I’m very fond of animal tales. Sometimes you can tell a story featuring non-human characters that just wouldn’t work with regular people. Check out my full essay at AESciFi.
Author Archives: J.J.S. Boyce
Book Review: The Ballad of Danny Wolfe
The Ballad of Danny Wolfe is very much a Prairie story, and understanding Wolfe, IP, and Indigenous street gangs in general means understanding the West, particular Manitoba and Saskatchewan: our small towns, life on “the Rez”, the history of colonialism and residential schools, modern racial tensions, and the unique way these cultural strands all play out in Winnipeg’s core, IP’s birthplace.
Read my full review at the Winnipeg Free Press.
Catching Up On Fiction Reviews
Here are five from this past year, all at the Free Press:
Catching Up On Non-Fiction Book Reviews
Here are two of the reviews I’ve done at the Winnipeg Free Press this past year:
Book Review: The Affinities
Wilson imagines how a series of neurological, psychological and physiological tests might determine a sort of modern-day Zodiac, sorting humankind into “affinities” based on their deepest truest selves. Early on, he makes the point that the families we’re born into might be arbitrary, but he does suggest that being loved because you’re part of the same affinity with someone rather than because of a shared genetic lineage comes with its own problems.
Read the full review at AE.
Utopian Science Fiction
I forgot to post about this short essay that ran on AE last spring. I take a tour of alternate societies from Jo Walton’s version of Plato’s Republic, Robert J. Sawyer’s Neanderthal society in a parallel universe, and the Big Three on human society in the next few centuries, millennia, or even eons.
Back to School, Belatedly
Well, time for some updates. I’ve still been writing, just not here. For this September past I penned a little essay for AE, appropriately, on education-themed science fiction. Perhaps just as appropriate a topic as the school year draws to a close.
You’ll notice my opening paragraph refers to the proverbial cocktail party. Often, when a person is going to pontificate on their career, and especially public perceptions thereof, they start off with, “When I meet people at cocktail parties . . .” I don’t actually go to a lot of cocktail parties, but in fine speculative as well as Einsteinian tradition: assume a perfectly spherical cocktail party. . . .
No, I’m half-kidding. But really, if I’m at the proverbial cocktail party, or some near analogue (gas-station nacho bar), and introduce myself as a teacher, I really do find it gets people talking. But I’m more interested in the deep thinking of smart writers on the topic than your typical non-educators. Thus, the essay. Please read it here.
Two Reviews
Long time, no update. I came down with something over the holidays, but I have had a couple reviews go up anyway. I reviewed the novel, Head Full of Mountains, and the anthology, Carbide Tipped Pens, both at AE. More to come but I’ll leave it at that for now.
Book Review: The Three Body Problem
As time goes by and I keep thinking about the ideas in this novel, I’m increasingly convinced that Three Body Problem will go down in science fiction history as one of the all-time great works. This novels asks some of the deepest questions there are in science, and in a compelling and imaginative way.
No quote from the review this time. I just wanted to give my heartfelt recommendation for this work. You can read my (perhaps understated) review at the WFP.
Book Review: Fractured
An apocalyptic anthology? And just in time for Halloween! See my review at AE. And in other news, I’m on the masthead now.