Guess who’s back? It’s been a while since I posted anything here. My review backlog has built up rather alarmingly, and I have plenty of articles in the works too. The reason for this is simple. Over the last weekend, I was attending World FantasyCon. There’s going to be a full report on everything I got up to while I was there, but not right now. My brain is still too fried from having to spend time among people. So in lieu of my usual introduction to the month, here’s a quick rundown of science fictional things I’ve been thinking about recently.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds: Season Three

Beset by production issues ranging from Covid to writers’ strikes, the third season of Star Trek’s best show from the current crop doesn’t quite hit the same highs as the first two series. But it’s also not the disaster some have painted it as. A lack of highs does not mean an abundance of lows. Even the much-maligned Four and a Half Vulcans isn’t as bad as some would have you believe. It’s bizarre, and certainly not a masterpiece, but it’s actually quite funny once you get into it.

Star Wars: Andor: Season Two

Yes, this is how far behind I am on my recent releases. This show is as close to perfect as I’ve ever seen. Even if you strip away the Star Wars branding, you’d be left with one of the best science fiction shows of the past two and a half decades. I feel like Disney might learn the wrong lessons from the show, but s it stands, it’s absolutely phenomenal. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

November Reading Plans

I’ve taken the unusual step of starting the month with a fantasy novel I picked up at FantasyCon. Hopefully it gives me time to catch up on reviews. After that, it’ll be full steam ahead on this year’s releases. After all, the Boundy Awards are just around the corner. There is going to be a very tight fight for this year’s Best Standalone award with new releases from Adrian Tchaikovsky, Alastair Reynolds, and Stephen Baxter all in the mix, alongside some others that I’ve already reviewed.

SciFiMonth

Yes, November is SciFiMonth, which I’m usually well on top of. As I say, my brain is fried right now. I’ll get there when I get there.

Future Reading Plans

Recent chats here and there have inspired me to plan out some more themed reading months. November is playing catch-up with new releases. December will be completing some series I’m in the middle of, and hopefully not picking up too many new authors. January is like to be Vintage SF month. February is wide open. For March (which International Women’s Month), I’m going against my instincts to ignore authorial identities and dedicating a whole month to female authors. April will probably be a third round of the Best of British. WarhamMarch might take a year off for 2026 as a result. Will I stick to any of these plans? Only time will tell.

Book Crawl Guides

A chat at FantasyCon with Black Library’s Victoria Hayward has got me thinking about writing some guides on the best places to hunt for books. I feel like this would be a fun thing to do in the run-up to Christmas, so you can better find books for the readers in your lives.

Book Buying Bans

Having bumped my TBR back up into the high double figures, I am firmly on a book buying ban for the rest of the year. Probably. I might have to extend it into 2026, or I might never get round to some of these books.

November Book Releases

• Out Now: Pluto, by Ben Bova and Les Jonhnson – A posthumous (for Bova) collaboration that brings a close to Bova’s Grand Tour of the solar system.
• 08.11.25: Shadows Upon Time, by Christopher Ruocchio – The grand finale of the Sun Eater series.