Asking the Wrong Questions

Illustration from the Swedish translation of The Hobbit , by Tove Jansson , 1962 [A previous version of this essay appeared on Asking the Wrong Questions in October 2010] The most that can be said for the dwarves is this: they intended to pay Bilbo really handsomely for his services; they had brought him to do a nasty job for them, and they did not mind the poor fellow doing it if he would; but they would have done their best to get him out of trouble, if he got into it, as they did in the case of the trolls at the beginning of their adventures before they had any particular reasons for being grateful to him. There it is: dwarves are not heroes, but calculating folk with a great idea of the value of money; some are tricky and treacherous and pretty bad lots; some are not, but are decent people like Thorin and Company, if you don't expect too much. Last week's news that the long-beleaguered production of The Hobbit is finally getting on its way sent me back to the book itself ...

I've made no secret of my admiration for Ancillary Review of Books 's podcast A Meal of Thorns . In every episodes, host Jake Cassella Brookins invites a guest—an author, critic, or academic—to discuss a single book. Selections range across genres (a recent episode focused on Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep ), discussing books new and old, famous and obscure. I guested on A Meal of Thorns last year with a discussion of Iain M. Banks's Excession , and Cassella was kind enough to invite me back in 2026. This time our topic was David Mitchell's 2004 breakout success Cloud Atlas , a novel in which six nested narratives, set in different time periods and written in different styles and genres, reveal unexpected connections, as well as a meditation on humanity's tendency towards cruelty and exploitation. As I say at the beginning of the episode, it is by no means an exaggeration to say that Cloud Atlas was one of the novels that made me. It's a book I discovere...

"Ringwraith" by Anato Finnstark Immediately, though everything else remained as before, dim and dark, the shapes became terribly clear. He was able to see beneath their black wrappings. There were five tall figures: two standing on the lip of the dell, three advancing. In their white faces burned keen and merciless eyes; under their mantles were long grey robes; upon their grey hairs were helms of silver; in their haggard hands were swords of steel. Their eyes fell upon him and pierced him, as they rushed towards him. Desperate, he drew his own sword, and it seemed to him that it flickered red, as if it was a firebrand. Two of the figures halted. The third was taller than the others: his hair was long and gleaming and on his helm was a crown. In one hand he held a long sword, and in the other a knife; both the knife and the hand that held it glowed with a pale light. He sprang forward and bore down on Frodo. We have arrived at the midpoint of The Fellowship of the Ring with ...

Reviewing every installment in a series is a rare accomplishment, even for a prolific critic. Reviewing every installment in a series by Adrian Tchaikovsy, who routinely publishes multiple novels and novellas every year, is surely an accomplishment worthy of note. Few series, however, reward this sort of sustained engagement as much as Tchaikovsky's Tyrant Philosphers series, which I strongly believe is one of the major achievements in fantasy of this decade. I reviewed the first novel in the series, City of Last Chances , in 2023, calling it a resurgence of the New Weird. Then late last year I published an omnibus review of the next two novels, House of Open Wounds and Days of Shattered Faith , as well as the novella Lives of Bitter Rain , which allowed me to observe how the books examine the workings of the fascistic Palleseen empire, and the deterioration of its ideals of "perfection" in the face of a bloody war and the costs of maintaining an empire. It was in res...

Every year, when Hugo nominations open, I put together a preliminary ballot. I jot down the titles of the things that blew me away in the previous year, and the perennial nominees like Strange Horizons (and more recently, the Ancillary Review of Books ). I look over the Hugo Spreadsheet of Doom for titles I might have forgotten or good ideas, and I send that ballot in. Then I put together another list, of books to read, movies to watch, and other things to look into between now and the nominating deadline. With weeks to go, I tell myself every year, I could easily get through all of these potential nominees and compile a diverse and informed ballot. This is not, to be clear, a plan that ever survives contact with real life, but this year has been a special case. It might explain something about my mental state as I prepare to finalize my 2026 Hugo nominations if I say that in the hours since I sat down to write this post, I was disturbed by an alert warning of Iranian missile launche...

"The Prancing Pony" by Tomás Hijo There were also many families of hobbits in the Bree-land, and they claimed to be the oldest settlement of Hobbits in the world, one that was founded long before even the Brandywine was crossed and the Shire colonized. They lived mostly in Staddle though there were some in Bree itself, especially on the higher slopes of the hill, above the houses of the Men. The Big Folk and the Little Folk (as they called one another) were on friendly terms, minding their own affairs in their own ways, but both rightly regarding themselves as necessary parts of the Bree-folk. Nowhere else in the world was this peculiar (but excellent) arrangement to be found. After several chapters spent in the wilderness, the hobbits return to civilization with their arrival at the village of Bree. Which is a rare example in this book of a location that is the home of ordinary people, not royalty or high elves, and which is both familiar and not. On the one hand, it is a pl...