Here are 100 books that Composite Creatures fans have personally recommended if you like
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I’ve long been fascinated with the dark side of science and human behavior, and grew up on a combination of dystopian classics and horror fiction. When I started writing for publication, apocalyptic themes quickly emerged. As the world around us grows more fraught by the day, I find a strange sort of comfort in reading and writing fiction that doesn’t shy away from depicting the negative aspects of social media, genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, or any other technology that has the capacity to create manmade disasters beyond our understanding. And as a small-press author myself, I’m always on the lookout for books that didn’t get enough love.
The nanotechnological apocalypse at the background of Anthropocene Rag has turned the United States into a mythological vision. A mysterious construct known as Prospector Ed (who sometimes adopts the persona of Mark Twain) delivers six magical tickets to various scattered Americans, all of whom have lost something in the “Boom.” While the post-nanoboom landscape is deadly (one of the main characters was orphaned when an intelligence-imbued stadium containing her parents simply decided to become something else), there’s also a lot of wonder, and the book is a loving homage to American mythology and lore.
Anthropocene Rag is "a rare distillation of nanotech, apocalypse, and mythic Americana into a heady psychedelic brew."—Nebula and World Fantasy award-winning author Jeffrey Ford
In the future United States, our own history has faded into myth and traveling across the country means navigating wastelands and ever-changing landscapes.
The country teems with monsters and artificial intelligences try to unpack their own becoming by recreating myths and legends of their human creators. Prospector Ed, an emergent AI who wants to understand the people who made him, assembles a ragtag team to reach the mythical Monument City.
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
I’ve long been fascinated with the dark side of science and human behavior, and grew up on a combination of dystopian classics and horror fiction. When I started writing for publication, apocalyptic themes quickly emerged. As the world around us grows more fraught by the day, I find a strange sort of comfort in reading and writing fiction that doesn’t shy away from depicting the negative aspects of social media, genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, or any other technology that has the capacity to create manmade disasters beyond our understanding. And as a small-press author myself, I’m always on the lookout for books that didn’t get enough love.
Told as a series of movie reviews, A Short Film About Disappointment unfurls its dystopia gradually. A hacker attack kicks off a global multi-decade economic depression, and to prevent this from ever happening again the Internet is abolished and replaced with the “Betternet,” a neutered and highly censored version of the Internet. Personal screens are also banned in this nanny state, leading to a robust cinema culture that the unread reviewer wants to contribute to with a dense art film of his own. The hilarious capsule descriptions of eighty (fictional) films serve as an oblique way of introducing the world, while the numerous tangents of the writer “Noah Body” tell a personal story of love, filmmaking, and a literal haunting by an ex-friend.
An ingenious novel about art and revenge, insisting on your dreams and hitting on your doctor, told in the form of 80 movie reviews
In near-future America, film critic Noah Body uploads his reviews to an underread content aggregator. His job is dreary routine: watch, seethe, pan. He dreams of making his own film, free of the hackery of commercial cinema. Faced with writing on lousy movies for a website that no one reads, Noah smuggles into his reviews depictions of his troubled life on the margins.
Amid his movie reviews, we learn that his apartment in the vintage slum…
I’ve long been fascinated with the dark side of science and human behavior, and grew up on a combination of dystopian classics and horror fiction. When I started writing for publication, apocalyptic themes quickly emerged. As the world around us grows more fraught by the day, I find a strange sort of comfort in reading and writing fiction that doesn’t shy away from depicting the negative aspects of social media, genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, or any other technology that has the capacity to create manmade disasters beyond our understanding. And as a small-press author myself, I’m always on the lookout for books that didn’t get enough love.
