January has come and gone, and February has kicked in the door in traditionally blustery fashion. This means two things for me. One, it’s almost lambing season. Two, it’s time for anther TBR & Beyond. I’m going to have a lot of late nights this month, and I intend to squeeze in as many pages as I can. Let’s get to it.

TBR

The big ‘if’ still hanging over my head (other than the threat of TBR collapse and painful consequences) is if David Mack’s Oblivion’s Gate is ever going to turn up. The release date has been pushed back yet again, and now stands at the 17th. If it does materialise, I’ll be adding the entire Coda trilogy to my reading schedule, but I’m by no means certain that it will ever arrive. Once again I can do nothing but shake my fist helplessly as paper supply chain issues.

A quick online poll resulted in two popular options amid my TBR, which are Stephen Baxter’s The Time Ships, and Xueting Christine Ni’s Sinopticon. As a big fan of H.G. Wells’ original The Time Machine, I’m kicking off the month with the Baxter. And as an equally large fan of pretty much all the translated Chinese science fiction I’ve encountered, Sinopticon will be following close behind. I’m particularly looking forward to a new Hao Jingfang story in the collection.

Even if Coda isn’t an option, I’m determined to make some headway through my Star Trek backlog. I’m leaning towards my first Discovery novels at the moment, just to shake things up a bit. And with the series itself returning to screens fairly soon, there probably isn’t a better time.

Then we have Warhammer 40,000 to consider. I’m planning to run #WarhamMarch again this year, so a lot of the books will be held back for that. There are, however, a lot of Warhammer books due to be released in the next two months, so I’m going to tackle some of them this month. Both Justin D Hill’s The Bookkeeper’s Skull and Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Day of Ascension are on the shorter side, but I’m going to try and sneak in Nick Kyme’s Volpone Glory as well.

Then we come to my assortment of general science fiction. I’m not sure I’ll have time to commit to K.K. Wager’s complete Farian War trilogy, so I’ll focus on standalones. Jack Vance’s Servants of the Wankh is so short I’m certain to fit it in somewhere, and I’m going to read one anthology this month, which could be from either Isaac Asimov or Edmund Cooper. I’m also planning to tackle David Brin’s absolutely behemothic Earth this month, which probably won’t leave time for much else. I bought a lot of these as part of Vintage Science Fiction Month, and though the event is over, I want to get to them before coming back to newer releases.

On the non-science fiction front, Simon Scarrow’s Eagles of the Empire series continues to delight, and I’m going to use the last part of the Britannia arc to break up my otherwise futuristic reading. Then, if Coda doesn’t arrive, I’m going to dive into Ken Liu’s mammoth epic fantasy The Veiled Throne. I’d like to be up to date with at least one series before March rolls around.

So, my February TBR looks something like this:

• The Time Ships
• Sinopticon
• The Bookkeeper’s Skull
• Day of Ascension
• The Eagle’s Prey
• Earth
• The Best Science Fiction of Isaac Asimov or Jupiter Laughed
• Servants of the Wankh
• Coda or Discovery and The Veiled Throne

AND BEYOND

After the mad rush of January, I’m hoping February slows down the release schedule a little. But I’m still going to try and keep on top of things, so here are some key dates to remember.

• 10th-Star Trek: Discovery is back with the second half of its strong fourth season. In the UK, this airs at 9pm Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays on Pluto TV.
• 18th- Space Force comes back to Netflix for a second series which, judging from the trailers, should be just as much fun as the first.
• 22nd-Michael Mammay’s new novel The Misfit Soldier is released. As a fan of the Planetside novels, I’m hoping for good things from this.
• 22nd-Sar Trek: Picard: No Man’s Land brings Trek into the world of audio dramas with a full story featuring Michelle Hurd and Jeri Ryan as Raffi Musiker and Seven of Nine. I am incredibly excited for this.
• At some point this month, Aaron Dembski-Bowden’s classic Warhammer 40,000 tale Cadian Blood will be rereleased. I’ll buy most things related to Cadia, so this is an obvious purchase.
  

That’s everything I can think of, but I know there are things I’ve forgotten. Be sure to let me know what your science fictional plans are for the month.