Indie Game Works by Nathan P. Gibson

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Indie Game Works is a book exploring fifty recent indie games and the stories behind their creation. Each game’s entry features stills and concept art, interviews with creators, and discussions of influences and how the game came to be created. The focus is on how these games are made in terms of their art, styles, and worldbuilding, meaning that it offers a great insight into the variety of ways that people conceive of game plots, art styles, and mechanics.

If, like me, you play games but often stick to those you know, this book is both expansive (showing some of the potential out there to play) and dangerous (adding to your wishlist of games you’d like to play). For people who are perhaps more familiar with many of the games included, it offers potential for looking under the hood of these games, as well as creative inspiration for people wondering if their idea is a game. I’ve run game design workshops before and I think this book would be a great one to have on hand when people are in the early stages of thinking about game creation, as shows a variety of art styles and directorial decisions that help shape indie games into their own specific experiences.

Whether you like to play games, make games, or just learn about the creative process, Indie Game Works is the sort of book you can dip in and out of, looking for ideas or just wanting to take in the beautiful art of the games inside it.

(Thanks to Thames & Hudson for the review copy.)

Taipei Story by R.F. Kuang

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Taipei Story is a literary fiction novel about a Yale student who goes to Taiwan for a summer-long intensive language programme. Lily Chen goes to Taipei hoping for a connection to the language she wishes she knew better, but when she gets there, she realises how much hard work everything is going to be. Her classes are difficult, she struggles with her roommate and others on her programme, and she’s not having the revelations she hoped for. Then her grandfather in China dies and she is forced to think more about her family and her relationship to people and to learning Chinese.

This book is quite different to the other books I’ve read by Kuang, as those (Babel, Katabasis, and Yellowface) all have quite a lot of plot, whereas Taipei Story is a literary version of someone’s study abroad blog, so is much more focused on the details of Lily’s day to day life than much actually happening. I think if you’re a fan of that kind of literary fiction—broadly similar to Sally Rooney—then Taipei Story will work well for you, but if you’re not, it might be more hit or miss. For me, I liked all the detail about food and what Lily was and wasn’t getting used to, as that felt like it was building up a picture of what she was actually focused on, but I did find the book slow and difficult to get into as I was waiting to see if anything was going to happen.

Once her grandfather dies, there’s more about Lily’s family and their past, but I expected this element to go deeper than it did, and the short chapter near the end that focuses on her grandfather felt a bit forced as it didn’t quite fit with the rest of the novel. The book has a lot of ideas around culture, language, and colonialism, but I don’t think how they were presented through Lily’s perspective always worked (for example, I think it means that the book can never properly engage with the mentions of genocide that come up). By the end of the book, Lily is still disconnected from the other characters, to the extent that we as the readers know very little about any of the other characters, and it doesn’t really feel like even Lily gets much change or character development.

Overall, this is a book that combines some deep ideas with a superficial narrative that for me was just a bit too predictable and similar to other literary fiction in this kind of ‘lost protagonist coming of age’ genre. I really enjoyed Katabasis because it was so fun and I think Taipei Story is just quite different to that. After reading it, I saw that Kuang had similar experiences to Lily with studying abroad and it did perhaps feel more like someone’s nonfiction account of travel and struggling with cultural change than a novel (so I can see why the blurb I read compared it to Patricia Lockwood). As someone who is more of a literary fiction person than a fantasy person by a long way, I have to admit that I prefer Babel and Katabasis.

The Sea Hides Its Dead by Megan Bontrager

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The Sea Hides Its Dead is a horror novel about a academic expedition to try and find an underwater cult of Leviathan. Caroline is a grad student who is the only person who believes in Edward Beck, an academic obsessed with a strange quasi-religious cult there’s little proof of. When Beck, who is also her lover, says he needs her to come along on an expedition into the sea caves where the cult may have dwelt, it seems like the chance she needs. However, once the group gets to the caves, they become trapped there, forced to undertake trials relating to their greatest sins.

