Arthurian Sites in the West by C.A. Ralegh Radford & Michael J. Swanton
reviewed by Georges T. Dodds
For those of you hooked on Arthurian legendary and lore, this book serves as a perfect counterpoint, describing and discussing the archæological evidence at four putative Arthurian sites in southwest Wales: Cadbury-Camelot, Tintagel, Glastonbury and Castle Dore and the Tristan Stone. Originally designed for specialists in mediæval literature attending a conference, the book's purpose was to present what, if any, hard archæological or historical evidence there was for the traditional association of certain sites in southwestern Britain with Arthurian legends.

Guardian of the Vision by Irene Radford
reviewed by Cindy Lynn Speer
This book is the latest instalment of the story of the descendents of Merlin and Nimuë and their battle for the powers of the Pendragon continues in Elizabethan England. Twins Griffin and Donovan Kirkwood were once as close as their looks. The main difference is that Griffin has inherited the magic that is needed to claim the title of Pendragon.

Keeper of the Realm by H.J. Ralles
reviewed by Lisa DuMond
One exposure to a group of LARP gamers is more than enough to convince anyone that these role players live inside the world of the game. Are video and computer gamers that... well... obsessive? How many people would want to be in the game, following the rules and doing there best to survive? Come to think of it, how many would make it through when the new reality hits them in the face and they have only one life to risk; no reset for when the boss beats them?

The Surgeon's Tale and Other Stories by Cat Rambo & Jeff VanderMeer
reviewed by Mario Guslandi
A slim booklet of only 90 pages, it assembles five pieces of fiction including the title story, a collaborative work by the two writers. It is the highlight of the book, providing an excellent mix of horror and fantasy where an old surgeon reminisces about his years as a medical student and the daring experiment attempting to bring back to life the corpse of a young woman.

Piercing the Darkness: Undercover with Vampires in America Today by Katherine Ramsland
reviewed by Georges T. Dodds
Be forewarned, if you want the Jerry Springer version of vampires in America, the stories of Goth mall-rats, or the born-again Christian version of vampires as Satanists corrupting just about everybody, this book is not for you.

British Kids Have More Fun: Swallows and Amazons
a column by Georges T. Dodds
John, Susan, Letitia, and Roger Walker are British school-children spending their summer holidays with their mother near a lake in northern England. From an overlook they can see a large island, and plan to sail there and camp. After some planning and gathering of equipment and food, they do so, with John as captain of the small sailboat Swallow, Susan as mate, Titty as Able-Seaman, and Roger as ship's boy -- setting up camp on the island.

Nirvana's Children by Ranulfo
reviewed by Nathan Brazil
The main character, and narrator, is a 15 year-old Filipino named Napoleon, living in Australia. Like most kids of that age, Napoleon is in conflict with his parents, but unlike most, he runs away from home. He quickly discovers that life without money, on the streets and with no friends, is a lot harder than he'd imagined. He joins a gang with an adult leader, known only as Blondie -- a cross between Fagin and Peter Pan -- whose ultimate ambition is to lead a children's crusade, and wrest control of the world from the corrupt adults. Blondie, of course, is two pies short of a picnic, but his followers love him anyway.

Conspiracy of Silence by Kevin D. Randle
reviewed by Thomas Myer
Tom finds that Kevin Randle presents an intriguing case for the U.S. Government covering up the details surrounding the Roswell crash.

The Da-Da-De-Da-Da Code by Robert Rankin
reviewed by Nathan Brazil
Jonny Hooker is a 27 year-old musician who is accompanied, in a metaphysical sense, by an imaginary monkey boy called Mr Giggles. Nobody else can see or hear Mr Giggles, but that does not mean he isn't there. Soon after the story begins, Jonny is found dead in the pond of Gunnersbury Park. Minus his head, which appears to have exploded.