Unlike some of the others on my list, the apocalypse(s) at the center of The Crooked God Machineare in no way quiet. The narrator, Charles, has been born into a world in a constant state of collapse. Taking the form of a bildungsroman, the novel recounts the medical advancement of slip implants, “hot wire spiders” that live in one’s brain and turn its user into a brainless zombie. There are also buses that take you to hell, oracles with laser eyes in the back of their heads, and a family-killing murderess who’s considered a hero by the denizens of this demented world. Every page brings fresh horrors, and without giving away the ending I can say that the conclusion doesn’t provide any hope of improvement.
The Black Planet is an oppressive world terrorized by a masked god. Charles is a young idealist struggling to keep his family from falling apart amidst daily violence and chaos. When Charles falls in love with the enigmatic Leda, she gives him hope for an existence outside of the masked god's regime. After Leda disappears one night, Charles leaves his small town to search for her. Along the way he uncovers the origin of the Black Planet, and confronts the god that would destroy all life in pursuit of a perfect and unchanging paradise.
A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.
Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother had…
I’ve long been fascinated with the dark side of science and human behavior, and grew up on a combination of dystopian classics and horror fiction. When I started writing for publication, apocalyptic themes quickly emerged. As the world around us grows more fraught by the day, I find a strange sort of comfort in reading and writing fiction that doesn’t shy away from depicting the negative aspects of social media, genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, or any other technology that has the capacity to create manmade disasters beyond our understanding. And as a small-press author myself, I’m always on the lookout for books that didn’t get enough love.
The dystopia inBash Bash Revolution is a bit closer to reality than the others on this list: it’s set specifically in 2017, but in a world pushed far closer to the brink of nuclear war than ours, with a much more psychotic version of Donald Trump in charge. Main character Matthew Munson’s mad programmer of a father creates an AI that might save the world from its own destruction, but only by locking every person into a solipsistic nightmare run on video game technology. In a way this book is about choosing between an apocalypse and a dystopia, which is something you don’t see very often.
*SELECTED FOR GAME INFORMER'S FALL 2018 READING LIST*
A compelling coming-of-age artificial intelligence novel from Philip K. Dick Award-nominated author Douglas Lain.
Seventeen-year-old Matthew Munson is ranked thirteenth in the state in Bash Bash Revolution, an outdated video game from 2002 that, in 2017, is still getting tournament play. He's a high school dropout who still lives at home with his mom, doing little but gaming and moping. That is, until Matthew's dad turns up again.
Jeffrey Munson is a computer geek who'd left home eight years earlier to work on a top secret military project. Jeff has been a…
As the author of nine cookbooks, I strive to help readers master new skills and to become more comfortable in the kitchen. I’m constantly reading other cookbooks to keep my fingers on the pulse of what’s happening in the food world, as well as to improve my own culinary prowess. It’s been nearly 20 years since I graduated from culinary school, and I love that I can open a book to refresh a forgotten skill, learn a new one, or delve into the “why” behind cooking’s biggest questions. These books have kept me entertained and intrigued, not to mention well-fed. I hope they do the same for you!
This book was written by the former culinary director of the website Serious Eats, and it’s one of my most turned-to references on my cookbook shelf. A deep dive into the world of culinary science, I learn something new whenever I flip through its pages. I particularly love the informational photos, charts, and illustrations, based on painstaking experiments and tests. Take the section on boiled eggs: It was fascinating to see an illustration showing how eggs look at 30-second increments of cooking, and to read the explanation of what exactly is happening inside an egg as it heats up, which helped me fine-tune the cooking time for my idea of the perfect jammy egg. This book is full of similarly nerdy experiments and information, and useful tutorials on techniques both basic and advanced, like carving a chicken or turkey, making mayonnaise, and making homemade sausage. Read the book from cover…
J. Kenji Lopez-Alt shows that cooks don't need a state-of-the-art kitchen to cook perfect meals. In a book centred on much-loved dishes, Kenji explores the science behind searing, baking, blanching and roasting. In hundreds of easy-to-make recipes with over 1,000 full-colour images illustrating step-by-step instructions, readers will find out how to make perfect roast turkey with crackling skin, how to make extra fluffy or creamy scrambled eggs and much more. Combining the unrelenting curiosity of a cheerful science geek with the expert knowledge of a practised chef, The Food Lab gives readers practical tools and new approaches to apply when…
I baked my first loaf of bread when I was eight. It was shaped like a brick and weighed about the same. With my grandma’s help, I tweaked the recipe, learned the importance of precise measurements, practiced my kneading, and ultimately won a blue ribbon for my efforts at the 4-H county fair. In the years since, my passion for food has grown. I love to learn how various crops are grown and harvested, I nearly cried when I tasted cheese I made myself, and I’ve been known to arrange travel around specific culinary adventures. For me, learning about food is nearly as enjoyable as eating it!