I was drawn to this book thanks to the title and the sea horror idea, and whilst it isn’t really a sea horror book like I was expecting, I did find it a fun horror adventure. The plot is very much as you’d expect, with the group descending and then facing various dramatic things happening. There’s a big focus on Caroline realising that Beck doesn’t really care about her, and her focusing on her friendship with Mallory, a relationship she previously undervalued. At times it feels like Caroline gets all this emotional depth at the expense of the other characters, who are mostly just stand-ins for certain concepts or tropes. I also found the morality at times a bit black and white, with the ‘good’ characters always having ‘sins’ that are completely justified in the narrative. The ending reinforces this, with a sudden happy ending that didn’t quite carry the weight of its negative aspects.

To me, it felt like a cross between a ‘stuck in a cave’ horror like The Descent and the academia/power/belief side of Katabasis. The horror of the Leviathan wasn’t really there for most of it, so it felt less about that side, and more about the human side of things. Personally, I think that the title perhaps isn’t the best for the book, as the book really didn’t feel much about the sea at all, which I was expecting. If you go into this expecting horror about power and trying to find a cult whilst trapped in a changing cave system, I think you’ll have a decent time.

Splasher by Billie Host

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Splasher is a horror book set within a university swim team, as people start dying in and out of the pool. Spencer is back at the university where a fellow member of the swim team died ten years ago, now the assistant swim coach for the team. When two students are found dead in the pool on his first day, the whole team are thrown off, but it doesn’t stop there.

I loved the concept of this book, combining a slasher with such a specific setting as a university swim team. My sister is into competitive swimming so I appreciated all of the detail behind the swim team, rather than it being a cursory theming, though I can see that some people might find there is a lot of swimming content in the book. The narrative itself is pretty simple, and the reveals are barely reveals, but I still found it pretty fun to come along for the ride. The narrative perspective swaps between a few characters, which doesn’t always work—I think it would have been better without one of the perspectives who was antagonistic, as it felt like revealed too much— but I liked how it meant you got some depth to more of the characters through their perspectives.

The book was marketed I believe as adult horror, but I think it is most similar to Point Horror books and fits more into that kind of genre (or at least into Point Horror nostalgia for adults). It reminds me a lot of why I used to love the Nightmare Hall books as a teenager: taking a specific element of university life and doing horror around that. However, despite being set in 2006 (mostly, and for occasional flashbacks in 1996), it is updated from Point Horror as there’s actual queer characters, which I appreciated. It’s not a particularly tense or scary slasher and it has quite a slow pace, so it is best for something fun and a bit silly with Friday the 13th vibes.

The Red Sacrament by Sara Hinkley

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The Red Sacrament is a vampire novel about a group of vampires and what happens when some strangers upset the balance between them and their leader. Arnault is head of a clan of vampires who perform at the Théâtre Saint-Siméon in Paris during a turbulent time in Parisian history. The vampires feed off the audience members and their concerns centre around who gets which parts, until a visit from a witch and then two newcomer vampires arriving in Paris change everything. Arnault is drawn to Victor, one of these newcomers, and dreams of the witch, but his preoccupations threaten the world he has built.

This is a book that is very much described as a “vampire novel” first and foremost, though it also has an interest in politics that feels very in-keeping with the broader gothic genre. The writing style is lush and really brings to life its nineteenth-century Paris and the contradictions held within it and within the lives of the vampire clan. The actual narrative has a slow pace, with a lot of focus on visual detail and the world of Paris. It is a book for people looking for that kind of atmosphere, a slow historical vampire novel that is playing with ideas more than plot. The characters except Arnault are not really explored in depth, because you get everything through his perspective, and I can see how for some people this might be frustrating, as a lot of the other vampires blur into one another.

This is also a novel that is in conversation with Interview with the Vampire quite clearly, as well as political and social ideas. Having read the book and seen the film, but not having watched the TV series yet, I found it interesting to see which elements I noticed as feeling explicitly in discussion with IWTV and how effective I found this. Ultimately, it does make it easy to say that if you like the theatre of vampires element of Interview with the Vampire and wished for something that explored the dynamics of that alongside the background of political upheaval, then that’s what you’re getting with The Red Sacrament.

