2012 Reading Year in Review

I’ve done this for a few years now (2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006), so in order to maintain the middling credentials as a genre blogger/book reviewer I have, I'm doing it again for 2012.

As I have in the past, I’ll start with some stats… I read (or at least attempted to read) 73 books in 2012, depending on how you count omnibus editions. I say attempted because a few books I simply dropped because nothing about the book compelled me to keep reading. Many of those, 40, were new/2012 releases, but I have been trying to get back into some of the older stuff and the fact that nearly half of what I read was pre-2012 means I did just that.

In 2012, I posted 51 reviews to SFFWorld and 3 to Tor.com. Yeah, I became one of Tor.com's semi-regular book reviewers in 2012. I've got a couple of Tor.com reviews coming up in early 2013.

Aside from the regular gamut of current year releases, I did some major catching up with Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time in the lead up to the January 2013 release of A Memory of Light.  I also read through a quite a few books by Daniel Abraham, including The Long Price Quartet in addition to this two 2012 releases.

Here are some stats:

• 35 can be considered Fantasy
  
• 40 2012/current year releases
• 20 books by authors new to me
• 25 can be considered Science Fiction
• 6 can be considered 2011 debuts
  
• 3 can be considered Horror
• 14 Books by women (Not necessarily 12 different women because, for example, I read 4 total novels [one novel and an omnibus] by Rachel Aaron)

All that said, on to the categories for the 2012 … which I think I'll call the Stuffies. As I said last year, this isn’t a typical top 10 or 12 or anything, but whatever you want to call them, here are some categories for what I read in 2011 and what I put at the top of those categories.

Rob’s Favorite Fantasy Novel(s) Read in 2012

2012 was another strong year for Fantasy, with according to Locus Magazine, 215 Fantasy/Horror novels published in 2012. One thing I noticed, in addition to the debuts, was the number of novels which were second/third/etc. installments in ongoing series. This isn't rare, per say, rather the opposite.

With all of that having been said, as I've done in the past, I'll highlight the fantasy novels that stood out to me in 2012

The Troupe by Robert Jackson Bennett was not only the best fantasy novel I read in 2012, it is my favorite novel of the year, full stop. It was a powerful novel and I'd even rank it as one of the ten best I've read in the last decade:

Bennett’s style is both subtle and powerful, he doesn’t often beat the reader over the head with blatant imagery or themes. Rather, the hints and pieces he offers the reader work so effectively to build a collaborative engagement of conversation between writer and reader that it proves all the more powerful. We know there’s a big curtain and behind that curtain, lots of pieces and players are moving around while the performers in front of the curtain waive their hands for the audience. In that respect, Silenus’s Troupe is just the front for much larger events and performances, as well as intimate movements and emotions.
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Throughout my experience with The Troupe I felt echoes or resonances with a lot of fiction I’ve read or watched over the years that rang very True. Not that Mr. Bennett was repeating the cadence as much as he was adding to the overall song. Some of these resonances include the aforementioned Ray Bradbury, as well as Stephen King (thematically The Dark Tower and specifically Low Men in Yellow Coats), Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s The Shadow of the Wind, the television show Lost, among other elements. What Bennett cued into is the veneer that much more is going on behind the curtain than what the reader sees on the page or the audience sees on the stage – a grand chess match between powers people can’t comprehend, let alone even realize exist.

Daniel Abraham is the author I read the most this year, in terms of quantities of books.  If The Troupe was the best novel I read in 2012, then The King's Blood, book two of The Dagger and the Coin is hands down the best Epic Fantasy novel I read in 2012:

Abraham is doing something very fascinating with most of his characters, but the one which I find the most intriguing is Geder Palliako. Through the eyes of most of the other characters, he is cast in a negative light ranging from as insecure to immature manboy to a dark manipulator to a fool to a coward. Through Geder’s eyes, Abraham evokes a great deal of sympathy for his plight, that ultimately, Geder seems to be trying to do what is best for the Prince under his watch and the land the Prince rules through him. His motivations come across as plausible outgrowths, particularly the less-than-savory aspects of his persona – his frustration, his anger, his jealousy, and his inadequacies. I’m not sure quite what Abraham is building with Geder, it is possible he is being whittled into something of a Big Bad for the series. On those aspects, I find a great deal of similarity between Geder and Walter White of Breaking Bad. Both characters are initially meek and weak, both characters struggle to overcome their fears in what might not be the best of fashions, and through various developments grow out of that shadow into something much more menacing. An important stage in Geder’s development is his ultimate reaction to Killian as seen through the eyes of Cithrin.


The notes are familiar, they are successful; these notes are why readers return to the genre again and again. When those notes are struck well, with precision, and with a flair that is a slightly different, yet graceful, tone, then this symphony is wondrous to behold. With The King’s Blood, Daniel Abraham has achieved such a graceful symphony. There’s an excitement to reading a great novel in a genre you enjoy, the pages ratchet up the excitement for what’s come before and what it promises, this excitement is present in The King’s Blood. Every beat of Epic Fantasy that I wish to hear was struck in The King’s Blood and struck with an evocative quality that comes across as a perfect hybrid of inborn talent and precisely honed skills.

Rounding out my top three is a novel from an author whose short stories I've read, but prior to this novel, never any of her novels. The novel is Range of Ghosts by Elizabeth Bear:

Set in a fantasized Middle-East, the novel centers on characters who are at the fringes of society: a young man who is the lone survivor of a vicious battle for succession that took the lives of many his family (Temur) and a young woman setting aside her royal lineage to assume the role of Sorceress (Samarkar). While Temur and Samarkar are the focal characters for much of the novel, fringe characters such as the tiger-woman (an outcast of her tribe) Hrahima or the woman with whom Temur initially bonds emotionally, Edene herself is part of a fringe society. These characters, despite and because of their ‘fringe’ status are powerful and persistent in their motivations and actions. Yeah, that’s right, Bear threw tiger people in as a race of characters, and though Hrahima is a minor character at the moment, through the other characters in the novel, Bear gives her a great sense of power and awe. I hope Bear explores this character in greater depth in future novels, as well as the society from which she comes


It is precise, engaging and powerful. Bear has packed the novel tightly with emotion, romance, characters who are believable and living, conflict both internal on a character level and external in physical battles, to such a degree that the wonder is in her ability to do so much in such a relatively small space. Bear balances the epic scale of gods in a fully realized and living cosmology as real beings with the intimate goals, feelings, and emotions of her human characters as magnificently as any writer plying their trade in fantasy today.

