Reviews

I mostly review books on the following subjects: (1) cartography and maps; (2) amphibians and reptiles; and (3) science fiction and fantasy. I also review books on astronomy, history and other subjects I’m interested in. My reviews have been published by AE, Calafia, Strange Horizons and Tor.com; I also regularly post reviews on my map blog, The Map Room, and on this website. This page serves as a hub for all of them.

Reviews by Year, below, list all my reviews, from all sources, in chronological order. There’s also an index of my reviews organized by subject and author.

For information on sending me review copies, see the FAQ.

Reviews by Year

2023

  1. Atlas of Design, Vol. 6 (The Map Room)

2022

  1. Burning Girls and Other Stories by Veronica Schanoes (Strange Horizons)
  2. Undiscovered Territories by Robert Freeman Wexler (Strange Horizons)
  3. North American Maps for Curious Minds by Matthew Bucklan and Victor Cizek (The Map Room)
  4. Clock and Compass by Mark Monmonier (The Map Room)
  5. Putting the Fact in Fantasy ed. by Dan Koboldt
  6. The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd (Strange Horizons)
  7. The Rise and Reign of the Mammals by Steve Brusatte

2021

  1. Driftwood by Marie Brennan (Strange Horizons)
  2. The Eternal City by Jessica Maier (The Map Room)
  3. Rabbit Island by Elvira Navarro (Strange Horizons)
  4. Elsewhere (The Age of Islands) by Alastair Bonnett (The Map Room)

2020

  1. In Search of Lost Islands (The Map Room)
    • The Phantom Atlas by Edward Brooke-Hitching
    • Phantom Islands by Dirk Liesemer
    • The Undiscovered Islands by Malachy Tallack
  2. Star Maps, 3rd ed., by Nick Kanas (Calafia)
  3. Instances of Head-Switching by Teresa Milbrodt (Strange Horizons)
  4. American Snakes by Sean P. Graham
  5. Secrets of Snakes: The Science Beyond the Myths by David A. Steen
  6. Snake by Erica Wright
  7. Underground Cities by Mark Ovenden (The Map Room)
  8. The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs by Steve Brusatte

2019

  1. The Pleasant Profession of Robert A. Heinlein by Farah Mendlesohn
  2. An Exercise in Telling: Sylvain Neuvel’s Themis Files (AE)
    • Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel
    • Waking Gods by Sylvain Neuvel
  3. The Art of Illustrated Maps by John Roman (The Map Room)
  4. Cartography by Matthew H. Edney (The Map Room)

2018

  1. Navigation: A Very Short Introduction by Jim Bennett (The Map Room)
  2. The Will to Battle by Ada Palmer
  3. The Art of Map Illustration by James Gulliver Hancock et al. (The Map Room)
  4. All Those Explosions Were Someone Else’s Fault by James Alan Gardner
  5. The Tangled Lands by Paolo Bacigalupi and Tobias S. Buckell
  6. How to Lie with Maps, 3rd ed., by Mark Monmonier (The Map Room)
  7. Head On by John Scalzi
  8. The Lost Art of Finding Our Way by John Edward Huth (The Map Room)
  9. Soundings by Hali Felt (The Map Room)
  10. Atlas by Tom Harper (The Map Room)
  11. A History of America in 100 Maps by Susan Schulten (The Map Room)
  12. A Literary Love Letter to Maps: The Writer’s Map (Tor.com)
    • The Writer’s Map edited by Huw Lewis-Jones
  13. The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World, 15th ed. (The Map Room)
  14. All Over the Map by Betsy Mason and Greg Miller (The Map Room)

2017

  1. Miniatures by John Scalzi
  2. The Stars Are Legion by Kameron Hurley
  3. A Perfect Machine by Brett Savory
  4. Weird Dinosaurs by John Pickrell
  5. All Our Wrong Todays by Elan Mastai
  6. The House of Binding Thorns by Aliette de Bodard
  7. Snakes of the Eastern United States by Whit Gibbons
  8. The Delirium Brief by Charles Stross
  9. Amatka by Karin Tidbeck
  10. The Territory Is Not the Map (The Map Room)
    • How to Draw Fantasy Art and RPG Maps by Jared Blando
  11. A History of Canada in Ten Maps by Adam Shoalts (The Map Room)
  12. Infinity Wars edited by Jonathan Strahan
  13. You Are Here: NYC by Katharine Harmon (The Map Room)
  14. Venera Dreams and the Art of the Mosaic Novel
    • Venera Dreams by Claude Lalumière
  15. Artemis by Andy Weir
  16. Picturing America by Stephen J. Hornsby (The Map Room)
  17. The Red Atlas by John Davies and Alexander J. Kent (The Map Room)
  18. Dragon Teeth by Michael Crichton
  19. Autonomous by Annalee Newitz

