Kent & Knight Reviewed at SFFWorld

Another pair of reviews from the usual suspects, (Mark and I), Mark reviews a US author’s book reaching UK shores after success here in the US and I review a UK author’s debut.

On tap for Mark is the first book in a Military Science Fiction series whose fifth book I reviewed a couple of years ago, Steven L. Kent’s The Clone Republic:

It is the year 2508AD. The Unified Authority rules over the galaxy, using clones for much of its policing across the colonies. The story is told from the perspective of one of these clones, Private First-Class Wayson Harris, initially newly assigned to the small and obscure desert outpost of Gobi on a planet called Ravenwood. As a clone, he’s trained to obey without question, and clearly finds the rather laidback setup at Gobi disconcerting.

Part of this attraction may be that initially, for all intents and purposes, the book doesn’t stray too far from the tried and trusted model for military stories. The Marines of 2508 pretty much act and talk like soldiers in 2013. What happens here on a desert-type world in 2508 is very similar to, say, Iraq, Iran or Afghanistan in 2013, a point further emphasized when some of the hardware used has familiar names such as Harrier and Tomahawk which could place the book as easily in the 1980’s as the 2500’s. This reminds the reader that a Marine is a Marine, regardless of time, and nothing really changes that, whether now or in the future. Here they complain, gamble, sleep around and fight one another like any other typical armed force, past, present and (presumably) future.

I take a look at Fade to Black, Francis Knight’s debut novel and the launch of her Rojan Dizon Urban/Dark Fantasy series:

Fade to Black has been categorized as an urban fantasy, but by no means is this the tramp-stamp, sexy magic version of the sub-genre. Rather, this is Urban Fantasy where the city is as much of a character as the people themselves, a novel with more similarities to China Mieville’s King Rat. The protagonist, Rojan Dizon, in addition to being a people finder/bounty hunter, is a pain mage. By inflicting pain unto himself, Dizon is able to locate his quarry more easily; find the proverbial needle in the haystack..

Mahala…a dark sprawling city with layers upon layers of grit and darkness, not exactly the streets of Chicago, Atlanta, or New York. Ruled by the Ministry, perhaps in an allusion to Orwell’s 1984, there’s a great sense of claustrophobia throughout the entire novel. There seems to be nowhere to hide and the characters who inhabit this world, particularly Rojan, have no privacy. There’s a mixed feel of potentially dark future with a hint of pre-industrial city – guns are relatively new, the city is powered by magic, yet the class structure to me felt more modern, something out of a film like American Psycho or even Wall Street. The city itself reminded me a bit of the towering metropolis of Alastair Reynolds’ Terminal World and the dark city of John Meany’s Bone Song, or on the film front the rainy, unnamed city of the film Seven. I also felt a strong resonance with Richard Morgan’s fiction, both his SF and fantasy novels.

Dirty Streets in the Future Underground - 3 New SFFWorld Reviews

Three, count ‘em three reviews to mention this week! Joining Mark and I once again is the great N.E. White (aka tmso in the SFFWorld Forums. We’ve got two urban fantasies and one alternate future history…


People who have been reading my blog for a while or have come to know me through the SFFWorld Forums are likely aware that Tad Williams is one of my favorite writers of the fantastic. So it was cautious optimism that tempered my initial reaction to the news Mr. Williams was trying something new, paring down from large-scale epic to the more slim Urban Fantasy of The Bobby Dollar Novels. The Dirty Streets of Heaven is a great success:

Dolorious, a.k.a. Bobby Dollar, is our first person narrator and one of many ‘Advocate’ angels who argue against the denizens of Hell for recently deceased souls. As an advocate, Bobby often appears just as people die and similar to the role a lawyer plays, he must argue for the soul’s place in Heaven. What becomes evident is how not all souls who may have seemed virtuous get immediate entrance to the pearly gates. Hell’s advocates are vicious and much like prosecutors whereas the angelic Advocates seem to be more of the defense. Shortly into the meat of the novel, a soul whose owner committed suicide vanishes as Bobby and his antagonists from Hell arrive to argue for the man’s soul. This has never happened before and sets in motion what becomes a layered and entertaining plot.

