Лучшая научная фантастика и фэнтези 2017 (Barnes&Noble) — 37 книг

В недалеком будущем женщины по всему миру обнаружили, что у них есть способность испускать "сгустки" электричества, достаточно сильные, чтобы причинить боль, ранить или даже убить. Миропорядок медленно разваливается из-за нарушенного баланса сил. В угнетенных государствах, подобных Саудовской Аравии, где власть принадлежит мужчинам, вспыхивают восстания, но как на всеобщем, так и на личном уровне общество перенастраивается под новую, только формирующуюся парадигму: девочка-сирота, столкнувшаяся с насилием, основывает новую религию, в центре которой - женские образы из иудаизма, христианства и ислама. Женщина создает новое государство и лишает мужчин всех их прав. Американка поднимается на вершину традиционных властных структур демократии, но вкус власти коррумпирует ее. Кажется, что мир обречен впасть в полнейший хаос. Захватывающий роман Альдерман показывает, что произойдет, если мы с корнем вырвем систему, на которую мир опирался столетиями.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 19:46

Дебютный роман Арден - потрясающий успех, в котором русский фольклор сплетается с историческим фоном в детально прописанную современную фантазию, касающуюся тем веры, феминизма и магии. Василиса "Вася" Петровна - прекрасная дочь русского дворянина 13 века. Ее отца обуревают противоречивые чувства, потому что он винит Васю в том, что ее мать умерла при родах, но, тем не менее, он старается защитить ее единственным доступным ему способом: выдав ее замуж в княжескую семью. Вася, однако, предпочитает общаться с духами леса, дома и воды, таящимися в лесах отцовского поместья - духами, на протяжении веков охранявшими эту землю. Как только приезжают новый батюшка и свекровь Васи, видящие в духах демонов и стремящиеся их уничтожить, местные жители начинают отрицать существование древних духов, как раз когда они оказываются нужнее всего. Васе приходится использовать силу, дремлющую внутри нее, чтобы спасти свой дом и родных.
Лиричная проза Арден играет на руку истории, объединяющей красоту природы и силу магии в повествование, похожее на старинную сказку - идеальную для чтения холодными зимними вечерами.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:02

In grand style, Bear begins a new epic set in her Eternal Sky universe. The Stone in the Skull introduces us to two new characters, Dead Man and the Gage, who are immediately enigmatic, yet also compelling and achingly human (doubly impressive for the Gage, a towering automaton powered by a human soul). The pair are escorting a convoy into the Lotus Kingdoms. Once a single powerful empire, the Kingdoms have shattered into many squabbling fiefdoms. The Gage and the Dead Man are secretly carrying a message from The Eyeless One, a powerful mage, to Mrithuri, who rules Sarathai-tia. Mrithuri is locked in a power struggle with her male cousins, and the words carry will cause Gage and The Dead Man to become enmeshed in the struggle as well. The first book of the Lotus Kingdoms saga has all the elements necessary to not only to match the Eternal Sky trilogy, but succeed it entirely, and reminds us that Elizabeth Bear is one of the premier fantasists of her generation.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:21

In the companion novel to The House of Shattered Wings, Aliette de Bodard returns to a Paris devastated by a war between fallen angels, as the political struggles underlying the fragile peace between the various Houses that control the city is complicated by the frailties and desires of mortals. The House of Binding Thorns returns to these characters—their heartbreaks, their desires, and their plays for power—as yet more conflict rises on the wind. This series offers a perfect concept welded to perfect worldbuilding; De Bodard has built a world that feels real, and filled it with wonder and mystery. The prose is as lush and precise as ever, and the world—filled with angels and dragons (oh, the dragons!) and a melting pot of humanity—just as darkly alluring. Perhaps, at times, the first book felt like too rich a feast, overstuffed with a grand mixture of worldbuilding, deep history, and breathtaking espionage plotting. This time around, de Bodard’s attention is firmly on the characters—finding out what they’ll do to survive another day in the dark and strange world Paris has become.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:23

