Matthew's Journal

Hemlock & Silver, T. Kingfisher

Wed, 14 Oct 2026 13:44:06 GMT

This is a story inspired by Snow White (or at least some elements of that story); our point of view character is Anja, a poisons specialist who is tasked by the king with finding out who (if anyone) could be poisoning his daughter Snow. Anja remains determinedly rational in the face of events that might suggest supernatural goings-on, even a talking cat...

I really enjoyed this, it's witty and sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, the plot is pleasingly twisty, and the setting and characters are well realised.

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Shroud, Adrian Tchaikovsky

Thu, 20 Aug 2026 10:32:16 GMT

This was the last of the Hugo Novels, which the library system finally got to sending me an ebook of.

I feel like a bad SF fan for saying this, given all the rave reviews, but I hated this. While I did like the final section, it felt a bit inevitable, and the journey to get there was a complete slog. I understand that it was meant to be a slog for the characters, but it was also a slog for me. I found the narrator's habit of adding "of course, it was about to get much worse" all the time extremely grating, and I guess I couldn't suspend disbelief enough that ( spoiler ), so there was a lot of "oh just get on with it already".

Similarly, whilst it's a cool idea to have sections narrated by the Shrouded, somehow the sections where both parties narrated the same events from their different points of view ended up reminding me of the romance trope where you just want both parties to have a grown-up conversation already. Or at least, I ended up feeling that way.

Shroud has things to say about colonization, capitalism, and how systems feel inevitable if you've grown up within them; and the final section of the book was more enjoyable. But I can't recommend it at all.

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Platform Decay, Martha Wells

Tue, 11 Aug 2026 17:35:23 GMT

This is the latest Murderbot novella, in which Murderbot is on a rescue mission along with Three. As you would expect from this series, things do not go entirely to plan.

This is a lot of fun, and I still really enjoy Murderbot's narrative voice. It doesn't really do anything new, though.

I imagine this will be on the 2027 Hugo Shortlist, hence my writing my brief thoughts down now :)

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Hugo votes: Novel, Novella, Dramatic Presentation, Long Form

Sat, 08 Aug 2026 14:39:58 GMT

I've reviewed the novels, novellas, and films, but didn't get round to ranking them until yesterday, the day before the voting deadline. So, here's how I voted:

Best Novel

A Drop of Corruption
The Everlasting
The Incandescent
The Raven Scholar
Death of the Author

Best Novella

The River Has Roots
Cinder House
What Stalks the Deep
The Summer War
Automatic Noodle
Murder by Memory

Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form

Sinners
KPop Demon Hunters
Frankenstein
Superman
Mickey 17

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Hugo short stories

Thu, 06 Aug 2026 17:48:44 GMT

I think this is the last category I'm going to be able to read before the voting deadline; again I'll try and say something non-spoilery about them all.

Six People to Revise You by J.R. Dawson. I read this when it came out on a recommendation, and I still think it's great - about how we see ourselves and how others see us.
10 Visions of the Future; or, Self-Care for the End of Days by Samantha Mills. As end-of-the-world stories go, this one manages to be somewhat hopeful.
Laser Eyes Ain’t Everything by Effie Seiberg. A rightfully-angry comment on accessibility.
Wire Mother by Isabel J. Kim. In the future, not being able to relate to AIs could be a problem…
In My Country by Thomas Ha. An odd tale of authoritarianism and how it might be resisted.
Missing Helen by Tia Tashiro. A very human story.

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Hugo novelettes

Wed, 05 Aug 2026 16:49:41 GMT

I've read these; it's hard to say much about them without spoilers, so here's a voting order and a brief note about each:

When He Calls Your Name by Catherynne M. Valente. A nice blend of a song and a horror genre.
Rapport: Friendship, Solidarity, Communion, Empathy by Martha Wells. I love a Murderbot story, although this one's a bit pedestrian.
Never Eaten Vegetables by H.H. Pak. A generation ship has gone awry in a corporate dystopia.
The Millay Illusion by Sarah Pinsker. I see why the illusion isn't revealed, but that leaves this a bit unsatisfactory.
The Girl That My Mother Is Leaving Me For by Cameron Reed. I wanted to like this, but it felt a bit heavy-handed.
Kaiju Agonistes by Scott Lynch. Even more heavy-handed than the titular Kaiju.