I’ve long been a fan of the of biblical themes receiving the “gritty” treatment, making Heaven and Hell much deeper than their biblical indications would lead one to believe. After all, my senior thesis in college was on such a topic. In that essay, I recall mentioning the comic book Spawn which depicted the conflict between heaven and hell in a similar light as does Tad Williams with an emerging third faction. In The Dirty Streets of Heaven, this conflict between Heaven and Hell is more of an underneath the surface thing and informs the characters and setting more so than actually being a primary plot point. In one interview with Tad Williams, the great writer Michael Moorcock came up as an influence, specifically the similarities between Moorcock’s depiction of the eternal conflict between Chaos and Order. I’d also point to Steven Brust’s To Reign in Hell which also grittifies the conflict between Heaven and Hell and even the great Tim Burton film Beetlejuice in how the afterlife is a bureaucratic extension of the real world dictated by unseen higher ups down to street walking ‘grunts’ and pencil-pushing desk jockeys.

Mark has long been a fan of David Wingrove’s Chung Kuo series and is following along with the major re-release of the series. The latest installment is The Middle Kingdom which is now book three but was originally book one:

After the setting of the scene in Son of Heaven, and the seriously violent events at the conclusion of Daylight on Iron Mountain, here’s where the story begins to move up a gear and many of the epic story’s main characters are introduced.

Beginning in 2190, the book briefly recaps on the events outlined in Daylight on Iron Mountain: the fall of the US, the nuking of Japan and the subjugation and ethnic cleansing of Africa. These events alone would make an epic story, though they are dealt with here in the matter of a few pages.

With such a list of characters it should be obvious that this is a complex and lengthy scenario where the reader is expected to be in for the long game and therefore and not everything is resolved here in The Middle Kingdom. What keeps the reader’s interest is the juxtaposition between all these disparate and often conflicting elements. The cultural values of the Han are very different to what we see in our Westernised society today, and the way that the old traditional values are combined with the new way of progress is jaw-dropping in their implementation. (Think of the film Blade Runner for such a similarly intriguing mix of Western and Eastern values.) The Han regime is harsh, from their point of view necessarily so, but the promise for the bright and glorious future makes it potentially worthwhile. Not all in positions of power see it this way, of course, and there are secret plans and counterplots a-plenty in order to both overthrow and maintain the current positions of power.

Nila reviews Whispers Underground, the third Peter Grant series by Ben Aaronovitch, an urban fantasy series that has been gaining some good buzz over the past couple of years.

 

The story begins with a ghost, of course. An offbeat, neighborhood kid named Abigail has found a ghost living in an old tunnel beneath her school. She decides to tell Peter, whom she knows deals with “weird magic stuff”. Together with his partner, Leslie May, whose face fell off in the first book, the three head on down to investigate. Mr. Aaronovitch sets the book’s mood with this opening scene, and while not the focus of the book, we learn a bit about the magic Peter can wield and the new, tenuous relationship he has forged with his new magic-constable partner, Leslie.

As is customary of this series, the reader is in for an educational treat on the history of one of London’s neighborhoods, and police procedurals. In this case, we get a peek into the BTP (British Transport Police) and the underground system that is vast and just might include secret tunnels and a race we’ve never seen before. Maybe.

Libriomancer and BookStore-BookBlogger Interview

Only one review this week (mine), but Mark posted an interview which I’ll mention after I call out my review.