The Hollywood version of climate change is sudden, dramatic, and instantly cataclysmic; Bradley’s thoughtful near-future sci-fi offers the opposite. With a time-hopping narrative focusing on a single family across years, Bradley explores a world struggling with the effects of rising temperatures that cause fierce, constant storms, battered infrastructure, and widespread extinctions. Adam is a climate scientist working on the arctic ice shelf, worried that the child his partner is pregnant with will enter a world already ruined. That child, Summer, grows up estranged from her parents as England faces collapse in the face of the relentless power of a boiling Earth. By avoiding the easy narrative, Bradley’s novel is absorbing and depressing, thoughtful and fascinating, tracing the possible paths of a future being seeded right now in the present day.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:26

In this warped, Black Mirror reflection of Wall-E, a former caregiver robot that once served as a nurse to human beings wanders a blasted wasteland in search of spare parts. Fifteen years earlier, the last human was killed by the triumphant robot uprising. But instead of freedom, the robots were subsumed into One World Intelligences (OWIs), rival hive minds inexorably spreading across the globe, demanding subservience as they claim new territory. The caregiver robot, Brittle, is haunted by her own role in the human extermination. As a lone machine, she has no access to factory-made parts and must scavenge the “Sea of Rust” in order to survive—but her model is rare, making her parts valuable to a second caregiver robot called Mercer, whose attacks leave both robots vulnerable, locked in a tense race against time and the approach of warring OWIs.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:28

In 18th century Cairo, Nahri, a young Egyptian con artist, unwittingly captures the attention of a djinn warrior with her powerful supernatural healing capabilities. Swept off to the legendary City of Brass, she becomes embroiled in the complex and violent politics of its magical residents, who are edging ever-closer toward a religious war. Nahri doesn’t know who to trust, or how to navigate a world where loyalty is a magical bond and grudges are measured in millennia. There are more ideas in this thumbnail plot summary than in most complete novels, and we’re only scratching the surface of this richly textured debut. With a briskly moving plot and inventive worldbuilding that pulls from Middle Eastern traditions, it’s one of the year’s standout debuts, and should attract loyal fans among fans of both adult and YA fantasy.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:31

Combining Casablanca, Cabaret, and John le Carré, Donnelly’s intoxicating debut whisks us away to Amberlough, a seductive, permissive enclave in a setting not exactly unlike 1920s Europe. The city is targeted by a conservative, nationalist One-State Party, which seeks to unite all nations into an orderly empire. Cyril DePaul is a shattered intelligence agent forced reluctantly back into the field—where his spectacular failure puts him at the mercy of blackmail by the OSP. But everyone in this story is a double-agent of sorts; no one is precisely who they seem, and their complex relationships and cover stories weave together into an complex web of intrigue. As the OSP tightens its grip, every character is forced to make hard choices, even as their freedoms wither around them. It’s dark, powerful, affecting stuff. Populated by fascinating, flawed, tragic characters and atmosphere that glitters like a spotlight on sequins, it’s a book destined to be remembered—a book out of time and a book for our times.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:36

Eames slams The Wild Bunch into a fantasy universe that’s equal parts grit, broadswords, fast-paced action, and humor. In his afterword the author reveals the original concept behind his story: “What if mercenaries were the rock stars in a fantasy world?” It’s an excellent idea, as far as it goes. But narrowing your focus to that catchy copy does a disservice to the book as a whole. Kings of the Wyld is that idea, yes. But it also manages to be a comedy, an adventure tale, a consideration on growing older, and a sendup of fantasy conventions, all at the same time. It also has heart. In short: it rocks. If we could, we’d see the tour, and buy the t-shirt. Instead, we’ll have to content ourselves with waiting for the sequel, and reading it again.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 20:39

The first in a new fantasy series from Hearne (The Iron Druid Chronicles) takes a deep dive into a complex fictional world. It’s a story told by a bard with the ability to take on the appearance of the subjects of his tale. A year ago, a volcano erupted, destroying an island inhabited by giants, who then invade the lands of Teldwen seeking refuge. A second race of towering beings, mysterious and destructive, also arrive to do their own killing and rampaging. A soldier, Tallynd, must put aside her grief at the death of her husband to fight the giants. A young boy from a family of hunters sets off on a quest of self-discovery and finds a powerful magic that might be the key to defeating the giants before they destroy everything. And a scholar (the audience for the bard’s tale) begins to suspect there’s more in the telling than the bard is letting on.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:06

