News
Debut Author Challenge: John Love
“TQ: What would you say is your most interesting writing quirk?
John Rather grandly, I used to tell people that I preferred writing key passages with pen on paper first: the texture of the paper, the feel of the nib, and so on. Like a real auteur. Pretty soon into writing FAITH, all that got thrown out. Word lets me put key phrases at odd positions, then fill in the gaps, until the whole moves into focus. More impressionist than linear.
And I like some malt whisky, and a cat, within easy reach.
TQ: Who are some of your favorite writers? Who do you feel has influenced your writing?
John Hitchhiker’s Guide is one of my SF favourites, in all its early forms: the original BBC Radio 4 programme, the equally original BBC TV adaptation, and Douglas Adams’ unequalled “Trilogy of Five Novels.” But not the Hollywood movie. I didn’t like that at all.” Read the full interview here.
A Review: Hitchers
“Will McIntosh’s debut Soft Apocalypse, which I reviewed here, was a brilliant novel about normal people trying to survive while society gradually collapses around them. It was easily one of my favorite novels of 2011. His catalog of strong short stories includes “Bridesicles,” which won the Hugo and was a Nebula finalist. It’s one of those rare stories where emotion and technology merge to form a perfect little SF universe. I can’t be the only reader who was eagerly awaiting this very exciting author’s second novel.
Well, it’s finally here, and it’s called Hitchers. People who are familiar with Will McIntosh’s debut will immediately notice that this is a completely different animal: a contemporary supernatural/horror novel rather than dystopian science fiction. Keep an open mind, because different as it is, it’s definitely worth your time.” Read the full review at Tor.com and pre-order Hitchers by the awesome Will McIntosh at your favorite book store.
Of Blood and Honey Shortlisted for the Crawford Award
Congratulations go out to Stina Leicht, Of Blood and Honey made the shortlist for the 2012 William L. Crawford Fantasy Award! And Blue Skies from Pain, the follow up to Of Blood and Honey, will be released in March. Don’t miss it!
And Blue Skies From Pain
Northern Ireland, 1977. Liam Kelly is many things: a former wheelman for the IRA, a one-time political prisoner, the half-breed son of a mystic Fey warrior and a mortal woman, and a troubled young man literally haunted by the ghosts of his past. Liam has turned his back on his land’s bloody sectarian Troubles, but the war isn’t done with him yet, and neither is an older, more mythic battle–between the Church and its demonic enemies, the Fallen.
After centuries of misunderstanding and conflict, the Church is on the verge of accepting that the Fey and the Fallen are not the same. But to achieve this historic truce, Liam must prove to the Church’s Inquisitors that he is not a demon, even as he wrestles with his own guilt and confusion, while being hunted by enemies both earthly and unworldly.
A shape-shifter by nature, Liam has a foot in two worlds–and it’s driving him mad.
ISBN: 978-1-59780-347-2
384 Pages $14.99
Trade Paperback
An Interview: Mazarkis Williams
“As a brand new SFF writer, with your début still very young and fresh, who is “Mazarkis Williams” and what’s he all about, both as a writer and a person?
There’s nothing very gripping about Mazarkis Williams—hopefully the book interests people more.
I’ll make an attempt. As both a writer and a person, I’m interested in what’s inside people. I want to know what others are thinking about, make sense of seemingly inexplicable actions, find common ground with those who on the surface seem so different.
Some of the author bios out there mention that I’ve been a gamer for over fifteen years. Being that nerdy is a huge help. I’ve been the game master and one of the players, and both roles give me great ideas for heroic or villainous behaviour. Motivations are key. When you become the villain to such an extent that you decide it makes sense to burn down an entire village, you have reached the immersion point an author needs to reach.
Also, when you design a campaign for six players, you have to decide how to keep each person engaged in the story. That can be a challenge.
Unfortunately gaming doesn’t translate directly into book writing. In gaming, the story is interactive. I play with a great group of people and we end up with crazy, intricate storylines.” Check out the full interview at Fantasy Faction.