I’ve been following Jim C. Hines since about the time I joined twitter last year and reading his blog fairly regularly. Though I have a few of his novels, I haven’t read any yet. Well, after reading Libriomancer that will definitely change. Here’s a bit of my review:

Told in the first person (like the majority of Urban Fantasies), Jim wastes little time in getting the ball rolling. While Isaac is cataloguing books at the Copper River Library, a group of Sanguinarius Meyerii, “informally known as sparklers” (vampires conjured through Stephenie Meyers’s Twilight novels) comes blasting through, attacking Isaac. The library is damaged and in the fight, Isaac is assisted by his pet fire-spider Smudge and last minute aid from Lena Greenwood, a nymph. (Readers of Jim’s fiction might also recognize Smudge from a certain set of novels about a goblin.) Isaac soon realizes the Porters are being targeted; especially when he discovers his mentor Ray is killed. Lena’s lover, Dr. Nidhi Shah, the psychiatrist who helps libriomancers keep their sanity after they expend energy to draw out objects from books, is also missing and a hostage of the vampires. She’s an easy target since she likely knows many of the Porter’s secrets.

…Libriomancer is an engaging, quickly paced novel that doesn’t shy away from examining the deeper elements that make up the whole of the novel (Gutenberg’s true intentions and nature, the problems of a large secretive organization overseeing something extremely powerful, the moral ambiguity of whether one should take advantage of a creature created specifically to serve). What a lot of this proves is that Jim C. Hines is a very smart, careful writer and one whose fiction I’ve overlooked far too long.

Mark interviewed Andrea Johnson and Elizabeth Campbell, the fine ladies behind BookstoreBookblogger Connection, of which SFFWorld is a participating site:

You both have a blogger’s background. Was this an important factor in your creation of BookstoreBookblogger Connection? Is it just for bloggers?


E: The blogging background is important I think because of the connections you end up making as a blogger, specifically an SF/F book blogger. These bloggers put so much work and love into doing these reviews, it’s important that they get more recognition for the hours of labor that goes into the reviews.


A: One of our goals for Bookstore Bookblogger Connection is to further promote bloggers and the book review blogging community. How cool would it be to walk into your favorite bookstore and see them promoting a book you like with a quote from a review blog you frequent, or even your own?

Blurbs submitted do need to be part of an existing review on your blog, or a group site that hosts reviews by many reviewers, such as SFFWorld.

The Kings Blood and Tricked Reviewed at SFFWorld

Mark returns to the weekly Tuesday reviews-at-SFFWorld post, joining me in his usual spot.

You folks know the drill by now, I give a bit about each book, insert the cover image and link to the review.

Mark reviewed one of the most anticipated fantasy releases of the yea, The King’s Blood, the second novel in Daniel Abraham’s The Dagger and The Coin sequence:

 

After the set up of Book One, things here start to move into new positions. The Apostate is revealed (if it wasn’t already known) as a major character from Book One. Captain Marcus Wester is now at work in his new job, working with his friend Yardem Hane for Magistra Cithrin bel Sarcour and the Medean Bank in Porte Oliva. Cithrin herself is struggling with the restrictions she agreed to in order to keep her position in the Bank in Book One, now working under Pyk Usterhall, a stern notary from the Bank to ensure her transactions are in the traditions of the Medean.

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Like an expert chess match, key pieces start to move into place this time around. Some of the actions the characters take are interesting and not what might be expected. The characters themselves become much more developed this time around. We learn more of Wester’s and Cithrin’s past, and we start to get more details of the dragons of the past. Geder in particular is, by turns, thoughtful, scholarly and violent as he reluctantly adjusts to his new position. Throughout the book there’s some life-changing decisions made, life-altering consequences and some major betrayals.

Kevin Hearne burst onto the scene last year with the first three installments of The Iron Druid Chronicles in successive months. The latest installment, Tricked, published in April and my review for it went up at SFFWorld today:

Once Atticus gets on with his new life, it isn’t long before the Native American trickster deity Coyote comes calling on the favor Atticus owes him for ‘killing’ him. It isn’t anything big for our favorite Druid, he just convince the Colorado earth elemental to make a gold mine for Coyote’s people. Of course more complications ensue over the course of the novel as a pair of skinwalkers, some of the nastier monsters of Coyote’s people. Atticus came to the attention of these skinwalkers thanks to Hel, the Norse god of the underworld and Loki’s offspring. Clearly, Atticus and company have their hands quite full.
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While I breezed through the first three installments of The Iron Druid Chronicles, I felt the pacing was not as well balanced here in Tricked. There’s almost…just almost a sense that Hearne was trying to cover too many plot points in the novel. On the other hand, for a 350 page novel, the fact that he packed so much into so few pages was pretty impressive.

