News Disclosure Day We Finally Know the Plot of Disclosure Day, Thanks to Emily Blunt The Steven Spielberg film plays with the idea of extraterrestrial life making themselves known to humanity By Vanessa Armstrong | Published on May 26, 2026 Screenshot: Universal Pictures Comment 0 Share New Share Screenshot: Universal Pictures There have been two trailers already released for Disclosure Day. Neither of them really reveal much about the plot of the film, or even if Emily Blunt’s character, Margaret Fairchild, is a human or an alien. In a surprise move, however, Universal Pictures just released an “interview” with Blunt about the film, where the star discloses a lot about Disclosure Day. “Margaret is suddenly imbued with these abilities she’s never had before,” she says early on in the one-minute video. That simple line confirms that her character is, in fact, human, not an alien in disguise. Blunt also reveals that Margaret has a psychic connection to Daniel Kellner, played by Josh O’Connor, who we’ve seen from previous trailers also has some inhuman-like abilities as well. The video then cuts to a scene from the film that backs up Blunt’s words. In it, Margaret cold calls Daniel even though the two have never met, and warns him not to go home because someone is going to kill him there if he does. The two, Blunt then explains, are “beholders of this world-changing secret,” and are key to extraterrestrial life presumably making themselves known to humanity. Blunt also explains that secret government forces (presumably represented by Colin Firth in the previous trailers) are against the two letting everyone know aliens exist and are trying to kill them both so the word doesn’t get out. And there you have it! The outlines of a plot! We can see the whole story unfold when Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day premieres in theaters on June 12, 2026. While we wait, check out Blunt’s full “interview” below. [end-mark] The post We Finally Know the Plot of <i>Disclosure Day</i>, Thanks to Emily Blunt appeared first on Reactor.

Excerpts Young Adult Read an Excerpt From All We Hunger For by Anna Mercier A young woman sneaks her way into a magical baking contest but gets pulled into an elusive aristocrat’s lavish world and his nefarious plan… By Anna Mercier | Published on May 26, 2026 Comment 0 Share New Share We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from All We Hunger For by Anna Mercier, a new young adult fantasy novel out from Henry Holt and Co. on June 23rd. In Anespérer, where magic comes alive through artistic skill, Elara Rousseau knows she’ll never be selected for the Objet d’Art. The high-stakes baking competition will elect a new Souverain to join the ruling council, and someone from the slums would never be considered. But when a brooding figure from her past sneaks her into the Objet, Elara has the chance to compete for a better future… as long as no one uncovers her traitorous secret.Nikolas Dupont will do whatever it takes to impress his powerful father, a Souverain who hasn’t officially recognized his son—like handpick a contestant to win and become his father’s political pawn. But Elara is more than he bargained for, and she ignites his own subdued passions.Against all odds, Elara excels and becomes a hero to the city’s poor, all while Nik’s faith in his father crumbles and the sparks between them burn brighter. As the competition heats up, Elara and Nik must choose: fight to win the competition and secure a future of safety for them both, or use the power of Elara’s art to spark a revolution. Elara had never seen the Souverains before. Not in person. They never visited the Restes before the uprising, and they sure as hell steered clear after. Only their likenesses had been captured on propaganda plastered to brick walls. The real subjects were haunting. While each Souverain was different in skin color and size, they were all . . . perfect. Not a blemish or scar, not a blush or a dark shadow beneath their eyes. It was if some delicate hand had sculpted each of them from the purest stone and polished their features to ethereal smoothness. Some, like Souverain Gabriel of Arts Manufacturiers, looked ageless despite their white hair, but the eyes gave them away. Each of them looked down at her with indifference, gargoyles upon a parapet. Of time and beyond it. One of the people and nothing like them. A final seat at the end remained open: a somber prize. Elara approached. “Please state your name clearly for the Counseil,” Souverain Lafontaine called. Elara’s mouth dried. She couldn’t fail. In order to help her mother’s recipes live on, she needed to let her name go. “I . . . I am Elouise Auclair.” She didn’t know her heart