Hello, my little blue octopuses! In today’s round-up of recent sci-fi and fantasy links, I have updates to share about the 2026 Locus Award winners, Dan Aykroyd’s debut novel, and a new story from Isabel J. Kim. Plus, I’m really curious—have you seen the new Masters of the Universe film yet? I don’t think I’ll be visiting a theater to watch it, but I’ll definitely check it out when it’s streaming, for science reasons. (Okay, for Idris Elba.)
My SFF reads for this week are Habila by Wayétu Moore and A Devil of a Crime by T. Kingfisher. Also, check out the cover reveals for The Double Dorothy by Olivia Waite and Devouring Gods by Jedediah Berry.
The Winners of the 2026 Locus Awards Have Been Announced!
Congratulations to all the 2026 Locus Award winners!
The Locus Awards are an annual set of awards voted on by readers of Locus magazine. The winners were announced on May 30, 2026, in a ceremony with MCs Sarah Gailey and Maggie Tokuda-Hall, and featured guests of honor Tananarive Due, Stephen Graham Jones, and Nnedi Okorafor.
There were 17 categories, and the winners included best science fiction novel (Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor), best fantasy novel (The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow), best horror novel (The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones), best young adult novel (Starstrike by Yoon Ha Lee), and best first novel (Sour Cherry by Natalia Theodoridou). You can read a complete list of the winners and nominees at Locus. SO MANY GOOD CHOICES.
Read an Excerpt from The Sixth Nik by Daniel Kraus!
It has barely been a month since Daniel Kraus won the 2026 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his amazing novel Angel Down, and we’re already getting a new book! The Sixth Nik is his first adult science fiction novel, about the unusual crew aboard a biomatter spaceship on a mission to investigate a plague-ridden planet.
From the publisher’s description:
“Deep into space, far past the triworld outposts, beyond range of the lethal trollbot internet, soars The Sickness: a ship woven from biomatter and capable of reacting to every need of its human crew. Sisilla, a nine-year-old cultist with a brain enhanced by arcane tech known as “niks,” has boarded to investigate the enigma of Fém—a plague-riddled planet that has abruptly gone rogue.
The mysterious crew includes a faceless assassin, a beautiful engineer jigsawed by plastic surgery, a peyote-addicted medic, and—most lethal of all—a rugged, NonModded captain with a score to settle with Sisilla. Other dangers abound. A hacked robot begins to believe Sisilla is its daughter. The Sickness itself is mutating, possibly even pregnant. And the secret of Fém is more horrific than anyone could have imagined. To survive, Sisilla will need to forsake her predetermined fate and embrace the unknown.”
Doesn’t it sound awesome??! While we wait for the whole book, you can read a small excerpt below and the entire excerpt at Reactor! The Sixth Nik by Daniel Kraus is out June 23, 2026 from S&S/Saga Press.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
A long silence preceded the Murder’s reply. “We find ourselves wishing to answer that.”
“Then do,” I encouraged.
“The answer shouldn’t matter. Acceptance of the Murder Tenet negates all physical, emotional, or intellectual emotions. And yet.”
“And yet you were ready to hurt Arzan.”
“Yes.”
“Ready to befriend Jayne.”
“Yes.”
“Ready to feel loss over Feng’s death.”
Murder 005 continued to stare. I felt empathy. Niffakoq, too, were trained to execute a task and nothing else. A peculiar thought entered my mind. What if the whole ship, not just the placentapool, was a womb? Only inside it did full-grown adults like Murder 005 and Arzan develop at rapid rates.
I was preparing to posit this theory when my nikking struck a spike of caution. Something in Murder 005 had shifted. Though I nikked no negative feelings toward me, I detected unambiguous danger. Murder 005’s blue lenses blazed.
“You sense we might hurt you,” they said simply.
It was unthinkable. But true. I monitored my pulse.
“Yes.”
“So strange, all these things we feel.”
Doubt did not conform well to a Murder. My discombobulation re-called the time Tûma and I had blundered into a goliath musk ox on the Petermann Glacier, rabid and unnikkable. I mentally traced an escape path to Captain Arzan, who had, at least, demonstrated a willingness to ply both axe and sword. But I did not flee. Murder 005 had lost their legs to protect me. It was illogical they would harm me now.
“It’s often believed Murders don’t care for people,” they said. “In fact, we care deeply. We care more than anyone. Culling humanity is not easy work. Imagine harvesting a field of grain in which every stalk believes it has the right to live.”
“Humans do have that right.”
“Right? Or privilege? If one doesn’t contribute to furthering the species, they are, in the end, only chattel.”
And To Close…
Robert Jackson Bennett, whose upcoming novel, A Trade of Blood, the third book in the Shadow of the Leviathan series, is one of my favorite books of the year, talked to Locus Magazine.
Okay, star bits, now take the knowledge you have learned here today and use it for good, not evil. If you want to know more about books, I talk about books pretty much nonstop (when I’m not reading them), and you can hear me say lots of adjectives about them on the BR podcast All the Books! and on Instagram.
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