Tricked might even serve as a decent entry point for new readers since Atticus and his crew are indeed starting over after their ‘deaths.’ I get a sense that Hearne has big things in plan for Atticus and Tricked might just be an intake of breath compared to what is facing our Druid power trio down the road.

Sanderson, Wingrove and Carroll at SFFWorld

November begins and it is a Tuesday, but as has been the case in recent weeks and months here at the o’ Stuff, we have some new reviews up at SFFWorld.

Brandon Sanderson has quickly risen to the top of the crop of Epic Fantasy writers thanks to his superb Mistborn saga and being the proverbial Dragon to finish The Wheel of Time. Thanks to that, The Alloy of Law is one of the more hotly anticipated fantasy releases in 2011. The book set in his popular Mistborn milieu, the novel is neither a sequel nor the start of a series, but a standalone set hundreds of years after the main trilogy:

Set at what might be described as the dawn of the Industrial age in Scadrial, the world in which Mistborn takes place, the scion of a once proud family – protagonist Waxillium (Wax) Ladrian – returns to assume the status of familial head in the glorious city of Elendel after the tragic death of his uncle and sister. Wax is returning from a stint as a lawman in the Roughs and returns as something of an enigma. His deeds are well documented, though the society in which he finds himself considers him lowly. In order to cement his and his family’s standing, Wax begins the political maneuvering, at the behest of the family’s butler, to meet Steris, a woman of high standing as a potential wife. When they attend a wedding together, Steris is kidnapped. Her kidnapping is part of an overall succession of kidnappings involving highborn women with a common thread.


So, a fairly straightforward plot – rescue the kidnapped girl – but layered with a lot of fun details and accoutrements to enhance the overall ‘taste’ of the stories. For starters, Wax doesn’t exactly return to Elendel alone, in tow is his old partner/sidekick Wayne. Wayne provides much of the comic relief and balances Wax’s often stoic bearing and character. Marasi, Steris’s cousin, proves a more deep character as balance to Steris’s cold bearing. Steris joins Wayne and Wax in the pursuit of Steris from her captors. The characters are well done, and as is always the case, the magic system of Allomancy and Feruchemy are more than a simple window dressing. Their use is essential to the story and Sanderson weaves in the details of how these abilities work fairly well into the narrative of the novel, though on a couple of occasions it does seem to be a lecture. Sanderson; however, does lampshade this with the character of Wayne.

David Wingrove’s Chung Kuo is an intricately layered future history that is being republished in a slightly rewritten form in an ambitions publication project in the UK over the next couple of years. This is the long way of saying that Mark reviewed the second book in the series Daylight on Iron Mountain:

Whilst the story focuses on the perspectives of a number of key characters, it is the often brief yet cumulative comments that create a wider picture. Japan has already been destroyed through nuclear weapons, and the Middle East does so here in a matter of sentences, refusing to disavow their religion. Other hints are made along the way: people of a coloured heritage are ruthlessly killed, people with disabilities also. The United States, broken into a group of splintered kingdoms, spend their time fighting amongst themselves until it is too late and they are unable to save themselves from the Chinese invasion, led by General Jiang Lei.
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It is here that we start to see the means by which the Chinese exert and maintain their power on a range of scales, from local politics to global domination, something which will develop more in future books. The actions taken to ensure power are dramatic and quite merciless. The author thinks nothing of killing and torturing characters to serve these means, which reflects the point that although there is a highly sophisticated social structure in this New World Order, the means of maintaining the structure are as brutal as ever.