Personally, I appreciate a lot of what Hinkley does in the book, particularly in terms of the writing style and creating a very fitting atmosphere through it. It has an otherworldly vibe, filled with dreams and shiny visions that betray rot underneath, with very real societal problems. However, I also found myself skimming through it, wanting more from its length. I think I might just be more of a twentieth- or twenty-first-century vampire person, or at least more Lost Souls than Interview with the Vampire.

Here Comes Summer by Georgie Kain

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Here Comes Summer is a romance novel about two ex-boyfriends who have to fake still being together to go on a trip around Europe for a travel brand. Brady is aimless, with his rich family wanting him to follow in their footsteps and become a lawyer, but when he gets an offer from a travel company to be an ambassador for their brand for the summer thanks to an old social media account, he jumps at the chance. The catch? They want a couple, having seen Brady’s posts with ex-boyfriend Hayes, who is now preparing for med school and worrying about money. This could be the perfect summer for both of them, but feelings might complicate their chance for easy money.

This is a great summer read if you’re looking for queer romance, as it is light and the drama never feels too deep or troublesome for the couple. I like how it is told from both Brady and Hayes’ perspectives, which makes the obvious miscommunication work better than it sometimes does (I find the trope is often frustrating when it is unrealistic and just there to create slight drama). There’s definitely some interesting character development for them both, with the narrative focusing on them needing to take some inspiration from each other as they grow up, and realise that they might need to rethink some of their impressions to understand each other better. Each location they go to has a weather report that I think is meant to give a flavour of what is going to happen to their relationship there, but I didn’t really feel like it was needed.

Here Comes Summer is an escapist romance that focuses on growing into who you want to be, whilst also touching on wealth differences and gay shame. It is on the lighter end of queer romance, but with characters that still feel like real queer people even in the very fictional situations.

White Spaces by Elvin James Mensah

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White Spaces is a novel about friendship, as four Black men come of age in London in 2012. Teddy is an editor at a major music magazine, seemingly living the dream even though it seems magazines are getting less and less popular. Regardless, he has his best friends (and old school friends) around him: Nathan who is trying to make money to support his son; Kain, who now works with Nathan but is afraid to come out as bisexual; and Birch, always the unpredictable one of the group, seemingly flitting through life without a care in the world. His friends mean the world to Teddy, but as they all struggle with complications in their lives, he has to face what might happen if they weren’t always able to be there for each other.

I’d not read anything by Mensah before, but was drawn in by the blurb of this book. It was a lot more emotional than I expected, as I was assuming it would be a fairly detached, literary take on these men’s lives, but instead, the narrative really focuses on them as individual characters and their emotions. It’s such a gripping read due to this real sense of connection with the characters, meaning that I ended up reading the book in two sittings. The story itself is heartbreaking and yet also not despairing, but looking for hope in whatever happens.

I really loved how the characters’ sexualities were presented and explored, with everyone having very different experiences and the narrative giving these all space. In particular, Teddy’s asexuality and his ways of communicating how important the love in friendship is to him was an element that felt very refreshing to see in contemporary literary fiction, not shying away from not only showing a character who doesn’t want sexual or romantic relationships, but having him explicitly talking about this fact with people.

There’s so much packed into this novel, with every character dealing with their own very real issues (one note I will give for potential readers is  that this book deals a lot with eating disorders, so be aware of that going in). I didn’t want to leave these characters behind and reading White Spaces made me immediately want to go and read Mensah’s earlier novel Small Joys. 

Slasher Summer by E.L. Chen

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Slasher Summer is a horror novel about a group who were once friends in high school, now reunited in the remote cabin where their cult favourite slasher film movie was filmed. Patrick has invited his old group of friends, all of whom came together to watch horror films, back together to stay in the cabin in their hometown where the film Slasher was made. Things between them haven’t been the same since high school, but this is their chance to come back together. However, when they spot the slasher from the film in the woods, suddenly their reunion is more than just a chance to remember the horror films they used to watch.