Other fantasies that really stood out to me were:

• Red Country by Joe Abercrombie - "Red Country is an exciting, entertaining novel; simply one of those books I could NOT put down. It helped me weather the blackout and power outage I experienced as a result of Hurricane Sandy. ... It isn’t clear what Joe will be writing next, but whatever it is, more stories in this world, a tale of Bayaz or frankly anything, I’ll be there. Red Country is easily a top book 2012 book for me."
• Shadow OPS: Control Point by Myke Cole - "On the whole; however, Control Point is a mostly tight novel that was much more thought-provoking and rewarding than I could have imagined. I keep questioning Britton’s actions, I sympathize with his emotions and I can’t come to a fully formed response of what I think his correct course of action would have been (or rather, what my course of action would have been) – rebel or go along with the system. "
• The Bones of the Old Ones by Howard Andrew Jones - "Let me get it out of the way, this book is one helluva an adventure. Flying carpets figure prominently in the novel, so what more do I need to mention? O.K. how about a possessed woman, a sorceress who seemingly does a turn of character, thrilling sword fights, giant bear-monsters, spirits and echoes of ancient heroes. Jones does a near pitch-perfect balancing act between character, action, backstory, and narrative flow."
• The Hammer and the Blade by Paul S. Kemp - "In Egil and Nix, he’s given readers possible long-distant cousins to Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser in that he’s got the large bruiser and short thief duo, as well as the banter between the two. Furthermore, one of the main areas in this world is known as the Low Bazaar, an obvious homage the Fafhrd and Grey Mouser story Bazaar of the Bizarre."
• King of Thorns by Mark Lawrence - "VERY good, more complex, perhaps more ambitious than Prince of Thorns. ... Still, I enjoyed it a great deal and if the finale, Emperor of Thorns can reach the same levels of excellence, craftsmanship, and imaginative storytelling as either of its predecessor, than I for one will be an extremely happy reader."
• Caine's Law by Matthew Stover - "Part of what was so great was seeing all the different versions of Caine Stover gave us and while each one was from a different timeline, the trademarks of his biting and uncompromising personality were on full display. It was also great to have another chance to treat with Ma’elKoth, Orbek and some of the other characters of Caine’s past novels."
• The Dirty Streets of Heaven by Tad Williams - "What is intrigues me a great deal is the mythology/back-story that informs the ‘current time’ of the novel. The forces of Heaven and the representatives of Hell have the Milton-esque and biblical with more of a modern shell. ... I enjoyed The Dirty Streets of Heaven a great deal and I’m even more excited to see where Tad Williams takes Bobby Dollar in the next two installments."

Rob Favorite Science Fiction Novel(s) Read in 2012

I read a bit more SF in 2011 than in 2012, but the SF I read published in 2012 stood out a great deal.  Two of the three authors appeared in my top 3 for 2011.

David Brin is a living legend in the genre, but I've read very little by him (maybe a short here and there and The Postman).  The novel he published in 2012; however, stands out as my favorite SF novel published in 2012, Existence:

Although the world has suffered catastrophes, like the aforementioned war and a melting of polar ice caps, and changed drastically, Existence is not a dystopian novel even if it is set in a somewhat post-apocalyptic environment. Early on, one of the points Brin makes through his characters and the world-building is that people survive and persevere. Though bad things have happened, people will continue on and adjust. It is both a novel of ends and beginnings, a novel of first contact and a novel that approaches an answer to the question partially framed by the Fermi Paradox “Are we alone in the universe?”
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What worked very well for me in making this a believable future was Brin’s method of relaying the world through his characters not in huge dumps of information, though some elements of the ‘current’ world were divulged in sizeable chunks, but rather the inferences and casual mentions of the past events as if it were common knowledge.

Blackout is the final novel of The Newsflesh Trilogy, Mira Grant’s Zombie-Apocalypse trilogy. The second novel maintained the same tension and narrative power as the first and has set the bar high for the concluding volume. Here’s some of what I said about Blackout:

What Grant has done, in a narrative sense in Blackout, is truly enjoyable and fascinating. The point of view narration in the previous two volumes is indeed intact; however, Grant rotates the chapters with the only initial indication being blog quotes from the opposite perspective. That is, Becks is part of Sean’s narrative and when we see a blog quote from her, it signals a chapter from Georgia’s point of view. It’s a rather obvious trick, but still quite successful. I felt that Georgia’s voice in Feed was stronger than Shaun’s was in Deadline, but there’s more of a balance between the two here in Blackout.

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I enjoyed the random Zombie novel here and there, but when I read Feed I was totally blown away, which set the bar high for Deadline. That bar was met and with Blackout and the whole Newsflesh Trilogy, Mira Grant has completed what should be considered the quintessential Zombie narrative for the early 21st Century: it raises as many (maybe more) questions about identity, government conspiracies, sanity, science gone wrong, and surviving in a Crapsack World. I found it difficult to put these books aside for the annoying interruptions of life while reading them and highly recommend the trilogy, which stands very, very high on my list of completed series.

James S.A. Corey (AKA Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck) round out my top 3 SF books with Caliban's War,  the second installment of The Expanse:

Although the war in the solar system came to something of a conclusion in Leviathan Wakes, tension and potential for greater conflict still exists. The events spinning out of James Holden’s actions on Eros are not without their repercussions. The MacGuffin of these books – the protomolecule – is now on Venus and being observed by the governments/military of both Mars and Earth while an Event on Ganymede similar to the vomit-zombies from the previous novel occurs. It is different enough to throw further speculation about the protomolecule’s nature and the group responsible for the Ganymede outbreak into rampant speculation.

…

Conversely, the ascerbic Avasarala provides some snarky humor throughout. Her uncompromising attitude is balanced by her interactions with her family. There’s also a good deal of political weaving especially through her character as she interacts with people very high up in the solar system’s hierarchy including a particularly grin-inducing scene with one individual at the novel’s conclusion. I hope to see much more of her in this series as it progresses.

Other SF books that really stood out to me were;

• Arctic Rising by Tobias Buckell - "For an ecological action-thriller, Buckell more than proves he’s capable of delivering the goods. More impressively, he balances the action pieces with equal amounts of engaging character development and geopolitical intrigue. The novel is broken into short, engaging chapters that make it easy to pick up and difficult to put down as many chapters end in a sort of question/conflict that made me want to keep reading.."
• Seeds of Earth by Michael Cobley - "a vast-canvas galactic space opera that exemplifies the qualities readers so enjoy in this space opera renaissance – multi-planetary society, dependence on artificial intelligence, alien horde as the enemy, mystical/mysterious alien allies, colonization of humanity, and more importantly he uses these familiar ingredients in a way that is fresh. Cobley packs a lot of ideas and elements into the novel which flows fairly organically."
• The Lost Fleet Beyond the Frontier: Invincible - by Jack Campbell - "In the end, I found Invincible to be a very gripping read despite a couple of the minor flaws. It should satisfy long-time readers of the Campbell’s series and might even work as an entry point for new readers, though much of the character interaction is informed by their past as recounted in the previous seven novels."
• Katya's World by Jonathan L. Howard - "In the end, Howard has crafted an engaging, entertaining and thought-provoking novel. Though quite different in accoutrements from the other Strange Chemistry title I read (Blackwood), the same sense of wonder and overall flavor is present – quality story focused on youthful characters in a fantastically plausible setting. Another winner for the imprint.."