could beat so loud until Souverain Lafontaine muttered a terse thank-you. He turned over a crisp paper filled with very few words: Auclair’s acceptance into Arts Culinaires. “You are quite the mystery. We’ve checked with the board of Arts Culinaires’ Directeurs, and none recognize your name.” “I doubt they remember everyone they’ve ever admitted.” The line she’d practiced with Fernand came easy. “Did you not find my name in the records?” “Indeed we did.” Lafontaine’s fingers stroked the paper in thought. “How did your name come to be in the pool of Favored? A Restes Aspirant in the Objet d’Art? Quite uncommon.” “That abysmal place across the river?” The comment came from someone in a brilliant yellow dress flapping an annoyingly loud fan. “The poor thing!” Some snickered. Worse, others pitied her. “Chef?” Lafontaine prompted. She released her fists. “I was just as stunned when the coat arrived. Perhaps my Professionnelle recommended me to the board of Directeurs?” “So you have formal training?” Souverain Tremblay of Arts Visuels asked. “Enough to have earned my Aspirant colors.” She indicated her brown skirts. “Unfortunately, Professionnelle Prevel passed recently, and I was let go from my newest position.” Buy the Book All We Hunger For Anna Mercier Buy Book All We Hunger For Anna Mercier Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget “Whatever for?” “My innovation, Souverain.” Fernand was ready near the doorway to the foyer. Showtime. Elara ascended the dais and laid her porcelain dish upon the table. Any other party would lean forward to inspect the sweet dessert. The Counseil were as statues, barely letting their eyes swoop down as she scooped the still-bubbling cherry and custard mixture onto individual plates. Elara made sure each Souverain had enough crunchy topping because texture was just as important as taste. “What is this?” Souverain Gabriel asked. “Clafoutis,” Elara replied. “Cherries marinated in—” “You’re dishing it out like we’re hogs to a trough,” Souverain Cormier sneered. She managed to smile through clenched teeth. “I intended to feed you like I would anyone else at my table. My apologies if such compassion isn’t custom here in Galerie.” Gasps whispered around her, followed by the person in yellow muttering, “Oh, I like her.” They were probably alone in that. Elara placed each helping before the Souverains. “I present cherry clafoutis made with umber rum and almond crumble. Enjoy.” She’d been wrong to think they’d tuck in. Instead, they ate as if forced, dipping the prongs of their forks into the liquid before begrudgingly going back for a granule of crumble. That didn’t stop her from holding her breath. Restes or not, food was food. They’d either love it or hate it, and the truth would be in their reactions. Even the most powerful people couldn’t deny their tongues. The Souverains’ eyes dilated, their nostrils flared, and their expressions took on that of children consuming their first taste of sugar—wonderment. The simple truth of knowing they’d enjoyed it would have been enough, but they surprised her by taking more. It wasn’t the ravenous hunger of the Restes, but the slow, savoring enjoyment the rich could afford. “A unique marriage of flavors,” Cormier said. “And the textures are interesting to explore,” Faucher added. All said as if they were performing for a packed audience rather than offering feedback. Lafontaine, the only Souverain who let his wrinkles show, patted his mouth with a napkin. “And the magie?” Elara couldn’t contain her smile when the audience burst into giggles. “You tell me, Souverain,” she replied. He turned his head down the line and recoiled. Six different Elaras stared back at her, each stretched or narrowed to fit the original owner’s body. Their faces, though, were entirely her, from the smattering of freckles on her nose and cheeks to the little scar at her eyebrow from when she’d sloshed a drop of hot oil on herself. Perfectly imperfect, just the way she liked it. One of the Elaras glared into the crowd. The moment they locked eyes with someone else, Elara’s dark hair extended into beautiful scarlet locks, her full cheeks caved inward, and her eyes sparkled brilliant hazel. “My goodness!” The chaos began. The Souverains broke into cackles, taking turns to gaze at one another, changing their forms. They found ways to entertain themselves, winking, flirting, and picking at hard-to-reach body parts. As planned, the audience moved in, eager to be the next face the Counseil impersonated. Curious servants collected from other rooms, and the police gravitated closer to protect the Counseil. Fernand saluted from the darkened foyer and darted upstairs, out of sight. Done. All he had to do was get out