For generations, this book has been helping young readers turn their kitchens into laboratories. After introducing basic scientific concepts, kid chefs/scientists get to test scientific principles with edible results: beef jerky, cottage cheese, pudding, and more. Along the way, they learn that making a meringue is about denaturing protein and that mayonnaise is a simple emulsion. I love the way in which the text and illustrations pair to clearly allow readers to conclude that good cooks truly are good chemists.
Kids take the reins in the kitchen with this hands-on book of edible science experiments! With revised and updated material, a brand-new look, and hours of innovative, educational experiments, this science classic by award-winning author Vicki Cobb will be devoured by a whole new generation of readers.
Combine with such books as Awesome Science Experiments for Kids to help junior scientists continue their learning, whether at home or in a classroom.
With contemporary information that reflects changes in the world of processing and preserving foods, this cookbook demonstrates the scientific principles that underpin the chemical reactions we witness every day—just…
The Duke's Christmas Redemption
by
Arietta Richmond,
A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.
Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man she…
For as long as I can remember I’ve been obsessed with figuring out how things work. What started with me pulling apart redundant household tech as a child (thanks to my very supportive parents) has become a lifelong passion in making and restoring one of the most incredible machines invented – the watch. Our millennia-old obsession with making things tells us so much about who we are and the world we like in. I love all of these books as, in varied ways, they inspire curiosity and connect us with our innately human instinct to understand the world around us.
I can’t think of a better way to close than with a book to inspire the next generation of people who love taking things apart! This brilliant compilation of easy makes sets out to cultivate curious young minds.
By using common things you can find around the house, it makes science and making accessible to all. The projects are all really straightforward and designed by Shaha, a dad and science teacher, to support the educational curriculum whilst having a lot of fun.
Transform and recycle household objects into your very own home-made toys and machines!
Learn about the centre of gravity by making a balancing bird, create a toroidal vortex with a smoke-ring machine, and turn a spoon into an electromagnet. Chances are you won't need to buy the materials required for these machines because they're all in your house right now. Every child can be an engineer with the help of Mr Shaha and his marvellous machines.
Written by a science teacher and dad, Mr Shaha's Marvellous Machines is the highly anticipated sequel to Mr Shaha's Recipes for Wonder. This book…
I like thinking about the people who misbehaved in the 1700s. As a teenager, I was initially drawn to journalism as a medium for telling stories, but in college, I was entranced by the stories I could tell with early American sources. Years ago, Jan Lewis noted that many readers want “bedtime stories” about how great the American Revolution was, but there’s much more to the Revolution’s history. Now, I’m a history professor at Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center of the City of New York. Having lived in the Boston area and New York City, it’s been a thrill to write books about the American Revolution in both places.
I went into this book cold, knowing nothing about it beforehand, and it left a powerful, thrilling impression. I almost don’t want to say anything else about it so that other readers can experience the same suspense.
Readers might know Anderson from Feed or his other quirky genre-bending books. This book, the first of two volumes, is a work of historical fiction set mostly in Boston. It uses eighteenth-century language to tell an epic tale about the American Revolution, the Enlightenment, and the dark side of both.
It’s a book of horror (perhaps even anticipating the movie Get Out), with intricate details that will delight a certain kind of reader.