Rob's Favorite Debut(s) of 2012

My favorite debut of the year was from Ace books (as it was last year), Myke Cole’s Control Point, the first installment in his Military Fantasy series Shadow OPS which logically posits that if magic were real, then the military would weaponize it, attempt to control, and to codify it:

Myke Cole’s near future saga blends Urban Fantasy and Military Science Fiction, two branches of Speculative Fiction that don’t come together often. The Great Reawakening has taken place, magic is real as are the creatures out of fantasy and myth like goblins and Rocs. The military has permitted (and controls) schools of Elemental magic dealing with wind, fire, water, and earth control. Other ‘schools’ such as reanimating the dead and opening up portals for quick travel, are forbidden. Oscar manifests sorcerous powers in the forbidden school of magic – Portomancy, the ability to open portals allowing for instant transportation to any location. Due to the laws in place, he must immediately turn himself into the authorities. As an officer in the military responsible for bringing in those who manifest out of the public, Oscar has seen what happens to Latents, people such as himself, so he flees and becomes a fugitive.

Gwenda Bond is not unfamiliar to the genre crowd, she's written pieces for Publishers Weekly and Locus.  She's a terrific writer which is why Amanda Rutter and the folks behind the Strange Chemistry imprint were smart to maker her debut novel Blackwood the launch title for the imprint:

In Gwenda Bond’s debut novel Blackwood she takes the historical fact of the disappearance, fills in with some more history, and adds some conjecture of dark magic to the disappearance. All of that is in the background for most of the novel and instead Ms. Bond focuses her novel on Miranda Blackwood, a young lady who works for the local theater and cares for her drunk father, her mother having passed away long before the novel begins.
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Miranda often dropped the “frak” bomb when frustrated and references to other geek culture shows abounded. In other words, Miranda’s a girl on whom a younger version of myself might have had a crush. Bond did a very good job of making me root for both of these young kids and making them both outcasts who find common ground.

Rounding out my three stand out debut novels comes a novel from a writer who has made a name for himself  as a short story writer, Saladin Ahmed's Throne of the Crescent Moon:

Where Ahmed excels is with his protagonist, Doctor Adoulla Makhslood. He’s the type of guy you want to have as the ‘crotchety but cool uncle’ at the bar with you to share a drink or at your side should that bar-room brawl occur. We get in the head of Makhslood as he re-examines the decisions he’s made in the immediate past and ponders of how he should best proceed particularly with the Falcon Prince.
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The pacing is terrific, as it drew me into the characters heads, I felt the high stakes of the conflict and really wanted these people to succeed. DAW wrapped this enthralling novel with a bright, eye-catching cover by Jason Chan that very much captures the feel of the novel displaying the three primary protagonists fighting a horde of ghuls. Over the course of the novel, I felt resonance between Throne of the Crescent Moon and comic book superheroes, specifically Batman and towards the end, characters in Watchmen.

Favorite Backlist / Book Not Published in 2011 Read in 2012

I'll start off this section with an entire series, Daniel Abraham's Long Price Quartet, which published from 2006 to 2009 in single volumes and was re-released in 2012 in two omnibus volumes:

A Shadow in Summer has many elements in common with Abraham’s fantasy contemporaries – imagined world with echoes of our own, archaic governments that hearken to our past, hints of magic and non-human creatures. Where the novel (and series) differs is in how these elements play together in Abraham’s sandbox. The magic is subtle  ...  So, taking a bit of a step away from the first volume, (in A Betrayal in Winter) Daniel Abraham gives readers what is essentially a fantastically infused murder mystery set in the imagined city of Machi. Though the events in the previous volume were indeed climactic, Abraham’s story illustrates how far ranging the consequences of one’s actions can be.  ...  Abraham jumps another fourteen years between books at the beginning of An Autumn War, Otah is entrenched in his role as ruler trying to keep his nation together. While Otah is busy ruling, Maati spends much of his time in the novel reflecting. Abraham provides a vantage point into the world outside of the cities where the andat have such an impact. ... Even though the first three volumes were intimate and personal in that Abraham’s dealings with characters focused on a relative few characters compared to his genre contemporaries, the stakes increased with each book. The personal aspect; however, is even more strong in The Price of Spring as the feel of the novel comes through Otah and Maati, once friends and allies who have become ideological enemies and are no longer in the same land.

George R.R. Martin makes an appearance on another one of my wrap-up posts, this time for  his classic vampire novel Fevre Dream:

Six years earlier, Anne Rice published Interview with the Vampire and the superficial similarities between the two novels are hard to ignore – both take place in the south, with much of the action focused on a ‘gentleman vampire.’ One of the most fascinating elements to Rice’s Chronicles was the backstory/history of the vampires as a race. Martin does quite possibly a better job in one book with his vampires – we learn of the history of the vampire solely through Joshua’s voice. While this works to a large degree, I find it more successful than Rice’s history more for what is left unsaid and told for Rice left seemingly no stone unturned. A little bit of mystery is stronger than knowing the full scope in this case.

The final book here is Monster Hunter International by Larry Correia.  Sometimes a protagonist is a mirror image of the writer and it comes across as self indulgent or as the dreaded Gary Stu.  While some can say that about the protagonist Owen Pitt, for me, the novel was a blast and I could easily overlook such Gary Stu-ish qualities. I'm pleased that I've got the next two on my kindle in the omnibus edition waiting to be read:

Correia admits to being a fan of B-Movies featuring monsters and that love for such films transfers well to the page he clearly had a lot of fun writing the book. Who wouldn’t want to throw their boss out the window, beat up his dream-girl’s annoying boyfriend, have carte-blanche when it comes to fighting monsters, save the world and get the girl of his dreams on his arms after beating the Big Bad? These audacious elements blared out to me while I was reading the book and I didn’t care because I was having fun reading it.

Monster Hunter International was clearly a book that I was able to enjoy despite (and maybe because of) some of the bombastic elements that if thrown together without some skill, I would have easily dismissed. Another element that helped to make the novel enjoyable was how Correia depicted Owen interacting with his newbie squad and in particular the defacto head of MHI, Earl Harbinger. Where some of the character interaction felt a little less genuine were some of the scenes when Owen and Julie interacted.

MVP Author of 2012

Anybody who has been following my blog for the past year or knows me from the SFFWorld forums should find it as no surprise that this slot goes to…

Daniel Abraham

His 2011 collaboration with George R. R. Martin's assistant Ty Franck, Leviathan Wakes (the first installment of the Space Opera series The Expanse) was short-listed/ nominated for the Hugo Award and The Locus Award for best Science Fiction novel in 2012.  The second novel in that series, Caliban's War, published to nearly as much acclaim. The King's Blood, the second installment of his epic fantasy series The Dagger and the Coin published to rave reviews. and I would be surprised not to see it on awards ballots next year. His acclaimed Long Price Quartet was released in two omnibus volumes in 2012.  Abraham is writing/scripting the comic book/graphic novel adaptation of his friend George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series. His urban fantasy series The Black Sun's Daughter hit UK bookshelves for the first time this year and his short fiction appeared in Gardner Dozois's 29th Annual Year's Best Science Fiction anthology.

Favorite ‘New To Me’ Author(s) of 2012

I did a wrap up this earlier in the year and I can't really say much has changed since then so I'll a couple:

Rachel Aaron – I enjoyed the heck out of her The Legend of Eli Monpress omnibus, I've read the fourth in the series - The Spirit War and the fifth/final - Spirt’s End - awaits to be plucked off of Mount Toberead. These are fun, entertaining fantasies that I think would appeal to readers who enjoy Scott Lynch.

