Give me a couple years and a few rereads and maybe I could come up with some sort of criticism for Volatile Memory, but at this moment, this book is perfect. It is powerful, engaging, beautifully written, poetic, and unique.
The story follows Wylla, a trans woman forced to scavenge across planets when corporate space proves too exclusionary. She is broke and her ship near breaking down when she receives a beacon calling out a piece of tech that no one has ever heard of, a MARK I HAWK mask. Expecting a large payday for something so rare, Wylla soon learns that selling the mask is impossible—because it would mean erasing the consciousness of the dead woman inside of it.
This novella is speculative fiction at its highest level, not because of how prophetic it is with its technology (though who knows, maybe one day we’ll all be running around in animal masks), but because of how it takes contemporary issues and expunges them into something so gut wrenching you cannot help but find their inclusion cautionary. The way in which Volatile Memory addresses bodily autonomy and forces the reader to ruminate on escaping the social and mental limitations of biology through technology, modernizes the transhumanism movement seen in genres like cyberpunk to include immediate concepts like gender dysphoria and feminine rage.
This book made me think of the division between my body and mind in a completely new and enlightening way, and I honestly couldn’t have asked for a more poignant piece of literature in this political climate. I would absolutely recommend this a thousand times over.

An interesting take on a sci-fi novella! Written in second person, which I know not everyone loves, but I do think it makes sense for this book. Volatile Memory is set in a dystopian future in space where people use animal-shaped masks to imbue them with superhuman abilities. It follows a trans woman scavenger who follows a signal to find a new, high-tech mask and gets more than she bargains for along the way...

It's a sapphic novella that explores gender and embodiment and what it means to be a person. It deals with systemic transphobia at the intersection of capitalism, and comes with a side of feminine revenge. I think a lot of people will like it if they aren't thrown by the use of perspective! Note that it also deals with domestic abuse. I received a copy of this book for review via NetGalley, all opinions are my own.

This queer, sci-fi novella is about masks, both literal and metaphorical. Wylla is a scavenger who has done her best to create a life for herself in galaxy that requires conformity. Searching for that big score to lift her out of poverty and give her freedom, she finds a new prototype mask on the body of a dead woman. When she takes off her own mask - one created to heighten her prey instincts to keep her safe - and replaces it with this new mask, she hears a voice.

The relationship between Wylla (a trans woman) and Sable (a conciseness without a body) is perfect for exploring themes of control and autonomy. I loved everything about this book and the many questions it raises. Even though their early relationship was fraught, I was rooting for both of them from the start!

This was SO. GOOD. An absolutely wild ride from start to finish. For a short piece, she really packed an emotional gut punch.
Lovely writing! Queer space pirates (essentially)! Revenge!! What more can a girl ask for??
This reminded me a hell of a lot of The Locked Tomb books, particularly Harrow. Read this!!!

A unique Sapphic sci-fi romance that will have you believing in an echo of love.

I highlighted SO much of this book. The first chapter I didn't even breathe. It's so well written, the characters are so compelling. The worldbuilding is a perfect blend of soft enough to still surprise me and solid enough that I'm not guessing about the rules of this universe.

The idea of someone's memories being trapped in a piece of technology, (a mask in this book), without a body do you have a gender? Or if you do, is it even relevant anymore? I really like this warm inclusive nod to who is included in the definition of woman, which is that she declares it herself. "Was I made 'woman' by my body? Was I still 'woman' now?"

This dialogue about gender with the juxtaposition of Sable (trapped in a mask) and Wylla (a transwoman), both fighting each other (at first) then external forces for their autonomy and identity. It's really clever. "I've fought to make this body mine. Sharing it now seems . . . like a betrayal."

I also liked the flip between POVs, we go between first person and second person POV, which is a BOLD choice, but it works really well as we toggle between our two main characters Wylla and Sable.

This is my first Seth Haddon book by not my last.

Pick this up if you want
👩‍🚀 Sapphic sci-fi romance
👩‍🚀 Amazing trans rep
👩‍🚀 First and second POV
👩‍🚀 Fast-paced adventure
👩‍🚀 Men getting what's coming to them
👩‍🚀 Gorgeous prose
👩‍🚀 Creative worldbuilding
👩‍🚀 Compelling characters
👩‍🚀 Space fight

This book is best read with a highlighter and all the tabs. Probably book a tattoo appointment too.

A wild ride that keeps you on the edge of your seat. At some times tense and griping but also action packed. The read went by way too fast and when I got to the end I was like thats it? No I need more. The technology was cool and interesting and I liked the world building. The main characters held my attention. I found it a gripping story about survival and perseverance in a world that wants you gone or to fall in line. It kept me on the edge of my seat until the very end.

as someone who isn't a very big sci-fi reader, this was fantastic! i normally wish novellas were longer but this was just the right length and the pacing so well done. it almost felt as if i was watching a video game be played in front of me at times which was my favorite part.