I found these a difficult set to rank, without any stand-out winners.

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The second three Hugo Novellas

Sun, 02 Aug 2026 11:44:59 GMT

Again, in order of reading:

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz is a post-apocalyptic story where some robots are trying to survive after the restaurant that they worked for went bust. It's a pleasant read despite the setting, and while the comments about capitalism and prejudice are well-aimed, it's quite cozy in tone. Enjoyable, but not one to write home about.

The Summer War by Naomi Novik. I've really enjoyed some of Novik's fairy-tale retellings, but this one took a while to get going. While I really enjoyed the final third or so, I somehow didn't find myself especially caring about the fates of many of the characters.

Cinder House by Freya Marske. This is another fair-tale reworking, but it would be quite a spoiler to say which. This goes in a couple of directions I wasn't entirely expecting, and I liked our protagonist. I also felt the final quarter or so was the strongest part of this, and it had a very satisfactory ending.

[I'm still hoping to get through the rest of the short fiction before the voting deadline...]

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3 Hugo novellas

Wed, 29 Jul 2026 19:50:16 GMT

First in reading order, What Stalks the Deep by T. Kingfisher. This is a follow-on from What Moves the Dead and What Feasts at Night, and is loosely inspired by Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness. Alex Easton (the same narrator as before) is summoned to West Virginia, where someone has vanished, and there are reports of weird goings-on in an abandoned coal mine. I liked how past trauma informs the actions of the protagonists in different ways, the genuinely creepy things that are found, and how those are handled, and the sense of mystery.

Second, I read The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar. I wasn't initially sure I was going to like it, with the grammar/magic system seeming a little abstract, but actually it really drew me in, and this is a beautiful and tragic story (I cried a lot in places), based in part on a folk song but taking it in a new and interesting directions. A stand-out story for me, and I'd highly recommend it.

Third, Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite. This is a murder mystery set on a generation ship. It's a cozy mystery and nicely put together. I really enjoyed it, but I'm not sure it's award-winning material.

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The Everlasting, Alix E. Harrow

Sat, 11 Jul 2026 19:38:45 GMT

I seem to have read a few books recently with ( a particular plot device ), all of which have to deal with ( an issue with that plot device ). I think The Everlasting does this pretty well. That combined with a pleasing narrative voice (or two) made this a very enjoyable read for me.

Thematically, it talks about how we tell stories about ourselves and others, and how those stories get changed or distorted for noble or malign reasons. A plus point is a canonically bisexual character (where their sexuality isn't a big deal) :)

I don't currently have access to a copy of Shroud, the final novel on the shortlist; I've not much got on with Adrian Tchaikovsky's books before, so I'm not sure if I'm going to try and get to it before the voting deadline (e.g. the local library's ebook version isn't available until after the deadline)...

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A couple of overdue Hugo reviews

Wed, 24 Jun 2026 19:42:11 GMT

I've been meaning to write these for a couple of weeks, so they're going to be a bit short and rubbish now. Better late than never...

I've watched the last of the films, which was Superman. It's fun in a mostly-standard-superhero film kind of way, but I thought the way it raised the "hang on, is having powerful vigilantes beating people up without any sort of due process of law actually good?" question and didn't satisfactorily resolve it was a bit poor - part of the suspension of disbelief in this genre is that you don't question that Superman beating the baddies is a good thing. And the plot-critical rift was left open for a very long time...

Death of the Author, by Nnedi Okorafor was an unusual book for me in that I liked where it ended up but found it a bit of a struggle to get there. I did like the interleaved narratives, and the ideas about story and AI, as well as what it's like to be well-known and on the internet. But I found Zelunjo Onyenezi-Onyedele too vexing a character to spend so much time with. So while it's an interesting book with a satisfying conclusion, I'm not sure I'd entirely recommend it as a fun read.

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Mickey 17

Thu, 04 Jun 2026 10:26:48 GMT

Mickey Barnes and Timo join an expedition to the planet Niflheim, hoping to outrun a murderous loan-shark. The hapless Mickey signs up as an "Expendable", not realising this means he will have his memories uploaded to a computer and then be made to do all sorts of hazardous work, getting cloned/printed afresh every time he dies. He rapidly makes his way up to Mickey 17 before being abandoned in an ice ravine...

