Here I am for my annual return. This has actually been my least booky year in ages, as in 2023 the demands of my lovely zine Mythaxis added six-hundred and seventy short stories to my virtual bedside table. That would probably be enough nightly reading for a year if they’d arrived in ones and twos, but they were delivered in just three devestating blows to my regular reading life and/or sanity, demanding extensive recuperation. I wouldn’t change a thing, though – now onto the novels that helped me recover!
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My top ten “new” reads of 2022
Welcome to the end, again, again—strange to me that I only post once a year on this blog now, and yet this duty seems to come around faster and faster… meh, expect more old man observations as I close ever in on my personal half century. Sixty reads consumed in 2022, along with five-hundred and ninety-three short stories for Mythaxis Magazine, which published twenty-eight more of the best to hit my desk (as well as delving into how artificial intelligence is going to make me obsolete).
I plan to shake the zine up in the new year with some exciting new features, but in the meantime here’s my rundown of my ten favourite books of this year (though actually it’s more like thirty-eight, because I shamelessly cheat (and that’s not even including the also-rans)). Presented in their order of completion, rather than any ranking of quality. Happy reading! I was.
My top ten “new” reads of 2021
Welcome to the start of another one—year, or best of list? Why not both? In 2021 I gobbled down forty-three novels or non-fiction books, and (in my capacity as speculative fiction magazine editor) six-hundred and seventy-four scifi, fantasy and horror short stories (file under “exhausting, but rewarding”). You can find out which of those I liked most by checking out Mythaxis Magazine at the link, but for some book-length recommended reading in your new year, look no further!
The Cartesian Theatre 