Mark catches up with an Urban Fantasy which was recently published in the UK, and initially published last year (2010), Black Swan Rising by Lee Carroll, the husband-and-wife team Lee Slonimsky and Carol Goodman:

A debut Urban Fantasy, written by husband-and-wife team Lee Slonimsky and Carol Goodman, this one is generally well written and engaging.

One of the basic ideas of UF is that the protagonist realises that there is a world beyond the normal/mundane. Whether it is China Mieville (where the two overlap) or Stephenie Mayer (mystical creatures intermingled with humans who are unaware) this ‘big secret’ is what makes a lot of UF fun.
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The use of some of New York’s iconic places as a background did this little harm either. There’s some lovely travelogue detail around the city, which evoked a great sense of atmosphere and setting. All of this of course makes the fantastical seem more acceptable. The trick here is to make the impossible seem credible and on the whole the authors do this – until almost at the end, when we go that one step too far, for me anyway. However, up to that point, the general impression is one that is generally entertaining.

Hexed in City with Hearne and Simak

Two reviews this week at SFFWorld, one from me and one from Hobbit/Mark Yon.

My review is of the second book in Kevin Hearne’s Iron Druid Chronicles - Hexed

In Hexed, Hearne further fleshes out the supporting cast introduced in Hounded, including Atticus’s new Druid-in-training Granuaile MacTiernan; his elderly neighbor Mrs. MacDonagh; the vampire and werewolf attorneys, and of course Oberon the Irish Wolfhound. Hearne does a great balancing act between moving the plot along briskly while also fleshing out those characters, introducing further complications into Atticus’s life, and keeping a cohesive and logical link of consequences to the actions previous volume. As I indicated in my review of Hounded, I adored the relationship between Oberon and Atticus and more backstory is provided between man and canine, as well as the continuing doses of humor and emotion.

The Iron Druid Chronicles is turning into a truly entertaining series with the first two volumes, one of my reading highlights of 2011. Hammered, the third volume, is (thus far) the final installment slated to be published, but I’m really hoping to see more of Atticus in Oberon in the future.

Mark is continuing his trek through the classics of SF with Clifford Simak’s saga City:

Clifford/Cliff Simak is an author I first came to when I was a teenager in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. At first I wasn’t sure – it wasn’t spaceships and action, but instead a much more subtle and gentle SF. (Mark Charan Newton has since referred to it as ‘rural SF’, which sorta works.) Instead of Star Wars bang-whizz action, we have pastoral introspection, Waltons-style homily and self-depreciating humour.
And in City in particular we have robots, ants and dogs.

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Simply, it is a set of eight interconnected stories (or in some cases, nine, with an extra tale, Epilog, written in 1973 and added in the 1980’s. Here it is not included, sadly).

Hearne, Newman and Marmell reviewed at SFFWorld

We’ve got three new reviews up at SFFWorld, two from me and one from Mark. I’ll start with mine, this time which is both a debut novel and the launch of a new series by Kevin Hearne. The series is titles The Iron Druid Chronicles . The first book is titled Hounded and here’s what I thought of it:

Atticus is a 2,000-plus year old Druid who lives with his Irish Wolfhond Oberon in Tempe, Arizona; runs a shop that specializes in herbal remedies and arcane books; communes with Celtic and native American tribal gods, witches and all sort of supernatural characters. When his arch enemy cranks up the hunt for Atticus, the Druid decides to stop running and confront the Celtic God Aenghus Óg. Aenghus has a somewhat fair reason to have hounded Atticus (whose true name is Siodhachan O’Suileabhain), appropriated Aenghus’s magical sword Fragrach during a battle. So, Aenghus sends his minions after Atticus and the minions get more powerful as the novel progresses until there’s an all-out spectacular battle of magic, gods, and Tuatha Dé Danann to cap off this fine novel.

