It’s officially 2020, and at Speculative Chic, we’ve spent the entire week celebrating! Since our usual Round-Up editor is still on vacation, I thought I’d tackle all the fun we’ve been having this week to share the love with all of you! So take a breather, sit back, and start reading: I don’t want you to have missed any of the celebrations this past week!
Monday
If there’s one thing the eve of New Year’s Eve is made for, it’s reflecting. So instead of our usual My Favorite Things column, Kristina Elyse Butke rounded up all of us who had 2019 Resolution Projects and asked a simple question: how’d it go? Some resolutions were wild successes, and others barely made it out of the gate. From a magical post-apocalyptic Atlanta to a galaxy far, far away, where do you think we ended up? Find out here.
Tuesday
Of course, New Year’s Eve wouldn’t be complete without a slew of new resolutions, so to enter into the New Year, Kristina then asked our contributors another question: what’s your 2020 Resolution? Unlike the usual resolutions to eat right, get fit, sleep better, and so forth, at Speculative Chic we have projects, and with those projects come accountability, which means you can follow all year long to see how our contributors do! What will 2020 bring? Well, it’s quite Expanse-ive (see what I did there?), because we’re covering a range of Disney, Mount TBRs, and in one of the more unique resolutions, speculative foods. Come see what 2020 promises, and please, share your own resolutions in the comments!
Finally on Tuesday, we couldn’t keep our silence any longer. We just had to share our thoughts on Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Many of us were looking forward to this final installment in this particular trilogy, so the question remains: how did it fare in the eyes of our contributors? You might be glad to know that reactions were a mixed bag, so come hear our thoughts, share your own, and beware the dark side (aka, spoilers!).
Wednesday
Happy New Year, and Happy New Decade! Welcome to 2020, where your Editor-in-Chic was clever enough to make sure you got a book review featuring a story that takes place in the roaring twenties. Oh, wait, no I wasn’t. Never fear! While it’s not set in the ’20s, Lane Robins shares her thoughts on the very intriguing Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo. I personally haven’t read a Bardugo story since her debut Shadow and Bone, and it sounds like her storytelling has come a long way. Hear what Lane has to say (spoilers are carefully marked!), and let us know if Ninth House makes your wishlist (like it did mine).
Oh, and did you hear that blast? It was the sound of Speculative Chic’s Book Club officially launching! To take off, I reminded everyone that our first selection is This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone, and the book is so nice, I’m reading it twice. No, I’m not just saying that to sneak in a terrible rhyme. Be sure to check out this surreal story, and join us for discussion on January 31st!
Thursday
We continue our journey into this brave new decade with Nicole Taft’s review of John Scalzi’s The Collapsing Empire. I don’t want to spoil anything, but if you need a quick and dirty take, I think fans of Dune, and/or Game of Thrones and/or Scalzi’s fiction are going to have a good time. I know I need to pick it up. See what Nicole has to say, and if you’ve already read it, let us know what you think!
Friday
It’s finally Friday, and we wrap up the holiday week with an exciting new column debuted by Sherry Peters: What If? This new column examines a specific speculative fiction property and asks what makes it great, but what could’ve made it better? For our very first examination, Sherry tackles not just V: The Original Mini-Series, but also V: The Final Battle. Whether or not you’ve seen either one, it’s a fascinating focus on a science fiction classic. Come read Sherry’s thoughts, and let us know: do you agree? Do you disagree? Or do you have a wildly different What If? angle that V should’ve pursued instead?
Book Club
And we’re off! In case you missed it, the Speculative Chic Book Club has officially launched, so if you haven’t started reading This is How You Lose the Time War, now’s the time. After all, 2019 flew by at light-speed, and I have no doubt January 31st is just right around the corner. Learn everything you need to about our first selection here.
If you’ve been there, done that, then be sure to check February’s selection, Jeremy C. Shipp’s The Atrocities and if you still need something to get your paws on after that, then go ahead and tackle March’s selection, Cate Glass’ An Illusion of Thieves. Spoiler alert: did you Cate Glass is actually a pen name for Carol Berg? If you didn’t, now you do, and now you know you really have to read these books, right?
We came, we saw, we celebrated, and now we need a little recovery time. Fortunately, we’re providing you with more than enough books to add to curl up with, so on that note, have a wonderful weekend, and we’ll see you next week!
Image from Star Wars Reads Day 2015
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