I’m going to share my thoughts from three of our six quarter-finalists in this post. Each begins with the information the author gave the SPSFC and then continues to my reviews. I’m going to try not to spoil anything but I can’t 100% guarantee no spoilers, since many of my reactions pertain to follow through of story aspects set up.

Please, please remember that these are only my thoughts. So much of reading enjoyment is subjective, so my hope is that you’ll discover something new to take a chance on! These reviews do not necessarily reflect who will be the semi-finalist from my team either. They are only my impressions and reactions.

Also, let me give a big thank you to all the authors for providing judges with review copies, as well as the team of the SPSFC for organizing the contest!

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My thoughts: I was hooked from the beginning, easily connecting with Kara and her troubles. It was interesting to learn about the world and the worldbuilding was shown so well. There’s a lot of questions of what are lies and what are truth from the beginning that only intensifies throughout the story. The sense of danger around Cae, Kara’s only friend and crush, was really well done, and the brutality of the torture was visceral. I also really liked how varied the alien species were. Some of the descriptions were a bit odd for me (like “tension in his cheeks fell”) and there were some grammatical errors but I could skim over those and continue with my enjoyment of the story. I really liked Kara’s realization that her culture (and Cae) were the bad guys, and then the turmoil as what she’s told doesn’t line up with what she feels, and the words offered to her seem so much more comforting that what she feels is really true.

The shek do as they’re told, huh? Creepily authoritarian. Geez why didn’t he tell her the voice she imagined was actually him? This guy is a walking red flag and I love it because he’s supposed to be.

— my reaction as I was reading chapter 4

The gaslighting is so well and thoroughly shown, and at the same time, while Cae is shown to be horrible, I think he really does love her–as much as he loves anything. It’s just that he loves control more, and if you are an immensely powerful telepathic being, wouldn’t the siren song of using your power to make people think of you the way you want them to be oh-so-tempting? And then their addiction to each other being so toxic. So great.

He didn’t seem real now. It had to be a dream. The real Caethiid would never do this.

He raised his eyes to meet hers and his chin quivered, just for a second. ‘This will be over soon,’ he said quietly. ‘We can go back to how we were before. I’ll take care of you.’

–Afterburn

There’s a ton of lack of agency throughout this book, but that’s also by design and it works really well for this story. It also highlights Cae’s willingness to go to any lengths to control her, from her powers to her body to her feelings and thoughts. His casual cruelties, his dismissal of her feelings and her thoughts, his constant invasion of her privacy and boundaries, all of which he portrays as being “just a joke” or “for her own good”. The story is hauntingly honest without holding back on the horrors.

It would keep her safe, he said again and again. Only when it was truly safe could he retire, that was the mission.

–Afterburn

I enjoyed Jey and Orcan. There aren’t a ton of side characters the reader needs to keep track of really, but they feel distinct, even though they orbit around the edges that is the tangled knot of Cae and Kara.

I felt like the end wrapped up slowly and quickly all at once. Lots of hurry up and wait but without a plan to hold on to. I kinda felt like I was just surfing along with Kara during the last few chapters, glad she finally made a decision, but also kinda feeling it was too easy. But then, the point of the conflict was her internal conflict on whether or not to trust him, so that works.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. There’s not a ton of action, but lots of drama, mostly internal. Sort of more psychological horror/abusive relationship wrapped in a blanket of sci-fi. Interesting to see the trope of bonded (romantic) relationships/fated mates being twisted into an abusive potential and that darker underside highlighted and shown in brutal force. Some weird descriptions of things and the sporadic grammatical oddity throughout but nothing that detracted too much.

Read this if you like: Psychological thrillers with soft sci-fi elements that don’t really need to be explained, along with mainstream telepathy. I haven’t read many psychological thrillers so I could be wrong but this really screams that genre to me. There’s so much gaslighting, I was trying to figure out what was real right along with Kara, while at the same time rooting for her to get away from Cae. Be wary of your mental health though! Content warnings should include loss of autonomy, forced medical procedures, gaslighting, and domestic abuse.

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My thoughts: Oh Transference! I took so many notes on this one! I really enjoyed the beginning, from the illustrated ads setting the mood to the disorientation of recovering from a long illness, to the tech and worldbuilding details shown as Nicholas takes on the appearance and memories of Allen, a recently-deceased rich boy from might higher up in the city. However, some of the dialogue didn’t really ring true for me, feeling a bit “as you know Bob,” both in regards to his previous addiction and “being a new man” as well as the brief stories from his “parents” — why wouldn’t they expect their son to know these things? I loved Allen’s memories tempting him, pushing him with the echo of addiction. The swing of emotions incapacitating and then driving him made sense but also felt a bit disorienting sometimes. 

