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Nicola Griffith

Author of Hild

32+ Works 6,817 Members 299 Reviews 31 Favorited

About the Author

Image credit: Kelley Eskridge

Series

Works by Nicola Griffith

Hild (2013) 1,564 copies
Ammonite (1992) 1,341 copies
Slow River (1995) 1,195 copies
The Blue Place (1998) 577 copies
Spear (2022) 431 copies
Stay (2002) 422 copies
Always (2007) 280 copies
Bending the Landscape: Science Fiction (1998) — Editor — 221 copies
Bending the Landscape: Fantasy (1997) — Editor — 209 copies
So Lucky (2018) 172 copies
Menewood (2023) 122 copies
Bending the landscape : Horror (2001) — Editor — 106 copies
Cold Wind (2014) 48 copies

Associated Works

Bookmark Now: Writing in Unreaderly Times (2005) — Contributor — 254 copies
Year's Best Fantasy (2001) — Contributor — 202 copies
Eclipse 3: New Science Fiction and Fantasy (2009) — Contributor — 160 copies
Some of the Best from Tor.com: 2014 Edition (2015) — Contributor — 153 copies
Little Deaths (1995) — Contributor, some editions — 131 copies
Futures from Nature (2007) — Contributor — 113 copies
The Best of Interzone (1997) — Contributor — 99 copies
Best of the Best Lesbian Erotica (2000) — Contributor — 99 copies
Restricted Access: Lesbians on Disability (1999) — Contributor — 78 copies
Best Lesbian Erotica 1999 (1998) — Contributor — 64 copies
Letters to Tiptree (2015) — Contributor — 54 copies
Red Thirst (1990) — Contributor — 54 copies
Ignorant Armies (1989) — Contributor — 51 copies
Interzone: The 4th Anthology (1983) — Contributor — 41 copies
Best Lesbian Erotica 1996 (1996) — Contributor — 40 copies
The Laughter of Dark Gods (2002) — Contributor — 37 copies
Ghost Writing: Haunted Tales by Contemporary Writers (2000) — Contributor — 32 copies
Periphery: Erotic Lesbian Futures (2008) — Contributor — 30 copies
Soul Jar: Thirty-One Fantastical Tales by Disabled Authors (2023) — Foreword; Contributor — 15 copies
Queer Universes: Sexualities and Science Fiction (2008) — Contributor — 14 copies
Clarkesworld: Issue 101 (February 2015) (2015) — Contributor — 13 copies
Narrative Power: Encounters, Celebrations, Struggles (2010) — Contributor — 10 copies
StarShipSofa Stories Volume 3 — Contributor — 4 copies

Tagged

7th century (38) anthology (487) crime (50) ebook (157) England (52) erotica (66) essays (67) fantasy (427) feminism (81) fiction (1,023) gay (50) gender (40) goodreads (43) historical (62) historical fiction (248) horror (66) Kindle (65) lesbian (305) lesbian fiction (41) lgbt (59) LGBTQ (84) medieval (38) mystery (156) non-fiction (67) novel (98) paperback (37) queer (142) read (107) science fiction (988) sf (290) SF Masterworks (49) sff (117) short fiction (40) short stories (308) speculative fiction (73) thriller (61) to-read (899) unread (87) women (39) writing (51)

Common Knowledge

Members

Reviews

A somewhat distractedly different take on Arthurian myth which introduces Pereture a self taught super strength young woman who slots into a Percival shaped opening of Arthur's companions. Lance fills the usual slot but there is also a Bedwyr, a name often used for Arthur's closest companion, but aside from coloring just a generic companion here. It's short and abrupt at points and holds the interest well enough to be worth reading.
½
 
Flagged
quondame | 23 other reviews | Mar 13, 2024 |
What kept me engaged at the beginning of Slow River was all the detail about waste-water treatment methods! Yes, I am a huge nerd. It was only more towards the end that Lore's three selves---childhood, her time with Spanner, and the time after Spanner---really started to come together so that I wasn't frustrated to be left hanging at the end of each (short) section, and started to fall for Lore herself. The way everything comes together at the end---"like the confluence of three rivers"---is just wonderful.

Tense switching usually irritates me, but in Slow River I almost didn't notice and it actually succeeded in helping the mental transition between sections of the story. If you're a writer, this is the book to study.

Please note that this book is pretty much all about abuse. There is hinted (and eventually, dealt with head-on) child sexual abuse, rape/"date" rape/all kinds of messed up consent, an abusive partner, forced sex work, suicide and attempted suicide, etc.... I'm sure I'm forgetting things. Not a very happy book. But it has an optimistic ending, which is important to me.

This was interesting to read right after I finished Trouble and Her Friends, another queer sci fi novel. In Trouble, the criminals are lovable scamps; in Slow River, living outside the law has serious consequences even when no one gets caught. Spanner's image of herself as a quirky, essentially good Robin Hood who lives by her wits has many cracks and flaws.