without being caught. When Elara turned back to the revelry, she felt . . . different. With her part of the deal finished, she could enjoy this moment. For all their pomp and authority, the Counseil were laughing like children. Deep belly laughter and rolling giggles as they played and delighted in the magie, eating more bites to keep their games going. This was what Elara wanted to do for the rest of her life. She wanted to bring the joy of food to everyone. Tonight, she could start that journey again with a clean slate—her job for Fernand now complete. Hell, someone here could invest in her. Offer her an apprenticeship on her way out. It was more than she’d ever allowed herself to hope for before. “Amusing,” Lafontaine said. Elara choked back a gasp. He wasn’t himself. He was a boy with dark hair slicked back, perfectly controlled save for the little curls at the base of his neck. His nose was wider and cheekbones fuller, with eyes like shards of glass. Striking. Elara could think of no other word to describe him. She turned back to find the original boy in the crowd, and warmth flooded her body. All that intensity in those blue eyes was narrowed on her. Not the powerful Souverains. Not the chattering aristocracy. Her. His brow ticked, eyes darting over her shoulder. She spun back to Lafontaine, who was himself again. “Unfortunately,” Elara said, “the effect doesn’t last long.” “While your trick is amusing, we cannot ignore the potential of this magie,” Lafontaine murmured to his colleagues, who hummed in response, all the joy replaced by business. Elara waited for someone else to speak. Anyone else. Time to make a graceful exit. She did her best to look dismayed as she collected the plates. “Thank you for the opportunity—” Lafontaine stabbed his fork onto the porcelain, pinning it to the table. His face was close enough to see the age he refused to hide, the little scar at his hairline, a blemish on his cheek. “That was not a dismissal.” Excerpted from All We Hunger For, copyright © 2026 by Anna Mercier. The post Read an Excerpt From <i>All We Hunger For</i> by Anna Mercier appeared first on Reactor.

Column Babylon 5 Rewatch Babylon 5 Rewatch: “The Corps is Mother, the Corps is Father” Bester and two Psi-Cop interns arrive on Babylon 5 to investigate a murder… By Keith R.A. DeCandido | Published on May 26, 2026 Credit: Warner Bros. Television Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: Warner Bros. Television “The Corps is Mother, the Corps is Father”Written by J. Michael StaczynskiDirected by Stephen FurstSeason 5, Episode 13Production episode 514Original air date: April 15, 1998 It was the dawn of the third age… At Psi Corps HQ (which has apparently been reconstructed—or moved to a new location—since it was bombed), Bester meets with Director Drake, who introduces him to two new recruits, Lauren Ashley and Chen Hikaru, who are both big fans of Bester. Drake assigns them to shadow Bester. A telepath named Jonathan Harris is muttering to himself while reading a brochure for B5. He gets up and departs, leaving the corpse of his roommate behind. Bester is showing his two ducklings around, including observing a training exercise in blocking a psionic attack and then to an inspirational video/propaganda piece recorded by a happy telepath. The latter is interrupted by the body of Harris’ victim being found. Bester is summoned to the scene, as Harris was a student of his. Ashley stops by Bester’s quarters that night: she’s traumatized by seeing her first dead body, and asks Bester if it gets easier. He says it gets easier when it’s mundanes, but never when it’s fellow telepaths. Ashley also makes a pass, but Bester politely declines. Drake then shows up and gleefully informs Bester that they have intel that Harris has gone to Bester’s favorite place: Babylon 5. In addition, Drake informs Bester that Harris was trained in attack probes, a “mind shredder.” Bester, Chen, and Ashley head to B5, as they don’t trust Earth Alliance forces to handle this. On B5, Harris joins a card game in downbelow. He has no knowledge of the rules, but he wins in pretty short order. After departing the table, one of the losers approaches him and accuses him of cheating (which he did; using telepathy to win games is illegal). Harris’ personality changes and he uses his mind-shredding abilities to kill the guy. This is witnessed by a man named Bryce. Credit: Warner Bros. Television Bester learns that a Drazi gave Harris a fake identicard. He also learns the location of Harris’ quarters from a surface mind scan. While Bester goes to report this to security, Chen decides to show initiative and go to the quarters in question—where he finds a dead body. Allan isn’t thrilled to