Che Taylor is 17 and his little sister, Rosa, is 10 -- and she's a psychopath. His itinerant parents are relocating the family -- again -- to start (another) social enterprise, this one in New York, and Che knows that when the plane from Bangkok touches down, Rosa will resume her secret campaigns of psychological torture and ghastly cruelty, and that he'll be the only one who can see through the cherubic, charismatic, ringleted facade to the monster underneath. If only he didn't love her so much...

For more than a decade, science fiction and fantasy writers have handed around Nisi Shawl and Cynthia Ward's Writing the Other, an intensely practical and thoughtful guide to inclusive, representative writing that includes people of genders, ethnicities, races, and orientations other than the writer's.

Justine Larbalestier's Razorhurst is an historical novel that skilfully weaves in a ghost story that puts the action of gang-warfare exactly where it belongs: in the relationship between the living and the dead.

Four more books have been added to the final week of the third Humble Ebook Bundle: John Scalzi's Hugo- and Nebula-nominated novella The God Engines; Dia Reeves's Bleeding Violet; Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill's Arcanum 101; and Ryan "Dinosaur Comics" North's To Be or Not To Be, a bestselling, choose-your-own adventure version of Hamlet. — Read the rest

For the past two months, I've been working on a secret project to produce an independent audiobook adaptation of my bestselling novel Homeland, read by Wil Wheaton, one of my favorite audiobook voice-actors (and a hell of a great guy, besides!). — Read the rest

In the tradition of August's book-review roundup, I've pulled together a collection of my favorite young adult reviews from the past decade. Hope you — and the young adults in your life — enjoy these as much as I did! — Read the rest

Justine Larbalestier provides some context for Republican MO senate nominee Todd Akin statement that, "from what I understand from doctors [pregnancy from rape] is really rare. If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down." — Read the rest

Team Human is a new young adult novel from Justine Larbalastier and Sarah Rees Brennan, about an ancient vampire who enrolls at a small town high school, where a beautiful young girl falls in love with him.

No, it's not that novel. — Read the rest

Justine Larbalestier, a very good novelist with very bad RSI, has written a great post called "Why I Cannot Write a Novel With Voice Recognition Software." In it, she explains why machine-based speech-to-text software isn't sufficient for fiction. I think that if I absolutely lost the use of my hands and had no other choice, I'd probably dive into speech-to-text and gut it out, but nothing short of absolute necessity would get me to write fiction with machine-based speech-recognition. — Read the rest

I just finished listening to the unabridged audiobook of Justine Larbalestier's new YA novel, Liar, read by Channie Waites, and I'm here to tell you that it's Larbalestier's best book (and that's saying something). Here's a sample of the audio:

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. — Read the rest

Update: Victory! Justine's publisher has replaced its whites-only cover with a gloriously brown one.

YA author Justine Larbalestier has gone public with her disappointment over her US publisher Bloomsbury's cover art for her forthcoming novel Liar. Specifically, Justine is upset that the cover shows a white girl, and the book is about a black girl. — Read the rest

In this superb Australian public radio documentary, "MBA: Mostly bloody awful," the idea of "scientific management" and "professional management" is subjected to an extremely critical look and comes up wanting. Focusing on the Harvard Business School and the circumstances that gave rise to it (America: "a corporation founded by a corporation"; "scientific" Taylorism and its focus on quantifying the unquantifiable, the fad to quantification in management, such as Meyers-Briggs). — Read the rest

Here's part two of my Boing Boing Holiday Gift Guide — wherein I list the bestselling items that have been reviewed here in the past twelve months. Today, it's fiction. Don't miss yesterday's Kids' stuff and stuff about kids post, too! — Read the rest

Well, it's coming up to the holidays and I've started to make my list and fill it in. As a starting point, I went through all the books and DVDs and gadgets I'd reviewed on Boing Boing since last November and looked at what had been the best-sellers among BB's readership, figuring you folks have pretty good taste! — Read the rest

The podcast edition of James Patrick Kelly's Hugo-nominated novella Burn won the Nebula Award last night. As far as I know, that makes it the first Creative Commons licensed work and the first podcast to win an Nebula.

Congrats are also in order for Justine Larbalestier, whose Magic or Madness won the Andre Norton Award. — Read the rest

The Locus Magazine poll for the best science fiction of 2006 is closing soon — the poll is open to everyone, and invites you to select your favorite works published last year for receipt of the prestigious Locus Award (I've won it twice: Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom won Best First Novel in 2004, and I, Robot won best Novelette in 2005). — Read the rest

Justine Larbalestier has concluded her wonderful young adult fantasy trilogy, Magic or Madness. The third volume, Magic's Child, brings the series to a really satisfying, complex conclusion that's both brave and thought-provoking.

In the Magic or Madness series, we are introduced to a magic system in which those born to magic die a little every time they use it — but go insane if they refuse to use it (hence the title). — Read the rest

"Magic or Madness," a fantasy novel for young adults has everything it takes to be an instant classic for smart, curious kids who look to fantasy for more than escape — who look to fantasy literature to stretch their understanding of the real world. — Read the rest