For those who liked Throne of the Crescent Moon as much as I did, Ahmed also has a collection of short stories for free on Kindle called "Engraved on the Eye."

Link here:https://www.amazon.com/Engraved-Eye-Saladin-Ahmed-ebook/dp/B009CVYQG2

I'm happy to announce that Engraved on the Eye debuted on Amazon nicely:

Books:

• 2 Best Sellers in Fantasy Anthologies
  

• 13 Best Sellers in Short Stories
  

• 8 Best Sellers in Anthologies & Literary Collections
  

• 3 Best Sellers in Short Stories Anthologies
  

• 8 Best Sellers in Genre Fiction Anthologies
  

• 73 Hot New Releases in Science Fiction & Fantasy
  

• 42 Hot New Release in Fantasy
  

• 2 Hot New Release in Fantasy Anthologies
  

• 4 Hot New Releases in Short Stories
  

• 1 Hot New Releases in Anthologies & Literary Collections
  

• 1 Hot New Releases in Short Stories Anthologies
  

  1 Hot New Releases in Genre Fiction Anthologies
  

  
  Kindle:
  
  

• 9 Best Sellers in Fiction Anthologies
  

• 33 Hot New Releases in Fantasy
  

• 1 Hot New Releases in Fiction Anthologies

Does anyone know of some good Jewish science fiction or fantasy?

I've recently read Engraved on the Eye by Saladin Ahmed, which was a collection of sci-fi and fantasy short stories from a distinctly Arab and Islamic angle. I was actually very, very surprised how much of both fantasy and sci-fi is inherently western (and thus Christian) so it was pretty mind-blowing to have all those tropes and expectations replaced from the ground up.

Remembering that the Jewish people gave us both Kubric and Cronenberg, I am certain there is some great books out there I've yet to discover. I have read Planet of the Jews by Phillip Graubart which was good but only half sci-fi since it was a story within a story. But I'm very curious if anyone knows of any stories, movies, comics etc. that take the usual magic and monsters or swords and spaceships and approach them from a decidedly Jewish perspective?

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch. Fantasy.

Engraved on the Eye by Saladin Ahmed. Fantasy stories. Free.

Terms of Enlistment by Marko Kloos. SF.

Wool Omnibus by Hugh Howey. SF. (Part One, free.)

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. SF.

The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie. Fantasy.

----

You also can check in at /r/FreeEBOOKS, /r/freekindle, /r/KindleFreebies and /r/kindlebookdeals occasionally. There are lots of self-published ebooks nowadays, and lots of them are offered free or very cheap, especially if the writer is a new author. Lots of them aren't very good, but there's also some hidden gold. Some writers will offer their ebook for free for a limited time (like, a week or less) in hope of encouraging some people to write them a good review.

I've enjoyed everything I read this month.

Blood Song by Anthony Ryan

I've been disappointed by a few popular books recently, so I was afraid that it wouldn't live up to the hype. But I was quickly drawn into the world and devoured this book.

Deadline and Blackout by Mira Grant

Finishing off the zombie blogging trilogy I started an earlier month.

Dust by Hugh Howey

Finishing off the Wool series. A satisfying conclusion.

Sabriel by Garth Nix

Young adult, but still enjoyable. I loved the two worlds separated by the wall.

Engraved on the Eye by Saladin Ahmed

Free Book Alert

Throne of the Crescent Moon has been on my to-read list, so when the author offered a collection of his short stories for free, I grabbed it quickly. And so should you.

Mike Underwood's Shield and Crocus – Fantasy as superheoes. Why don't more powerful protagonists turn into outright superheroes? Discounting Peter Brett's The Warded Man, who is essentially Magical Batman by the end of his first book, these feel like the exception. Here, the supervillains won and have turned into Fantasy tyrants, leaving the heroes operating almost as an underground cult. It's a neat angle on the Fantasy novel, though eventually all the fight scenes wore on me. The big problem is that the heroes feel more like archetypes than individuals – I kept referring to two of them as Rodimus Prime and The Flash all the way to the end. Still a fun book.

Jo Walton's My Real Children – After Tooth & Claw and Among Others, this cemented Walton as one of my favorite authors. She makes hard pitches into great books. In this case I don't even know the novel's genre – Patricia Cowan is a senile woman, but she remembers two distinct lives in high detail and swears children from both still visit her. At first you think it's just a Butterfly Flaps Its Wings plot, her lives diverging over whether she got married or not, but gradually you realize neither world is ours in some really interesting Alternate History choices. I can't remember the last book I read that nailed being a citizen amid current events like that, that level of distance, and then terror when something global actually touches your life. Both lives have a wealth of intimate developments, and it's fascinating to see how both lives could possibly end up in the same place.

Mark Lawrence's Prince of Thorns – I think I would have dug this at 13, but not at 33. Jorg is this cynical, uber-capable kid on a revenge kick and forms no interesting relationships despite gathering a crew of raiders. He's an obvious power fantasy character who is also a crappy person, leaving me with no desire to see him succeed, and yet his path to revenge/triumph is the point, so there wasn't anything else in the book to appeal.

Saladin Ahmed's Engraved in the Eye – A free short story collection by the author of Throne of the Crescent Moon. It's a mixed bag, but completely worth the download for Ahmed's take on the Western in "Mister Hadj's Sunset Ride" and a great take on depression in "General Akmed's Revenge?" The question mark is part of that title. I love that.

Rumiko Takahashi's Ranma ½ Books 5 & 6 – I'm so glad I gave this series a chance. It's absolutely nuts in great ways. The point at which Ranma's dad and his old teacher both turn into giant monsters, then are so tired out by the transformation that they call off the fight? Sublime.

Robert Asprin's Another Fine Myth – My first exposure to Asprin. Cute, breezy, cheesy, and a pretty good hit/miss ratio on the humor. My favorite part was Aahz convincing a demon hunter that the gems on the crappy sword weren't garbage – they were precious magical stones enchanted to look like garbage to protect them. That’s good stuff.

Naoki Urasawa 20th Century Boys Book 6 – Still a great series, but I'm not sure what I can say at this point that won't spoil it. I'll link to my review if anyone is interested.

I'm looking forward to October. I just started Guy Gavriel Kay's Under Heaven (heavy stuff so far), and have the next two books of 20th Century Boys and the last two books of Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach Trilogy waiting. I'm thinking of trying out Nnedi Okorafor's Lagoon. Has anyone read that yet?

Saladin Ahmed's Engraved on the Eye is free on Amazon and one of the best short fantasy collections I've read in recent years.

Generally not my cup of tea. I had to help edit quite a few for a previous job and they were rather difficult to get through (I wanted to set one of them on fire but the senior editor said it was tempting but no). For me the romance is often the least interesting part of a book or film, so there needs to be a bit more going on to keep my attention.

So I don't mind stuff that has a strong romantic streak but it's got to be unconventional or interesting in some way. Recent example, I picked up a collection of short stories by Saladin Ahmed, and the story "Hooves and the Hovel of Abdel Jameela", though probably more fantasy-horror, I found to also be very romantic.