Jim C. Hines – I’ve only read one book by him, Libriomancer, but it really stood out to me.  Jim is a smart writer, has one of the best author blogs in the genre, and I've got a few books of his sitting along the slopes of Mount Toberead. 

Favorite Publisher of 2012

For the second year in a row, I have to give the nod to…

Orbit Books

A quick look through of this post and it shouldn't be that great a surprise that Orbit Books is the publisher whose books I enjoy the most. For my reading time, no publisher produced books that worked as consistently from book-to-book for me. That is, on the whole, all the books I read published by Orbit worked for me in a big way.

This isn’t to say that other publishers didn’t publish great stuff I enjoyed, just that nothing I read from Orbit fell into the disappointment/clunker/meh category. I can't say the same for the other publishers whose books I read in 2011.

Looking Ahead to 2012

Another shot of Sully to close out the year as she ponders what's to come in 2013. Either that or she sees some deer.

What does 2013 bring?

• Season 3 of Game of Thrones
• Season 3.5 Walking Dead
• The final season of Breaking Bad
• Man of Steel
• The Hobbit (part 2)
• Thor 2
• Iron Man 3
• Shadow OPS: Fortress Frontier by Myke Cole
• The Daylight War by Peter V. Brett
• American Elsewhere by Robert Jackson Bennett
• A Memory of Light the final Wheel of Time (I'm a Memory Keeper for the Philadelphia signing!)
• Abaddon's Gate the second in James S.A. Corey's The Expanse
• The Tyrant's Law book 3 of Daniel Abraham's The Dagger and the Coin

Looks like a decent batch of major releases on the small screen, big screen, and page for me. Let's just hope some of it lives up to the hype.

Books in the Mail (W/E 2012-12-15)

American Elsewhere by Robert Jackson Bennett (Orbit Trade Paperback  02/12/2013) – With The Troupe, Robert Jackson Bennett may have written my favorite novel of 2012 (hint: he did) and one of the best novels I read in the past five or ten years so yeah, you could say this is high on the anticipation list for 2013.

Ex-cop Mona Bright has been living a hard couple of years on the road, but when her estranged father dies, she finds she's had a home all along: a little house her deceased mother once owned in Wink, New Mexico.

And though every map denies Wink exists, Mona finds they're wrong: not only is Wink real, it is the perfect American small town, somehow retaining all the Atomic Age optimism the rest of world has abandoned.

But the closer Mona gets to her mother's past, the more she understands that the people in Wink are very, very different - and what's more, Mona begins to recognize her own bond to this strange place, which feels more like home every day.


The Great North Road by Peter F. Hamilton. (Del Rey Hardcover 12/26/2012) – Hamilton’s latest epic is a standalone (much like his superb Fallen Dragon).  The book is out in the UK and Mark/Hobbit had some good things to say.

New York Times bestselling author Peter F. Hamilton’s riveting new thriller combines the nail-biting suspense of a serial-killer investigation with clear-eyed scientific and social extrapolation to create a future that seems not merely plausible but inevitable.

A century from now, thanks to a technology allowing instantaneous travel across light-years, humanity has solved its energy shortages, cleaned up the environment, and created far-flung colony worlds. The keys to this empire belong to the powerful North family—composed of successive generations of clones. Yet these clones are not identical. For one thing, genetic errors have crept in with each generation. For another, the original three clone “brothers” have gone their separate ways, and the branches of the family are now friendly rivals more than allies.

Or maybe not so friendly. At least that’s what the murder of a North clone in the English city of Newcastle suggests to Detective Sidney Hurst. Sid is a solid investigator who’d like nothing better than to hand off this hot potato of a case. The way he figures it, whether he solves the crime or not, he’ll make enough enemies to ruin his career.

Yet Sid’s case is about to take an unexpected turn: because the circumstances of the murder bear an uncanny resemblance to a killing that took place years ago on the planet St. Libra, where a North clone and his entire household were slaughtered in cold blood. The convicted slayer, Angela Tramelo, has always claimed her innocence. And now it seems she may have been right. Because only the St. Libra killer could have committed the Newcastle crime.

Problem is, Angela also claims that the murderer was an alien monster.

Now Sid must navigate through a Byzantine minefield of competing interests within the police department and the world’s political and economic elite . . . all the while hunting down a brutal killer poised to strike again. And on St. Libra, Angela, newly released from prison, joins a mission to hunt down the elusive alien, only to learn that the line between hunter and hunted is a thin one.

Limits of Power (Book Four of Paladin’s Legacy) by Elizabeth Moon (Del Rey Hardcover 02/21/2012) – I liked the first two in this series (Oath of Fealty and Kings of the North) quite a bit and last year I read (and thoroughly enjoyed) the first trilogy set in this world, The Deed of Paksenarrion) which is now in my Omnibus Hall of Fame [© PeterWilliam]. For reasons that I can’t explain even to myself, I didn’t yet get around to reading the third installment, Echoes of Betrayal. Hopefully, I’ll catch up in early 2013

Elizabeth Moon is back with the fourth adventure in her bestselling fantasy epic. Moon brilliantly weaves a colorful tapestry of action, betrayal, love, and magic set in a richly imagined world that stands alongside those of such fantasy masters as George R. R. Martin and Robin Hobb.

The unthinkable has occurred in the kingdom of Lyonya. The queen of the Elves—known as the Lady—is dead, murdered by former elves twisted by dark powers. Now the Lady’s half-elven grandson must heal the mistrust between elf and human before their enemies strike again. Yet as he struggles to make ready for an attack, an even greater threat looms across the Eight Kingdoms.

Throughout the north, magic is reappearing after centuries of absence, emerging without warning in family after family—rich and poor alike. In some areas, the religious strictures against magery remain in place, and fanatical followers are stamping out magery by killing whoever displays the merest sign of it—even children. And as unrest spreads, one very determined traitor works to undo any effort at peace—no matter how many lives it costs. With the future hanging in the balance, it is only the dedication of a few resolute heroes who can turn the tides . . . if they can survive.

2012 Best of Lists are Appearing...

With December fully upon us, many outlets are putting forth their best of the year lists.  Hell, some outlets did this in October and November.  I'm currently working on the annual round-up for SFFWorld with Mark, Nila, and Kat while also cribbing together the annual review post for this blog.

The short of it is, Tor.com posted their round up: Reviewers’ Choice 2012: The Best Books We Read This Year, and as I've contributed three reviews/appreciations to the site, I was invited to contribute. I won't reveal what I slotted as my top three (we were asked to limit the list to three choices, but some of us cheated a bit), you'll have to click over there to see what I thought.  I'll say it is pretty neat to be one of the part of this post with some of Tor.com's more visible and respected reviewers (folks like Jo Walton, Liz Bourke, Ron Hogan, Stefan Raets and Niall Alexander whose reviews have always been insightful and some of the most thoughtful in the genre) in specific, and on the whole to be a contributor for Tor.com

Books in the Mail (W/E 2012-11-24)

A little bit of a break after last week’s relatively large haul of books, thanks I’m sure, to the Thanksgiving holiday. One of these is a definite read, one a maybe and the others…not so much.