Recent Releases
Faith by John Love
Moby Dick meets Duel in John Love’s debut novel of Space Opera and Military Science Fiction! Faith is the name humanity has given to the unknown, seemingly invincible alien ship that has begun to harass the newly emergent Commonwealth. 300 years earlier, the same ship destroyed the Sakhran Empire, allowing the Commonwealth to expand its sphere of influence. But now Faith has returned! The ship is as devastating as before, and its attacks leave some Commonwealth solar systems in chaos. Eventually it reaches Sakhra, now an important Commonwealth possession, and it seems like history is about to repeat itself. But this time, something is waiting: an Outsider, one of the Commonwealth’s ultimate warships. Slender silver ships, full of functionality and crewed by people of unusual abilities, often sociopaths or psychopaths, Outsiders were conceived in back alleys, built and launched in secret, and commissioned without ceremony. One system away from earth, the Outsider ship Charles Manson makes a stand. Commander Foord waits with his crew of miscreants and sociopath, hoping to accomplish what no other human has been able to do — to destroy Faith!
Trade paperback
320 pages $14.99
ISBN: 978-1-59780-3-908
The Serpent Sea by Martha Wells
Moon, once a solitary wanderer, has become consort to Jade, sister queen of the Indigo Cloud court. Together, they travel with their people on a pair of flying ships in hopes of finding a new home for their colony. Moon finally feels like he’s found a tribe where he belongs.
But when the travelers reach the ancestral home of Indigo Cloud, shrouded within the trunk of a mountain-sized tree, they discover a blight infecting its core. Nearby they find the remains of the invaders who may be responsible, as well as evidence of a devastating theft. This discovery sends Moon and the hunters of Indigo Cloud on a quest for the heartstone of the tree–a quest that will lead them far away, across the Serpent Sea. . . .
In this followup to The Cloud Roads, Martha Wells returns with a world-spanning odyssey, a mystery that only provokes more questions–and the adventure of a lifetime.
Praise for The Cloud Roads:
“Wells…spins an exciting adventure around an alien hero who anyone can identify with.”–Publishers Weekly
“A starring light of the fantasy genre recaptures her mojo by going in a new direction.”–SF Signal
A Path to Coldness of Heart by Glen Cook
At long last, the conclusion to Glen Cook’s Dread Empire saga has arrived! King Bragi Ragnarson is a prisoner, shamed, nameless, and held captive by Lord Shih-kaa and the Empress Mist at the heart of the Dread Empire.
Far away in Kavelin, Bragia’s queen and what remains of his army seek to find and free their king, hampered by the loss or desertion of their best and brightest warriors. Kavelina’s spymaster, Michael Trebilcock, is missing in action, as is loyal soldier Aral Dantice. Meanwhile, Dane, Duke of Greyfells, seeks to seize the rule of Kavelin and place the kingdom in his pocket, beginning a new line of succession through Bragia’s queen, Dane’s cousin Inger. And in the highest peaks of the Dragona’s Teeth, in the ancient castle Fangdred, the sorcerer called Varthlokkur uses his arts to spy on the world at large, observing the puppet strings that control kings and empires alike, waiting… For the time of the wrath of kings is almost at hand, and vengeance lies along a path to coldness of heart.
Hardcover 978-1-59780-329-8
320 Pages $24.99
Dancing With Bears by Michael Swanwick
Michael Swanwick — The Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy award-wining author of Stations Of The Tide — delivers a stunning “Post Utopian” novel of swashbuckling adventure, dangerous women, and genocidal AIs.
Dancing with Bears follows the adventures of notorious con-men Darger and Surplus: They’ve lied and cheated their way onto the caravan that is delivering a priceless gift from the Caliph of Baghdad to the Duke of Muscovy. The only thing harder than the journey to Muscovy is their arrival in Muscovy. An audience with the Duke seems impossible to obtain, and Darger and Surplus quickly become entangled in a morass of deceit and revolution.
The only thing more dangerous than the convoluted political web surrounding Darger and Surplus is the gift itself, the Pearls of Byzantium, and Zoesophia, the governess sworn to protect their virtue.
This steam punk-esque adventure explores the great game of espionage and empire building, from the point of view of the worlds most accomplished con-men, Darger and Surplus.
The Emperor’s Knife by Mazarkis Williams
There is a cancer at the heart of the mighty Cerani Empire: a plague that attacks young and old, rich and poor alike. Geometric patterns spread across the skin, until you die in agony, or become a Carrier, doing the bidding of an evil intelligence, the Pattern Master. Anyone showing the tell-tale marks is put to death; that is Emperor Beyon’s law…but now the pattern is running over the Emperor’s own arms.