2016

  1. Radiance by Catherynne M. Valente
  2. Adventures in Academic Cartography by Mark Monmonier (The Map Room)
  3. The Semi-Secret Life of Andrew J. Offutt
    • My Father, the Pornographer by Chris Offutt
  4. China at the Center edited by Natasha Reichle (The Map Room)
  5. Snakes of the Southeast by Whit Gibbons and Mike Dorcas
  6. Quantum Night by Robert J. Sawyer (AE)
  7. The Winged Histories by Sofia Samatar
  8. Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer
  9. Company Town by Madeline Ashby (AE)
  10. Necessity by Jo Walton (AE)
  11. Ghost Talkers by Mary Robinette Kowal
  12. Not So Much, Said the Cat by Michael Swanwick
  13. Atlas Obscura by Joshua Foer, Dylan Thuras and Ella Morton (The Map Room)
  14. Shoot the Moon by Nicolas Dupont-Bloch
  15. Invisible Planets edited by Ken Liu
  16. Bridging Infinity edited by Jonathan Strahan
  17. Pirate Utopia by Bruce Sterling
  18. Treasures from the Map Room edited by Debbie Hall (The Map Room)
  19. The Glass Universe by Dava Sobel

2015

  1. Irregular Verbs and Other Stories by Matthew Johnson (AE)
  2. Unruly Places (Off the Map) by Alastair Bonnett (The Map Room)
  3. Elements by Suzanne Church (AE)
  4. Beethoven: Anguish and Triumph by Jan Swafford
  5. My Real Children by Jo Walton (AE)
  6. The Martian by Andy Weir
  7. God and the Machines: The Short Fiction of Peter Watts (AE)
    • Beyond the Rift by Peter Watts
  8. Child of a Hidden Sea by A. M. Dellamonica
  9. The Just City and The Philosopher Kings by Jo Walton (AE)
  10. The House of Shattered Wings by Aliette de Bodard
  11. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel (AE)
  12. Falling in Love with Hominids by Nalo Hopkinson (AE)
  13. Atlas of Cursed Places by Olivier Le Carrer (The Map Room)
  14. Echopraxia by Peter Watts (AE)

2014

  1. The Snake Charmer by Jamie James
  2. Lockstep by Karl Schroeder
  3. Tracks and Shadows: Field Biology as Art by Harry W. Greene
  4. Questionable Practices by Eileen Gunn
  5. The Map Thief by Michael Blanding (The Map Room)
  6. Long Hidden edited by Rose Fox and Daniel José Older
  7. A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki (AE)

2013

  1. On the Map by Simon Garfield (The Map Room)
  2. The Book of Thomas by Robert Boyczuk
  3. Red Planet Blues by Robert J. Sawyer
  4. Here, There Be Dragons by James A. Owen
  5. A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan
  6. Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed
  7. Glamour in Glass by Mary Robinette Kowal
  8. Without a Summer by Mary Robinette Kowal
  9. The Human Division by John Scalzi
  10. My Beloved Brontosaurus by Riley Black
  11. 2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson
  12. The Art of the Map by Dennis Reinhartz (The Map Room)
  13. Here Be Dragons by Stefan Ekman (The Map Room)
  14. Sea Monsters on Medieval and Renaissance Maps by Chet Van Duzer (The Map Room)
  15. The Best of All Possible Worlds by Karen Lord
  16. The Mapmaker’s War by Ronlyn Domingue
  17. Redshirts by John Scalzi
  18. Glitter and Mayhem edited by John Klima, Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas
  19. Horse of a Different Color by Howard Waldrop
  20. A History of the World in Twelve Maps by Jerry Brotton (The Map Room)

2012

  1. Atlas of the Galilean Satellites by Paul Schenk (The Map Room)
  2. A Door into Ocean by Joan Slonczewski
  3. Triggers by Robert J. Sawyer
  4. Planesrunner by Ian McDonald
  5. Arctic Rising by Tobias S. Buckell
  6. Above by Leah Bobet
  7. Quiet by Susan Cain
  8. The Islanders by Christopher Priest
  9. Masters of the Planet by Ian Tattersall
  10. Theodore Rex by Edmund Morris
  11. Map of a Nation by Rachel Hewitt (The Map Room)
  12. The Life and Death of Planet Earth by Peter Ward and Donald Brownlee
  13. Embassytown by China Miéville
  14. The High Crusade by Poul Anderson
  15. Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey
  16. At the Mouth of the River of Bees by Kij Johnson
  17. The Pottawatomie Giant and Other Stories by Andy Duncan
  18. Mira Grant’s Newsflesh Trilogy
    • Feed by Mira Grant
    • Deadline by Mira Grant
    • Blackout by Mira Grant
  19. Caliban’s War by James S. A. Corey
  20. Be My Enemy by Ian McDonald
  21. Colonel Roosevelt by Edmund Morris
  22. Princes of Sandastre by Antony Swithin

