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A review by scottishben
Sword & Laser Anthology by Day Al-Mohamed, Aidan Moher, Paul Kreuger, Tom Merritt, David Emery, Patrick Rothfuss, Adam Callaway, Auston Habershaw, Sean Tadsen, Rebecca J. Thomas, Zachary Tringali, Luke R. Pebler, Stephen Case, Sarina Dorie, Jeffrey N. Baker, Austin Malone, Victoria Hooper, Kristy Sutherland, Jacob A. Boyd, Mike Murphy, Veronica Belmont, Trisha L. Sebastian, Nicole Feldringer
3.0
This Anthology came about because the book group I am in (and many, many others on Good Reads) had a lot of budding authors in it and the hosts thought it would be a good idea to create an anthology with the mainly unpublished writers who are part of the group.
Any collection which gives new authors opportunities is to be lauded and the writers together with the editors have done a sterling job of creating readable and fairly well written stories. At times the dialogue or characterisation lets some of these stories down a little but these are some of the most challenging areas for new writers to get right.
The book is split in two with the first 10 stories being fantasy and the last ten being science fiction. Overall I thought a good job was done to pick stories that, whilst might having some flaws were entertaining and enjoyable to read. It would take the most curmudgeonly critic to not find some positive things to say about the joyful execution of some of the more adventurous tales or to fail to find some charm in the less adrenaline filled tales.
However I do not think that there were any stories here that would have been published in say Beneath Ceaseless Skies or Electric Velocipide. The stories do not feel fresh, original or quite well executed enough to make it in established venues.
I think anyone in the S&L club will be glad to have picked up this volume as will people who enjoy a good fantasy or SF yarn but I do not think this anthology will succeed beyond those requirements, but then to be fair it does not really try to do that.
Any collection which gives new authors opportunities is to be lauded and the writers together with the editors have done a sterling job of creating readable and fairly well written stories. At times the dialogue or characterisation lets some of these stories down a little but these are some of the most challenging areas for new writers to get right.
The book is split in two with the first 10 stories being fantasy and the last ten being science fiction. Overall I thought a good job was done to pick stories that, whilst might having some flaws were entertaining and enjoyable to read. It would take the most curmudgeonly critic to not find some positive things to say about the joyful execution of some of the more adventurous tales or to fail to find some charm in the less adrenaline filled tales.
However I do not think that there were any stories here that would have been published in say Beneath Ceaseless Skies or Electric Velocipide. The stories do not feel fresh, original or quite well executed enough to make it in established venues.
I think anyone in the S&L club will be glad to have picked up this volume as will people who enjoy a good fantasy or SF yarn but I do not think this anthology will succeed beyond those requirements, but then to be fair it does not really try to do that.