This book is one of the many love letters to slasher stories that have been released in recent years, featuring many references to classic slasher films and characters. The book doesn’t get too bogged down in the references though, and it really builds up the characterisation of the group as the focus rather than just ticking off tropes. I loved the way that it plays with some of the more dated elements of slasher tropes, particularly around race and sexuality, and questions who is allowed to play which role in the genre. At the same time, the narrative has a slow build up and then a gory second half, so it doesn’t lack the kind of excitement you’d expect from the genre. I worked out the twist partway through, but it was still a satisfying ending that felt decently set up.

If you’re a fan of fun slasher stories, but also want a version that takes characters who are slightly older than the usual teens and has them wonder if they really want to stay who they were in high school, then Slasher Summer is one to look out for. There’s definitely a few characters whose deaths make you feel like you wished they could’ve had longer, which I think is a testament to the characterisation as in many slashers you can often struggle to tell the initial deaths apart.

Hard Place by Gab Torr

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Hard Place is a novel about queer community, trauma, and hypocrisy, as a woman joins a new house share. Billy was used to everything being decided by her controlling girlfriend, Rose, but when they break up, she finds herself in a new type of situation: a queer house share. Rhoda and Sid have community guidelines for the house, a book group of friends that Billy can’t help but judge, and want everything to be communal and discussed. But whilst Billy mocks them in her head, she also starts to realise that she does need to explore her own boundaries and her past.

This is a layered book that both satirises a certain kind of queer roommate situation and also is a sometimes surprisingly dark look at one person’s traumatic past and how that might cause them to be a messy person who makes bad choices. Hard Place is one of those books where you initially can’t work out exactly where the lines between satire and sincerity will lie, and even as the book goes on, it feels like Torr doesn’t quite want you to know that. Instead, there’s a lot of details that feel biting, but also it does seem like Billy does sometimes benefit from the sincere-to-the-point-of-ridiculous care from her housemates.

The ending is a fascinating choice, one that almost makes you wince but also wonder what it means for the characters, especially as they don’t really go through the kind of character development that the blurb suggested. There’s perhaps not as deep a biting commentary as the book goes on, and elements like Rhoda’s parents actually owning the house they live in are a horribly true representation of many people in London, but none of the characters really delve into what it means (though the ending feels like it does comment on it on a reader level).

Hard Place is a fascinating novel to me, as a literary fiction take on often exaggerated queer drama and very real trauma that skirts between satire and sincerity.

Goodbye Chinatown by Kit Fan

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Goodbye Chinatown is a novel about food, family, and belonging, as a chef is torn between priorities in a changing world. Amber Fan moved to England from Hong Kong as a child, studied at Oxford, and is now opening a Chinese fusion restaurant in London’s Chinatown. Her parents are returning to Hong Kong with young Bobby, but Amber is determined to make it, and even more so when mysterious Celeste offers money towards Amber’s restaurant. As the years go on, their lives change, and they are all caught between cultures and secrets.

This is a beautifully written novel that really paints a picture of Chinatown as it has changed over the years, and then of Hong Kong and its changes too. The narrative comes in stages, jumping in time to show how the world changes, and purposefully never quite giving closure from one section to another. I liked the descriptions of food, particularly in the earlier parts of the novel where it is most prevalent, and the way that you get not just Amber’s perspective on her food, but also, later, Bobby’s perspective on her obsession with food too.

Due to the structure and style, you often feel like you’re peeking at the characters rather than getting more deeply to know them. One side character in particular seems important initially and then basically disappears for the rest of the book, so it’s not the sort of novel in which everything comes together, but more like a sequence of different events and choices, reflecting life. The political and familial tensions are carefully woven together, not offering answers, but instead showing the complexity of people.

Goodbye Chinatown is a fascinating look at ideas of belonging and authenticity. I think the food angle will draw people in—novels focused on food seem to be having a bit of a moment—and this one offers food as sumptuous description but also as a cultural marker, a passion, and a metaphor.