Ack-Ack Macaque by Gareth L. Powell, is a cleverly plotted and thoroughly immersive alternative future in which you believe a monkey can fly a spitfire. With its well-drawn characters, page-turning intrigue, and clever plot twists—never mind, several neat surprises I never saw coming—it will have you chugging back the strong coffee way into the wee small hours of night, just to finish it.
\nThis is one of those reads that, just when you think the stakes couldn’t get any higher, Powell dials up the adrenalin and ups the ante. All the while leaving you breathlessly rooting for the good guys, as they battle against not only the odds, but their own insecurities and doubt. Thankfully, Victoria, Merovech and, of course, the monkey of the moment himself, Ack-Ack Macaque, throw themselves into the fray determined to change the outcome, no matter the personal cost. And with guns blazing, take the reader on an action-packed, roller-coaster ride of fun and adventure.
\nA clever hybrid of SF, with a dash of alternative history, melded with a fabulous helping of Steampunk. Powell skilfully blends genres all without missing a single beat. Putting Ack-Ack Macaque up there with the best of them and one you’ll find yourself talking about long after you’ve finished reading the last page.
\nIn short, Powell shows us his prowess and proves he is fast becoming a master storyteller.
\n", "date_published": "2026-06-21T10:13:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/06/21/ackack-macaque-by-gareth-l/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/06/19/red-noise-by-john-p/", "title": "Red Noise by John P. Murphy", "content_html": "Oh dear, where do I start? Let’s get this one out the way first, billed as Kill Bill meets High Plains Drifter, RED NOISE is neither. It lacks the finesse, the heart, the emotion, and most importantly, the brutal action that peppered both Kill Bill and High Plains Drifter or any damn spaghetti western.
\nRED NOISE should be a cracking good read given its premise, a lone gunman who comes to town, get’s ripped off, and decides to clean out the bad guys and save the day. Sad to say, this version misses the mark by a couple of thousand light years.
\nOur erstwhile anti-hero is a miner, a woman, who prefers to be alone, and, we’re repeatedly told, has a scarred face. A point that is emphasised a couple of times, but to what end, I’m not sure? To make her behaviour more acceptable, more man-like, because that’s how the character comes across. As if, at the last minute, the author changed his mind.
\nBut that aside, man or woman, this should have been so much more, and wasn’t. There is little if any world building, and scant details or background to the set up on the ageing space station. Instead we’re offered up a ‘Mysterious man’ scenario who, having been cheated, takes out a form of twisted revenge under the guise of cleaning up the spaceport.
\nBut what we’re never given is any reasoning behind anyone’s behaviour, actions, or motives beyond the banal. These people are bad … in fact, they’re all sad rejects, and the bad is what we’re told. Like everything in this drab story, we’re ‘told it’ rather than shown.
\nThe same with the so-called action pieces, most of which happen off page so we are just ‘told’ once again, what happened. So that everything becomes one long monotonous piece of exposition punctuated by the occasional inane dialogue that, believe me, is not in any way funny, droll or witty—as advertised.
\nThere is nothing witty here, nothing vaguely or remotely interesting because the characters themselves lack any definition, depth, or background. The most exciting character described—and this happens about the halfway mark (200 plus pages in)—is NUKE, a guy with a nuclear bomb attacked to his heart, who’s in exile from the station… well, for obvious reason, otherwise this dull story would be over in a heartbeat, with a large explosion.
\nThe MC herself lacks any depth, detail, or background and is otherwise referred to, throughout, as just the Miner. Or, because of a brief conversation with one of the heavies, Boss Feeney, early on, as either Jane, because she saw a book title, or Mick, because her hacked bank account name is, Mickey ‘Fucking’ Mouse. It’s all rather puerile.
\nAnd if this woman rubbed her chin once, she rubbed it every fecking five sentences.
\nEven with a lack of connection, empathy, or depth to the characters, this still could have been an interesting read if there had actually been a story, any real action, and less meandering of everyone from point A to point B, through endless dirty dull grey corridors, with endless explanations of the piss smell everywhere.