Spirit’s End (Books 5 of Eli Monpress) by Rachel Aaron (Orbit Books, Trade Paperback 11/20/2012) – I thoroughly enjoyed the first four books of the series, having read the omnibus of the first three and book 4 The Spirit War earlier in the year.

Eli Monpress is clever, he's determined, and he's in way over his head.

First rule of thievery: don't be a hero. When Eli broke the rules and saved the Council Kingdoms, he thought he knew the price, but resuming his place as the Shepherdess's favorite isn't as simple as bowing his head. Now that she has her darling back, Benehime is setting in motion a plan that could destroy everything she was created to protect, and even Eli's charm might not be enough to stop her. But Eli Monpress always has a plan, and with disaster rapidly approaching, he's pulling in every favor he can think of to make it work, including the grudging help of the Spirit Court's new Rector, Miranda Lyonette.

But with the world in panic, the demon stirring, and the Lord of Storms back on the hunt, it's going to take more than luck and charm to pull Eli through this time. He's going to have to break a few more rules and work with some old enemies if he's going to survive.

Bard’s Oath by Joanne Bertin (Hardcover 11/27/2012 Tor ) – Final novel in the sequence which began with The Last Dragonlord. Martin fans think they have long waits? The second installment in this particular sequence first published in 1999.

In The Last Dragonlord and Dragon and Phoenix Joanne Bertin created a world 

unlike our own, where Dragonlords soar in the skies above the many realms of the land. 

The Dragonlords’ magic is unique, giving them the ability to change from dragon to 

human form; to communicate silently among themselves; and other abilities not known 

to mortals.

For many millennia, the Dragonlords have been a blessing to the world, with their 

great magic and awesome power. And though they live far longer than the humans who 

they resemble when not in their draconic state, these fabled changelings are still loyal to 

their human friends. Now in Bard's Oath, their magic is not the only power abroad in the world. And not all the magic is as benign as theirs.

Leet, a master bard of great ability and vaulting ambition, has his own magic, but of a much darker nature. Years ago, death claimed the woman he loved, setting him on a course to avenge her death, no matter the consequences. Now, mad with hatred and consumed by his thirst for revenge, Leet has set in motion a nefarious plot that ensnares the friend of a Dragonlord, using his bardic skills . . . and dark powers only he can summon, to accomplish his bitter task.

Raven, a young horse-breeder friend of the Dragonloard Linden Rathan, is ensnared by Leet and under the bard’s spell, is one of the bard’s unwitting catspaws. When accused of a heinous crime, Raven turns to Linden, and while Dragonlords normally do not meddle in human affairs, Linden comes to Raven’s aid, loath to abandon him in his time of desperate need.

But Raven, and others victimized by Leet, are at the mercy of human justice. Can even a Dragonlord save them from a dire fate before it is too late?

The Best of All Possible Worlds by Karen Lord (Del Rey, Hardcover 02/12/2013) – This is Lord’s second novel and looks to be a winner. In addition to the names listed in the blurb below, I’ll say that superficially, I get an Octavia Butler feel.

Karen Lord’s debut novel, the multiple-award-winning Redemption in Indigo, announced the appearance of a major new talent—a strong, brilliantly innovative voice fusing Caribbean storytelling traditions and speculative fiction with subversive wit and incisive intellect. Compared by critics to such heavyweights as Nalo Hopkinson, China Miéville, and Ursula K. Le Guin, Lord does indeed belong in such select company—yet, like them, she boldly blazes her own trail.

Now Lord returns with a second novel that exceeds the promise of her first. The Best of All Possible Worlds is a stunning science fiction epic that is also a beautifully wrought, deeply moving love story.

A proud and reserved alien society finds its homeland destroyed in an unprovoked act of aggression, and the survivors have no choice but to reach out to the indigenous humanoids of their adopted world, to whom they are distantly related. They wish to preserve their cherished way of life but come to discover that in order to preserve their culture, they may have to change it forever.

Now a man and a woman from these two clashing societies must work together to save this vanishing race—and end up uncovering ancient mysteries with far-reaching ramifications. As their mission hangs in the balance, this unlikely team—one cool and cerebral, the other fiery and impulsive—just may find in each other their own destinies . . . and a force that transcends all.

“This fascinating and thoughtful science fiction novel breaks out of the typical conflict-centered narrative paradigm to examine adaptation, social change, and human relationships. I’ve not read anything quite like it, which it makes that rare beast: a true original.”—Kate Elliot, author of the Crown of Stars series and the Spiritwalker Trilogy

The Fractal Prince by Hannu Rajaniemi (Hardcover 11/27/2012 Tor ) – Sequel to Rajaniemi’s extremely well-received debut The Quantum Theif.

“The good thing is, no one will ever die again. The bad thing is, everyone will want to.”

A physicist receives a mysterious paper. The ideas in it are far, far ahead of current thinking and quite, quite terrifying. In a city of “fast ones,” shadow players, and jinni, two sisters contemplate a revolution.

And on the edges of reality a thief, helped by a sardonic ship, is trying to break into a Schrödinger box for his patron. In the box is his freedom. Or not.

Jean de Flambeur is back. And he’s running out of time.

In Hannu Rajaniemi’s sparkling follow-up to the critically acclaimed international sensation The Quantum Thief, he returns to his awe-inspiring vision of the universe…and we discover what the future held for Earth.

Books in the Mail (W/E 2012-11-17)

The flavor this week seems to be Steampunk, at least for half of the books I received this week.  Five authors I've never read and one of these books does look interesting.


The Lazarus Machine (A Tweed &; Nightingale Adventure

by Paul Crilley (Pyr Hardcover 11/06/2012) – Pyr has been doing quite impressive things in the market of Young Adult Steampunk. This is another snazzy looking book, from an author well-versed in genre storytelling (short stories and work on Star Wars media properties)

An alternate 1895. . . 

A world where Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace perfected the Difference Engine. Where steam and Tesla-powered computers are everywhere. Where automatons powered by human souls venture out into the sprawling London streets. Where the Ministry, a secretive

government agency, seeks to control everything in the name of the Queen.

It is in this claustrophobic, paranoid city that seventeen-year-old Sebastian Tweed and his conman father struggle to eke out a living.

But all is not well. . . 

A murderous, masked gang has moved into London, spreading terror through the criminal ranks as they take over the underworld. As the gang carves up more and more of the city, a single name comes to be uttered in fearful whispers. 

Professor Moriarty.

When Tweed's father is kidnapped by Moriarty, he is forced to team up with information broker Octavia Nightingale to track him down. But he soon realizes that his father's disappearance is just a tiny piece of a political conspiracy that could destroy the British

Empire and plunge the world into a horrific war.

