Liberty Hardy is an unrepentant velocireader, writer, bitey mad lady, and tattoo canvas. Turn-ons include books, books and books. Her favorite exclamation is “Holy cats!” Liberty reads more than should be legal, sleeps very little, frequently writes on her belly with Sharpie markers, and when she dies, she’s leaving her body to library science. Until then, she lives with her three cats, Millay, Farrokh, and Zevon, in Maine. She is also right behind you. Just kidding! She’s too busy reading.
Twitter: @MissLiberty
Hello, my little cloning ants! In today’s round-up of recent sci-fi and fantasy links, I have stuff to share about a fun SFF novel coming in 2026, slow-burn sci-fi shows, some of the year’s best astronomy photography, and more!
Here’s a 2026 SFF Book You Want to Add to Your TBR Now
I am almost finished with a book that is absolutely wild and weird, and I really like it: The Divine Gardener’s Handbook: Or What To Do If Your Girlfriend Accidentally Turns Off the Sun by Eli Snow. I completely admit to having picked it up for the title, then I saw the Tamsyn Muir comparison, so I had to read it. It’s a queer SFF book about gardening and toxic work culture, and it’s really fun.
There’s a God who is tended to by a head gardener named Purcell, who is the descendant of an esteemed family of gardeners. She feels a lot of pressure to be perfect, both to maintain her position and to win the annual flower pageant, so she’s stressed all the time. Plus, she’s been hiding a big plant-related secret her whole life. But now Purcell has a new coworker, Cyprin, who is frustratingly attractive and also trying to win the pageant. Cyprin plays dirty, because secretly she’s there to get revenge, so she’s not above hijinks. Despite their animosity, they’ll have to work together when they uncover a conspiracy against God.
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So, the good news is that I have really enjoyed this book. The bad news is that The Divine Gardener’s Handbook isn’t out until August 18, 2026. (I know, I know, I’m sorry.) So mark it down now!
Read an Excerpt from A Land So Wide by Erin Craig
While I have not yet had the pleasure of reading Erin Craig’s adult debut, A Land So Wide, it’s near the top of my TBR, because I keep seeing it everywhere and have heard great things about it.
It’s about the townspeople of Mistaken, who are trapped in the village by a curse made years before by a lumber baron. Anyone who wanders into the village and spends a night finds themselves stuck as well. To leave Mistaken and go into the woods would be certain death, as the forests are filled with beasts. So Greer Mackenzie is terrified when her true love disappears beyond the town’s borders, being chased by a monster.
From the publisher description: “Greer, a mapmaker and eccentric dreamer, has always ached to explore the world outside, even though she knows she and her longtime love, Ellis Beaufort, will never see it. Until, on the day she and Ellis are meant to finally begin their lives together, Greer watches in horror as her beloved disappears beyond the Warding Stones, pursued by a monstrous creature. Determined to rescue Ellis, she figures out a way to defy Mistaken’s curse and begins a trek through the cold and pitiless wilderness. But there, Greer is hunted, not only by the ruthless Bright-Eyeds but by the secret truths behind Mistaken’s founding and her own origins.”
If this sounds like fun to you, Reactor recently shared an excerpt, and the book is out now, so you don’t have to wait to get it!
Palate Cleanser: Gizmodo’s Picks for This Year’s Best Astronomy Photography
If you need a break from looking at events happening on this world, check out these incredible images from outer space! Gizmodo has chosen its picks from the annual ZWO Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition, and they are both literally and metaphorically out of this world. Imagine if our sky always looked like swirls of sparkles against a rainbow background, or the sun looked that angry in the sky. These are wild.
10 Sci-Fi Shows That Prove Slow Burns Are Always Worth It
You know how I love a list! Collider recently shared this list of slow-burn sci-fi shows worth watching because “a fast pace is in no way necessary for a sci-fi series to be entertaining, and this has been proven on many an occasion.” I have watched two of these—Station Eleven and Dark—but I want to watch more of them! How did J.K. Simmons have time to have a whole-ass television series when he was already in a million other shows and movies? Does that man ever sleep? Was he cloned by ants?
Related: Now seems like a good time to remind you to watch my favorite speculative fiction movie of the last few years, Palm Springs, which features J.K. Simmons and the amazing Cristin Milioti. I clicked on an image of it on Hulu, simply because it had Milioti, not knowing what it was about, and I ended up loving it so much!
And To Close: Julie Berry on Mashing Up Two Historical Monsters
True story: When I first read about Julie Berry’s new novel, If Looks Could Kill, I yelled with joy. Medusa versus Jack the Ripper??! YES, PLEASE. After all, Medusa has been much maligned over the centuries, and Jack the Ripper deserves to be stoned to death. I cannot wait to read it! And that cover—W-O-W.
Recently, Julie Berry talked to People about flipping the script on the legends and why she thinks people are so fascinated by stories about murdered women.
“What’s most surprising to me about such stories is how unsurprising they are — how well stories have taught girls that in this world, they are bodies in danger. It’s a scent in the air they breathe. The Wolf always wants to eat Red Riding Hood. The older girl realizes “eating” stands for something else, but the specter of her killed and devoured body as part of the natural order lingers. Similarly horrifying results likely linger in the minds of young men who read them, too.
As a woman who loves literature, I’m trapped in a double-bind. I love these dark, gruesome myths and fairy tales and the imaginative worlds they’ve long evoked for me. And I chafe at the world I inherited from them, one that tells me and my sisters we are flesh first, and persons second, if at all. I sometimes rage against a world that too often privileges a man’s right to violence over a girl’s right to exist, but I probably don’t rage enough. I’m accustomed to it, in part, because stories I read in childhood trained me to accept it.
In Storyworld, Perseus is a hero for decapitating Medusa, and Jack the Ripper gets points for getting away with murder. “
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 Bluesky and Instagram.
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