Mark reviewed a classic reissue by Kim Newman Anno Dracula :

Although Anno Dracula is Kim writing fiction, it has many of the trademarks of Kim’s other work. It is well researched, immersive, fast paced, and knowledgeable, and it drops sly and subtle genre references into the plot in almost every paragraph, and is very, very clever.

The plot is thus: In 1888 the widowed Queen Victoria remarries, to Vlad Tepes, Prince of Wallachia. Tepes is better known to some as the renamed Count Dracula and as Prince Consort is one of the prime movers in a new repressive police state determined to maintain order between the vampires and the humans (‘Warm Bloods’).

When Whitechapel in London becomes the place of a series of horrific murders, each side is suspected by the other. Vampire Geneviève Dieudonné (from Kim’s own Warhammer series) and Charles Beauregard (of the Diogenes Club (itself a reference to a fictional club created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) are involved as they are given the job of the mystery of the Ripper murders.

Lastly, Mark caught up with a book I reviewed last year Conqueror’s Shadow by Ari Marmell

What Ari tries to do here is something interesting, to tell the tale of a Conqueror – Corvis Rebaine, Terror of the East – but by what happens twenty years later, when the Conqueror has conquered and gone away to hide in seclusion with his wife and family.

Of course, his opponents are not going to let him get away with being hidden and his home and family are discovered, with the consequence that he has to don the old armour of ‘the Terror’ and then go off to collect his former allies, the demon Khanda (held captive in a magic token), the ogre Davro and the wood-witch Seilloah, in order to take on his nemesis, Audriss.

So, we have witches, ogres and magic. Not to mention nasty goblins. Nothing particularly new there, either. The plot is really a rewritten The Magnificent Seven re-imagined as Fantasy. The main plot idea - that of the ‘old warrior returning’ is not really new, and goes back to Gemmell’s Druss for example.

Soulles, Tender Morsels

We’ve got two reviews this week at SFFWorld, one from me and another from Bridie.

My review is Soulless, the debut from Gail Carriger, which actually publishes in about a week but might be in stores right now.

Carriger does an impressive job of drawing the reader into the story immediately, as Alexia is confronted by a savage vampire at a party. She is shocked at its behavior, since most vampires know of her soulless status and would not be so forward in trying to drain an individual of their blood. With no other recourse, Alexia holds out her parasol and stabs the vampire in the heart, killing him. Carriger soon reveals the hierarchy of supernatural creatures in England. Vampires, unsurprisingly, hold very estimable positions in society, after all, they are long-lived and hold much knowledge. Werewolves hold to a pack mentality and are looked down upon in some circles as below man.
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I was enjoying the way Carriger revealed her supernatural world and I liked the characters of Lord Maccoon, Alexia, and Lord Akeldama. Unfortunately, the immediacy of the opening of the novel and the charm of the characters began to wear off as the novel progressed, especially the prattling between Alexia and her friend Miss Ivy Hisselpenny, a constant wearer of ugly hats.

Bridie reviewed Margo Lanagan’s Tender Morsels a somewhat controversial novel released last year and re-released with a new cover this year.

Based on The Brother’s Grimm tale “Red Rose and Snow White” but with gruesome extras, this tale is not fairy, it’s quite harrowing in fact. Being aimed at Young Adults, it’s no surprise that it has stirred some controversy, with many believing that younger readers should not be reading books that contain incest and gang rape. Lanagan does gloss over the details however, making the scenes completely non- explicit, leaving me wondering why she would choose to put them in at all, like she was trying to make a book for both adults and children but got stuck somewhere in-between, somewhere where it was both too childish and too adult at the same time. It really sits on the fence and makes it obviously suitable for teens but that means it is close to the children’s section and easily mistaken as book for children.
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The book is quite beautiful in places, with a lot of scenes that were especially well written and touching but there is a certain lack of pace that out-weighed the beautiful nature of the writing. Now, I am used to reading more action packed books so you may call me biased and stuck in my ways but I did come away with a feeling of; what has really happened? Sure, there were horrible sex acts but other than that… nothing! I didn’t feel any urgency while reading even the most unusual scenes. In the end, what I found most impressive is that, despite all the obstacles, ultimately other emotions did shine through, such as despair, hope and love, and it is these I would say are the real backbone of the book.