Laws just give the illusion that what’s happening is fair. Of course, it’s not.

— Transference

I do love Charon the cat, lol–he provides great tension, but I wish he mattered more to the plot since he was taken along for so much of the book. He kinda got forgotten toward the end, and I wondered why he was even there. I also loved Micah, Joe the driver and Joe his daughter, and the doctor Brian. They all had minor roles but I enjoyed them.

There were some issues I saw with consistency. For instance, it’s revealed that robots are super rare even for the rich–except Allen has robot arms helping him dress and bringing him a sleeping solution at night, and he trains with robot droids. Sometimes comments that are made seem like he’s been “back” longer than he has in the plot, and then other times, revelations feel rushed and without enough basis for me to really believe. Allen’s memories also come up rarely, and serve no more than a minor inconvenience/push on the plot. Sometimes Nicholas has questions that I would have expected to have been in Allen’s memories and therefore should have been a non-issue or should have raised confusion from the side characters (like when he asks about the tune his mom hums).

“There’s something cold in you, kid, something this society took and broke when you were too young to stop it. It’s in you, just like I know it’s in me too. And I see it in your mum too, just like I see it in all the people of the Boroughs. I know it’s anger, and it’s hate, and I know this all has to happen. There’s a fucking reckoning that’s been building for centuries and the gate has to burst. But don’t let it swallow the people you love. They’re the reason you’re doing all this.”

— Transference

I felt like the duality of “these people are morally corrupt” along with “they aren’t complete monsters” came too easily and too soon, with too little to prove it. I also wish that when he discovers Dotty’s politics match his own so well, he considered joining forces with her. I felt like his interactions with Dotty and his swings in thoughts and convictions back and forth were too easy. I loved some of his thoughts, but they just didn’t feel natural in context with the rest of the prose, since the emotional buildup to them or the timing wasn’t quite right. Since this was part of the main crux of the story, it was a big thing for me.

The table is laid with a spread of foods that I only recognize half of. Baked potatoes, charred asparagus, a centerpiece of roasted duck—actual real duck—and several other dishes are ready to serve. The sight of it makes me dizzy, and I grab the back of a chair to steady myself. Enough food for twenty people easily, but it’s meant only for the three of us. A hundred feet below me, down in the Boroughs, my mother is making another tasteless meal of blocks, and the thought of it tears at my heart.

— Transference

I did really enjoy the meals program they set up and how he showed Dotty how the lower rungs of society were forced to live. I also liked the glimpse of the highest rung of society, Sun Gate, where Dotty’s family is. It felt odd to me that her part of the city would have whole new political parties, but I suppose if no one else in the city was allowed access to politics? But then wouldn’t he have more confusion? Really, Sun Gate felt like a whole new city, which might have been the point.

The pills stop your body from absorbing calories beyond exactly what your body needs. Now I don’t take them at every meal, but sometimes a person just wants to keep eating and not worry if it’s a bit excessive, you know?”

I stare at her, and at the pills, and I’m so flabbergasted that I don’t even know what to say. A hundred feet below us, people are living on the edge of starvation on a subsistence diet of nutrition cubes, and here…

— Transference

I loved many of the concepts of this story and I loved its aim, too. I also very much enjoyed the setting. However, I wished some parts were more deeply developed, to pack even more of a powerful punch as a mirror on society. It had some great quotes, though, like those I placed above. All in all, despite my quibbles with some of the details, I still enjoyed my time reading this book quite a bit.

Read this if you: enjoy stories of class struggles, especially in a dystopian City-in-a-Bottle setting. Also, if you enjoy infiltration plots fully immersed in a cascade of new sci-fi tech you don’t fully need to understand to accept. If you enjoy twisty plots, too, check this one out–and be sure to buckle up for the twists in the third act!

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My thoughts: The flip-flopping dual PoV really worked for me, and I absolutely adored the banter and the noir vibes. This should probably have content warnings for violence, murder, secret societies, organized crime, police corruption, ghosts, and zombies, but all of that (except for the ghosts and zombies) goes right along with the detective mystery and noir vibes, too. I love the voices of both main characters; they feel natural and distinct. I also loved figuring out the world and what was going on along with both main characters, and I also loved how their goals were opposed to each other throughout much of the book. It really worked with the fast pace and the story’s tension.

