April 25, 2019
Welcome back to Sound Off!, a semi-regular column where members of Speculative Chic gather together to chat about the latest BIG THING in entertainment. This time, gather your family and discuss Hellboy (2019), which premiered in the United States on Friday, April 12, 2019. Sound Off! is meant to be a reaction, but not necessarily a review. After all, while we are all…
April 25, 2019
The Poppy War (2018) Written by: R.F. Kuang Genre: Fantasy Pages: 549 (Kindle) Series: Book One of The Poppy War Publisher: HarperCollins Why I Chose It: I had heard a lot of positive buzz about The Poppy War, but it was ultimately its Nebula Award nomination that convinced me to give it a chance. The Premise: When Rin aced the Keju…
April 24, 2019
The Princess in Black (2015) Written By: Shannon Hale and Dean Hale Genre: Children’s Chapter Book Pages: 96 pages (Hardcover) Series: Princess in Black (Book 1) Publisher: Candlewick Why I Chose It: My three-year-old was doing a reading challenge through school and I was looking for something a little longer to read to her besides her normal picture books. I’ve…
April 23, 2019
Yes, absolutely that is a terrible pun. But I didn’t want this post to get off to a rocky start. I’ll stop now. Promise. But seriously, readers. From the dawn of time people have been manipulating stone for lots of different reasons. We make weapons, houses, places of worship, watchtowers, memorials, or trailmarkers (see: cairns). Standing stones are probably the…
April 22, 2019
They might not be raindrops on roses or whiskers on kittens, but that doesn’t mean that we love them any less. Welcome back to My Favorite Things, the weekly column where we grab someone in speculative circles to gab about the greatest in geek. This week, we sit down with Troy Harkin, whose twisted poetry collection, Casting Shadows, was released…
April 20, 2019
Hail and well-met, strangers! Welcome to the next leg of the journey to the speculative realms. I’ll be your guide as we embark on a perilous quest through the sixteenth week of the year. Choose your weapons. Mount your steed. Join the guild, and let’s go!
April 19, 2019
A note from editor Casey: T’was the snap heard ’round the world. Everyone who exists on the internet and in fandom pretty much already knows what happened at the end of Avengers: Infinity War. I was feeling a little cheeky when I suggested this month’s roundtable discussion: who shouldn’t come back from The Snap? It’s kind of obvious that…
April 18, 2019
Netflix may have cancelled its Marvel shows, but that doesn’t mean it’s moving away from comic book adaptations. Enter The Umbrella Academy. Released on Feb. 15, the 10-part series is based on a comic book series of the same name written by Gerard Way of the popular emo rock band My Chemical Romance. Minor spoilers below.
April 17, 2019
For this post, I tackle three games from my Steam backlog: Gris, Cultist Simulator, and Subsurface Circular. One is about a lost young woman, another is about finding your way through the seedy streets of Jazz-Age London, and the last is about riding the subway while looking for the truth. Let’s dive in, shall we? (No spoilers, I promise!)
April 16, 2019
In the eighties, the era where I reached menarche (such a fancy word), there were few books that addressed the topic of menstruation in popular fiction. One of course, was by the unparalleled Judy Blume – Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret (1970) about a girl growing up in a mixed faith household. (And let’s face facts, we all…