Down to the Bone

Justina Robson, 2011

(January 2012)

Pacey, undemanding, fun. At last. After the weightier, more blatantly intellectual or satirical stuff I’ve been reading recently I figured I deserved something more obviously frivolous. Cyborgs, demons, faeries, and elves. Sit back and go with it.

I’ve also noticed that this is the first female author I’ve read since I’ve started this little record. I’m not sure how to interpret that. My reading habits generally flit between SF, popular science and history, and literary fiction (which is an awful turn of phrase, but it’ll have to do). There’s a gender imbalance in publishing anyway, but in the first two of those genres I suspect it’s even greater than normal.

SF is my go-to genre when I’m not actively looking for anything in particular, and there really are so few decent female SF authors. Ursula Le Guin, obviously, but few others I know of. Lauren Beukes' most recent book was pretty good, and I tried some of Elizabeth Moon’s Serrano books, but the whole interplanetary warfare/three day eventing thing was as awkward as it sounds.

As ever, I’m open to suggestions.


(I've got family visiting this week. A few posts are scheduled automatically to keep things ticking over. I really value everyone who comments, though I'll have to catch up on those later. I'd apologise, but I'm sure you'll cope)