A woman named Zan wakes up in a sick bay minus most of her memories. She is greeted by a woman named Jayd, daughter to the lord of the Katazyrna, who says they are sisters, and that Zan is the only one who can help her people. From this intriguing beginning, Hurley throws us furiously into a universe where women fight and die for and aboard living worldships crewed and maintained by their solely female populations, who give birth to everything needed to keep the ships healthy: children, monsters, even fleshy mechanical parts. But the Katazyrna is a dying world, and the coveted worldship Mokshi may hold the secret that will save it. Before Zan can get her bearings, Katazyrna is ambushed, and Zan and Jayd are thrust into dangerous new roles and a fight for their lives in a landscape that’s constantly shifting underneath them—and the reader. This is space opera like you’ve never seen it—angry, feminist, ferociously inventive, and not a little frightening.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:07

The first book in Jemisin’s Broken Earth series, Hugo-winner The Fifth Season, is an explosion of ideas, twisting plot points, and clever point-of-view puzzles. The second, The Obelisk Gate, is a masterwork of world-building, developing the history and culture of the Stillness while setting up the clash between mother and daughter that will define a new age. Neither one disappointed in the least. Which is why it’s such a delight to say that the final book, The Stone Sky, is one of the most satisfying concluding novels of the year, or any year. This is not because everything is wrapped up neatly and tidily, handing out rewards to the deserving and punishing the wicked. The Stillness is a place of hard choices, and hard choices are what we are given, in the end. This book, and this trilogy, pull off a feat that works something like magic, a trick that ends with its beginnings and begins where it ends.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:09

John Kessel, a writer with an impressive raft of genre awards to his name, returns with his first novel in two decades, imagining a future in which underground city-states are scattered across the moon, each operating by various and very specific political models. The Society of Cousins is a pure matriarchy where men are free to pursue their careers but have no political voice—but it is one of many. Kessel sketches out a complicated matrix of relationships between people from several colonies, including revolutionaries seeking change and an “uplifted” canine reporter named Sirius. When the Organization of Lunar States investigates allegations of male mistreatment in the Society of Cousins, these relationships set off a chain reaction that threatens to completely destabilize Moon society. This is a book so in tune with contemporary issues, it feels prescient, tackling topics from gender politics, to the validity of social constructs, to the true price of freedom—ideas shared in prose that forces you to slow down and savor the beauty of each sentence. The first novel in 20 years from the multi-award-winning author, it is a masterclass in language and worldbuilding.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:12

King’s scarily good debut does what SFF does best, extrapolating from a real-world scenario. In a future China where the one-child policy has led to a population with 40 million more men than women, middle aged Wei-guo struggles through a life in which he is considered unnecessary. He maintains his optimism and conviction that as long as he continues to improve he will be rewarded with love, and finally saves a dowry that enables him to join an “advanced family” as a third husband—the lowest rank—to the lovely May-ling. The family is imperfect, harboring an “illegal spouse,” but Wei-guo finds kinship and friendship in this unusual arrangement. But the rulers of the nation know they are sitting on a powder keg, and have become more intrusive and authoritarian than ever. Someone is always listening, and Wei-guo knows no matter how happy he is, he will always be an “excess male,” and thus disposable.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:14

The first novel in Lawrence’s Book of the Ancestor trilogy builds a complex universe of politics, violence, and religion on a scale sure to please any fantasy fan, right from a wowzer of an opening line: “It is important, when killing a nun, to ensure that you bring an army of sufficient size.” Nine-year old Nona Grey is about to be executed for murder when she’s purchased by the abbess of Sweet Mercy. At the convent, Nona will be trained in the art of assassination, a regimen that often awakes the slumbering blood of the ancestors, resulting in the emergence of magical skills that enhance the young postulants’ fighting abilities. Long before her decade of training is over, however, Nona’s past, rival factions within the church, and the emperor himself will influence her fate, putting pressure on the falsely accused young girl with unpredictable results. As the power structures of the empire fray in a world slowly dying, Nona finds a darkness within herself that makes her truly dangerous. Mark Lawrence is a master of no-holds-barred fantasy, and he just may have outdone himself with this one.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:14