The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse by Robert Rankin
reviewed by Georges T. Dodds
Imagine Who Framed Roger Rabbit in Toy City rather than Toon Town, where the characters are wind-up toys or Mother Goose characters, and you'll have some idea of where this book is headed. Chock full of puns, double-entendres, quirky in-jokes, lampooned clichés and loopy characters, this is a story that you will find either outrageously funny or forgettable puerile humour.

The History of The Hobbit by John D. Rateliff
reviewed by Steven H Silver
Long before Frodo traveled to Morder to destroy the One Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien wrote another tale of Bilbo, who traveled with the wizard Bladorthin to steal the treasure of the dragon Pryftan. If some of those names are not familiar, it is because Tolkien's The Hobbit went through numerous iterations before reaching its final version.

The Golden Key by Melanie Rawn, Jennifer Roberson, and Kate Elliott
reviewed by Catherine Asaro
Guest Reviewer Catherine Asaro thinks this is a fantasy novel about art. Or perhaps a generational saga? Actually, it is an alternate universe story. Then again, maybe it's hard science fiction. Or should that be hard fantasy? To define it within only one genre is impossible. Suffice it to say that this nominee for the World Fantasy Award is a remarkable book.

Star Wars: Jedi Twilight by Michael Reaves
reviewed by Michael M Jones
On the city-planet of Coruscant, capital of the new Galactic Empire, no one is resting easy. The Clone Wars are still fresh in everyone's minds, with the fall of the Jedi and the ascension of Palpatine to the Emperor's throne still having far-flung repercussions. For not every Jedi is dead, and not all hope has been crushed. Plotting is afoot, and at the center of it all, unwittingly, is Jax Pavan, Jedi Knight turned bounty hunter, having fled into the worst parts of the city in an attempt to escape the fates of his brethren. The past, unfortunately, is about to catch up to him.

Star Wars: Death Star by Michael Reaves and Steve Perry
reviewed by David Maddox
It is the most destructive battle station ever to threaten the Star Wars Universe. The Death Star's name says it all. A weapon of unimaginable proportion that can destroy entire planets in an instant. How could anything stand against such a construct? But how did this monstrosity come to be? And what of those that helped build it?

Star Wars: Darth Maul - Shadow Hunter by Michael Reaves
reviewed by David Maddox
Set mere days before the latest movie, the book begins when a rouge Neimodian decides to get rich by selling information on the Trade Federation's impending blockade of Naboo. The evil Darth Sidious sends apprentice Darth Maul to eliminate the traitor and anyone else he's interacted with. This turns out to be Lorn Pavan, a rogue information broker with a grudge against Jedi along with his sarcastic partner, a 'droid named I-Five. Along the way, young Jedi Padawan Darsha Assant, out on her first mission, gets caught up protecting the two from the deadly Sith Apprentice.

Voodoo Child by Michael Reaves
reviewed by Neil Walsh
It's Mardi Gras, 1998. Most of New Orleans is partying. Mal Sangre is plotting. You see, Mal Sangre is an ambitious man. He wants to be a god. And he doesn't care who has to die -- or how many -- or how horribly -- before he attains his goal.

Dogs of Truth by Kit Reed
reviewed by Paul Kincaid
She continues to turn out stories that are fresh, daring, clever, unexpected, all the things we love about really great science fiction. Over the past decades, she has won plaudits from most of the top writers in the genre, and from most of the serious press outside the genre. So how come there is still a sense of an undiscovered treasure about her? How come she isn't automatically recognised far and wide for what she is, quite simply one of the best writers at work in the genre today?

Shifter by Judith & Garfield Reeves-Stevens
reviewed by Alisa McCune
Galen Sword is a troubled man. Orphaned at an early age, Sword has spent most of his life as a playboy looking for new thrills. One night, Sword finds himself in the ER after a horrible car accident. The hospital staff decides he is too far gone and they move on to the next patient. At death's door, Sword is healed and gains memories of his childhood. He is the heir to the Victor of Pendragon but he does not know what this means or where he is from.

