SSF Stories with Middle Eastern Leads

This post is focuses on my favorite science fiction and fantasy stories with protagonists whose race and ethnicity is rooted in the Middle East.
Previous Posts: SFF Stories with Native American Leads, SFF Stories with Asian Leads and SFF Stories with Black Leads.

The Aggregate Stats

• Total number of works/series/authors on the list: 15/7/24
• Author with most works on the list: Frank Herbert, with 6 books on the list
• Most consistent pattern: Historical Fantasies.  Rather than take the ideas and culture and build their own world, about half the series on the list placed their stories in a serious historical context.
• Biggest overall surprise:  No fantasies with the magic based on ancient Egyptian mythology.  I would have assumed that would be more popular, but no.

and now for...

My Favorites

SFF Stories with Black Leads

This post is focuses on my favorite science fiction and fantasy stories with protagonists whose race and ethnicity is rooted in sub-Saharan Africa and the African diaspora. I'm separating out Northern Africa and putting that with the Middle East, since I figured Egypt and Saudi Arabia have more in common with each other than with the places such as the Congo or Japan.
Related Posts: SFF Stories with Native American Leads, SFF Stories with Asian Leads, and SFF Stories with Middle Eastern Leads.

The Aggregate Stats

• Total number of works/series/authors on the list: 16/7/6
• Author with most works on the list: Octavia Butler, with 7 books on the list
• Most depressing realization: The overwhelming majority of books here have no recognizable black people on the covers. Sigh.
• Biggest overall surprise: No (non-urban) fantasies. How'd that happen?

and now for...

My Favorites

SF/F Stories with Asian Leads

This post only covers from central, East and Southeast Asia. I'm covering the Middle East and north Africa in a separate post.
Related Posts: SFF Stories with Native American Leads, SFF Stories with Black Leads, and SFF Stories with Middle Easter Leads.

The Aggregate Stats

• Total number of works/series/authors on the list: 24/7/7
• Author with most works on the list: Eileen Wilks, with 8 books in her Lupi series
• Biggest overall surprise: No ninjas. Huh. With all the assassin stories out there, I would have assumed I had read something more explicitly ninja-esque.  I'm going to have to hunt one down.  Also, I was a little surprised at the diversity. After doing the list for Native Americans, I was expecting patterns to emerge, even among excellent writers.  But, they're a pretty diverse group of stories.

and now for...

My Favorites

SF/F Stories with Native American Leads

In an attempt to celebrate great examples of sci-fi and fantasy books with Native American protagonists, I'm writing down a list of my favorites.  It's part of a series of posts covering SFF stories with non-white protagonists. See also SFF stories with Asian Leads, SFF Stories with Black Leads, and SFF Stories with Middle Eastern Leads.

First...

The Aggregate Stats

• Total number of works/series/authors on the list: 17/5/6
• Author with most works on the list: Patricia Briggs by a landslide - 8 books and 1 short story.
• Most common trope: Coyote. A close second is the female half Native American/half white tomboy protagonist with grease under her fingernails from all her work as a mechanic or mechanical tinkerer. She can handle her own in an adventure and is prepared to defend herself if she has to, but would rather be left alone, especially since she has secrets to hide. Unfortunately, her secrets draw her into the preternatural world she's trying to avoid. Seriously, this describes half the protagonists!
• Biggest overall surprise: There's only one full-blood Native American, and there are no (non-urban) fantasies on the list. There are also no stories set within a Native American culture (or magical version thereof), the stories always have the protagonist living in a white world. 

and now for...

My Favorites

2012 Self-Published Reading Challenge!

I've decide to participate in the 2012 Self-Published Reading Challenge 

.

*blare of trumpets*

At this point I'm going for Short Story Level - 75 Books, which means I'm going to read and review about 75 self-published books over the course of this year.  I'm behind in writing up reviews though, so we'll see how the year goes.  I'll fill in the list as I read the books.

1. Katre's Summer
2. Time Mends
3. The Dragonswarm
4. Telesa: The Covenant Keeper
5. Twist
6. Priscilla the Great: Too Little Too Later
7. The Spinster & The Beast
8. Suspicious Hearts
9. A Lady's Point of View
10. The Assassin's Curse
11. Coexist (?  Maybe self-published?)
12. Blood Will Tell
13. Blood Past
    

Shattered Dreams

Summary: A nice regency romance available as a $.99 e-book. 

Shattered Dreams, by Laura Landon, tells two love stories set vaguely in Regency-era England, with a little action near the end for spice.  The first love story is of a perfect man (handsome, charming, titled, rich, well-adjusted, etc.) and a flawed woman (beautiful, vivacious, and titled, but also dealing a disability and accompanying emotional issues).  The second is of two former lovers who were separated by a misunderstanding.

The book is worth reading if you regency romances, but it's not so great that I'll accost random strangers on my way to work and force them to read the book.  I'm not that sort of person, after all.  I think where it fails for me is that there are four main characters, but only one of them has any real complexity.  The others are fun to read, but shallow, which ends up making the book a bit fun-but-shallow also.

My Favorite Romances with Differently Abled Leads
Reading this book did get me thinking about my what romance books I enjoyed that have a lead dealing with a disability of some sort.  Here's my top 5:

1. Miles in Love by Lois McMaster Bujold.   It's my favorite series in general.  You should really start earlier in the series, but this is the core romance part of it.  It's a far future science fiction with a a brittle-boned, hyperactive, little person genius protagonist.  Imagine all possible good things you can say about a book and you can assume they apply here.  Yay!
2. The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie by Jennifer Ashley.  OMG, autism spectrum disorders never sounded so sexy as in this regency.
3. Candle in the Window by Christina Dodd. Medieval romance with a blind heroine.  Actually, the hero is blind, too, now that I think about it.  Well-deserved RITA award winner.
4. Seeing Eye by Patricia Briggs in the Strange Brew Anthology.  Short story paranormal romance/adventure between a blind witch and scarred werewolf.  Set in Seattle, it features secondary characters from her Alpha and Omega series
5. Nothing to Commend Her by Jo Barrett.  Hero is severely disfigured from burns, set in Regency England. Warning, it's a bit corny, so don't come here expecting an award winner.  But I really like the characters and find myself rereading on occasion to recapture the happy feeling it gives me.