RR's Top 10 Spec-Fic Novels of 2011

We'll run this thing countdown style, but first with a preamble:  almost half my reading this year was non-fiction, so I missed a few of the "big" releases (Stephenson, Bakker, etc.).  I look forward to comments complaining about how your favorite author (besides me) is missing.

THE BEST

10.  Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson - Sanderson barely makes the list this year.  Considering the book was barely a book that seems fair.  Yes, it's Mistborn with guns...and that's AWESOME, but it wasn't much of a story.  Short, short, short, and we all want more, more,  more.

9.  Magic Slays by Ilona Andrews - The only Urban Fantasy novel to make the list and of course it's going to be Andrews.  Andrews is the top of that sub-genre.  This novel was a pause in the larger Kate Daniels story, but still had some rocking scenes.

8.  The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss - A novel that brought us both the laughable Fae Super Sexathon and the amazing Cthaeh, it was pure Rothfuss, with an unbeatable readability, clue's to the trilogy's mysteries all over the place, and...Kvothe being an ass.

7.  God's War by Kameron Hurley - I love this world!  Bugs, deserts, Middle Eastern and African influences.  Characters that are hard, a plot that is harder, and a world that is hardest of all.

6.  The Iron Jackal by Chris Wooding - Wooding's steampunk meets Firefly series keeps on going and I keep eating it up.  This time we got some major world-building going on and perhaps it didn't have Black Lung Captain's pace and character work, but it still has enough of Darian Frey and his crew for anyone.

5.  Stonewielder by Ian C. Esslemont - A Malazan novel, so obviously I loved it.  With a whole new continent to explore, Malazans, Crimson Guards, and plenty of gods and goddesses causing the usual convergences this one felt formulaic to the series, but I'm not complaining.

4.  The Crippled God by Steven Erikson - The last book in the mainline Malazan story went out big...then decided big wasn't enough and went ludicrous speed.  There were some good conclusions here, some long speculated moments coming about, and some interesting open doors for the future.  RR needs more Karsa STAT.

3.  Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey - It's not the space opera notes that work best in this novel but the noir and mystery notes.  The fast pace, no-holds-bared action, and complex social themes may not have made it the "best" read of the year, but they did make it the funnest read of the year.

2.  Infidel by Kameron Hurley - That's right, Hurley makes the list twice.  Her second novel was even better than the first.  Every problem I had was solved, the world was further explored, the characters faced serious challenges, and some insane HOLY BLEEPAGE got thrown around on twists and turns.

1.  The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie - Say one thing about Logen Ninefingers, say he's not required to make an Abercrombie book great, but even the mentioning of his name goes a long way.  Abercrombie kicked a lot of character and plot BLEEP in this book but they both fail before what the man did with chapter structure.  The "letter" and "battle" chapters were just as great as advertised, making this my spec-fic book of the year.


THE DISAPPOINTMENTS


5.  Still No Scott Lynch! - Scott Lynch's long awaited third Locke Lamora novel continues its waiting period.  Lots of rumors on this one, maybe it's handed in, maybe it's being revised, maybe he's writing book 4 at the same time.  Or maybe not.  All I know is a year without Scott Lynch's style and skill is worse off than one with it.

4.  The Unremembered by Peter Orellun - One of the most pushed and pumped debut novels of the year.  It had an amazing cover.  It had all the might of Tor behind it.  Yet...the major who read it looked on it in horror.  The prose...the purple prose!  The rip off of Eye of the World.  A cry came out from across the blogosphere:  what was Tor thinking pushing this?  Perhaps worse than the novel itself was the manipulation on review sites like goodreads and Amazon by unknown forces to see the novel given high marks.

3.  The Dragon's Path by Daniel Abraham - In an amazing feat, Daniel Abraham managed to make both my "best of" and "disappoint" lists (he's part of the writing duo going by James S. A. Corey).  This novel lacked all the joy and tight plotting of its brother, it also had bland characters that were hard to like and a world that was forgettable.  A decent novel, but not up to the standards of his other work.