2011

  1. Among Others by Jo Walton
  2. In Maps and Legends by Michael Jasper and Niki Smith (The Map Room)
  3. Servant of the Underworld and Harbinger of the Storm by Aliette de Bodard
  4. Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente
  5. Written in Stone by Riley Black
  6. Infinite City by Rebecca Solnit (The Map Room)
  7. Dancing with Bears by Michael Swanwick
  8. Zoo City by Lauren Beukes
  9. OpenStreetMap by F. Ramm, J. Topf and S. Chilton (The Map Room)
  10. Fuzzy Nation by John Scalzi
  11. Engineering Infinity edited by Jonathan Strahan
  12. The Dervish House by Ian McDonald
  13. The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N. K. Jemisin
  14. When the Great Days Come by Gardner Dozois
  15. Beginner’s Guide to Keeping Venomous Snakes by Lenny Flank
  16. The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt by Edmund Morris
  17. Jules Verne: The Definitive Biography by William Butcher
  18. Lifelode by Jo Walton
  19. 1493 by Charles C. Mann
  20. Master of the House of Darts by Aliette de Bodard
  21. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
  22. Maphead by Ken Jennings (The Map Room)
  23. Historical Atlas of Washington and Oregon by Derek Hayes (The Map Room)
  24. Personal Geographies by Jill K. Berry (The Map Room)

2010

  1. Rite of Passage by Alexei Panshin
  2. The Power of Place by Harm de Blij (The Map Room)
  3. The Snake Scientist by Sy Montgomery (Gartersnake.info)
  4. Ambassadors from Earth by Jay Gallentine
  5. From Here to There by Kris Harzinski (The Map Room)
  6. National Geographic Atlas of the World, 9th ed. (The Map Room)
  7. Fall from Earth by Matthew Johnson
  8. The Alchemist and The Executioness
    • The Alchemist by Paolo Bacigalupi
    • The Executioness by Tobias S. Buckell

2009

  1. Two Inexpensive Star Atlases (The Map Room)
    • Sky & Telescope’s Pocket Sky Atlas by Roger W. Sinnott
    • Cambridge Star Atlas, 3rd ed., by Wil Tirion
  2. Map Addict by Mike Parker (The Map Room)
  3. Paris Underground by Mark Ovenden (The Map Room)
  4. The Fourth Part of the World by Toby Lester (The Map Room)
  5. Bloom County: The Complete Collection, Vol. 1: 1980-1982 by Berkeley Breathed

2008

  1. Our Dumb World by The Onion (The Map Room)
  2. Longitude by Dava Sobel (The Map Room)
  3. Canada Back Road Atlas (The Map Room)
  4. Transit Maps of the World by Mark Ovenden (The Map Room)
  5. Seeing in the Dark by Timothy Ferris
  6. Smile When You’re Lying by Chuck Thompson
  7. Lost States by Michael J. Trinklein (The Map Room)
  8. Rhumb Lines and Map Wars by Mark Monmonier (The Map Room)
  9. Cartography Design Annual #1 edited by Nick Springer (The Map Room)
  10. Marsbound by Joe Haldeman
  11. Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi

2007

  1. Arthritis Without Pain by Scott J. Zashin, M.D. with M. Laurette Hesser (Ankylose This!)

2006

  1. GPS Mapping: Make Your Own Maps by Rich Owings (The Map Room)
  2. Making Maps by John Krygier and Denis Wood (The Map Room)
  3. Playing with Trains by Sam Posey
  4. Walking with Your Ancestors by Melinda Kashuba (The Map Room)
  5. How to Lie with Maps, 2nd edition, by Mark Monmonier (The Map Room)
  6. Seeing Through Maps by Denis Wood, Ward L. Kaiser and Bob Abramms (The Map Room)
  7. From Squaw Tit to Whorehouse Meadow by Mark Monmonier (The Map Room)
  8. 1491 by Charles C. Mann
  9. The Geist Atlas of Canada by Melissa Edwards (The Map Room)

2005

  1. One for the Morning Glory by John Barnes
  2. Making Book by Teresa Nielsen Hayden

2003

  1. Reptiles of the Northwest by Alan St. John (Ark’Type)

2002

  1. The ROM Field Guide to Amphibians and Reptiles of Ontario by Ross D. MacCullough (The OHS News)

2000

  1. Snakes of North America by R. D. Bartlett and Alan Tennant (The OHS News)
  2. Two New Corn Snake Manuals (The OHS News)
    • Corn Snakes by R. D. Bartlett
    • The Corn Snake Manual by Bill and Kathy Love
  3. Fossil Snakes of North America by J. Alan Holman (The OHS News)
  4. Texas Snakes: Identification, Distribution and Natural History by John E. Werler and James R. Dixon (The OHS News)

1999

  1. Keeping and Breeding Snakes, 2nd. ed., by Chris Mattison (The OHS News)
Jonathan Crowe
Map blogger. Science fiction and fantasy critic and writer. Snake whisperer. Typewriter fiend.

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