see that Bester’s arrival heralds corpses on the station, but Bester tartly points out that the body has been dead for two days, so he was killed before they arrived. Franklin’s autopsy indicates a manner of death that had to have been caused by a telepath, specifically a P12. However, Harris is only a P10, and a P10 can’t do that. Franklin suggests that maybe he was misdiagnosed as a P10, and Bester arrogantly explains that that doesn’t happen. There’s another body, and this one happened after Bester’s arrival: the other gambler. Telepaths aren’t allowed to gamble, or kill people, so the situation is really bad. Bester tells Ashley to keep an eye on security’s examination of the items in Harris’ quarters, while he has Chen go to downbelow to find other places where Harris might be gambling. Bester assumes (correctly, as it happens) that Harris is trying to get enough money to get passage off the station and far away from Earth and the Corps. Chen sees Harris in downbelow, but before he can contact Bester to tell him, Bryce kills him. The Babcom terminal Chen was about to use recorded the killing, but all they can see of the killer is his hand, and his skin is lighter than Harris’ and also tattooed—which means there’s another killer on the station. Security found handwritten notes in Harris’ quarters—written in more than one different style of handwriting—and also some recordings, in some of which he’s raving at his roommate and talking about Jonathan Harris in the third person. Bester realizes to his shock that Harris must have what is these days referred to as Dissociative Identity Disorder. One of his personalities must be a P12, which explains the murder that a P10 couldn’t have accomplished. They track Harris and Bryce and a firefight breaks out, but Bryce is subdued, and Harris kind of collapses on his own. Security releases both men to the Corps’ custody. In hyperspace, Bester allows Ashley the “honor” of shoving Bryce out the airlock, murdering him in cold blood. This is a rite of passage for new Psi Cops, spacing mundanes. Ashley continues to fangoober Bester as they head home. Credit: Warner Bros. Television The Corps is mother, the Corps is father. Apparently, Psi Corps keeps a giant mothership in hyperspace that nobody knows about. It’s not really clear what the ship’s purpose is, since the smaller ships that dock with it have to be able to enter a jumpgate and travel through it to get to and from the mothership, but whatever. No sex, please, we’re EarthForce. Ashley hits on Bester more than once, but Bester declines. Apparently his feelings for Carolyn are strong enough that he won’t cheat on her. (Though he did cheat on his wife with Carolyn.) Welcome aboard. Back from “Phoenix Rising” is Walter Koenig, making his final on-screen appearance as Bester. (Koenig was also set to guest star in an episode of Crusade, but the series was cancelled before the episode in question was filmed.) Dana Barron and Reggie Lee play Bester’s ducklings, Vince Riotta plays Bryce, and Dex Elliot Sanders plays Harris. And this week’s Robert Knepper moment is the welcome appearance of the great character actor Mike Genovese as Drake. While he has had many roles over the years, to me, Genovese will always be Lieutenant Garfield on The Flash series from 1990. Trivial matters. For the second time this season (after “Secrets of the Soul”), none of the five primary leads appear in the episode at all. The only opening-credits regulars who appear are from the “also starring” section of the opening credits: Richard Biggs and Jeff Conaway. This technically ties this episode with “Intersections in Real Time” for the one with the fewest opening-credits regulars, though in this case both those appearing have lines of dialogue, which Mira Furlan didn’t in the earlier episode. This is the third and final B5 episode directed by Vir actor Stephen Furst. Amusingly, all three episodes—“The Illusion of Truth,” “The Deconstruction of Falling Stars,” and this one—have the theme of alternate perspectives from a normal episode of B5. He will go on to direct two episodes of Crusade. Telepaths apparently can’t detect alternate personalities, which retroactively explains how Talia Winters’ embedded personality that came to the fore in “Divided Loyalties” went undetected by several different intense telepathic experiences she underwent (bonding with Ironheart in “Mind War,” being recorded by Abbut in “Deathwalker,” etc.). Viewers may have thought that the character named Jonathan Harris was a tribute to the actor who played Dr. Smith in Lost in Space alongside Bill Mumy, but it was, in fact, the prize in a B5 fan club raffle held at the 1997 World Science Fiction Convention in San Antonio. The