Tales from Earthsea — Ursula K. Le Guin

Tales from Earthsea -- Ursula K. Le GuinEarthsea is probably the greatest fantasy series ever written.   I’ve yet to find better.

Available in the collection The Books of Earthsea

Dragonfly – 1998
Darkrose and Diamond – 1999
The Finder – 2001
The Bones of the Earth – 2001
On the High Marsh – 2001
A Description of Earthsea – 2001

Ursula’s Page

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Grafenwalder’s Bestiary — Alastair Reynolds

Grafenwalder's Bestiary -- Alastair ReynoldsThis one has call backs to A Spy in Europa, Diamond Dogs, and Chasm City, so if you missed reading any of those then you really need to go and read them first.

And it’s such a good short, like, really good.   The ending is brilliant.

Available in the collection, Galactic North.

And now, finally, at long last, we get onto the title work, Revelation Space.   Yes peoples, it’s finally the big books’ time to be read, so it may be a while between future reviews.

Alastair’s Page

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The Books of Earthsea — Ursula K. Le Guin

The Books of Earthsea -- Ursula K. Le GuinI’ve lost count of the amount of times i’ve read the original Earthsea stories, and now that we’ve got even more i’m sure i’ll read them countless times more.   Earthsea is very much the most probably greatest fantasy series ever written.   I’ve yet to find better.

Here’s an article in The Guardian… “David Mitchell on Earthsea – a rival to Tolkien and George RR Martin”.

The Word of Unbinding – 1964
The Rule of Names – 1964
A Wizard of Earthsea – 1968
The Tombs of Atuan – 1970
The Farthest Shore – 1972
Tehanu – 1990
Tales from Earthsea – 1998-2001
The Other Wind – 2001
The Daughter of Odren – 2014
Firelight – 2018

Ursula’s Page

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Turquoise Days — Alastair Reynolds

Turquoise Days -- Alastair ReynoldsIn this book we go off to the planet Turquoise, so named because it’s an ocean planet covered in turquoise oceans.

Within the oceans are the Pattern Jugglers that got a mention in Diamond Dogs, and in this book we get a much deeper introduction to them.

So yeah, a really enjoyable novella adding yet another alien layer onto the growing alien layers of the Revelation Space universe.

Available in the duology, Diamond Dogs, Turquoise Days.

And the next book in the series is Grafenwalder’s Bestiary.

Alastair’s Page

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The Last Log of the Lachrimosa — Alastair Reynolds

The Last Log of the Lachrimosa -- Alastair ReynoldsThe Lachrimosa is an Ultra vessel whose captain has bought some information which he believes will make him a lot of profit.   And so the ship ends up at a planet exploring a place the crew really don’t want to explore.

This has hints of the wars between the maggots and the machines that was mentioned in Chasm City, and it seems we’re getting info dumped for the big books at the end of the series.   Info dumping aside, it’s an enjoyable novella to whizz through in a day or so.

Available in the collection, Beyond the Aquila Rift.

This is folllowed by Turquoise Days.

Alastair’s Page

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