The expedition is led by a feeble but egotistical white supremacist whose followers (who make up a sizeable chunk of the expedition crew) wear red hats; and that is about as subtle as the politics of this film gets. It has a number of Points To Make, and it does so with some vigour.

A bunch of the plot doesn't hold up if you look at it hard ( spoilers ), and sometimes the plot was deeply predictable ( spoilers ). There were bits that were too cringey for me, but I have abnormally low tolerance for cringe.

But I think my main problem with Mickey 17 was that I didn't find myself caring about the plot very much - something about the whole thing kept breaking my suspension of disbelief, and I found myself thinking "this is a very silly movie" rather than getting caught up in what was happening. Possibly because too many of the characters' choices seemed inexplicable? Anyhow, my least liked of the Hugo films this year so far (and there's only 1 left).

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Sinners

Mon, 25 May 2026 13:59:48 GMT

The introduction to Sinners tells us that various folk traditions (including the Choctaw) hold that some people are born with the ability to make music so true that it pierces the veil between life and death, conjuring spirits from the past and future; whilst it can bring healing, it can also attract evil. For the first half or so of the film, we are left unclear if this is a metaphor about the power of music or to be understood as a supernatural phenomenon.( mild spoilers, nothing the trailer won't show you )

Music is certainly central to Sinners, and I particularly liked how the different strands of music from different backgrounds were woven together; and the juke joint scene that has done the rounds on the internet is indeed a fine moment. I'm not sure the Choctaw elements were quite fully fleshed out, and some of the characters were maybe under-developed, but it's still a very enjoyable story.

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The Incandescent, Emily Tesh

Sat, 16 May 2026 14:48:26 GMT

There have been a number of magic school books in recent years; in The Incandescent, we largely follow events at Chetwood School through the eyes of Dr Walden, Director of Magic. She is an expert magician, and clearly an effective teacher, if a little weak on the pastoral front. And the fact that she is back as a staff member at what was once her own secondary school is definitely not a sign that's she's not moved on from what happened when she was a student there...

I enjoyed the way magic was woven into an English boarding school, and how nicely Tesh captures (and satirizes) the nature of institutional life. I like a competent protagonist, too, and Dr Walden is very competent, and pleasingly keen on the merits of education. I almost (but not quite) always understood the choices she was making. The plot works well, and throws up some surprises, but comes together pretty well in the end; although the motivation for Mark's behaviour is never really explained (nor is why we the readers are more aware of the red flags than Dr Walden is). I also appreciated the exploration of the ethics of demons and how magicians interact with them.

I enjoyed this a lot.

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The Raven Scholar, Antonia Hodgson

Fri, 08 May 2026 15:57:48 GMT

This is the first of a trilogy, set in Orrun, a fantasy world where people tend to associate with one of 8 (demi-)gods, one of which is the Raven. We see much (but not all) of the action through the eyes of Neema, the Raven Scholar of the title. Hodgson has written murder mysteries before, and it's not entirely surprising then that Neema ends up tasked with investigating a murder.

It's not, though, primarily a murder mystery - that's just one of the things that's driving a pretty twisty plot; and while I spotted some of the plot points coming, it's a cleverly written book that keeps you guessing and only a couple of times did the plot twist feel entirely like it was "cheating". There's a range of interesting characters (although some of them didn't get fleshed out enough to really make an impression), although not all of their behaviour entirely makes sense with hindsight. Without spoiling anything, events of the first part made me reluctant to invest in some of the primary characters in the subsequent book.

Being the first of a trilogy, it ends rather in the middle of things, which is a bit disappointing (if unsurprising). While I enjoyed it, I don't think I'll be seeking out the second book until the trilogy is completed.