echoes of all of our conversations. “You’re an optimist. Thank you—I’d almost forgotten what one of your kind looked like” —Bester to Franklin. Credit: Warner Bros. Television The name of the place is Babylon 5. “We don’t often see a sense of humor in Psi Corps.” After four-and-a-half years of being gleefully evil every time he showed up, Walter Koenig gets rewarded with a spotlight episode of his own. It’s always fun to get a different perspective in an episode, and when B5 does it, it generally works, and this episode does indeed generally work. The notion of a telepath with multiple personalities is an interesting one, though it’s pretty much just a plot device here. There’s a lot to explore that the episode doesn’t bother with, unfortunately—including nary a mention or indication that Psi Corps HQ was bombed just a couple of episodes ago… Dex Elliott Sanders does a nice job with Harris’ multiple modes. Bester’s ducklings are not quite as successful. Dana Barron is adequate as a Bester groupie, but not much more than that. Her eagerness is a little too underplayed, and Koenig winds up acting her off the screen every time they’re together. Reggie Lee is even less adequate, but at least he has the good graces to be knocked off. Though that points up the major problem with the episode. One of the things that we’ve been told about the Psi Corps from jump is that they care for their own, seen most recently in the conclusion to the Byron storyline. This entire episode is predicated on the Corps being the ones to take care of Harris rather than let EarthForce authorities or B5 security handle it. But then Chen is killed, and it barely even registers. There’s no outrage, no expressions of grief, no ramping up the hunt to take care of a mundane who dared kill a telepath. It’s just the next step in the mystery, a redshirt who’s killed but barely acknowledged after that. The way Barron plays Ashley, it feels like her only thoughts on the death of her colleague is that he’s out of the way so she can flirt more aggressively with Bester… It’s also a missed opportunity to have Bester on the station and deny us any interactions between him and either Sheridan or Garibaldi. Still, this is a nice little change-of-pace, showing how insular and awful the Corps is. Notably, Chen and Ashley’s demeanor is classic member-of-a-cult behavior, thus accomplishing in one episode what never came together in multiple episodes of Byron and his gaggle of rogue telepaths…. Next week: “Meditations on the Abyss.”[end-mark] The post <i>Babylon 5</i> Rewatch: “The Corps is Mother, the Corps is Father” appeared first on Reactor.

News Toy Story 5 Ey! Toy Story 5 Features Bad Bunny as Pizza & Alan Cumming as Evil Bullseye We also have a final Toy Story 5 trailer, where Jessie leads the fight against the screens By Vanessa Armstrong | Published on May 26, 2026 Credit: Disney/Pixar Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: Disney/Pixar The fifth Toy Story movie is almost upon us, and it’s set up to be a battle between the toys and a smartass Lilypad screen. The young human, Bonnie, still plays with Jessie, Forky, and her other toys, but she soon gets a newfangled device called a Lilypad (think of the LeapPad tablets circa 2011 in our timeline) that says that Bonnie is ALL HERS ALL OF THE TIME. Jessie, as the final trailer released today makes clear, isn’t standing for it. She leads the other toys in a battle against the screen for playtime with Bonnie. The toys she meets along the way are a mix of old characters and new… and today Pixar announced two additional guest cameos that fill me with joy. The first cameo is Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, who you may know as six-time Grammy Award winner Bad Bunny. He is lending his voice to the soon-to-be iconic character, Pizza with Sunglasses. What kind of character is PWS, as I’m calling him? His official description describes him as “effortlessly cool and mysterious” and a member of “a small but mighty community of forgotten toys that live in an abandoned backyard shed.” Ey! The second cameo is also delightful! Alan Cumming’s dulcet voice will also appear in the film as Evil Bullseye. Bullseye, Toy Story fans know, is Woody’s loyal, non-talking horse. Cumming’s evil version of the toy is reportedly quite loquacious, which we’ll see (and hear) during one scene of the film. We won’t have to wait long to see these cameos in the fifth film in the franchise: Tickets are now on sale for Toy Story 5, which premieres in theaters on June 19, 2026. While you wait, check out the final trailer below. [end-mark] The post Ey! <i>Toy Story 5</i> Features Bad Bunny as Pizza & Alan Cumming as Evil Bullseye appeared first on Reactor.