2.  Snuff by Terry Pratchett - For the first time I asked myself if Terry Pratchett has himself a ghost writer.  Just an odd book that was as not Discworld as you can get.  Pratchett is in my all time top 10...this one was a huge let down.

1.  A Dance With Dragons by George (Not as) R.R. (As Me) Martin - We waited six years for Dany, Tyrion, and Jon...we got a waffling girl, turtles and pigs, and not an Other in sight.  My three star review on Amazon received over 1,000 helpful notes so I know I'm not alone in my disappointment.  No matter how good the Theon/North storyline might have been, the rest...was all disappointment.


DEBUT AUTHOR OF THE YEAR


Kameron Hurley for her great work with both God's War and Infidel.  Not only is she the debut author of this year, she's the author I'm most excited about since the Debut Explosion of 06/07.  If you haven't checked out her books, start zapping them onto your Kindle immediately.

Real Review: Infidel by Kameron Hurley

Link:  Infidel

It got better.

All the world-building and morally grey characters I loved in the first novel are just as good as before and all the problems I had with the plot are...GONE. Without having to dish out epic size awesome amounts of world-building Hurley gets to instead spend more time on fine tuning pace and plot and there's tons of pay off here. A quick, engaging, twisting read.

But don't think the world-building just went away. No, we get a whole new ride in our amusement park. Tirhan is kind of the Jerry Springer of our Bugpunkian world; it's polite, it wears a suit, and when it seems like things are getting boring in the war department it throws in a chair to spice things up. Add in some familiar refugees, some new shifter tricks, EVAL sand, and a group of rogue bel dames for plot stewing. The chair isn't even really needed for plot purposes, but it does prove Nyx can kill people with just about anything.

There are some brutal, Wow Out Loud moments in "Infidel". Go check out "God's War" if you haven't and get this one at the same time. This series is only getting better.

Four and half stars.

Real Review: God's War by Kameron Hurley

Link:  God's War

Are you tired of farmboys?

Do you feel like if you read about another Great Evil that you might do yourself bodily harm?

Tired of swords and horsies, are you?

Good! Welcome to "God's War". There are bugs and holy wars and untypical characters inside its pages. The world Kameron Hurley creates is definitely New Weird and also in that wonderful gooey center where you can't decide if it should be called Sci-Fi or Fantasy. It has the best worldbuilding of any debut that I've read this year.

This world of bugpunk magic and boxing, of sands and war-torn wastelands, of matriarchal and patriarchal societies, of the different ways religion can turn based on the same text....of, of, of...this world held me from beginning to end. There's lots of `ofs'. There's a lot here to sink your teeth into.

The only reason I'm not giving it Five Stars and screaming "Debut of the Year" from the top of my surgically implanted lungs is that the plot was very unsure for the first hundred pages and then very all-over-the-place in the last fifty.

Still...I really liked it. I'm looking forward to the next novel in the series. Sadly I don't get to say that enough with new Spec-Fic writers. Check it out!

Four stars.

Real Review: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Link:  Ready Player One

I don't know if I have much to add that hasn't been said by the bijillion reviews this book has gotten. I'll just agree that I come down on the side of those who very much enjoyed the read for the great nostalgia popcorn that it was. "Ready Player One" is "Night at the Museum" for geeks, especially 80s geeks. I myself am more of a 90s geek but the five-year-old in me remembers some of the other awesomeness that happened to him. Though I must admit the novel lacked in shoulderpads and some of the other...bad parts...of the 80s.

Writing wise...you aren't going to be wowed. It's extremely didactic, the characters and plot go as you expect them to. "Ready Player One" lightly touches on some issues like over-population, corporation control, and internet alter-egos, but all of it is only the merest touch before we get back to all the "War Games" and "Monty Python" quotes. Boy might also get girl...or maybe boy might also get 40-year-old guy living in mother's basement as the joke is told and retold.

Don't expect high art; read fast and don't look behind you, Don't Panic, and you'll probably have a good time with this one.

Three and a half stars.