Crown of Vengeance(Book One of The Dragon Prophecy) by Mercedes Lackey and James Mallory (Tor Hardcover 11/13/2012) – Lackey is another writing machine, she’s got many series ongoing and overall, this is her seventh collaboration with Mallory in the same world, though this looks very approachable for new readers. Every time I saw one of their earlier books, I thought they looked like pretty interesting High Fantasy and Lackey seems like a writer I should at least try once. This might be the book

Mercedes Lackey and James Mallory, bestselling authors individually and together, return to the world of their New York Times and USA Today bestselling Obsidian and Enduring Flame Trilogies with Crown of Vengeance.

Here, readers will learn the truth about the Elven Queen Vielissiar Faricarnon, who was the first to face the Endarkened in battle and the first to bond with a dragon. She worked some of the greatest magics her world has ever known, and paid the greatest Price.

Crown of Vengeance is an exciting fantasy adventure that will appeal to fans of Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar series. No previous knowledge of Lackey and Mallory's collaborations is necessary to enjoy this fast-paced, action-packed novel, but returning readers will be excited to discover this amazing story.

King of the Dead (Book One of The Jeremiah Hunt Chronicles #2) by Joseph Nassise (Tor Hardcover 11/27/2012) – Sequel to Eyes to See published just about a year ago and the second in his urban fantasy series.

Joseph Nassise shook up the urban fantasy genre with Eyes to See, a novel New York Times bestselling author Jonathan Maberry called “heartbreaking, deeply insightful, powerful and genuinely thrilling.” In a devil’s deal, Jeremiah Hunt sacrificed his human sight in exchange for the power to see the hidden world of ghosts and all of the darker spirits that prowl the streets. Hunt uncovered a world of murder and magic that took his daughter from him and nearly cost him his life, but that was only the beginning....

Now Hunt is on the run from the FBI, who have pegged him as a mass-murdering dark sorcerer. His flight from the law is diverted to New Orleans when his companion, a potent witch, has a horrific vision of the city under magical siege. When they arrive, they realize that the situation is more dire than they could have imagined: the world of the living faces a terrifying attack by forces from beyond the grave. King of the Dead, the second book in this groundbreaking series, promises more of Nassise’s electrifying writing that will enthrall readers looking for a supercharged, supernatural thrill.

A Conspiracy of Alchemists (Book One in The Chronicles of Light and Shadow) by Liesel Schwarz (Del Rey 03/05/2013) – Schwarz’s debut novel is also the launch of a Steampunk series with what seems to be vampires added for good measure. This one seems like it would appeal a great deal to fans of Gail Carriger.

LEAVE IT TO CHANCE. Eleanor “Elle” Chance, that is—a high-flying dirigible pilot with a taste for adventure and the heroine of this edgy new series that transforms elements of urban fantasy, steampunk, and paranormal romance into pure storytelling gold.

It is 1903, and the world is divided between light and shadow. On the side of light is a wondrous science that has transformed everyday life by harnessing magical energies to ingenious new technologies. But each advance of science has come at the expense of shadow—the traditional realm of the supernatural.

Now two ancient powers are preparing to strike back. Blood-sucking immortal Nightwalkers and their spellcasting Alchemist allies have a plan to cover the whole world in shadow. All they require is the sacrifice of a certain young woman whose past conceals a dangerous secret.

But when they come after Elle, they get more than they bargained for. This enterprising young woman, the daughter of a scientific genius, has reserves of bravery and determination that even she scarcely suspects. Now she is about to meet her match in more ways than one: a handsome yet infuriating Warlock named Hugh Marsh, whose agenda is as suspect as his charms are annoyingly irresistible.

Books in the Mail (W/E 2012-10-13)

An enormous haul this week which balances out the very small hauls the past couple of weeks. The November releases from Ace/Roc and DAW comprise the bulk of what arrived.


Bronze Summer (Book Two of The Northland Trilogy) by Stephen Baxter (Roc Hardcover 11/06/2012) – Second installment in Baxter’s distant past alternate history saga.

Stephen Baxter’s “imaginative [and] bold”* novel Stone Spring drew readers into an alternate prehistoric scenario that now continues with Bronze Summer. Thousands of years have passed. And a wall that was built to hold back the sea, must now hold back the advancing armies of a reviving Troy…

What would have been the bed of the North Sea is now Northland, a society of prosperous, literate and self-sufficient people. They live off the bounty of the land, an area created by the building of the Wall. It began as a simple dam, thousands of years ago. Now, inhabited from end to end, the Wall is a linear city stretching for hundreds of miles, and a wonder of the world.

For millennia, the Wall has also kept the growing empires of the Bronze Age at bay. But decades of drought have destabilized those eastern civilizations. Men—and women—filled with greed and ambition have now turned their eyes toward the fertile West. A new and turbulent age is dawning. For any wall, no matter how strong, can be breached—particularly from within…

*Daily Mail (UK)

Bowl of Heaven by Larry Niven (Tor Hardcover 10/16/20129) – Two of the major Hard SF writers of the past couple of decades come together for the first time in a good old first contact novel. .

In this first collaboration by science fiction masters Larry Niven (Ringworld) and Gregory Benford (Timescape), the limits of wonder are redrawn once again as a human expedition to another star system is jeopardized by an encounter with an astonishingly immense artifact in interstellar space: a bowl-shaped structure half-englobing a star, with a habitable area equivalent to many millions of Earths…and it’s on a direct path heading for the same system as the human ship.



A landing party is sent to investigate the Bowl, but when the explorers are separated—one group captured by the gigantic structure’s alien inhabitants, the other pursued across its strange and dangerous landscape—the mystery of the Bowl’s origins and purpose propel the human voyagers toward discoveries that will transform their understanding of their place in the universe.


Hitman:Damnation by Raymond Benson (Del Rey, Paperback 10/30/2012) – The popular video game series gets a prequel novelization/video game tie-in by a writer familiar with penning such adaptations/novelizations/tie-ins. .


THE OFFICIAL, ALL-ORIGINAL, ALL-OUT THRILLING PREQUEL TO THE MUCH-ANTICIPATED NEW GAME HITMAN: ABSOLUTION

Since the devastating conclusion of Hitman: Blood Money, Agent 47 has been MIA. Now fans awaiting the return of the blockbuster videogame and film phenomenon can pinpoint the location of the world’s most brutal and effective killer-for-hire before he reemerges in Hitman: Absolution. When the Agency lures him back with a mission that will require every last ounce of his stealth, strength, and undercover tactics, they grossly underestimate the silent assassin’s own agenda. Because this time, Agent 47 isn’t just going to bite the hand that feeds him. He’s going tear it off and annihilate anyone who stands in his way.

Collision Course by David Crawford (New American Library, Trade Paperback 11/06/2012) – Sequel to Lights Out

Only the strong will survive. But what does it mean to be strong?

The “Smash” has been building for years—runaway national debt, escalating oil prices—but when order finally breaks down, it happens astonishingly fast. Economic collapse. Government in chaos. Gas shortages. Loss of power. No running water. Martial law. Rioting, looting, and lawlessness…

Security specialist DJ Frost saw the writing on the wall, and he has prepared. He’s planned his bug-out route to escape a city many are now trapped in. With his ATV, night-vision goggles, gear, guns, and enough gas to get him to his retreat home in the country, he ventures out alone under cover of darkness.