\nAt 200 pages in my mind was apt to wander, as the repetition became mind-numbingly boring.
\nThe author clearly dropped the ball when it comes to any kind of plot. Decided we didn’t need any world building, or depth, to a set of paper-thin characters whose only motivation seem to be in beating one another up. So that, in the end, I could not have cared less about anyone in this plodding excuse of a story that makes me wonder, why, oh why was this a Nebula Award finalist?
\nIn conclusion, there is nothing fun, fast or entertaining about RED NOISE. May I humbly suggest you avoid it, as you might die of sheer boredom or otherwise drown in the author’s 440 pages of verbal diarrhoea!
\n", "date_published": "2026-06-19T11:38:53-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/06/19/red-noise-by-john-p/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/06/12/velocity-weapon-by-megan-e/", "title": "Velocity Weapon by Megan E. O'Keefe", "content_html": "First of all, let me start by saying I thoroughly enjoyed Velocity Weapon from beginning to end. And, like any good roller coaster ride, this one starts off with a few gentle reveals, and slowly—at first—builds up to a number of startling revelations, as you crest a peek, wondering what the hell is coming next and then? Suddenly you are being plunged head first over a dramatic cliffhanger, rolling at breakneck speed towards the next clever twist in the plot. So that, just when you think you have an inkling of what might be going on, O’Keefe pops your bubble and blindsides you. Nothing, as they say, is ever what it seems. As it should be with any good story.
\nIntroducing our characters, the story opens with Gunnery Sergeant Sanda Greeve waking up in a medical bay after a battle, and discovering not only is she on an enemy ship, but she’s naked and … oh, look, only has one leg!
\nBefore we know it, she makes another starling discovery. The ship she’s on is tech far in advance of that of her own people—the Primes—but more, it has a sentient AI. The Light of Berossus or, Bero, as he introduces himself to Sanda, has scooped up her emergency pod thereby saving her for a slow sure death. But wait, there’s another twisted surprise in store for our beleaguered Sergeant. Bero tells her it is now 230 years in the future after the battle of Dralee.
\nI mean, come on, what a great opening.
\nIntersecting Sanda and Bero’s story, we have Biran, Sanda’s brother, a newly anointed ‘Keeper’ who’s about to get into a lot of trouble, never mind, political intrigue, even before he’s read his acceptance speech. And oh boy, does O’Keefe drop us, and poor Biran, straight into the deep end from the get go. The poor guy has to navigates shark infested political waters but seems to find a mentor in Keeper Lev. But is his saviour really an alley, or just using him for his own ends?
\nWell, we all know the answer to that, no one is ever as they seem. And, awash in trying to make sense of just what’s going on, Biran—and us along for the ride—has to act fast and on his feet. Believing he is acting for the best interested of Ada, finds out just who is friends really are. And while we watch him inadvertently chumming the deep water he’s frantically treading, we get to meet the major players in Biran’s circle and sphere. The Keepers of Prime. Living a life of what is for most, a life of luxury, on a space station circling the dwarf planet Ada. A planet picked for its location, specifically for the Prime Corp. to build another of its all-important Gates. A Casmir Gate that affords the Gate-Keeping Primes access to near instant travel across the galaxy.
\nYoung, inexperienced, and way out of his depth, nonetheless, Biran, goes all out to find out what’s really going on, and what not only happened to his sister at the merciless battle of Dralee, but why their nearest neighbour in the system, the Icarions, are so hell bent on destroying Ada, the Keepers, and, it would seem, the Gate itself.
\nThere is a subtle and not so subtle interplay of politics—via Biran’s threads—and what’s happening on Ada. And then, there’s the reality of life in space, as seen in Sanda’s thread, thinking she is the last living person in the system, mourning the loss of everyone she ever loved and held dear.
