Speculative Society Book Club, April/May

The first reading in our bi-monthly Speculative Society book club is officially complete, and I have a few thoughts to share. The group voted to discuss Steampunk Tales, Vol. 1, a title that seems to only be available in ebook form and was a bit of a confused effort. I should point out that while I'm very familiar with (and a big fan of) the steampunk genre, I've not read a ton of short story collections over the years, esp. those written by multiple authors.

Overall, I really enjoyed about half of the stories in the book, and there was certainly enough diversity in styles and themes to keep the reader interested. I think the main problem was that a few entries had too many genre cliches, while several others were actually excerpts from longer pieces, although some of them did a pretty good job of standing on their own. The stand-outs for me were Catherynne M. Valente's The Anachronist's Cookbook, Brian Rappatta's The Reanimation Emporium, and G.D. Faulksen's The Mask of Tezcatlipoca. The remaining entries range from fairly good to completely boring.

Considering the very reasonable price of this collection, it's almost worth it for the better tales alone. I haven't participated in a book club in several years and I do think that short stories are a trickier thing to tackle than full novels. I'm looking forward to getting more in depth with character, plot, theme, etc. in whatever we choose for next month.

Voting is underway, so sign up and join the fun in our Goodreads Speculative Society!

Cheers!
Ella

Come and Read with Us

Steelyballs and Joseph Campbell

It’s hard to imagine but we’re almost a year old.  In honor of this upcoming anniversary, we are starting a bi-monthly book club called the Speculative Society over at Goodreads.  [Look at Friday’s post with the lovely Marilyn.]

What is it about speculative fiction that you like?  The adventure? The new worlds?  The characters?  In your opinion, what makes a good read? 

Personally, I love books with characters I fall in love with and think about them after I've closed the book.  I want the story to take me on an adventure preferably to a different world.  And if there is a hint of mytholgy, I'm ecstatic.   If you notice, my cat Steelyballs can’t get enough of it either.  Good kitty! 

So, tell me what is your preference?

Till next time,

Elizabeth

Speculative Society

In honor of our one year anniversary in April, we are proud to announce a bi-monthly book club, Speculative Society. Using Goodreads.com platform, we will hold a poll and discussion for the book for everyone to participant in.

All of us here on the Salon will choice a book from our genre, and let our readers or participants to choose the book we will read as group. In the event you cannot join us for discussion on Goodreads, we will post our individual reviews before we start the next book.

We decided to host a new book every two months to give everyone a chance to join the discussion at any time. So there are no spoilers, the discussion threads will be broken down by a group of chapters. Free feel to discuss anything within the grouped chapters’ threads.

Please join us in choosing our first novel to read for the Speculative Society at our group page on Goodreads. Starting today, the polls will be open for two weeks giving us two weeks to borrow or purchase the books before we start on April 1^st. If you know anything who is interested in joining, let them know as well.

We cannot wait to start and remember to vote here! Hope to see everyone there.