His body servants have been executed, he ignores his wives, but he is doomed, for soon the pattern will reach his face. While Beyon’s agents scour the land for a cure, Sarmin, the Emperor’s only surviving brother, awaits his bride, Mesema, a windreader from the northern plains. Unused to the Imperial Court’s stifling protocols and deadly intrigues, Mesema has no one to turn to but an ageing imperial assassin, the Emperor’s Knife.
As long-planned conspiracies boil over into open violence, the invincible Pattern Master appears from the deep desert. Now only three people stand in his way: a lost prince, a world-weary killer, and a young girl from the steppes who saw a path in a pattern once, among the waving grasses – a path that just might save them all.
Hardcover
978-1-59780-384-7
300 Pages $24.99
Selected Stories of Fritz Leiber by Fritz Leiber
Now in Trade Paperback!
“I learned how to play the game of literature–a game of power and precision and elegance–from reading Fritz Leiber, but it was a lesson I learned in fits, chasing his stories across scattershot anthologies. What a blessing and a pleasure that we can all now be schooled, easily and everlastingly, by this marvelous collection.”
– Michael Chabon
“He was one of the giants of genre literature and it is hard to imagine the world of tales we read today being the same without him…. Fritz Leiber’s better short stories do the thing a fine whisky does… they leave aftertastes in memory, an emotional residue and resonance that remains long after the final page has been turned.”
– Neil Gaiman
“For anyone who loves great literature, Fritz Leiber walked on water.”
– Harlan Ellison
Known in his lifetime primarily to readers of science fiction and fantasy, Fritz Leiber is now recognized as one of the finest writers of popular fiction of the twentieth century. An intimate of H. P. Lovecraft, Leiber crafted the twentieth century’s first great stories of urban horror, created the sword and sorcery tale almost single-handedly, and wrote strong, resonant science fiction. Nothing less than a visionary American author, Leiber is considered by critics and fans alike to be one of our most original and versatile storytellers.
The seventeen tales selected for this volume showcase Leiber’s virtuoso range and unforgettable characters: from the fabled, decadent streets of god-haunted Lankhmar to the eerie underworld of a Martian gambling hall; from a sunless, frozen Earth to the shattered, bombed, and violent wreckage of a post-atomic New York, and beyond. Edited by master
anthologist Jonathan Strahan and Locus magazine founder Charles N. Brown, Fritz Leiber: Selected Stories presents a wide sampling of his best short fiction so that a new generation of twenty-first century readers can continue to discover and enjoy his groundbreaking and memorable fiction.
Contents:
Introduction by Neil Gaiman
Smoke Ghost
The Girl with the Hungry Eyes
Coming Attraction
A Pail of Air
A Deskful of Girls
Space Time for Springers
Ill Met in Lankhmar
Four Ghosts in Hamlet
Gonna Roll the Bones
The Inner Circles (aka The Winter Flies)
America the Beautiful
Bazaar of the Bizarre
Midnight by the Morphy Watch
Belsen Express
Catch That Zeppelin!
Horrible Imaginings
The Curse of the Smalls and the Stars
Bio:
Fritz Reuter Leiber, Jr. (1910-1992) was an American author of fantasy, horror, and science fiction. The son of a pair of Shakespearian actors, Leiber was also an actor, expert chess player, and champion fencer. Born in Chicago in 1910, Leiber spent his youth touring with his parents’ theater company. He graduated with honors in philosophy from the University of Chicago in 1932. Leiber married Jonquil Stephens in 1936. In 1938, their son Justin was born. After Jonquil’s death in 1969, Fritz Leiber moved to San Francisco, where he died on September 5, 1992.
Leiber’s formative sword-and-sorcery story, “Two Sought Adventure,” was published in Unknown magazine in 1939. Subsequent stories and novels would appear in such magazines as Astounding, Dangerous Visions, Fantastic, Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Galaxy, Other Worlds, Star Science Fiction Stories, and Weird Tales. A number of Leiber’s works have been adapted for film or television.
In addition to multiple Hugo, Nebula, Derleth, Lovecraft, and World Fantasy Awards, Fritz Leiber received the Grand Master of Fantasy (Gandalf) Award in 1975, World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1976, the Bram Stoker Lifetime Achievement Award in 1987, and the Grand Master Nebula Award in 1981.
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