\nThen there is the even more harsh reality of life on the fringes of society, as seen via Jules Vicenza, part of a nickel and dime crew dodging the law, and other criminal gangs, while heisting anything left lying around, unguarded. Jules, and her cohorts, live in the Grotta—a backend festering carbuncle on the arse of the gleaming city-dome, that is Alexandria-Atrux. But the proverbial shit hits the fan for Jules and the team when the heist what they think is an unguarded cache of the drug, Wraith. And discover much more than they bargained for when Jules steals some data pads, and more, a vial of pearly liquid. Thereby setting off a string of events that will cost them all dearly.
\nI won’t go into details but will tell you, the author will keep you on your toes, so pay attention, there’s a lot going on here. So much so, it’s all but impossible to distill it all down into a few short paragraphs. What we have is solid world building, a crew of well fleshed out characters, and a plot with plenty of twists and turns as to give you neck ache. But, be warned, not everything ends as you might think, as O’Keefe sets us up for what is surely to come in subsequent instalments of this enjoyable series.
\nOh, I do so love, a complicated, twisty plot. And O’Keefe certainly delivers.
\n", "date_published": "2026-06-12T09:30:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/06/12/velocity-weapon-by-megan-e/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/06/10/permafrost-by-alastair-reynolds/", "title": "Permafrost by Alastair Reynolds", "content_html": "This incredibly short novella by Alastair Reynolds—all 176 pages of it—offers so much promise but, for me at least, it failed to deliver. I think if the author had bothered to write a full-length novel and added better depth to both the story itself never mind the characters, it might have been an over-all better read.
\nAs it is, there is a total lack of credibility to the time travel aspect and theory, which, while an intriguing idea, is not expounded upon at any length or depth. And just comes across as sloppy writing.
\nWhich is a shame, because the author could have come at it from any number of angels and we could have still believed better than as it stands.
\nHad Permafrost been presented as such, we might be able to suspend our sense of disbelief better. But then again, only if the characters themselves had been in any way, shape, or form, believable.
\nAs it was I felt the MC was there more as an after thought. Permafrost seems to be more about the concept of time travel than an actual story about people involved in trying to time travel, especially as we are supposed to believe they are out to save the world. Though what from, other than—apparently—their own hubris, I don’t know.
\nNothing is fully explained—whether that’s motivation, plot, or characters—nor is the concept of Permafrost’s time travel given more than a cursory explanation via a flimsy backstory. Then there is the whole ending which, quite honestly, left me laughing, and not in a pleasant way. It was ludicrous.
\nThe story hinges on a set of parameters set up by the author, himself, about how the characters would time travel, and about the paradoxes that would be created up and down the timeline and then, ignores his own rules right at the end, without consequence.
\nLet me explain. The story hinges on the fact a character, Antti, is supposed to go back, find what everyone is looking for, then fly it to an exact location to be found in the book’s present by our main protagonist, Valentina. But … the main character destroys the experiment after being warned by Antti that they are creating a desolate future beyond their own present. So in destroying the experiment in her now, she stops Antti ever going back to begin with (still with me here?) so how is it, all this is ignored without time “grandfathering” up and down the time stream? Which would, of course, result in them all forgetting, and the item never arriving in the present in order to save the world, which it does?
\nAll in all, this is a rather dull, uninteresting look at the possibility of time travel, via characters who are never fully fleshed out or given any depth. With sloppy science, never mind a flawed rational that flopped badly at the end because the author forgot the plot.
\n", "date_published": "2026-06-10T11:42:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/06/10/permafrost-by-alastair-reynolds/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/06/09/spaceside-by-michael-mammay/", "title": "Spaceside by Michael Mammay", "content_html": "SPACESIDE follows on two years after the events that take place the end of Planetside without so much as missing a beat. And Mammay doesn’t play catch up, like some authors might do, but goes straight to Butler having to deal with the aftermath of his decision—having become the most infamous person in the galaxy. Both mentally and physically, he’s shaken, and he’s lost confidence in himself, and his decision making process. He’s seeing a shrink, not sleeping well, and doubting and second guessing himself at ever juncture.
\nAnd then, when he starts seeing Cappans sat on the bus, as he’s going to work. You know something is up. Butler struggles to figure out whether he’s seeing thing, being paranoid, or hallucinating from stress. Is what he saw real? And are there hybrid Cappans on the planet, or is his past just giving him waking nightmares?
