It’s a whole new year of books, and we have some suggestions! Plus the science behind Westeros and the amazing 200-year-old Mary Shelley.

Ready Player One may have a sequel, The Witcher TV show has a show runner, and we have no bones to pick with California Bones.

#312 – Eating Bones for Fun and Magic by swordandlaser

This week we have a lot to say about wine, some to say about Amazon’s Lord of the Rings series and loads to say as we wrap up Connie Willis’ Doomsday Book. Plus we kind of sort of kick off December’s Book, California Bones.

OMG. Patrick Rothfuss is best buds with Lin-Manuel Miranda and they’re doing a TV prequel to Kingkiller Chronicles, while Felicia Day plays Poppy the Dragonologist AND Amazon wants to do a Tolkien series. And that doesn’t even begin to shed light on how good our book pick Doomsday Book is. But the piece de resistance of the show is one man’s story of losing power and trying to read.

We’re happy for Chuck Wendig and sad for the passing of Roy Dotrice and Julian May. And we’re also debating whether side conversations are a good literary device.

That’s right, Sword and Laser has been picking and reading books for 10 years and we’re not even close to stopping. This week we discuss why you don’t need to travel to London to read Theodora Goss but it doesn’t hurt. And why we’re extra excited for Andy Weir’s Artemis.

Good Omens looks good, Annihilation looks great, our last thoughts on Helliconia Spring, and why we’re reading about monsters in October.

Annalee Newitz joins us on the show to talk about her new novel Autonomous. We discuss indentured robot servitude, the archaeological digs she’s digging right now, and what the future of our economy could look like!

The Martin Studies International Network will help you study Westeros better, Scott Lynch gives hope for the next Locke Lamora book and sadly, we lose a great one in Jerry Pournelle,