Tachyon tidbits featuring Nalo Hopkinson, Marjorie Liu, Marie Brennan, R. B. Lemberg, and Jacob Weisman

The latest reviews and mentions of Tachyon titles and authors from around the web

For their Book Riot list, K. W. Colyard includes Nalo Hopkinson’s FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS among The Most Influential Sci-Fi Books of the Past 10 Years.

Authors of color swept the Hugos in 2016, but Nalo Hopkinson’s collection was sadly not among the winners — not because of any failure on the author’s fault, but simply because there is no Hugo Award for best anthology or collection. Despite that little oversight, FALLING IN LOVE WITH HOMINIDS has been a fan favorite since its publication in 2015. Here, post-apocalyptic monsters mingle with ghosts stranded in shopping malls. It’s an eye-opening look at what science fiction can do.

Cover art by Chuma Hill
Design by Elizabeth Story

Forever and Everly recommends Marjorie Liu’s THE TANGLEROOT PALACE as one of 12 Books to Read When You’re in a Slump.

Short story collections are truly a savior for me whenever I’m struggling to read, and this one is one of my favorites! I adore a majority of these stories, and they are wholly captivating with their rich fantasy (and often fairytale-like) settings, magical weirdness, and focus on female characters and voices. Marjorie Liu has such a unique take on fantasy, and if you’re a fan of the genre, I think you’ll really enjoy her fresh twists on typical tropes and storylines!

Cover art by Sana Takeda
Design by Elizabeth Story

Nina Shepardson on Outside of a Dog praises Marie Brennan’s DRIFTWOOD.

While an individual person can move into other parts of Driftwood, their birth-home will inevitably fall to the Crush. Some become despairing, others bitter, but a few manage to maintain hope. Some do this by preserving what they can of their homeworlds, others by intermarrying with people from other worlds and building a new home in the multispecies society of the Drifters. The characters in DRIFTWOOD are diverse, not just in appearance and customs, but in their outlook and reactions to what has happened to them. My only complaint is that I wish the book had been longer so I could have seen more of the world Brennan created.

Cover by Elizabeth Story

Nourish-n-Cherish recalls a conversation with their son about Peter S. Beagle’s use of poetry in IN CALABRIA.

We chuckled at the feeble attempts of poetry and I told him about the way poetry was woven into the book written by that mastermind of unicorn stories, Peter S Beagle. In the book, IN CALABRIA. In the book, a farmer writes poems and reads poetry (not his own but famous poets) out to his goats and cows.

Cover design by Elizabeth Story

Rick reads some books, I dunno loves R. B. Lemberg’s Nebula Award-nominated THE FOUR PROFOUND WEAVES to a rating of 5 out 5.

This book throws you in at the deep end of its world and its magic, and is all the better for it. Lemberg weaves exposition and conceptual brilliance into their narration with such ease that I immediately let myself go into the dream-logic of cloths woven from change, wanderlust, hope, and death. It all made deep intuitive sense. The magic within this book, within this world, was palpable, hungry, too brilliant to encompass in mere words on the page.

Cover by Elizabeth Story based on initial concepts by Francesca Myman

Suhail Rafidi was excited to visit with Tachyon publisher Jacob Weisman at San Francisco Writer’s Conference 2023.

I had the opportunity, for the second time ever, to speak with Jacob Weisman, the founder of Tachyon Publications. And he remembered me! Well, he mostly remembered my friend David Gill (“The Philip K. Dick Guy”). The first time I met Mr. Weisman was at an SF in SF event, when the featured guest was Robert Silverberg. At the conference, we stood by the bookstore table and spoke of everything from sci-fi novellas to the next SF in SF event at the Bookbinder’s Museum. I love a friendly chat among nerds.