Martin McGrath
Welcome to my website. I intend to use this space to hold forth on things like politics, books, technology, films and anything else that interests or irritates me.
You can also use this site to see examples of some of the work I've done as journalist, writer and designer. I'm available for freelance work and my rates are competitive and negotiable for good causes.
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Tag Archives: bsfa
REVIEW: VIRTUES OF WAR AND GHOSTS OF WAR BY BENNETT R COLES
The latest issue of The BSFA Review (no.4, Summer 2018) has been published. It contains two of my reviews. The first one – of a pair of military sf novels by Bennet R Coles – is below. The second will … Continue reading
REVIEW: AURORA RISING/THE PREFECT BY ALASTAIR REYNOLDS
The latest issue (no. 3) of the BSFA Review is out, and it contains my review of Alastair Reynolds’ Aurora Rising (previously released as The Prefect). This is a slightly extended version. I jumped into the ebook of Alastair Reynolds’ … Continue reading
GENRE HIGHLIGHT OF 2017 – OCCUPY AVENGERS #8
The BSFA’s Vector Review of 2017 was delivered today, which includes a piece I wrote on the bit of genre reading that stuck in my mind most clearly in the past year. I chose a few panels from a crossover … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged 2017, bsfa, comics, Marvel, review, reviews, sf, Vector
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REVIEW: THE HIGH GROUND BY MELINDA SNODGRASS
The High Ground by Melinda Snodgrass (Titan Books, 2016) When I was a child I loved the breakfast cereal Ready Brek – instant porridge whose television advertisements used to feature a young boy protected from the winter elements by a … Continue reading
Posted in Blog reviews, Review
Tagged 2017, bsfa, review, reviews, science fiction, sf, Vector
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BOOK REVIEW: OCCUPY ME BY TRICIA SULLIVAN
The overwhelming sensation left at the end of Tricia Sullivan’s strange, awkward, new novel is of things straining and stretching and struggling to be free. This is true of the characters, all of whom seem to be constantly pushing against … Continue reading
Posted in Other reviews, Uncategorized
Tagged books, bsfa, review, reviews, science fiction, sf, Vector
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DAVID RAIN: A SMALL REMEMBRANCE
Back at the end of 2010 I interviewed David Rain for the British Science Fiction Association’s Focus (no.54, 2011) – a magazine for writers. David was programme leader for the MA in Creative Writing at Middlesex University, which was at that … Continue reading
REVIEW: THE BEES BY LALINE PAULL
Why would an author write a story in which the main characters are bees? One reason might be simply that bees are interesting little creatures – fascinatingly social, successful, widespread and apocryphally busy – and we are intimately familiar with … Continue reading
REVIEW: DARK STAR BY OLIVER LANGMEAD
Untold riches and global celebrity? Whatever it was that possessed Oliver Langmead to write Dark Star, we must hope that it was neither of the above. Because who, in their right mind, writes a science fiction/noir detective story (and it … Continue reading
Posted in Other reviews, Uncategorized
Tagged 2015, books, bsfa, review, reviews, sf
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REVIEW: GEMSIGNS AND BINARY BY STEPHANIE SAULTER
Gemsigns and Binary by Stephanie Saulter (Jo Fletcher Books, 2013 & 2014) (Originally published in Vector 278) I can cut a long story short in reviewing Stephanie Saulter’s first two novels, Gemsigns and Binary (collectively part of the slightly clumsily … Continue reading
REVIEW: NOIR AND LA FEMME EDITED BY IAN WHATES
Noir and La Femme edited by Ian Whates (Newcon Press, 2014) (originally published in Vector 277) Ian Whates, through Newcon Press and the Solaris Rising series, has established himself as a key editor in UK short fiction and I, like … Continue reading