Volatile Memory by Seth Haddon
Review by James Thomson

A novella about the masks we wear, and what exactly it means to be a woman.

Wylla Sotain is a scavenger, living day by day, and searching for the mythical big score so she can finally repair her ship and drag herself out of poverty in an uncaring galaxy. In this particular future, people wear AI-powered masks to enhance their abilities. Wylla has a battered old MARK I RABBIT, which means her senses are heightened, like the prey animal she is.

It seems like her fortunes are about to change when she tracks down an expensive prototype that shouldn’t even exist, but she finds the MARK I HAWK lying on the face of a dead woman called Sable Veonya. When she puts the mask on, Sable talks to her and remembers being murdered. Now everybody is looking for them, including VisorForge, the corporation that is responsible for the masks, and the other scavengers who want a piece of the action.

The book is told in second person perspective, with Sable talking to you, the reader, as if you were Wylla. Harrow the Ninth readers will be quite familiar. Wylla is trans and has been fighting the system her whole life. Sable, on the other hand, now has no body at all. They both accept each other quickly, and a relationship develops between the two of them while they try to track down Sable’s killer, and avoid the authorities.

There are so many enjoyable and unique ideas here, and the plot moves very quickly. I do wish this was a full length novel, so the story had a bit more time to breathe, and the romance could develop slightly more naturally over time. As it is though, you can probably read this in one sitting, and get the whole thing downloaded into your brain near-instantaneously. Which, honestly, seems quite fitting.

Recommended!

Wylla is a trans woman trying to make it in a hyper capitalist sci-fi future, where deviation from the norms of gender identity and appearance is viewed as transgressive. She's made her body truly hers, and hacked every online marker and registry to reflect that, and she'll be damned if she backs down. MARK I HAWK, previously grafted to the face of a corpse, is a woman of questionable identity, struggling to remember her past or just how she got into the circuitry of a mask to begin with.

Let's start with the good. Wylla is freaking awesome; HAWK is pretty dang cool too. The world set up by Haddon is interesting and deeply uncomfortable and dystopian and has a lot of promise with regards to depth and nuance. The hyper capitalism is HYPER capitalism, with everything being named after capitalist/corporate structures, and I think that's a neat spin on this variant of the genre.

But unfortunately that leads me to the bad, of which there's a few for me. The first is that the world building wasn't enough! There's so many cool and interesting concepts that I feel just deserved more than what was given. We're given enough to understand that the power structure is similar to that of a corporation, especially with the words used and applied to positions of power, but we don't have the context to know exactly why they're bad and what they've done. For example, the Subsidiaries have arrived, and they're super important, but nothing is fleshed out enough beyond the foundations to tell us exactly WHY or what kind of power they really hold.

Secondly, the writing style is strange and feels like it's trying to be more than it is or should be. It's from the perspective of the woman in the mask, and so at times it feels disjointed, and rightly so for the narrative, but in other ways makes more sense than it should for someone or some thing frequently divested of perspective and tactile information. In that same way, though, it could also be that the writing style itself just doesn't jive well with me, mainly because it feels like someone going through an almost wistful recollection of events tinged with reverence for Wylla rather than a continuous narrative happening in the now.

Absolutely none of that is to say that the writing is bad, not at all. I enjoyed the story despite my above gripes, and I'm interested to see what else Haddon does outside of his comfort zone! My final thoughts however are that I really feel like Volatile Memory needed more pages and more information to ease the reader into the setting, because there's so much there and it's genuinely so COOL and 176 pages just isn't enough!

Thank you NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for the free eARC in exchange for my honest review!

This was a story about the masks we choose.

This was a fascinating reading experience and I'm struggling to review it. I don't enjoy a 2nd person POV narrative, and typically dnf right away if that's the style, but I was so interested in what was happening that I couldn't put it down and read it in one sitting. It's compelling, and definitely inspired me to think about what exactly makes us who we are: is it our memories? If not- what is it? I'll absolutely check out future entries into the same universe.

Thanks so much @tordotcompub and @netgalley for the eArc!

fun short novella about having a body and being a lesbian and also not having a body and being a lesbian. And being two lesbians in one body. While in space. Also transgender and anticapitalist about it

Lovers of female rage will enjoy Volatile Memory! Vengeful, action-packed, interesting, heavy. I really enjoyed the author’s choice of narrative device.

