With Both Hands

Sign in Subscribe

Books

No, You Can't Be an Astronaut 2023 Edition is Free on Amazon

In 2018 I reviewed the book No, You Can’t Be an Astronaut, written under the pseudonym Patience Fairweather, Ph.D. That book is now on its fourth edition, and the author E. G. de Pillis, is willing to shed her pseudonymity. You can pick up the book for free

Writers, Readers, and Critics

I recently recorded a podcast about book reviewing, and this got me thinking about what it is that I do here at With Both Hands. I had to come up with answers on the fly for the podcast, but the advantage of a blog is that I can take my

Swords Against the Night: The Lost Book 4

When I wrote my review of Darkness and Stone, book 3 in Peter Nealen’s “The Lost” series, I said Nealen had done a great job wrapping it up. Nealen wrote me and let me know that there was plenty more where that came from. I still think Nealen made

I Might Believe in Faeries

Friend of the blog Aaron Irber invited me on his podcast I Might Believe in Faeries to talk about Tim Power’s masterful time-travel novel The Anubis Gates. I spoke with Aaron and his patrons for an hour an a half in a wide-ranging discussion on Powers’ use of symbolism,

La Danza de la Muerta free until November 3rd

I reviewed Donald Uitvlugt’s La Danza de Muerta in August of 2020. Here’s my assessment: The theme of this collection is memento mori. Some of these stories are tragic, some terrifying, and some hopeful. Each story is incredibly dense, a feat achieved in part through allusive references, which

Vampire Hunter D Humble Bundle

Humble Bundle has a screaming deal on the Vampire Hunter D light novels by Kikuchi Hideyuki. You can pick up 29 volumes for as little as $25. I passed Vampire Hunter D over when I was younger, but I picked this up and read the first one and I’m

Light Unto Another World by Yakov Merkin

Light Unto Another World by Yakov Merkin [Amazon link] is the first of a planned 10 volume isekai series, with volumes 1 through 5 already published, and 6 through 10 recently crowdfunded on Kickstarter. Uriel Makkis is on his way to a deployment with the Israeli army when he finds