponent, generating resources to play cards to achieve the win conditions. The bottom-up view, however, highlights many exceptional features that distinguish the game from every other TCG and CCG. Let's start with the asymmetry—the dark and light side.
