WINTERSMITH By Terry Pratchett

Published : 2006
Pages : 400
Overall Mark : 8.5/10

Tiffany Aching finds her world turned upside down once again when she decides to dance at the Wintersmith celebrations. This simple action attracts the attention of the Wintersmith himself, who mistakes Tiffany for the spirit of Summer, and due to Tiffany’s interference, it appears that winter may now never come end! Eventually, realising what a danger this new, more human version of the Wintersmith might be, Granny Weatherwax decides to get the Nac Mac Feegles to find Roland, Tiffany’s sort-of love interest, and send him into the underworld to find the real spirit of Summer so that Tiffany can again swap places with her and then the world can be saved.

In many ways this novel is a significant improvement on the previous instalment. The plot flows smoothly and keeps the reader thoroughly interested in what will happen next. I’m happy to her that another Tiffany Aching novel is in the offing, as I can only imagine the characters and situations will continue to go from strength to strength.

FOREVER ODD By Dean Koontz

Published : 2005
Pages : 420
Overall Mark : 7/10

When Odd Thomas’s childhood friend is kidnapped, Odd finds himself having to deal with a crazy woman who thinks Odd can show her the dead. As he ventures to an abandoned hotel to meet with the woman and try to save his friend, he discovers that many of the people who died in the hotel’s infamous fire have remained as spirits

I didn’t like this as much as the original book, but it was still pretty good. Odd has grown since the first novel, but he feels like more of a loner as he doesn’t have anyone to share his life with. The ending also gives the perfect in for the third novel, which I’m sure I’ll get around to reading one day…

DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP? By Philip K Dick

Published : 1968
Pages : 210
Overall Mark : 9/10

Bounty hunter Rick Deckard can’t believe his luck when Dave Holden, one of his fellow bounty hunters, is injured in the line of duty by an android called a Nexus-6, one of the most advanced androids built to date, and he is handed his current list of rogue androids to hunt down and collect the rewards. As he begins his search for the dangerous automatons, he realises that perhaps they’re not so different from humans when he meets a woman named Rachael Rosen, who turns out to be an android herself, and he finds himself falling for her.

This is possibly one of the most well known science fiction pieces ever written, and definitely Dick’s most widely read work. Famously made into Blade Runner by Ridley Scott in 1982, this is actually in many ways superior to the movie, concentrating more on the story as a sort of parable on race relations than an out and out action piece.

LISEY’S STORY By Stephen King

Published : 2006
Pages : 667
Overall Mark : 7/10

Lisey Landon is the widow of famed author Scott Landon, and deeply misses her dead husband. As she tries to cope with her husband’s death, she is confronted by a number of people who want to get their hands on his unpublished work, including a man named Dooley who threatens Lisey with violence if he is not given the remaining works, but as Lisey looks through Scott’s remaining works, she discovers some long forgotten secrets about him, including a dead brother and a fantasy world which is far more real than she first believed.

This is another of King’s weirder stories, slightly reminiscent of such works as "Secret Window, Secret Garden" and "From A Buick 8". The characters here are engaging and well thought out, and the seemingly simple scenario is stretched to near breaking point in it’s complexities, which just goes to show that King is getting back on track with some of his earlier works.

MEN OF TOMORROW By Gerard Jones

Published : 2004
Pages : 340
Overall Mark : 6/10

Starting in war time America, this book takes a look at the history of the modern comic book, with its history coming from such diverse areas as the Jewish science fiction writing community to the gangsters of the 20s and 30s. This looks at the differing levels of success had by many of the key figures in comic book history, from the creators of Superman and their struggle to retain creative control and ownership, right up to the inception of Marvel comics and their more fun loving approach to the business.

This was an interesting read, with lots of worrying aspects pointed out about the early life of the comic book maker. Much of the focus of this book is on the monetary gains and losses caused by comic books in their early years of manufacture, and the notion that people who follow their dream may find it soon turns into something of a nightmare.

DARKLY DREAMING DEXTER By Jeff Lindsay

Published : 2004
Pages : 275
Overall Mark : 9/10

Dexter Morgan works for the Miami police force as a lab technician, but in his spare time he harbours a dark secret. Dexter is a serial killer, specialising in torturing and murdering people who truly deserve to die, and he manages to cope with all the killings by distancing himself from other people by putting on a façade to hide his natural uncaring state. But when a new serial killer comes to town, one whose techniques Dexter finds attractive and fascinating, he realises that perhaps his murders have gone too far and that this new killer may actually be him acting without his own knowledge…

For a first novel, Jeff Lindsay does done an amazing job with the character of Dexter. By creating a truly likeable lead, despite his penchant for murder, Lindsay has given us a uniquely fascinating insight into the mind of a killer who is actually very likeable, and you’ll even find yourself routing for him at times.

I, ROBOT By Isaac Asimov

Published : 1950
Pages : 249
Overall Mark : 8.5/10

Dr Susan Calvin recounts some of her more memorable experiences with robots, largely focussing on the innate problems people are faced with by the three laws of robotics. Her stories span from tales of little girls and their pet robots, robots forming gangs or unions, robots choosing self preservation over that of a human, and their sometimes eventual conclusions that they know what’s best for society more than humanity does!

This is an interesting collection of short stories, in which Asimov has clearly thought through the relative merits and problems of his invented three laws. It seems to me that he genuinely believes that they would not work, and that any attempt to make them work would lead to anarchy. The writing is simple and entertaining, and Asimov at no point tries to blind the reader with science but instead leads them by the hand, explaining everything along the way.