Books Martha Wells Book Club Martha Wells Book Club: Witch King A story that asks what comes *after* the rebels win… By Alex Brown | Published on May 26, 2026 Comment 0 Share New Share After a short break, I’m ready to dive back into the Martha Wells Book Club. This month we’re reading the first book in the fantasy series the Rising World: Witch King. This was the first book of Wells’ I read that wasn’t in the Murderbot Diaries, and part of what inspired me to take on her back catalogue. I’d been planning on re-reading it, and the only thing that held me back was that I knew I would get to it eventually for this column. I am delighted to report that I enjoyed it even more the second time around.  When Kaiisteron, Prince of the Fourth House of the underearth, wakes, he feels strange. This isn’t the first time he has had a literal out-of-body experience. It’s not even the first time his spirit has jumped from one body to another. Whatever water-based curse kept his body in stasis has broken. After a fight with a couple bad guys that ends as quickly as it began, Kai is in yet another new body, this time an expositor. I’ve written about this before, but something I love about Martha Wells is how she drops readers into the deep end. She gives readers little backstory upfront, preferring to tease out information and cultural details as the story progresses. We start right in the thick of it and Wells doesn’t slow down. Witch King takes place in the present and past of the lands within what is now called the Rising World. This fledgling empire was born from the ashes of the ruins left from the arrival of the mysterious and brutal conquerors, the Hierarchs, and the bloody revolution that overthrew them. Kai is a demon now trapped on the surface world in the body of an expositor, a sort of witch harnessed by the Hierarchs. He’s joined by Ziede, a former teacher in a cloister that was razed by the Hierarchs who can manipulate air spirits. The book begins with Kai and Ziede as they search for Tahren (Ziede’s wife and a Fallen Immortal Marshall who betrayed the Hierarchs for the rebellion) and try to figure out who held Kai and Ziede hostage. They are joined by their new companions: Sanja, a child kidnapped by the expositor whose body Kai now possesses; Tenes, a young witch enslaved by said expositor; and Ramad, a personal vanguarder to a political leader. The answers they find offer a difficult path forward for not only the Rising World but our trio of powerful beings as well.  Their journey takes them along the eastern coastland of the Rising World and upriver to the Hierarchs’ former stronghold, the Summer Halls. We see that palace/fortress as a flooded ruin in the present and as a lavish display of power and stolen wealth in the past. The past also takes readers far to the west to the grasslands of the nomadic people Kai once called his own. To the south of the sea bordering the realm is another landmass, and it is from there the Hierarchs originated. (All this is helpfully detailed in the map at the front of the book.) Our motley crew are stalked by an enemy, likely the ones behind the plot to imprison Kai and Ziede and disappear Tahren. Unexpectedly, they locate Tahren’s brother, Dahin, who gives them the next clue in their quest. The past follows Kai from the battlefields on the Saredi grasslands to a demon cage in the Summer Halls. With the help of Ziede, Tahren, and Bashasa, a hostage prince from a conquered kingdom, Kai decides he will destroy the Hierarchs, come hell or high water. If he has to die so that others may escape, so be it. The past influences the present, and the present explains the past. Like many of Wells’ previous books, Witch King is a meditation on trauma, imperialism, colonization, forced assimilation, genocide, and the exploitation of labor and resources by those with too much power. It features a main character who blunders their way into found family as they work to take down their oppressor. It’s a little sadder than her other books, but hope still threads through. It is a story that asks what comes after the rebels win. It reminds me a little of Andor and the new Star Wars trilogy. In the sections set in the past, the theme is both Maarva Andor growling “fuck the empire” and Luthen Rael admitting “I burn my life to make a sunrise I know I’ll never see.” The present sections show what the new trilogy tried to get across. A rebellion may be built on hope, but a stable society is built on progressive ideals and a refusal to allow fascism any room to breathe. Kai, Ziede, and Tahren are in the situation they’re in because the Rising World didn’t quash those who sided with their oppressors when they had the chance. Now the future of everything they nearly died to bring forth is at risk.  