‘You’ve no idea what you’re involved in.’
‘That’s why I ask questions,’ said Jimmy. ‘With the gun as an incentive. Try to keep up.’

–The Ghost Gun

There’s not a ton of sci-fi elements here–mainly just the artifacts, which one doesn’t have to fully understand to accept. The ghosts and zombies too, as they follow from the artifacts (mainly the Ghost Gun but I’m not ruling out other artifacts, lol). A reader could easily interpret this as fantasy or sci-fi, depending on what you think of the artifacts, but something about the vibes makes me feel comfortable slotting this in as a light sci-fi but heavy on the detective mystery.

I loved Cassie and Jimmy (our two main characters) along with Harry, Cassie’s partner/supervisor. Jimmy being an ex-detective made a ton of sense to me and I loved seeing the slow slide of the Ghost Gun’s effects on him. The decisions Jimmy and Cassie make largely make sense (except for when Jimmy begins to slide under the artifact’s influence) and show their competence and intelligence as well as their character, which I really appreciated. I loved Jimmy’s caution and the way both tried to outmaneuver the other, both being skilled at their jobs.

‘Want to head over and snoop around? It’d be following a lead.’
‘I’m content to follow a senior officer.’
Harry shook his head sadly. ‘What have they done to you?’
‘I’ve learnt from you.’
‘That’s just nasty. C’mon, let’s go pretend to be detectives again.’

— The Ghost Gun (Harry and Cassie banter)

I loved the tension of Jimmy trying to figure out the gun, especially when it was following him around and therefore making trouble for him. I love the ghosts showing up, too, and how that creates trouble for him slowly over time (the ghost bird is hilarious and yes, I did root for it to cause more trouble lol).

‘Four years ago. Found dead in mysterious circumstances.’ Cassie hesitated as she read ahead. ‘Dead, but they weren’t sure how. No visible signs on the body, which was subsequently stolen.’
They met each other’s gaze.
Harry scratched his chin. ‘I’ve got some vacation days saved up. Wondering about using them. If your back starts playing up, you could see if the doctor will suggest a few days off.’
‘To be honest, I’m kind of intrigued.’
He gave her a long-suffering look. ‘Okay, the conscientious stuff was bad enough. Please don’t develop a liking for mysteries. We get too few of them here to sate such appetites, and most crimes aren’t that mysterious. They’re all about people being shitty to each other. It’s only the details that change.’
‘How long did it take you to become so cynical?’
‘About five minutes. You’re obviously a slow study.’

— The Ghost Gun (Harry and Cassie banter again)

Quibbles: mostly the grammar and everything was solid (occasional typos but nothing beyond a traditionally published book), but sometimes “Euclidean” is treated as plural grammatically and other times singular.

‘Ms. Dubois, I’m Detective Kinsala. This is Mister Bancroft, a criminal.’
‘We’re going for bluntness?’ asked Jimmy. ‘I don’t remember discussing that.’
‘Miss Dubois,’ said Kinsala. ‘We’d like to discuss the Euclideans with you.’

— The Ghost Gun (Cassie and Jimmy banter)

If you’re looking for diversity, Cassie is Black and some side characters are Black. All the characters were treated the same, but that also meant I forgot she was Black sometimes. Jimmy has progressively greater mental health struggles as a result of his use of the Ghost Gun, and these are inserted smoothly and naturally, with a slow, deft increase in effect.

The last third of this book threw twists at me that kept me hooked and thoroughly immersed, but which all made sense with the plot and the characters involved, too. Again, I love, love, love how Cassie’s got good instincts and how both she and Jimmy are good at their jobs, but how progressively less careful Jimmy gets as things heat up and potential madness from the Ghost Gun (or just the ghosts?) asserts itself. And the ending! WOW. Amazing. Absolutely loved. What a great ending!

Read this if you: want a noir mystery with dual PoVs and great banter, but light on the sci-fi elements. Also if you like the duality between one main character with strict morals and another with extremely loose morals (who treats murder as a strategic thing). If you like fast paced plots with plenty of humor even in the dark, somewhat gritty vibes, and if you like books that can stand on their own but also open up a whole series plot line at the end, check this one out.

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Don’t forget to check out Athena’s reviews for these books, too! The Ghost Gun review and Afterburn review.