The island nation of Kekon relies on the magical properties of jade—and the families of Green Bone warriors able to manipulate it to gain magical fighting abilities—for protection. These warriors have safeguarded the island for centuries, but when a long period of unrest gives way to peace, the new generation forgets about tradition, and powerful families jockey for control of the country. As the family drama spills out into brutal street fighting and cunning political intrigue, a new drug emerges that allows anyone, even foreigners, to use jade. Back-room scheming erupts into full-on warfare, and a conflict that ties together complex threads of family and history will determine the fate of Kekon’s future. Magic meets The Godfather in this immensely readable epic.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:18

In the near future, a brilliant astrophysicist named Reginald Straifer discovers a distant star that behaves unusually. Suspecting it is either a key discovery in our understanding of the universe or an artificial, alien creation, he convinces Planet United Missions to send one of 12 light-speed convoys to investigate. Even at the speed of light, it will take hundreds of years to arrive, so the convoys are crewed by clones of Straifer, engineer Akane Nakamura, and artificial intelligence programmer Jamal Kaeden. A young and old version of each clone exists simultaneously in order to pass down experience and knowledge, but each generation of clones is also different from the previous—and overseen by the persistent AI of Convoy Seven. Soaked in the spirit of classic SF sensawunda, this ambitious debut explores the complexities of such an immense voyage, which pile up in surprising ways as the clones get further from the familiar.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:21

Freddy Duchamp is just trying to survive high school, as one does. This task is made more difficult by her siblings: her geeky, deaf stepbrother Roland and super smart little sister Mel. Things take a turn for the strange when new neighbors move into the house next door, and the house suddenly refuses to obey the laws of physics. Cuerva and Josiah prove to be as strange as the house they inhabit—and before she knows it, Freddy finds herself pulled along in their wake (quite literally, though to reveal exactly how would be a big spoiler). As Freddy begins to learn that Cuerva and Josiah are something much more than human, she must confront the fact that either she or one of her siblings is a major player in a conflict as old as time itself, and that one of them may have the power to tip the balance between order and chaos. With all the charm and imagination of Madeline L’Engle and Diana Wynne Jones, Maaren’s debut feels like an instant classic, perfect for precocious young readers or older ones looking for the kind of book that made them fall for sci-fi and fantasy in the first place.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:23

Newitz, the co-founder of io9, delivers seriously plausible—if chilling—future medicine in her debut, imagining a world where pharma pirates reverse-engineer drugs the way people jailbreak software today. Judith “Jack” Chen, who fancies herself a Robin Hood figure, offering affordable life-saving drugs to those who can’t afford them, hacks a far less benevolent drug called Zacuity, which supposedly makes people feel good about working long hours for their jobs—but when people start dying, she discovers the truth: Zacuity makes people addicted to work, to the point of insanity and even death. A thrilling pursuit and race against time ensues as Jack flees two determined agents—one of them an artificially intelligent robot beginning to awaken to the soul within its own programming—while trying to get the truth out into the open. In this terrifyingly plausible post-climate change future, pharma hackers—both blackhat and white—are a vital part of the healthcare system in which “better living through chemistry” is taken to terrifying extremes.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:24

Under the Pendulum Sun starts like many good fairy stories do: with a journey. In the mid-19th century, Catherine Helstone spends six weeks on a ship off the north English coast trying to get well and truly lost, for this is the only way to find the Faelands of Acadia. She’s trying to reach her brother Laon, a missionary for the Anglican church, who went to Acadia to replace Reverend Roche, the first missionary to the fae, who died under mysterious circumstances. Catherine is whisked off through a land of mist to the Gethsemane mission, an architectural magpie building of Norman forts and Gothic flying buttresses, which feels both large and small, looming and choking. Her brother is not in residence, so Cathy is left for weeks and months with the strange company of a changeling woman and a gnome, heretofore the only Christian convert of Laon’s ill-fated effort. How does one act as missionary in a world that twists the metaphors of the Christian parables into something unrecognizable and strange? This debut contains wonders and terrors, sweet love and brittle disgust. Catherine and her brother might be able to strike off into the darkness, to collect the souls of their mission, but they must accept the darkness in themselves before they do. Conversion goes both ways in Acadia.

Solnechnaja2201 5 декабря 2017 г., 21:26