Review of 2018 Books

65 books read including 4 re-reads and several on graphic novels

Best novel read
Winner: The Labyrinth Index (Stross)
Runner-up: Thin Air (Morgan)
Stross pips this one by keeping me up all night with an absolute page turner. Lyonesse is not on this as I read the first two books originally at the end of 2017

Best gaming book read
Winner: The Sword, the Crown and the Unspeakable Power
Runner-up: Delta Green Handler’s Guide
SCUP wins this by underpinning my best gaming experience this year.

Notable point - I’ve read hardly any graphic novels this year.

Science Fiction (14)

1. Autonomous (Annalee Newitz)
2. Thin Air (Richard K. Morgan)
3. Runcible Tales (Neal Asher)
4. Mason’s Rats (Neal Asher)
5. The Parasite (Neal Asher)
6. The Expert System’s Brother (Nicolas Tchaikovski)
7. Owning the Future: Short Stories (Neal Asher)
8. Dogs of War (Adrian Tchaikovsky)
9. Bridging Infinity (Ed. Jonathan Strahan)
10. Noumenon (Marina J. Lostetter)
11. Noumenon Infinity (Marina J. Lostetter)
12. Lifeboat (Marina J. Lostetter)
13. Elysium Fire (Alastair Reynolds)
14. Ironclads (Adrian Tchaikovsky)

Urban Fantasy/Horror (7)

1. Lies Sleeping (Ben Aaronovitch)
2. The Labyrinth Index (Charles Stross)
3. Witches of Lychford (Paul Cornell)
4. The Lost Child of Lychford (Paul Cornell)
5. A Long Day in Lychford (Paul Cornell)
6. Wyntertide (Andrew Caldecott)
7. Delta Green - The Way it Went Down (Dennis Detwiller)

Fantasy (9, 1 graphic novel, and 4 re-reads of Lyonesse books so 13 total)

1. Norse Mythology (Neil Gaiman)
2. Through the Woods (Emily Carroll)
3. Collected Folk Tales (Alan Garner)
4. The Letter for the King (Tonke Dragt)
5. Alice (Christina Henry)
6. The Red Queen (Christina Henry)
7. Lyonesse 1: Suldrun’s Garden (Jack Vance) x2
8. Lyonesse 2: The Green Pearl) (Jack Vance) x2
9. Lyonesse 3: Madouc (Jack Vance) x3

Spy Novels (3)

1. The Trinity Six (Charles Cumming)
2. The Man Between (Charles Cumming)
3. The Swiss Spy (Alex Gerlis)

Noir/Detective/Crime (2)

1. Rupture (Dark Iceland #4) (Ragnar Jónasson)
2. Whiteout (Dark Iceland #5) (Ragnar Jónasson)

Biography (1)

1. The Princess Diarist (Carrie Fisher)

Contemporary literature (2)

1. The Reservoir Tapes (Jon McGregor)
2. Reservoir 13 (Jon McGregor)

Gaming (15 but misses out re-read of SCUP and lots of short books = 16)

1. Delta Green Agent’s Handbook (Dennis Detwiller)
2. Delta Green Handler’s Guide (Dennis Detwiller)
3. The Forbidden Lands Player’s Guide (Beta)
4. Forbidden Lands RPG (Fria Ligan)
5. Forbidden Lands: Spire of Quetzel (Fria Ligan)
6. Forbidden Lands: Raven’s Purge (Fria Ligan)
7. The Journal of Reginald Campbell Thompson (Cthulhu Britannica)
8. The Journal of Neve Selcibuc (Cthulhu Britannica)
9. Tremulus (Sean Preston)
10. The Sprawl (Hamish Cameron)
11. The Sword, The Crown and the Unspeakable Power (Todd N. & Tom J.) x2
12. The Cthulhu Hack (Paul Baldowski)
13. The Dark Brood (Paul Baldowski)
14. Cthulhu City (Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan)
15. Dark Albion: The Rose Wars

Non-Fiction (7)

1. A Brief History of Time (Professor Stephen Hawking)
2. The Storm before the Storm (Mike Duncan)
3. Surviving AI: The promise & peril of artificial intelligence (Calum Chace)
4. Dungeons & Dragons Art & Arcana: A Visual History (Michael Witwer, Kyle Newman, Jon Peterson, Sam Witwer)
5. Stranger Things - The Companion (Nick Blake)
6. Notes from the Upside Down (Guy Adams)
7. Stranger Things - The Ultimate Guide (Stephen Smith)

7 January 2019