For Gabe Horne, the “Smash” is nothing compared to his own moral and spiritual collapse after losing his wife and son. But in this time of crisis, he may not have the luxury of drinking himself to death. There are others at his door, and they will need to help one another to survive.

Each man, in his own way, will face the ultimate challenge of preparedness in this new world order—as both hurtle toward a devastating showdown.…


The Dragon Men (A Novel of The Clockwork Empire #3) by Steven Harper (Roc Mass Market Paperback 10/30/2012)– Harper is a fairly prolific novelist, this is the third in his steampunk (or rather clockwork) series, which looks interesting. I hadn’t even realized a second book was published nor have I seen the first.

As China prepares to become the ultimate power in an era of extraordinary invention and horror, Alice Michaels’ fate lies inside the walls of the forbidden kingdom….

Gavin Ennock has everything a man could desire—except time. As the clockwork plague consumes his body and mind, it drives him increasingly mad and fractures his relationship with his fiancée, Alice, Lady Michaels. Their only hope is that the Dragon Men of China can cure him.

But a power-mad general has seized the Chinese throne in a determined offensive to conquer Asia, Britain—indeed, the entire world. He has closed the country’s borders to all foreigners. The former ruling dynasty, however, is scheming to return the rightful heir to power. Their designs will draw Gavin and Alice down a treacherous path strewn with intrigue and power struggles. One wrong step will seal Gavin’s fate…and determine the future of the world.

Blood Crime (A Hollows original graphic novel) by Kim Harrison, illustrated by Gemma Magno (Del Rey Trade Paperback 09/26/2012) – Harrison is one of the most popular authors of Urban Fantasy and this is an original story set in the milieu she’s made popular.

You can’t tell the story of how it all began for supernatural cops Ivy Tamwood and Rachel Morgan without telling how it all nearly ended. The fiery living vampire and erstwhile earth witch never asked to be paired up in the first place. And having to work Inderland Security’s crummiest beat—busting two-bit paranormal street punks—sure didn’t sweeten the deal. But when it counts, Ivy and Rachel always have each other’s backs. They’d better—because someone just hung targets on both of them.

It doesn’t take a hotshot homicide detective to know that nearly getting flattened by a falling gargoyle or impaled by a lead pipe aren’t on-the-job accidents. But it doesn’t seem possible that the class of crooks Ivy and Rachel routinely collar could kill anything but brain cells. So who put Cincinnati’s tough and tender twosome on their “to do in” list? Is Ivy’s vampire master, the powerful and seductive Piscary, jealous of her growing bloodlust (and just plain lust) for Rachel? Or have forces unknown—living or undead—made the partners prey in a deadly witch (and vampire) hunt?

Before this case is cracked, Ivy and Rachel will face down vicious dogs, speeding locomotives, rogue bloodsuckers, and their own dark desires; spells will be cast and blood will be spilled; and Kim Harrison’s hair-raising, heart-racing, dark urban world of magic and monsters will leap howling from the pages of her second electrifying, full-color graphic novel..



The Wild Ways by Tanya Huff (DAW Mass Market Paperback 11/06/2013) – Huff is incredibly prolific, bouncing between fantasy, urban fantasy and military science fiction: This book (the mass market paperback version of the book I received last year) is the sequel to The Enchantment Emporium.

"The Gales are an amazing family, the aunts will strike fear into your heart, and the characters Allie meets are both charming and terrifying." -#1 New York Times bestselling author Charlaine Harris

Alysha Gale's cousin Charlotte is a Wild Power, who allies herself with a family of Selkies in a fight against offshore oil drilling. The oil company has hired another of the Gale family's Wild Powers, the fearsome Auntie Catherine, to steal the Selkies' sealskins. To defeat her, Charlotte will have to learn what born to be Wild really means in the Gale family...


The Clone Redemption (Clone Army #8) novel by Stephen L. Kent (Ace Paperback 10/30/2012) – Kent keeps churning out this series, publishing at least one per year. I only read one installment, the fifth (The Clone Elite, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. If Ace were to reissue a couple of omnibus volumes of three novels each, I’d buy the first two omnibus volumes right now. Hear that ACE? Omnibus editions!

Earth, A.D. 2519. Less than a year has passed since the clone military of the Enlisted Man’s Empire toppled the government of the Unified Authority. Now the clones rule Earth, but a new enemy has emerged—and set off civil war…

Formerly trained to fight for the U.A., clone Marine Wayson Harris had led the Enlisted Man’s Empire invasion of Earth and wrested control away from the old regime. He’s now ready to do what it takes to ensure the new balance of power isn’t jeopardized.

When a trio of religious fanatics from Mars attempts to attack Harris, he fears there is more unrest among the colony’s residents. Hoping to stave off an uprising, he leads a troop of Marines to Mars. But once there, they learn the situation is much graver than they first feared.

The red planet’s refugees have decided the clones are their number one enemy, and measures to eradicate them are underway. And when Harris is kidnapped and drugged, he discovers something disturbing about himself.

He can be reprogrammed…


Flame of Sevenwaters (A Sevenwaters novel) by Juliet Marilier (Roc Hardcover 11/06/2012)– I read her debut novel, and the first of the Sevenwaters saga waaaay back in October 2004 when it was the SFFWorld Fantasy Book Club of the Month and liked it very much. Unfortunately, this series was one of quite a few I really liked at the start, but never finished out.

that is a “gripping tale of enduring love” (Publishers Weekly). Now, Marillier returns to Sevenwaters with the story of a young woman destined to unlock the secrets of the Otherworld…

Maeve, daughter of Lord Sean of Sevenwaters, was badly burned as a child and carries the legacy of that fire in her crippled hands. After ten years, she’s returning home, having grown into a courageous, forthright woman with a special gift for gentling difficult animals. But while her body’s scars have healed, her spirit remains fragile, fearing the shadows of her past.

Sevenwaters is in turmoil. The fey prince Mac Dara has become desperate to see his only son, married to Maeve’s sister, return to the Otherworld. To force Lord Sean’s hand, Mac Dara has caused a party of innocent travelers on the Sevenwaters border to vanish—only to allow their murdered bodies to be found, one by one.

When Maeve finds the body of one of the missing men in a remote part of the woods, she and her brother Finbar embark on a journey that may bring about the end of Mac Dara’s reign, or lead to a hideous death. If she is successful, Maeve may open the door to a future she has not dared to believe possible…

The Cassandra Project by Jack McDevitt and Mike Resnick (Ace, Hardcover 12/06/2012) – Secret history near future SF by two of the most awarded SF writers

Two science fiction masters—Jack McDevitt and Mike Resnick—team up to deliver a classic thriller in which one man uncovers the secret history of the US space program…

Early in his career, Jerry Culpepper could never have been accused of being idealistic. Doing public relations—even for politicians—was strictly business...until he was hired as NASA’s public affairs director and discovered a client he could believe in. Proud of the agency’s history and sure of its destiny, he was thrilled to be a part of its future—a bright era of far-reaching space exploration.