As mentioned, the story jumps back and forth in time, with the historical sections prefaced with epigraphs from cultural documents written by denizens of the Rising World. At first, the excerpts feel random; one is from an Enalin chronicler baffled by how the Arike people “divide their people into only two genders, signaled by clothing styles,” while another discusses the Enalin political leadership structure. It is not until we get further into the book and the tidbits of details Wells scatters throughout conversations and experiences start to coalesce that we see how important these epigraphs are.  The gender piece comes up a couple of different ways. We see how each society interprets gender expression and identity differently. Some don’t distinguish gender through attire or physical form while others do. The trio come across soldiers who traditionally would have been women but now present as men, and Kai wonders if they are really men or were women who were forced to change gender against their will. Demons and the Saredi had an ancient agreement where demons would possess the bodies of dead Saredi in exchange for providing magic and children. Neither party cared about matching the gender between human host and demon spirit, and the biological characteristics of the human form have nothing to do with how their societies perceive gender. Which is how Kai, who uses he/him pronouns, ended up in the body of Enna, a young woman. As Kai-Enna, Kai was always referred to as “he.” Another female demon is in the body of an old man, and she is always referred to as “she.” Gender isn’t the only way queerness appears in this book. As Kai-Enna and later in the body of human and expositor men, Kai is attracted to men. We never see any desire for anyone using she/her pronouns. Ziede and Tahren are women who are married to each other. Several characters use they/them pronouns, and any person who Kai cannot immediately identify their gender he refers to then in a neutral way, such as “the person.” Queerness as a revolutionary identity doesn’t exist in the Rising World like it does in ours. We don’t see queerphobia or different identities legislated against. People are who they are. As a queer person, I find this so refreshing in speculative fiction. I don’t mind reading books with bigotry in them, especially if the characters are fighting against it. Sometimes I want to feel empowered and revitalized, like I know I can keep fighting in the real world after reading about fictional characters doing the same. However, sometimes I’d rather read about characters who don’t have to fight to be their true selves. Sometimes I want to see a world where queerness exists not as an identity or as a contrast to compulsory cisalloheterosexuality but as something that just is.  Queerness is so prevalent and well done in Witch King and the Murderbot Diaries that I was disappointed that Wells didn’t include it in her earlier books (or didn’t include it to the same extent). Not surprising, given the state of speculative fiction in the ’90s and first part of the 21st century, but disappointing nonetheless. I was always frustrated by speculative authors who could imagine whole new worlds full of strange cultures and fascinating characters but couldn’t conceive of two dudes kissing. I’m so glad Wells has made her more recent books diverse in a variety of ways, including disability. Tenes is mute and uses sign language (here called Witchspeak) to communicate. Other non-disabled people also use it and no one has anything negative to say about her disability; in the Rising World, queerphobia isn’t the only -phobia or -ism to not exist.  Since its release in 2023, I’ve read plenty of reviews of Witch King. I was effusive in mine for Reactor, but some others were more lukewarm, and for reasons I personally find unconvincing. All of the things other reviewers complained of—lots of cultural and societal details, readers not having a full understanding of how the Rising World or its magical inhabitants function by the end of the book, it not being as humorous or action-packed as the Murderbot Diaries, a large cast, the flashbacks, Wells offering lots of questions but few answers—are things I loved. They are also things that appear in all of her books, to some extent. The Ile-Rien series is the only series left I haven’t read, yet of the rest of her fantasy books, Witch King is par for the course. I’d put it closer in tone and style to her standalones City of Bones and Wheel of the Infinite. To each their own, but I loved Witch King so much. I’d put it as my second favorite of the books of hers I’ve read so far.  We’re staying in the Rising World for next month’s book, Queen Demon. I haven’t read it yet, since I’ve been saving it for this column. The anticipation is killing me![end-mark] Buy the Book Queen Demon Martha Wells Buy Book Queen Demon Martha Wells Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget The post Martha Wells Book Club: <i>Witch King</i> appeared first on Reactor.