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My 2025 Hugo Votes

Sun, 26 Apr 2026 19:55:04 GMT

The announcement of the 2026 Hugo shortlist reminded me I never posted about how I voted for the 2025 awards. I'm afraid it's now too late to add any reviews beyond what I wrote at the time, but here is how I ranked the finalists (the winning entry in bold):

Best Novel

The Tainted Cup
A Sorceress Comes to Call
Someone You Can Build a Nest In
The Ministry of Time
Alien Clay
Service Model

Best Novella

The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain
The Butcher of the Forest
The Tusks of Extinction
What Feasts at Night
The Brides of High Hill
Navigational Entanglements

Best Novelette

The Four Sisters Overlooking the Sea
By Salt, By Sea, By Light of Stars
Loneliness Universe
Lake of Souls
Signs of Life
The Brotherhood of Montague St. Video

Best Short Story

Stitched to Skin Like Family Is
Marginalia
Why Don't We Just Kill the Kid in the Omelas Hole
We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read
Three Faces of a Beheading
Five Views of the Planet Tartarus

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Books from recent travels

Thu, 05 Feb 2026 14:05:30 GMT

Three books I've read recently. First is A Drop of Corruption, the sequel to The Tainted Cup, which I really liked. I also really enjoyed A Drop of Corruption; like the previous book it's a great page-turner with a twisty mystery plot, with a well-drawn world and some interesting themes (particularly around governance and social institutions). Recommended, but read The Tainted Cup first. Eligible for the 2026 Hugos, I think.

Second, I've had A Half-Built Garden on my Kobo for a while, and finally got round to reading it. It's a near-future first contact novel, although for the aliens its not their first contact. There's a lot here about how we treat our environment and govern ourselves, as well as how we've used sci-fi to imagine alternative futures. I thought this book rewarded having long periods of time to approach it in; it needs thoughtful reading.

Finally, Nordic Visions, subtitled "The best of Nordic speculative fiction", edited by Margrét Helgadóttir. A selection of short stories from (in order) Sweden, Denmark, The Faroe Islands, Iceland, Norway, and Finland. These stories are mostly from the horror/fantasy part of speculative fiction, and some of the horror is pretty dark. As with any such selection, it's a bit of a mixed bag, but there are some very strong stories in here; I think the opening She was particularly effective, and I enjoyed the Kalevala story The Wings that Slice the Sky.

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What is a person?

Sat, 25 Oct 2025 14:18:32 GMT

The second chapter of our book group book (Rowan Williams' Being Human) is "What is a person?"

He starts by paraphrasing a slightly obscure[0] essay by Vladimir Lossky, who, he says, declares that we lack good vocabulary to distinguish between something that is simply one unique instance of its kind, and the quality (whatever it is) that makes a conscious thing of this kind irreducible to its nature.

The point he's making, I think, is that there is something more to being a person than simply being an example of a kind of thing. He's saying that there is something about us as a whole that isn't captured simply by listing facts that happen to be true about us. He then quotes Lossky at more length:

Under these conditions, it will be impossible for us to form a concept of the human person, and we will have to content ourselves with saying: “person” signifies the irreducibility of man to his nature— “irreducibility” and not “something irreducible” or “something which makes man irreducible to his nature” precisely because it cannot be a question here of “something” distinct from “another nature” but of someone who is distinct from his own nature, of someone who goes beyond his nature while still containing it, who makes it exist as human nature by this overstepping [of it].

Williams then goes on to talk about how people are shaped by the web of relationships they are part of and influence "A person, in other words, is the point at which relationships intersect, where a difference may be made and new relations created." He asserts that this (at least to Christians) is a mystery that applies to each and every human individual, and that from this it follows that the same kind of reverence or attention is due to all of them (regardless of any of the features of people that result in their marginalisation).

This is all well and good, and I'm sympathetic to the desire to avoid the "meet this set of criteria to be a person" approach that can come out of debates as to what it means to be a person. And from a Christian point of view, the idea that all people are first of all in relation to God before they are in relation to anyone or anything else; and thus that we must bear that in mind in all our doings with other people is useful (and very traditional).