Anderson’s imaginative and highly intelligent exploration of . . . the ambiguous history of America’s origins will leave readers impatient for the sequel. — The New York Times Book Review
Young Octavian is being raised by a group of rational philosophers known only by numbers — but it is only after he opens a forbidden door that learns the hideous nature of their experiments, and his own chilling role them. Set in Revolutionary Boston, M. T. Anderson’s mesmerizing novel takes place at a time when Patriots battled to win liberty while African slaves were entreated to risk their lives for…
I take joy in the simple delights of life, such as eating chocolate, enjoying the sights of flowers in full bloom, and soaking in the sun on warm, sunny days. Those are the times I like to get out and explore, be inspired, and write. I like to write about all of the light we can discover in our world—the light from within and all around us—because it is easy for people to get sucked into focusing on the dim realities of our world or what’s not right. My goal is always to entertain, inspire, and spark wonder in my readers.
I just adored reading about all the adventures of the curious little girl, Ada Marie Twist, in this book. A late bloomer, Ada Marie’s first word, “Why?” comes at the age of three. From that moment, her language takes off, filled mostly with questions about how things work. I can relate to Ada Marie because I used to ask a lot of questions as a kid, too. It drove my mother crazy.
My mom eventually bought me a book of questions, hoping it would refocus my energy, but the joke was on her because the book had no answers! Luckily, I had understanding teachers in school who allowed me to explore my curiosity about the world. Similarly, in the book, Ada Marie’s curiosity tests the patience of her parents. But they eventually come to recognize her potential as a budding scientist.
A #1 New York Times Bestseller
A Wall Street Journal Bestseller
A USA Today Bestseller
Inspired by real-life makers Ada Lovelace and Marie Curie, this beloved #1 bestseller champions STEM, girl power and women scientists in a rollicking celebration of curiosity, the power perseverance, and the importance of asking "Why?"
Don't miss Ada's further adventures-with her friends Iggy Peck and Rosie Revere-in the instant New York Times bestseller Rosie Revere and the Raucous Riveters, the first all-new chapter book starring The Questioneers!
Ada Twist's head is full of questions. Like her classmates Iggy and Rosie-stars of their own New York…
This book follows the journey of a writer in search of wisdom as he narrates encounters with 12 distinguished American men over 80, including Paul Volcker, the former head of the Federal Reserve, and Denton Cooley, the world’s most famous heart surgeon.
In these and other intimate conversations, the book…
I’ve been reading sapphic or lesbian romances ever since I got my hands on Touchwood and Curious Wine decades ago. When not writing contemporary sapphic romances, I’m always reading them. Happily ever afters haven’t always been the case for two women in love, least of all in fiction. I write sapphic romances to provide for other women like me what I hoped to find in bookstores when I was younger. It wasn’t easy to find a romantic story between two women, let alone have choices. Representation matters, and writing–and reading–books about two women in love is important to me and women like me, especially as states ban such books.
It might tempt someone to choose a book in Noyes’ Ask, Tell series, but Alone is my recommendation.
A romance with such a lonesome title might not appear swoon-worthy on the surface, but dig a little deeper, and witness the burgeoning romance between Celeste and Olivia develop in such beautiful fashion in their isolated cocoon–until all goes wrong.
Still, the loving way they interact, learn about each other, and then yearn for each other had my heart skipping beats until the end. Noyes has a way of writing characters with whom it’s easy to fall in love.
Half a million dollars will be Celeste Thorne’s reward for spending four years of her life in total isolation. No faces. No voices. No way to leave.
Since Celeste has never really worried about being alone, the generous paycheck she’ll receive for her participation in the solitary psychological experiment seems like easy money. br> When she finds an injured hiker in the woods bordering her living compound, her strictly governed world is thrown into disarray. But even as she struggles with the morality of breaking the rules of the experiment, Celeste can’t deny her growing attraction to the kind and…
