After reminding listeners that the deadline for Hugo nominations is fast approaching on March 15 (and reminding them once again of the eligibility of this podcast for Best Fancast and of Jonathan for Best Editor, Short Form), we move on to the much-discussed, record-setting Brandon Sanderson Kickstarter, and the question of whether it really matters to anyone other than Sanderson and his readers. Acknowledging that Sanderson readers are fully likely to get exactly what they are expecting, this led us into a brief discussion of reader expectations, also the topic of a recent essay by Molly Templeton on Tor.com. While occasionally we come across a book with almost no prior knowledge or publicity, most books come with expectations based on the author’s previous work, or even the publisher’s reputation.

Some of the authors discussed here, and some that Jonathan and Gary are currently reading or expecting to read, include Guy Gavriel Kay, R.F. Kuang, Kelly Barnhill, Nghi Vo, John Crowley, and Karen Joy Fowler. At the end, we touch briefly upon the question of history in fiction, and the different strategies of using entirely fictional characters, almost entirely historical figures, or a mixture of both.

This week, in our more-or-less annual discussion of the Locus Recommended Reading List, we are delighted to be joined by Locus Editor-in-Chief Liza Groen Trombi.

We talk about the purpose of the list, how it has changed over the years, how books or stories get on the list, and a few thorny questions about how to decide whether a novel is SF or fantasy if it contains substantial elements of both. In addition to mentioning some of our own favourite works of the year, we touch upon the importance of the First Novels list, which might be a harbinger of what’s to come, and how story collections and YA novels have grown in importance over the years.

Toward the end, we pay a brief tribute to two Locus Magazine pioneers, reviewer Faren Miller (who was also the magazine’s first full-time employee), and bibliographer William G. Contento, who helped establish resources that remain crucial to anyone interested in the SFF field.

This week (episode 3 of season 13) we return to our tradition of almost entirely unstructured rambling. Jonathan and Gary consider such questions as to whether a novel can be good SF, but not much good in literary terms, or a good literary novel not much good as SF.

While we recognize that many popular subgenres, from military SF to heroic fantasy, have plenty of readers loyal to the old traditions, we muse about whether many of today’s writers feel some pressure to meet both traditional literary and SF standards, and Jonathan namechecks R.F. Kuang. Some writers we mention, such as Arkady Martine, seem to effortlessly do both. On the other hand, why were several genre mystery readers of the 1930s and 1940s, like Hammett and Chandler, were later recognized as major literary figures, the same didn’t seem to have to SF writers of the same period.

Toward the end, we touch upon Paul Kincaid’s provocative new essay, “A Taxonomy of Reviewing” and his book on Brian W. Aldiss, amongst other things.

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode.

This week Jonathan and Gary are back, a little early, to talk about the annual science fiction calendar, the awards season, how there are so many awards, what books they’re reading, and what books they’ve worked on. Oh, and for a short moment, they touch on movies and TV too.

All in all, episode two of season 13, sounds pretty much like most of the other episodes we’ve recorded over the past twelve years, so if they were your jam, this might be too.

As always, we hope you enjoy it and are very grateful to everyone for listening in…

Welcome to The Coode Street Podcast. With 2021 barely in the rearview mirror, it’s time to kick off season 13 with a brand new episode. A little over a month ago we sat down with James Bradley, Alix E. Harrow, and Ian Mond to discuss 2021: The Year in Review in Episode 568. At the end of that chat, we all said we’d back to discuss the books we’re looking forward to in 2022, and here we are!

This week we discuss 25 or so books that we are looking forward to or, maybe, have read already and can recommend that you check out (along with a few strays). Pre-order links are below. We also are clear we’ve definitely missed books we’ll end up loving.

As always, our sincere thanks to James, Alix, and Ian for making time to chat with us.  We hope you enjoy the episode and that you’ll see us again in a couple weeks.

JAMES

1. The Candy House, Jennifer Egan
2. To Paradise, Hanya Yanigihara
3. Goliath, Tochi Onyebuchi
4. Sea of Tranquility, Emily St John Mandel
5. A History of Dreams, Jane Rawson

ALIX

1. Siren Queen, Nghi Vo
2. Saint Death’s Daughter, C.S.E. Cooney
3. How High We Go in the Dark, Sequoia Nagamatsu
4. Nona the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir
5. Spear, Nicola Griffith

IAN

1. The This, Adam Roberts
2. Dark Breakers, C.S.E Cooney
3. The Last Blade Priest, Will Wiles
4. Booth, Karen Joy Fowler
5. Hard Places(1), Kirstyn McDermott

JONATHAN

1. The Original Bambi: The Story of a Life in the Forest, Felix Salten (trans. Jack Zipes)
2. Babel, or The Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution,  R.F. Kuang
3. The Landing, Mary Gentle
4. All the Seas of the World, Guy Gavriel Kay
5. Devil House, John Darnielle