Icefire by Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens
reviewed by Lisa DuMond
Not all alien landscapes exist in outer space. This novel takes you to a place as foreign as the surface of Mars and as inhospitable. Welcome to the frozen desert of Antarctica. Take the chance to get to know it; someone's about to make certain it's wiped out.

Star Trek, The Next Generation: The Continuing Mission by Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens
reviewed by Wayne MacLaurin
A lush coffee table-sized tome packed with photos, drawings and sketches covering the entire series from pre-production to the movies and beyond, this book guides the reader through the chapters (seasons) of the series and provide an interesting glimpse into what went on behind the scenes.

A Time to Die by Mickey Zucker Reichert
reviewed by Cindy Lynn Speer
A few years back, Benjamin Nash was elected President of the United States on a platform that promised the most impossible of things: an end to death. Not just sometime, but by the year 2030. It is a promise he has not really able to keep, but 2030 rolls around he's still in office. Doctor Patricia Jewett is a chronic care specialist who obeys the strict laws of life at all cost. The patients must be kept alive no matter the damage, and babies, even if the fetus proves to genetically mutated beyond all expectations of a decent life, are brought to term. Patricia is the one who watches over them all, until two major things happen.

The Beasts of Barakhai by Mickey Zucker Reichert
reviewed by Lisa DuMond
Consider Benton Collins, mild-mannered graduate student in biology, not your typical hero-type, maybe not even your average second-banana. One inhabitant of the strange world of Barakhai thinks that Ben is the deliverer the citizens have been waiting for. Zylas, the recruiter of this unlikely champion, doesn't give him much of a chance to say no; instead, he tricks Ben into following him through a bolt-hole into a place no human ever envisioned.

Sweet Miss Honeywell's Revenge by Kathryn Reiss
reviewed by Cindy Lynn Speer
Zibby has been working hard to save money for a brand new pair of roller blades. Blades she plans on getting for her birthday when her mother and aunt finish perusing the tables of the local dollhouse show. Just before the show ends, Zibby finds herself compelled to buy an antique dollhouse that costs exactly -- to the penny -- what she has in her pocket. Her mother is thrilled, but when Zibby comes out of the trance, anger doesn't quite describe her feelings.

Paperquake by Kathryn Reiss
reviewed by Ian Nichols
The mystery begins when Violet Jackstone, the non-identical sibling in a set of triplets, begins to dream of things which she has never experienced, but which seem real to her. Dreams of ordinary domestic pastimes, such as needlepoint, are intermingled with dreams of terrible tragedy, of flames and earthquake. The earthquake dreams, she thinks, might be explained by the series of small tremors which San Francisco, where she lives, is experiencing. But how to explain the domestic dreams?

Paint by Magic by Kathryn Reiss
reviewed by Ian Nichols
One of the objectives of the time-travel story is to evoke the period to which the journey takes place. This is, perhaps, easier when the scene is in the dark ages, or the age of dinosaurs, where action can take the place of characterisation, and the unfamiliarity of the setting can be a fascination in itself. However, when the setting is just a little while ago, and the action is not particularly violent, then the writer is required to evoke the people of the time, rather than the action. It is this skill in characterisation at which the author excels.

Hooking the Reader by Sharon Rendell-Smock
reviewed by Charlene Brusso
The book is a compilation of responses from genre writers (mystery, romance, SF & fantasy, western) when asked to supply "what they thought of some of their own opening sentences; to provide some of their own favorites and how they came up with them; and in general their thought processes when creating those sentences." The sheer volume of correspondents is impressive.

Stalking the Vampire by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Tammy Moore
In the second Fable of Tonight series John Justin Mallory is still living in the alternate Manhattan. It has been nearly a year since the events in Stalking the Unicorn and things are looking up for John Justin. He still doesn't have his Velma, but he does have a loyal partner in Colonel Winifred Carruthers, a thriving detective agency, an office cat-person and a magic mirror. There's not much more a Manhattan gumshoe could ask for.