The analysis of what it means to be human through an AI character will always be interesting to me, i resonated a lot with the dysphoria present it felt raw to me, the identity theme was excellent and as for the world building it reminded me of time war which will always be amazing, it was unique

Volatile Mind definitely makes you think. It took me a minute to get into it but once I did, I was locked in. The story makes you think about humanity and what it means to be a human. The story follows a trans woman who is a scavenger. The world building was interesting and I felt like I wanted more, but of course , with it vainglorious a novella, there’s only so much. I think the author did a good job with the world building by showing and telling.

I feel as if I would get a lot more out of this by analyzing it with others. This would be a great read for a book club.


Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC

‘Volatile Memory’ feels like the love child between ‘This is How You Lose the Time War’ and Murderbot.

If you take all the poetry and romance and longing of Time War and mix that with the atmosphere and plot of Murderbot you have this book somewhere between that.

And actually, I think that’s all you need to know about this story. It’s romantic and fast paced and has your heart racing and swooning at the same time. Loved it!

what I thought I was getting when I requested this arc: a cool sci-fi novella with a sleek concept, a gorgeous cover, and queer protagonists.

what I actually got (in under 200 pages, mind you): a blistering, lyrical exploration of feminine rage, queer identity, and the weight—and liberation—of saying no to a world that demands we define ourselves for its comfort. and a sapphic romance powerful enough to rattle constellations.

volatile memory is the kind of book that sneaks up on you. beneath its novella-length shell lies a densely packed, emotionally devastating narrative. the prose is almost poetic in rhythm, and it’s written entirely in second person, which initially threw me for a loop, but once wylla and sable come face to face, the choice becomes very clear, and very smart. both of them are fully-realized, ferociously human characters navigating a world that deems their humanity—especially their autonomy—unacceptable. i could’ve easily devoured 500 pages of just them talking, scheming, being soft and furious in turn, but part of what makes this book work is how it embraces its brevity. no sentence is ever forgettable.

overall this is a beautiful, bold, unapologetically queer story. even if you're not a sci-fi reader, i still think this one could surprise you. it's that good. also, that gideon comp? yess. not because the tone is similar (it’s actually not), but the vibes are all there.

thank you to netgalley and tor publishing for the arc!

Volatile Memory by Seth Haddon is a powerful and poignant sci-fi novella that completely drew me in. Set in a gritty, tech-saturated world where people use masks to enhance their abilities, this story was both refreshingly unique and deeply thought-provoking.

At its core, this is a story about identity—about learning to know and accept yourself in a society built on rigid class systems, conformity, and corruption. It explores themes of transphobia and queerness with such care and depth, and the queer romance at the heart of it all was beautifully done.

I’m always here for stories with feminine rage and vengeance, and Volatile Memory delivers that in spades. It’s the kind of book that lingers in your mind long after the final page. I’ll be thinking about this one for a while.

Highly recommend picking this one up when it releases in July! Huge thanks to NetGalley and Tor Publishing for the gifted ARC.

Thank you to Netgalley for the eARC!

Volatile Memory is a a vividly imaginative sci-fi adventure that tackles identity and what it truly means to be human all while seeking out revenge and trying to avoid being hunted- gotta love characters that can multi task. I was immediately enthralled by Wylla and especially Sable (I am in love with our murderous rage filled disembodied queen) and the complex dynamic between them. It was so refreshingly unique and I am a little obsessed with the aesthetic of these animal styled masks that grant the wearer skills based on the creature it embodies. Honestly the entire story was just so gripping and entertaining. There was never a slow moment and it makes me wish that this novella had been a full novel so that we could spend even more time in this world and with these characters because I just so thoroughly enjoyed the brief time I had with them.

Thank you once more to Tor for this eArc! Volatile Memory is a debut novella with an incredible premise and worldbuilding that delivers on it. In a sci-fi, spaceship-ridden world of scavengers with animal-like masks, Wylla is a trans woman surviving in a transphobic world. But when she ends up finding an unprecedented sentient mask, her life is turned upside down.

This is a super tense, yet hearfelt weird novella -- which I think you all know is my favorite genre! For fans of odd speculative fiction, with a cool narrative framework and mind-stretching world building, this is perfect. And if you like slightly toxic but mostly sweet, they're-in-a-weird-situation, alla Locked Tomb, Baru Cormorant, sapphic couples... Man, are you in for a treat!

My only issue was again: the ending. I just thought it was a tad too rushed, but I do think I'm quite picky on beginnings and endings, especially in novellas. But the narration, worldbuilding and premise here are so good, that it more than makes up for it. Overall, a fantastic debut at Tor, and I can't wait to see what Haddon does next!

Seth Haddon is a fantastic fantasy writer, and I'm so happy he's making his debut into science fiction. He does an incredible job of making well rounded, queer characters in interesting settings that hook you from the beginning. I really couldn't put this down!