The Stacks
All book reviews
402 honest reviews across fiction, non-fiction, mystery, sci-fi, romance, and more.
Showing 241-264 of 402
The Curse of Chalion
by Lois McMaster Bujold
Lois McMaster Bujold's 2001 fantasy debut outside the Vorkosigan universe. A broken courtier in a Iberian-flavored fantasy kingdom, and a theology that actually works.
A Century of Noir : Thirty-Two Classic Crime Stories
by Max Allan Collins
Max Allan Collins and Mickey Spillane co-edit a century of noir. Curated with care and historical seriousness. A reference shelf in one volume.
T is for Trespass
by Sue Grafton
The 20th Kinsey Millhone. Sue Grafton writing the late-series novel that almost no one writes well. A neighbor's elderly father, a new nurse, and one of the best villains of the form.
A Place of Hiding
by Elizabeth George
An Elizabeth George Inspector Lynley novel set largely on Guernsey. The Channel Islands geography and the wartime history both get serious attention.
Earthly Delights
by Kerry Greenwood
The first Corinna Chapman mystery. Kerry Greenwood starting a second long-running series. Melbourne baker, found family, contemporary register.
Hell Gate
by Linda Fairstein
The 12th Alex Cooper mystery. Linda Fairstein at her most New-York-specific, with Hell Gate at the center and the geography doing real work.
Hard Truth
by Nevada Barr
The 13th Anna Pigeon mystery. Nevada Barr in Rocky Mountain National Park. Three girls survived a horror, and what they will not say is the case.
Eastern Standard Tribe
by Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow's second novel. Time-zone tribes, an asylum-committed protagonist, and a meditation on belonging in a globalized communication world.
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
by Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow's 2003 debut. Reputation economies, post-scarcity Disneyland, and one of the cleanest near-future SF visions of its decade.
Enchantment
by Orson Scott Card
Orson Scott Card's Russian fairy tale novel. A graduate student in Kiev finds an enchanted princess in a glade. Card outside Ender, and at his most enjoyable.
Paladin of Souls
by Lois McMaster Bujold
Bujold's 2003 Hugo and Nebula double. The middle Chalion book. A middle-aged widow becomes the unexpected vessel of a god. One of the great fantasy novels of its decade.
Falling Free
by Lois McMaster Bujold
Lois McMaster Bujold's 1988 Nebula winner. The Quaddies and Leo Graf. The first book of what became one of the great SF series.
Hostage
by Robert Crais
Robert Crais's 2001 standalone. A small-town California police chief, three teenagers in a wrong house, and a hostage situation that escalates into something else.
Demolition Angel
by Robert Crais
Robert Crais's 2000 standalone. A LAPD bomb squad detective with a damaged past and a serial bomber. One of the best police procedurals of its decade.
Suspect
by Robert Crais
Robert Crais's standalone with K-9 dog Maggie and ex-Marine handler Scott James. The book that broke me and most other Crais readers I know.
Ordeal by Innocence
by Agatha Christie
Christie's 1958 standalone. A man returns to a family two years after one of them was hanged for a murder he could have alibi'd. Bleak, careful, unusually adult.
Endless Night
by Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie's 1967 standalone. Her most modern and most genuinely unsettling novel. The book she said she wrote in six weeks.
Make Me
by Lee Child
The 20th Reacher novel. Lee Child in late-period form. A small Midwestern town named Mother's Rest and a missing private investigator.
Enough Rope
by Lawrence Block
Lawrence Block's collected short fiction. Eighty-plus stories. The case for Block as one of the most versatile American crime writers of his generation.
Bradbury Stories: 100 of His Most Celebrated Tales
by Ray Bradbury
The career-spanning Ray Bradbury short fiction selection. As close to a complete introduction as a single volume gets.
Dead Air
by Iain M. Banks
Iain Banks (non-M) writing a post-9/11 London literary novel. A radio shock jock unraveling. Sharp, funny, and surprisingly tender.
The Algebraist
by Iain M. Banks
Iain M. Banks's standalone space opera. A galaxy without faster-than-light travel, a millennia-old gas-giant civilization, and one of his best villains.
Down in the Flood
by Kenneth Abel
The third Danny Chaisson novel. Kenneth Abel writing Hurricane Katrina before Katrina happened.
Trust Me
by Jeff Abbott
A Jeff Abbott standalone thriller. The kind of high-concept hook with a satisfying execution that the form sometimes still delivers.