The other similarity between the two books, of course, is that Lore is a lesbian, and so are many of the major and minor characters, and that's NOT one of the traumas---there is no homophobia at all. (There also isn't any visible racism, though there is an intense ableist scene.) On the other hand, in Trouble and Her Friends, homophobia and racism and sexism haven't truly changed, they've just adapted to new contexts with new twists. I thought a lot about the contrasts between these two visions of institutional discrimination, and while Trouble's is probably more realistic, Slow River's is still an interesting change of pace. It certainly makes you think.
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Flagged
caedocyon | 46 other reviews | Mar 6, 2024 |
The writing style and prose are simplistic and the plotting speeds ahead extremely quickly. A supernatural/metaphysical element is unconvincing and eye-roll inducing when it makes one of its occasional appearances. A threat of serial killers targeting MS patients on a cross country crime wave headed for the protagonist is, while unlikely and by-the-numbers-spare, at least something. The protagonist spends the whole of this short book in a state of bitterness and unpleasantness. Not much to recommend here for me.… (more)
 
Flagged
lelandleslie | 16 other reviews | Feb 24, 2024 |
Back in 2018, when I was finally able to get around to reading the first book in this series, I wrapped up that endeavor being impressed by the effort that Ms. Griffith had put into the novel, but had to admit that I more respected the work than loved it.

Flashing forward to 2024, I find myself in much the same boat. Hild is a great character, and I do love the way that Griffith writes about the landscape and environment of the England of the period as a character in and of itself. However, it does appear to be that now Dr. Griffith (she has picked up a doctorate in medieval history in the interim) is undertaking the endeavor of writing her own chronicle of England, and I'm not sure that I'm signing up for that in the long run. Here's the thing: Originally billed as the "Light of the World" series, Hild's story is now being billed as the "Hild Sequence," and a sequence sounds significantly longer than a trilogy. While I applaud Griffith's ambition, a lot of people have come up with ambitious writing programs that they were/are unable to conclude.

Realizing that this all sounds like damning with faint praise, I do expect to be looking at the follow-on books.
… (more)
 
Flagged
Shrike58 | 5 other reviews | Feb 15, 2024 |

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Associated Authors

Mark McLaughlin Contributor
Mark W. Tiedemann Contributor
L. Timmel Duchamp Contributor
Don Bassingthwaite Contributor
Carrie Richerson Contributor
J. K. Potter Contributor, Cover artist
Kathleen O'Malley Contributor
Keith Hartman Contributor
Ellen Klages Contributor
Holly Wade Matter Contributor
Simon Sheppard Contributor
Leslie What Contributor
Rebecca Ore Contributor
Nancy Johnston Contributor
Wendy Rathbone Contributor
Ralph A. Sperry Contributor
Jim Grimsley Contributor
Allen Steele Contributor
Richard A. Bamberg Contributor
Charles Sheffield Contributor
Nancy Kress Contributor
Denise Lopes Heald Contributor
Stephen Baxter Contributor
Shariann Lewitt Contributor
Ellen Kushner Contributor
K. L. Berac Contributor
M. W. Keiper Contributor
James A. Moore Contributor
B.J. Thrower Contributor
Jeff Verona Contributor
Charlee Jacob Contributor
Dominick Cancilla Contributor
Richard Bowes Contributor
Robin Wayne Bailey Contributor
Delia Sherman Contributor
Mark Shepherd Contributor
Kim Antieau Contributor
Tanya Huff Contributor
Barbara Hambly Contributor
Gary Bowen Contributor
Brian A. Hopkins Contributor
Alexi Smart Contributor
Kraig Blackwelder Contributor
Cynthia Ward Contributor
James Van Pelt Contributor
A.J. Potter Contributor
Sam Wolfe Connelly Illustrator
Pearl Hewitt Narrator
Rovina Cai Illustrator, Cover artist
Karla Eoff Copy editor
Elena Balbusso Cover artist
Anna Balbusso Cover artist
Abby Kagan Designer
Charlotte Strick Cover designer
Jeffrey L. Ward Map artist
Bruce Jensen Cover artist
Kathleen M. Lynch Cover designer
Ingrid Herrmann Translator
David Stevenson Cover artist
Dana Spaeth Cover artist
Kathleen Lynch Cover designer
Vincent Chong Cover artist
Amy Halperin Cover designer
Kellan Peck Designer
Tim Francis Photographer
Terry Karydes Designer
Christine Foltzer Cover designer
Nellys Li Cover designer
Kevin Murphy Cover artist

Statistics

Works
32
Also by
35
Members
6,817
Popularity
#3,586
Rating
3.8
Reviews
299
ISBNs
78
Languages
5
Favorited
31

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