But public disinterest and budget cuts changed that future. Now, a half century after the first moon landing, Jerry feels like the only one with stars—and unexplored planets and solar systems—in his eyes.

Still, Jerry does his job, trying to drum up interest in the legacy of the agency. Then a fifty-year-old secret about the Apollo XI mission is revealed, and he finds himself embroiled in the biggest controversy of the twenty-first century, one that will test his ability—and his willingness—to spin the truth about a conspiracy of reality-altering proportions...

Polterheist (Esther Diamond #5) by Laura Resnick (DAW, Mass Market Paperback 11/06/2012) –This series seems to have gained some solid momentum for Resnick, this being the fifth volume.

HOLIDAY SHOPPING CAN BE HELL ON EARTH

In the fifth novel of this witty fantasy series, Esther Diamond returns, working as an elf in Fenster & Co., a Manhattan department store during the Christmas season. Meanwhile, the store’s trucks are getting hijacked. The cops suspect the Gambello crime family, but Esther’s friend Dr. Z adok believes there’s more going on at Fenster’s than frustrated shoppers — like someone trying to stage the rebirth of an ancient demon.

Kris Longknife: Furious (Kris Longknife #9) by Mike Shepherd (Ace Mass Market Paperback 10/30/2012) – Shepherd churns these books out on a very regular, annual schedule. In addition, he’s also released a couple of e-only novellas in the universe. :

Having used unorthodox methods to save a world—and every sentient being on it—Lieutenant Commander Kris Longknife is wanted across the galaxy for crimes against humanity. For her own safety, she’s been assigned to a backwater planet where her Fast Patrol Squadron 127 enforces immigration control and smuggler interdiction.



But Kris is a Longknife, and nothing can stop her from getting back to the center of things—not when all hell is breaking loose. Now she’s on the run, hunted by both military and civilian authorities—and since the civilian authorities happen to be her immediate family, Kris soon finds herself homeless, broke, and on trial for her life on an alien world…



Halo: The Thursday Warby Karen Traviss (Tor, Hardcover 10/02/2012) – Second installment in the trilogy Traviss is penning in the Halo universe has been focusing her writing on some of the most popular genre franchises over the past handful of years - Star Wars, Gears of War and now Halo. I’ve only read, but greatly enjoyed, her first three Wess’Har novels, but I think this could be an interesting book.

Welcome to humanity’s new war: silent, high stakes, and unseen. This is a life-or-death mission for ONI’s black-ops team, Kilo-Five, which is tasked with preventing the ruthless Elites, once the military leaders of the Covenant, from regrouping and threatening humankind again. What began as a routine dirty-tricks operation―keeping the Elites busy with their own insurrection―turns into a desperate bid to extract one member of Kilo-Five from the seething heart of an alien civil war. But troubles never come singly for Kilo-Five. Colonial terrorism is once again surfacing on one of the worlds that survived the war against the Covenant, and the man behind it is much more than just a name to Spartan-010. Meanwhile, the treasure trove of Forerunner technology recovered from the shield world of Onyx is being put to work while a kidnapped Elite plots vengeance on the humans he fears will bring his people to the brink of destruction.

Shadowheart (Volume Four of Shadowmarch) by Tad Williams (DAW Trade Paperback 11/06/2012) – This was as very good conclusion to the four book trilogy, as I said in my review: This entire saga started out with great promise, albeit a bit slowly as is often the case with Tad Williams’s epics. What that does is provide for a solid foundation for which Tad can throw his story and play with the gods he creates, give the true Epic sense to his character’s journeys they richly deserve, and allow a true sense of world changing events to be felt within his narrative. Each character gets an emotional spotlight, through either the scenes in which they appear, or through the reflections of other characters.

The long-awaited concluding novel in Tad Williams's thrilling epic Shadowmarch series.
.

Southmarch Castle is about to be caught between two implacable enemies, the ancient, immortal Qar and the insane god-king, the Autarch of Xis. Meanwhile, its two young defenders, Princess Briony and Prince Barrick, are both trapped far away from home and fighting for their lives.

And now, something is awakening underneath Southmarch Castle, something powerful and terrible that the world has not seen for thousands of years. Can Barrick and Briony, along with a tiny handful of allies, ordinary and extraordinary, find a way to save their world and prevent the rise of a terrible new age-an age of unending darkness?

The Shattered Dark (A Shadow Reader novel Book 2) by Sandy Williams (Ace Mass Market Paperback 10/30/2012)– Second in Williams’s Urban Fantasy series, I don’t recall seeing the first

McKenzie Lewis has a gift. It allows her access to a world few have seen, and even fewer can comprehend. It’s her secret. And it exists in the shadows…

McKenzie was a normal college student, save for one little twist: she’s a shadow reader, someone who can both see the fae and track their movements between our world and the Realm. It’s a gift for which she has been called insane, one for which she has risked family and friends—and one that has now plunged her into a brutal civil war among the fae.

With the reign of the king and his vicious general at an end, McKenzie hoped to live a more normal life while exploring her new relationship with Aren, the rebel fae who has captured her heart. But when her best friend, Paige, disappears McKenzie knows her wish is, for now, just a dream. McKenzie is the only one who can rescue her friend, but if she’s not careful, her decisions could cost the lives of everyone she’s tried so hard to save.

Newly Discovered Authors - First Half of 2012

This little post concerns itself with the authors I’ve discovered this year, read for the first time, and plan on reading more of in the future. I suppose there’s no quicker way to say it fully so there you go. Anyway, some of these writers are new to all of us, meaning their debut novels published this year, other authors have been published with books on the shelves (physical or virtual) for more than a year. I’ll do this thing alphabetically:

Rachel Aaron – I enjoyed the heck out of her The Legend of Eli Monpress omnibus, have the fourth in the series - The Spirt War - waiting to be read, and the fifth/final - Spirt’s End - set to publish later in 2012.

Saladin Ahmed – This entry is another debut author, at least in terms of novels, but I was so impressed with Throne of the Crescent Moon I’m quite eager to see where Saladin next takes Doctor Adoulla Makhslood and his companions.

Robert Jackson Bennett – I’m only part-way through The Troupe, his third novel and the first I’ve read, but it is connecting with my reading sensibilities VERY strongly. I get a bit of a King/Bradbury feel so far and I’ve seen nothing but good things about his other two novels The Company Man and Mr. Shivers.

Myke Cole – Shadow OPS: Control Point is his first novel and also the first in the Shadow OPS series and an extremely accomplished novel. Might be my favorite of the year at this point or very close to it. Two more books in this series are set to publish for Mr. Cole and I’ll be lining up to get them.

Larry Correia – I ordered the Monster Hunters omnibus from Baen for all of $6.00 and the first novel in it, Monster Hunter International is lots of fun. He’s trucking along with this series, releasing the fourth, Monster Hunter Legion in September plus he’s got to volumes of The Grimnoir Chronicles which is a Noir-ish alternate history urban fantasy.

Jeff Salyards – Another debut author whose Scourge of the Betrayer was a tight and impressive military fantasy novel. Not sure when the second is publishing, but looking forward to it.