But it doesn't seem to me to be actually answering the question of "What is a person?" Rather like the idea (I think from Zen & the art of motorcycle maintenance) that everyone knows what "quality" is, but most people would struggle to define it; fine for the day-to-day, but not a very satisfactory answer to the question posed. Williams at least half admits this, saying later in the chapter that it's only a theological perspective that makes sense of the idea of personhood "But what I'm really suggesting is that when it comes to personal reality the language of theology is possibly the only way to speak well of our sense of who we are and what our humanity is like — to speak well of ourselves as expecting relationship, as expecting difference, as expecting death [...]" But how to talk about personhood to people who reject any sort of theological worldview?

Williams notes that Science Fiction has from time to time looked at this question of personhood - when encountering an alien or a cyborg, how do you decide to accord the status of person to this other being? He concludes that the answer is that "At the end of the day, we can say this is something we could discover only by taking time and seeing if a relationship could be built." That still seems unsatisfactory to me, not least in the age of generative AI systems[1] that produce plausible-sounding answers to any question and with whom at least some people seem to convince themselves they've had a relationship.

Is there a useful way of answering the question "What is a person?" without relying on a theological worldview or having the sort of argument that concludes that some humans are less people than others?

[0] e.g. the WP article doesn't mention it at all. But then Williams did his thesis on Lossky. The article "The Theological Notion of the Human Person" is online
[1] which are stochastic models of "what would an answer to this question likely sound like", and I am axiomatically going to declare as neither conscious nor persons

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I Saw The TV Glow

Sat, 06 Sep 2025 19:53:52 GMT

This is the last of this year's Hugo Award shortlist for dramatic presentation long form. It's very strange. Owen and Maddy are disaffected teenagers who bond over their obsession with The Pink Opaque. How much of it is warping their perception of reality or actually warping reality is left unanswered; the whole film proceeds at a very slow pace, and that plus the occasional breaking of the fourth wall give it a dreamlike or nightmareish quality. I think it is talking about fandom, queerness, and gender, but I didn't really get it. And the end was a damp squib.

I didn't vote in this category, but if I had I think I would have ranked Flow first; it came second behind Dune.

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More Hugo Films: Dune, The Wild Robot

Sun, 10 Aug 2025 19:10:04 GMT

It's past the voting deadline, and I didn't vote in the dramatic presentation long form category, but I'm still trying to watch the shortlisted films.

I'd not seen Dune part one, so watched that and then part two (which was on the shortlist this year). It's one book turned into two lengthy films, and part two has a rubbish ending - we get no sense of Paul becoming Emperor as any kind of triumph before it's undermined by the immediate start of the next war. They are both grand spectacles, but their pacing is odd - at times it seems to be dragging and then key events are rather rushed over (so you're left not really quite understanding what happened without resorting to plot summaries after the fact). And the racial politics have dated poorly, shall we say? And I don't think the whole sandworm ecosystem is even vaguely plausible. But there's some great scheming and some interesting characters (albeit that a lot of the villains are entirely 2-dimensional).

The Wild Robot is an altogether different film, very heavy-handed with its messaging and happy to tug on the heart-strings. The plot doesn't really stand up to scrutiny (robot has access to all human knowledge, but doesn't know how geese swim? etc.), but it's well-animated and has lots of fun moments. And despite being the film of the first book of a trilogy, it actually has a decent ending! But I really struggled to suspend my disbelief because the plot is so full of holes.

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Next Chancellor of the University of Cambridge

Wed, 09 Jul 2025 09:32:03 GMT

It's time to vote for the next Chancellor (previously); I've looked at the candidates and their statements, but still don't have an obvious-to-me choice of who to vote for.

When I asked on mastodon, I got two responses (one for Sandi Toksvig, one for her or Gina Miller); FB has shown me one friend saying that Chris Smith is "a nice bloke, but also the only candidate worth of the role"; and I've been sent this from someone who evidently doesn't share my general political view (though I'm inclined to agree that being the author of tuition fees probably rules John Browne out).

I can see why people might think Wyn Evans is a good option, but his proposals seem to me more the sort of thing you'd expect the vice-chancellor to do, rather than the chancellor who is not really involved in the running of the university directly.

I'm currently inclined to put Sandi Toksvig first; I'm sure she'd be great at the schmoozing-major-donors thing, but also at engaging with staff & students and advocating for the University.

I'm planning to vote in person on Saturday...