\nAgain, Mammay has written a cleverly twisted plot dropping Butler (and us) into the middle of what, at first, looks like a simple case of corporate espionage, but given Butler’s background and history, it soon becomes apparent that there is more going on, than meets the eye. And suddenly, we’re deep into a mystery, wrapped in a thriller, loaded with suspense, that’s fraught with intrigue.
\nOnce more we follow the clues at the same times as Butler, trying to make sense of what’s going on. Grandstanding his thoughts and emotions, and working through his thought processes and internal conflict, something that makes Spaceside feel so much more intimate. Here we have a man, normally use to action within a defined command structure, facing down his own indecision at the same time he’s coping with the consequences of his previous actions, including the subsequent loss of his wife. All of which helps flesh out Butler on a very personal level. Not just as a narrator of the story.
\n“Your whole life you do big, important things. You speak and people listen. Then suddenly that’s over, and you’re wasting your life doing some bullshit job that doesn’t matter, where nobody cares what you do as long as you show up for the company functions.”
\nI really enjoy this style of first person, in depth reactive analysis, through a main character, when it’s done this well. Butler is so well written, that he’s able to carry the entire story and, make us believe. It’s a joy to read this kind of clever writing, that not only keeps us second guessing, but also able to blindside us with a few neat plot twists. Till, even up until the end, we’re not sure just how Butler is going to get out of this one, alive!
\nThe author also brought back a couple of other characters bleeding over from Planetside, to help aid and support Butler, including the now retired General Serata who, like Butler, is now living with the consequences of what happened in Planetside. While also giving us a solid cast of secondary characters that were, in and of them selves, really interesting as well.
\nWhat Mammay’s stories offer are a uniquely different take in what is a crowded MilSF market. What I especially love about his storytelling, never mind the witty dialogue, is the strength of his main character, Butler. All in all, this series is not only clever, it’s smart.
\n", "date_published": "2026-06-09T09:51:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/06/09/spaceside-by-michael-mammay/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/06/03/in-the-dark-spaces-by/", "title": "In the Dark Spaces by Cally Black", "content_html": "In The Dark Spaces by Cally Black, is a totally immersive sci-fi adventure shaded with dark overtones. In some respects it’s also a fast paced, heart-pounding, cannot put it down thriller. And let me be the first to say, the pacing is enough to give you lactic acid build up in your muscles just sitting on the couch, reading this one. In The Dark Spaces is so well paced with each chapter smoothly flowing into the next, so that the story just sucks you along for the ride. I simply couldn’t put this one down.
\nShort, sharp, event-filled chapters detail the almost none stop action as our erstwhile hero, 14 year old Tamara (Weku) an illegal stowaway aboard the ill-fated deep space hauler, Jolene, is witness to untold horrors. A Crow-like alien race attacks the freighter killing everyone aboard, except that is, Tamara and her tiny cousin, Gub. Tamara finds herself trapped in the freighter’s stores when the attack first starts, but manages to work her way back through the ship, inside the walls, unseen. A place she knows well, as they have been her hiding places for her entire short life. A life that means nothing to the freighter’s crew and owners, if they were to catch her.
\nIt’s not the crew who catch her, though, when making her way to the kitchens to find her aunt—a cook aboard the freighter—and upon finding her dead, hides in a pantry with the defenceless Gub. But the violent enemy are going room by room, floor by floor, killing all the crew. Tamara, use to thinking on her feet to avoid encounters with the crew, has to do something. Something to distract these strange thin black aliens garbed in shiny black armour, and draw them away from the only living family she has left in a seemingly cold hearted universe. Gub. And herein lives the heart and soul of this story, just what is Tamara willing to do in order not only to save her own life, but that of a baby, to make it out alive.
\nEverything, is the answer.
\nIt is astounding what the author, Cally Black, puts Tamara through. The decisions this young teenager has to make, never mind the bitter, heartbreak choices she’s presented with at each step along the way. Decisions that would break even the best of us. But plausibly, and with so much turmoil and heart, Black shows us just how Tamara not only survives, but starts to bond with her captors in ways only someone so innocent could. With her heart in the right place.
