The Book Plank

Best Short Fiction of 2014 I only seriously started reading short fiction in the fall of this year and even made a new weekly feature "Short Fiction Friday" on the blog dedicated to review short fiction stories. A lot of readers aren't a fan of short fiction or anthologies but I really like it, well when they are good stories of course. In my opinion, short stories can excellently feature as in between stories for books or as a prequel to a series or just loose adventures in an on going series. The stories that feature in this list are all part of something bigger. Unlocked by John Scalzi gives the perfect introduction to his book Lock In which you will see later on. It is written in an interesting way dairy kind of style following the footsteps of the outbreak of the Haden syndrome I do warn you, be sure to have Lock In ready before reading this story as you want nothing more than to read the book. The Messenger by Mark Charan Newton was released a few weeks befo...

Lock In by John Scalzi, Lock In #1 Fifteen years from now, a new virus sweeps the globe. 95% of those afflicted experience nothing worse than fever and headaches. Four percent suffer acute meningitis, creating the largest medical crisis in history. And one percent find themselves “locked in”—fully awake and aware, but unable to move or respond to stimulus. One per cent doesn't seem like a lot. But in the United States, that's 1.7 million people “locked in”...including the President's wife and daughter. Spurred by grief and the sheer magnitude of the suffering, America undertakes a massive scientific initiative. Nothing can restore the ability to control their own bodies to the locked in. But then two new technologies emerge. One is a virtual-reality environment, “The Agora,” in which the locked-in can interact with other humans, both locked-in and not. The other is the discovery that a few rare individuals have brains that are receptive to being controlled b...

SFF: Unlocked: An Oral History of Haden’s Syndrome by John Scalzi A new near-future science fiction novella by John Scalzi, one of the most popular authors in modern SF. Unlocked traces the medical history behind a virus that will sweep the globe and affect the majority of the world’s population, setting the stage for Lock In , the next major novel by John Scalzi. Last week I kicked off a new feature for the blog the SFF (Short Fiction Friday) and I mentioned that I was looking for recommedations, Unlocked: An Oral History of Haden's Syndrome was recommended to me by Tiemen Zwaan. As you can read from the short synopsis above, Unlocked: An Oral history of Haden's Syndrom is a prequel to John Scalzi's Lock In which will be released later in August, the 14th to be exact. With this short story John Scalzi builds up the framework for Lock In, showing just all what has transpired so far surrounding the Haden's Syndrome.  The first thing that false to note is the...