A.C. Buchanan

Morgan lives in an intentional community of neurodivergent and mostly queer people in a rambling old mansion. Oh, and ghosts. Lots of ghosts. But when something starts scaring the ghosts, Morgan and the gang realise they have to help them.

This offbeat (sub)urban fantasy novel is affirming and supportive and just plain adorable.

I'll be honest, I really want to live with Morgan and their housemates. I absolutely love the writing. I love the inclusiveness. I love the found family and sense of community. What I didn't love was the editing – and I don't just mean typos, though there were typos. What I found distracting were the continuity errors (someone has many brothers at one point and then is an only child a few chapters later) and the sagging middle.

With a more thorough edit, this could be a really amazing novel. In many ways, it still is … just not quite as good as it could have been.… (més)

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!

(Please be warned that there are minor spoilers for the plot and scenes that happen within the book in my review! Caution advised!)

I wanted to like "Sanctuary" so much. An intriguing premise and an amazingly diverse cast just made me want to dive right in! Unfortunately, I wanted to get out of the swimming pool of "Sanctuary" only three chapters in. There is barely any plot to this novel, and when you do get some plot piece, it feels like only snatches of it. It takes about forty percent into the book for ANYTHING of plot relevance to happen. (I checked) There was a lot of focus on the characters, which is normally the thing I love! But everything about the characters felt like surface-level descriptions of their appearance and disabilities and almost sounded performative at points. I feel like I know nothing about these characters beyond their race, gender, and disability. I know Araminta is plus size, a redhead, an artist, and is Morgan's (the character who the story is told through) girlfriend. That's about it, besides the small snippets of Araminta's life prior to coming to Casswell. The only thing I know about Vinnie is that they're trans, a mom, and black. That's it. Another issue is that there are so many named characters, both living and dead alike, within this cast, I keep forgetting who is a human and who is a ghost! Also, the author seems to keep forgetting who is in what scene?! At the beginning of the scene where they talk to the ghost hunters, Morgan states that “Saeed has gone to catch up with classmates – I’m cynical enough to suspect he may have timed it strategically to avoid this meeting” but after Morgan has ANOTHER internal introspection (she does this A LOT), says those speaking have come to an agreement. Logan (The ghost hunter brother) asks if they can record their conversation with the ghost and SAEED says no? Saeed is stated to not be present during this meeting at the beginning of this scene. Was there a scene change? This has happened before, with the author starting the scene with Morgan talking to Callum online and Callum asking if they can meet in person, in the first part of the sentence. The second part of the sentence has them in the city meeting Callum at a coffee shop. The scene changes are far too abrupt and sometimes I don’t even realize there HAS been a scene change, which leaves me incredibly confused. These scene changes are VERY abrupt and disorienting. I kept thinking I accidentally skipped forward a few pages or accidentally skimmed over a paragraph. But no, the scene changes do suddenly change in the blink of an eye like that. There were minor plot points that annoyed me, such as Morgan wondering, “I wonder even if the pendant was once his, perhaps he thinks we stole it from him. Perhaps he doesn’t understand how much it is Araminta’s, how much it is my gift to her.” when the ghost gets pissed she took the pendant from the bottle. Like girlie pop, you DID steal it from him! It was locked away in a bottle that you had to BREAK to get it out, and you watched a ghost poof out when you did it! That pendant was stuck in the same bottle as the ghost for who knows how long, so obviously taking it was a bad idea! Did this girl never read “The Teeny-Tiny Woman”?! Also, I apologize, but I'm going to be very blunt. The final fight scene was one of the worst I have ever read. I have barely any idea what was going on because I was literally only told "We're fighting! Oh no [Name] has been injured! (Morgan goes on another long introspection monologue) We're back to fighting! (Another long Morgan internal monologue) FIGHTING!" and so on. It also dragged on FOREVER. I have no idea how long their fight was supposed to be in real-time (Was it hours? Days? Minutes?) but in reading time, it was long. All in all, I really didn't like Sanctuary. It has plenty of potential; in fact, I could see it being made into a television series or a movie, but it just didn't work for me as a book.

Also, this is a random minor nitpick, but this book keeps referring to ADHD as "ADD". But they did away with the term "ADD" in the DSM-4 (pub. 2000) and simplified it to ADHD with three sub-types. The DSM-5 (pub. 2013) changed it to "ADHD with presentations", so now it is just ADHD and the ways it presents, but I would admit for some that is fairly new. But still, you had at least twenty years to learn the correct term. It's possible that they still called it ADD in the UK, where this book is set, so I apologize if that's why the author keeps using what the DSM considers to be an outdated term.

Also, was having a ghost named Lydia Martin a Teen Wolf nod or a coincidence? Also, what is a house wiki?!… (més)

What a lovely science fiction novella! It’s a quiet story, and a short read (I read it in under an hour). Because of that, this review will be a bit shorter than normal.

Vonika’s an autistic engineer who chose to immigrate to an alien planet. She has built a career and life for herself there, complete with a marriage to an alien woman. In Temia, older citizens go through a process where they transition away from individuality and towards a group consciousness. Vonika is still deciding whether or not she’s willing to go through the process when she begins to get flashes of memories that don’t belong to her… At the same time, Temia is on the brink of war with a neighboring country, so Vonika’s life may be changing in more ways than one.

This Other World is intimately focused on Vonika’s life. While she is effected by larger events and affects them in turn, This Other World is no the sort of story that has a large scope or a heavy focus on action. It’s the sort of book I’d imagine would be perfect for curling up with a cup of tea on a cold day.

Vonika never felt like she fit in on Earth, and she still doesn’t really fit in in Temia. But as one of the only humans in the nation, her differences are presumed to be a feature common to her species and she finds herself more readily accepted. I can’t speak as to how her autism is portrayed, but I’ll note that this is own voices – the author is autistic as well.

I suggest This Other World for anyone looking for charming sci-fi novella with a bit of a mystery element.

Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.… (més)