[this post is public, I am screening comments by anyone not already on my DW access list, will unscreen if I think they're making a useful contribution]

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Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

Thu, 03 Jul 2025 17:52:29 GMT

This is a prequel to Mad Max: Fury Road, and provides the backstory for Imperator Furiosa in that film. So here we see her life from a child in one of the remaining green places to the Imperator we meet in Fury Road.

Aside from the opening, this film is very much in the orange-and-black dieselpunk post-apocalyptic vein of Fury Road. There's a lot of high-speed chase-come-fight sequences, which are quite the spectacle, a fair amount of bloody violence, and some quirky funny moments (especially from Chris Hemsworth as Dementus), which provide a little comic relief.

Furiosa doesn't let off full throttle very often, so this is not one to watch for interesting ideas or a nuanced plot. But if you can avoid thinking too hard about how plausible it all is (or isn't), it is pretty entertaining.

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Wicked (2024 film)

Mon, 30 Jun 2025 15:37:54 GMT

This is the first in a two-part adaptation of the musical of the book (which is in turn a re-interpretation of The Wizard of Oz investigating the Wicked Witch of the West's backstory). It's a very long time since I saw The Wizard of Oz, and I've not read the Wicked book nor seen the musical. ( review, with spoilers )

The songs are reasonable (though none of them have stuck in my head), the leads are very good, and it's very pretty. And I was pleased to recognise Peter Dinklage by his voice :) But I don't think I'd recommend it as a film.

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Starting on the 2025 Hugo Shortlist

Sun, 25 May 2025 19:04:14 GMT

I've consumed two things from the 2025 Hugo Award shortlist recently. They're Quite Different.

The first was The Tainted Cup, by Robert Jackson Bennett. I loved this; it's a crime thriller set in a fantasy world, where The Empire exists to keep its people safe from Leviathans. It has a lot of what you'd expect from the crime genre; whilst a couple of times that meant that I spotted the plot twist or reveal coming, there was still plenty here to keep me guessing (and turning the pages). It also talks about power and money (and how those with both can often keep clear of the law), and perhaps something about how we treat those who aren't the same as ourselves. There are some quite gruesome bits. I have a suspicion that there may be a sequel or two, which I look forward to reading :)

Flow is an animated film without any dialogue. After some apocalypse that has removed all of humanity, a flood comes, and a little cat (our point-of-view character) is nearly swept away. Over time it meets and befriends some other animals, and they have adventures together. This is not a plot-driven film, and I think works better if thought of as a poem in cinematic form. There are moments of very authentical animal behaviour, and also some rather less plausible ones (like animals being able to operate a tiller). I would have liked to have seen this on a big screen, I think.

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Trans-Galactic Bike Ride

Wed, 13 Nov 2024 18:24:45 GMT

This book is subtitled "Feminist bicycle science fiction stories of transgender and nonbinary adventurers", and that's a pretty good summary of the contents. The stories are delightful, and capture some truths about the experience of riding a bike as well as trans & non-binary representation. They're fun stories, but also thought-provoking, and generally at least somewhat optimistic. I enjoyed them a lot.

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Raven Black / Shetland

Sat, 26 Oct 2024 16:46:58 GMT

I've recently been watching Shetland on iPlayer. It's a pretty good crime series set on Shetland. After a bit of a wait, I got Raven Black, the first of the books on which the series is based, from the library.

It's not the first novel to be adapted (they did Red Bones, the third book, first), so it's possible some of the changes relate to events that will happen later in book-canon, but I was quite surprised at how different the book and TV were. The main plot is quite similar (in terms of who killed whom and why), but there are changes even then (Magnus Bain's involvement in historic events, particularly), but there are number of quite significant changes to characters - Tosh doesn't appear at all, and book-Cassie is a young girl still living with her mother, whilst Perez is significantly less sympathetic (in particular around his opinions on Sandy). And the solution in the book seems quite rabbit-from-a-hat, even when I knew who the killer was in advance.

I am undecided if I want to try and read more of the books by Ann Cleeves, but it was certainly interesting to read Raven Black (and unusual for me to be coming to the book-canon second rather than first).

ETA: There's a short film Alison O'Donnell Remembers: Shetland where the actor who plays Tosh talks about how and why the character was developed for the TV adaptation.

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