Staffer’s Book Review Book Tree Contest

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from us at Adventures in Scifi Publishing. I’ll make another post in the New Year about our podcast and website plans for 2014, but for now, I thought I’d share my entry into Staffer’s Book Review Book Tree Contest.

The contest is hosted by Angry Robot Books, Justin Landon (book reviewer for Staffer’s Book Review) and Wesley Chu (Angry Robot Books author of Lives of Tao and Deaths of Tao). Here are the details for entry as given by Justin’s post:

Contest Rules

• Build a book tree out of…. books. Decorate it however you like with whatever holiday themed decorations are appropriate for you and yours.
• Email me a picture of your tree (justin@staffersbookreview.com) or post a link in the comments. I’ll update this post with photos as I receive them.
• Winner to be chosen by a committee of Wesley Chu and me based on awesomeness. Size is important, but not the defining factor. Bonus points will be given for shameful promotion of Angry Robot, Strange Chemistry, Chu’s books in particular, or me (but not required, sadly).
• Contest open to people everywhere, excluding Antarctica. Penguins. Yuck.
• Entries must be submitted by January 6, 2014.

Prizes (because who cares about anything else!)

Grand Prize Winner: A sexy and diverse selection of Angry Robot Books direct from the publisher. They refuse to tell me what’s in it because I might rig the contest for “a complete stanger” who happens to live at my house. I’m also going to throw something awesome from the dealers room at ConFusion signed by every author I can find at the convention.

Second Prize Winner: SECRET PRIZE PACK. Yeah. It’s a secret. It’s something I’m cooking up in my book lab full of stuff publishers send me. Some of it might be signed. Some might be early advanced copies. Some of it might be terrible, that’s why it’s a secret. But, you want it. Probably. (This prize is limited to folks in the US because I haven’t figured out how to make gobs of money with this blog. You’re stunned, I know.)

Third Prize Winner: Two Angry Robot Book and/or Strange Chemistry titles. Hand picked by Wesley and I, because we love you.

What’s in my book tree:

First off, my penguin waves to Justin with Christmas grace for his comment on Antarctica. Penguins rock. I’d like to take a moment to link you to some of the books in my tree because they are some of my favorites. I’d have more Angry Robot titles in there, but they’re on my ereader. If I win this contest, I’m really hoping Mike Shevdon‘s Courts of the Feyre series will be included, hint hint, it’s one of my favorites.

Still Life by Michael Montoure – Vampire Horror written in the poetic grace of one of my favorite indie authors, Michael “Mind-Bomb” Montoure. I gave him that nickname because his short stories are also among my favorite for how they consistently surprise me with worldbuilding and emotional wallups. (My review).

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline – I listened to the audiobook narrated by Wil Wheaton, thanks to Jason Hough’s recommendation. I also highly recommend consuming this book this way. This is the story of a young man’s adventure through a Worlds of Warcraft type game to keep an evil corporation from ruining the game. The 80’s pop culture references were older than my music and video game experiences, but it was still a fun book with a surprisingly emotional conclusion. (My review).

Fiend by Peter Stenson – In the running for best book of 2013, which I’ll announce after the new year. A zombie book, sure, but one that I couldn’t put down and which ended with an emotional gut-punch. The idea of meth addicts being the only survivors of a zombie apocalypse was also surprisingly entertaining, but best of all were the love story and journey through addiction and self doubt. Deeply moving tale. I hope Peter has a long career, because that was exactly the kind of excitement I want from a book. (My review and podcast interview).

No Return by Zachary Jernigan – His debut novel reads like someone who’s been writing in secret for a decade. Sure, the sexual aspect is not for some (I barely made it through and only by skimming), but his progressive character building and world creation made the prude reader in me stick along and grateful for the ride. No pun intended, though I do love Zack. (My review and podcast interview).

The Machine by James Smythe – A modern day Frankenstein by one of my favorite Science Fiction authors. This one wasn’t as unrelenting as The Explorer, but the slow burn is worth it for a Horror that takes its time to slowly unravel the character’s sanity. Her goal is to fix her husband after a device meant to fix his PTSD leaves him a vegetable. The warnings about trying the device on her own are well-founded. (My review and SF Signal interview).

Dragons of Autumn Twilight: Chronicles, Volume One (Dragonlance Chronicles) by Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weiss – One of the transformative books in turning me into a genre fiction fan. I’ve always loved reading (Where the Wild Things Are, R.L. Stine, and Stephen King were my earlier reads), but this was the first book that made me not care about anything else, and I was on an exciting vacation when I found it. Something has happened to my love of Epic Fantasy since, (I haven’t really craved it in years), and I have a hard time reading Hickman and Weiss now that I’m older and don’t like choking on adverbs, but at the time, this book was my all-time fave.

The Craft of Writing Science Fiction that Sells by Ben Bova – The book that clicked on the lightbulb of how to create a character arc for me as a seat-of-the-pants writer.

The Iron Wolves: Book 1 of The Rage of Kings by Andy Remic – You know what, I’m about done with this list, and this book is the reason why. I would much rather be reading this. I’m 35% in and am very impressed with Remic’s ability to create characters I care about while keeping the action exciting and horrific. There is a lot of potential in the world he’s building, both because of his fascinating cast of characters and the sides that are being established in the soon-to-explode war. The Iron Wolves comes out Dec. 31, and I’d like to have a glowing review for you by then.

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Timothy C. Ward
Executive Producer

Timothy C. Ward has been podcasting since 2010, first as AudioTim, and now with AISFP. His first publication, Cornhusker: Demon Gene (A Short Story), is available on Kindle for $.99. His novel in progress, Kaimerus, is described as “Firefly crashes on Avatar and wakes up 28 Days Later.”

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