\nIt’s through this focus on her survival, that we get to know more about both Tamara’s world and that of the Crow People, the Garuwa. And Tamara’s place within the troop that has, in effect, kidnapped her—and no spoilers here on just how she manages to do that, it’s so damn clever. We get to know the enigmatic leader, Tootoopne, to individual members of the squad, Wooloo and Tweetoo who in turn slowly bond with Tamara too.
\nThis is no easy read, it was, for me, at least, heart-wrenching in places, so much so that I found myself shedding a tear or two. This is a story that goes right for the emotional jugular and never lets up. It’s tough, brutal, heartbreak, heart—warming, uplifting, and at times, will break you into little pieces. Yet … yet at the same time, we slowly see the bonds of family and friendship, we see the hope breaking through and, in the end, a way is found for an uneasy truce to be forged between Garuwa and humans.
\nThis is a powerful read, and testament to the author that she not only threaded the needle but made it all work in such a way as to leave a reader wrecked by the end—but in a good way.
\nIf you are looking for outstanding world building, a character with such heart she will bleed you dry, snappy dialogue, and secondary characters that reach out to you from the page, then I suggest you grab yourself a copy of In The Dark Spaces, and be prepared for one hell of a read!
\n", "date_published": "2026-06-03T15:18:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/06/03/in-the-dark-spaces-by/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/06/02/planetside-by-michael-mammay/", "title": "Planetside by Michael Mammay", "content_html": "The first in a trilogy by Michael Mammay, Planetside melds the best in the military science fiction tradition with a murder-mystery, and a droll and somewhat jaded perspective of the lead protagonist, in the guise of Col. Carl Butler. Who, with a healthy dose of scepticism, in an action-packed plot infused with plenty of action, gets to the bottom of the odd disappearance of a young lieutenant.
\nBut what should be a simple premise—find out what happened to Lt. Mallot—turns out to be anything but simple, for Butler and his team. And when he doesn’t trust the team he’s been given, any more than the commander of Capa Base, Col. Butler’s job becomes a game of matching wits with those around him. Military personnel who, at best, are either not enthusiastic about helping, or are doing their best to hinder his investigation while hiding secrets of their own.
\nWhat Planetside is, at its heart, nestled within a framework of military science fiction, is a multi-layer and very cleverly written mystery. And while Butler delves further into what happened, layer after layer is peeled back to reveal an insidious underbelly of corruption and ambition. Well, we all know about people using the mantra, “I’m doing all this to save humanity,” is a cover for their behaviour usually means they are so focused in their belief, as to forget they are probably selling their soul for a lie.
\nWhich is exactly what we find in this story. Small discrepancies, minor incidents, all begin to add up. And the more he digs, the more everyone stonewalls his investigation. To the point where Butler realises the only way he’s going to get to the truth is to go planetside to confront the problem head-on and, hopefully, in doing so, finally get some answers.
\nWell, Butler finally gets his answers and, so do we. In a taut twisting build-up, pieces of the jigsaw puzzle slowly fall into place, as we arrive at resolution, I for one, wasn’t expecting, in a truly twisted endgame that well, quite literally, blew Planetside wide apart!
\nWith flowing, easy to read prose, a congenial, well-defined MC, and a twisted plot layered with ruses and complexity, Planetside is one of the best military SF reads I’ve had in a long while. Mammy certainly has all the right credentials to write what is, a thoroughly absorbing mystery built within a futuristic framework, with plenty of nail-biting action as the bullets and rockets explode. Plenty enough to satisfy even the most jaded SF palate.
\n", "date_published": "2026-06-02T15:17:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/06/02/planetside-by-michael-mammay/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/05/26/glory-main-by-henry-v/", "title": "Glory Main by Henry V. O'Neil", "content_html": "GLORY MAIN by Henry V. O’Neil is one of those books, once started, you cannot put down. Classic military science fiction, Glory Main harks back to the likes of Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, Barry B. Longyear Enemy Mine, and David Weber’s Honor Harrington series of novels, and along with well fleshed out characters, clever world-building, and is a fast-paced gripping read.