Stalking the Unicorn by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Tammy Moore
John Justin Mallory is a down-on-his-luck Private Investigator who is seeing the New Year in with a bottle of booze and a pocket full of regrets. The main one is Velma, the lush-bodied, loyal secretary who never was, but he has also been evicted from his apartment and been left to take the heat for a blackmailing scheme run by his ex-partner before he debunked with John Justin's wife. The knee-breakers are outside waiting for him and there's a sure loser waiting for him to bet on it at the track.

Starship: Pirate by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Paul Raven
In this sequel to Starship: Mutiny, former Republic Navy Captain Wilson Cole and his crew are forced into going on the run into the lawless Inner Frontier of the galaxy. The Navy is embroiled in a war with the Teroni Federation, and doesn't have the spare resources to chase after an ageing ship with a half-complement of crew. And Cole can't take the Theodore Roosevelt into Republic space to find the next batch of fuel or shipment of food. As the title implies, piracy is the obvious answer.

Starship: Mutiny by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Steve Lazarowitz
Commander Wilson Cole is witty, arrogant, sarcastic, entertaining as hell and almost always right. The book is filled with potshots at the military, particularly dealing with internal politics and public relations. It's also the story of a war hero, hated by his superiors, loved by the public; a man demoted for his success at ignoring stupid orders in order to save the day. Wilson Cole carries his mantle brilliantly, a soldier fighting the "bad guys," while trying to avoid being hamstrung by his superiors.

Dragon America by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Steven H Silver
The book opens in the middle of the American Revolution as George Washington is trying to figure out how to finally defeat the British. To this end, he has sent tracker Daniel Boone into the interior to attempt to form an alliance with the Shawnee. Although Shawnee chieftain Black Fish rejects Boone's offer, he does provide Boone with two companions, the runaway slave Pompey and the Shawnee Grey Eagle, as well as a quest. There are rumors that somewhere out west there are dragons.

A Hunger in the Soul by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Steven H Silver
Although probably not Resnick's primary purpose in writing this story, the similarities between Stanley's search for Livingstone in Africa and Markahm's search for Drake in this novel are enough to make any reader want to research the historical expedition.

Alien Crimes edited by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Peter D. Tillman
This latest entry in the Science Fiction Book Club's original anthology series is a follow-up to Down These Dark Spaceways, a volume of hard-boiled SF detective stories. The highlight is Gregory Benford's "Dark Heaven", an elegant tribute to the Travis McGee mysteries, set in Benford's native Alabama. This atmospheric Gulf Coast pastoral features the obligatory world weary detective in a near future police procedural that takes a very odd turn. Alien amphibians from Centaurus have established a coastal enclave near Mobile. Detective Mckenna is investigating an odd series of drowning homicides...

Worldcon Guest of Honor Speeches edited by Mike Resnick and Joe Siclari
reviewed by Jayme Lynn Blaschke
Collected here are 31 speeches spanning the history of the World Science Fiction convention, delivered by such genre luminaries as Hugo Gernsback, John W. Campbell, Jr., Robert A. Heinlein and Kate Wilhelm. It's not a complete representation -- the editors are quite upfront in the introduction about their inability to secure permission to publish some of the speeches, and difficulty in even locating tapes or transcripts of others.

Men Writing Science Fiction As Women, Women Writing Science Fiction As Men and New Voices in Science Fiction edited by Mike Resnick
reviewed by Michael M Jones
Two of these anthologies explore two sides to the same coin. Science fiction has always been about exploring the realm of possibilities, and that includes exploring gender and perception. The editor approached a number of writers, and asked them to imagine a world from the viewpoint of the opposite gender. The only rules: that the story had to be told from the viewpoint of a specific gender (male if the author was female, female if the author was male), and if changing the narrator from Victor to Victoria or vice versa didn't invalidate the story, they didn't want it. That said, the authors were all ready for the challenge.