\nFeaturing a small diverse group of enduring characters who are thrown headlong into a life or death survival situation, Glory Main jumps right in at the deep-end. Our cast of struggling survivors include a young, greenhorn lieutenant, a shipboard shrink, a Spartacan Scout, read: special forces commando type, and a map-maker who also happens to be a conscientious objector. This alone should tell you what to expect from four such opposed personalities. Throw in that they’re stranded on a harsh almost barren world amid a bitter and terrible war, were lies from Command are the norm. And fighting not only themselves, the local flora and fauna, and a slow death by starvation, but an enemy who, as it turns out, looks like them—The Sims. The Simulants. The facsimiles—And the stage is set for one hell of a battle of survival, wits, determination and sheer will against the mounting odds.
\nPlausibly written throughout, the tech and its use in Glory Main is very familiar and yet, still manages to have the futuristic and otherworldly edge to it. As does the setting. Just when we think we understand what’s going on, O’Neil tosses in another roadblock and obstacle for the characters to over come. But far from painting his characters into tight corners, creating either false jeopardy or contriving situations, you feel you are there, on this gritty, unforgiving world suffering through the worst with each and every character. And while written in the first person POV, as seen through the eyes of Mortas, the story still unfolds naturally, and realistically.
\nThe best part of any story, for me at least, is whether or not the author manages to pull off a plausible blindside, something O’Neil does right near the end, in Glory Main. Not only was I (like many I suspect) happily surprised with a clever plot twist, but I suspect O’Neil has set us up for what we know must come in successive installments. And yes, I can’t wait for the next in the series. The world-building, language, descriptions and info dumps—when they came—never once over shadowed or weighed the story down and the pacing was near on perfect.
\nAll-in-all, Glory Main is a well-written, fast and compelling read. Henry O’Neil certainly knows the military, and knows how to craft an engrossing story. And whether or not you enjoy reading military science fiction or not, the story, which is character-driven and character-based, is still worth a read!
\nGlory Main is everything an updated version of Starship Troopers should be, a cracking good read.
\n", "date_published": "2026-05-26T10:51:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/05/26/glory-main-by-henry-v/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] }, { "id": "http://alexink.micro.blog/2026/05/23/the-empress-of-mars-by/", "title": "The Empress of Mars by Kage Baker", "content_html": "I fell in love with this book right from the get-go. I mean, what could be better—it’s a wonderfully written western about a strong-willed woman set on the frontier. A frontier which just happens to be, yes, you guessed. Mars.
\nMary Griffith is just the kind of character I love. She’s full of quirky foibles, piss and vinegar and, after being summarily dumped by the British Arean Company (a great name by the way) she’s reduced to making do and making ends meet by doing the one thing her Irish-ancestors were always good at: brewing ale and running a bar!
\nWhat’s more, Mary is not alone; with three daughters to look after and a menagerie of misfits and left-overs, Mary struggles admirably between a rock (the British Arean Company hellbent on closing her down or, at the very least, undermining her) and a hard place. Mars herself.
\nKage Baker has a keen eye for characterisation, and deftly leads us (and Mary) on a merry dance of ups and downs, scrapes and battles, as we wonder how Mary (and her motley idiosyncratic crew) will get out of her latest dilemma and, in doing so, stick it to the British Arean Company in the process. But the story isn’t as simple as that. It’s layered enough as a character portrait (of Mary at least) as much as it is part action-adventure and mystery. Throw in a healthy measure of wry humour and satire, as far as I am concerned, you have a winning mix.
\nThe Empress Of Mars is a page-turning, rollicking good read and the kind of adventure story I loved as a kid, and adult alike. I hope you’ll love it too.
\n", "date_published": "2026-05-23T15:54:00-04:00", "url": "https://alexandrawolfe.ca/2026/05/23/the-empress-of-mars-by/", "tags": ["Book Review","SciFi"] } ] }