Enclave Reviewed on a Green Day

I gave up on the book I was talking about yesterday after reading another chapter or two without making a connection to the character or the story. Essentially, and nothing at all worked for me. I couldn’t get over my initial annoyance with the protagonist, so off to the discard pile goes the book.

On the other hand, I enjoyed Kit Reed’s latest novel, Enclave, which I thought was both dark with shots of hope injected throughout. Here’s a sampling of my review:

As often happens in such Utopic settings, something shatters the sought-after idyllic setting. The monastery in which the novel takes place is supposed to be impregnable and unbreachable, which is why Sarge chose it for his boarding school. Sarge and his crew try to tell the children they are at the Academy for their own good, to save them from the pending apocalypse. These children are initially told the reason for their installment at this Academy is to further their education, when in reality all these kids have some sort of troubled past. As such, their parents want to get rid of them. “Killer” Stade got his nickname from killing a peer, another young man was sent to the Academy because his epileptic fits would be too embarrassing for his royal family to handle, while another child is sent because she/he is confused about his/her gender.

Genre Wars reignites!
Jeff VanderMeer leads an interesting discussion about what books are Dark Fantasy and what books are Urban Fantasy after seeing a table of books labeled "Dark Fantasy."

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day!!

Books in the Mail (W/E 02/14/2009)

Another huge week of arrivals, so another extremely long Sunday post…


The Women of Nell Gwynne’s by Kage Baker (Subterranean Press Hardcover June 2009) – This sounds like an interesting little novelette (or novella?) from Baker. I’ve still got two novels from her staring at me.

Lady Beatrice was the proper British daughter of a proper British soldier, until tragedy struck and sent her home to walk the streets of early-Victorian London. But Lady Beatrice is no ordinary whore, and is soon recruited to join an underground establishment known as Nell Gwynne’s. Nell Gwynne’s is far more than simply the finest and most exclusive brothel in Whitehall; it is in fact the sister organization to the Gentlemen’s Speculative Society, that 19th-century predecessor to a certain Company...and when a member of the Society goes missing on a peculiar assignment, it’s up to Lady Beatrice and her sister harlots to investigate.

Death's Daughter (Book 1 of Calliope Reaper-Jones) by Amber Benson (Ace Paperback February 2009) – Amber Benson, as most people who read this blog probably know, was a star of Buffy, The Vampire Slayer (a show I embarrassingly never really watched, must catch up soon). She’s collaborated with Christopher Golden in the past and this (I think) is her first solo effort. The premise reminds me a bit of the CW’s Reaper, which I like.

Calliope Reaper-Jones so just wanted a normal life: buying designer shoes on sale, dating guys from Craig's List, web-surfing for organic dim-sum for her boss...

But when her father-who happens to be Death himself-is kidnapped, and the Devil's Protege embarks on a hostile takeover of the family business, Death, Inc., Callie returns home to assume the CEO mantle- only to discover she must complete three nearly impossible tasks in the realm of the afterlife first.


The Ebb Tide – A Langdon St. Ives Adventure by James P. Blaylock (Subterranean Press Hardcover July 2009) – I tried the earlier Langdon St. Ives omnibus (The Adventures of Langdon St. Ives)from Subterranean Press and it just didn’t click for me. I like Steampunk, but maybe I wasn’t in the right reading frame of mind for it, so perhaps this little book will work better for me.

A flaming meteor over the Yorkshire Dales, a long-lost map drawn by the lunatic Bill “Cuttle” Kraken, and the discovery of a secret subterranean shipyard beneath the River Thames lead Professor Langdon St. Ives and his intrepid friend Jack Owlesby into the treacherous environs of Morecambe Bay, with its dangerous tides and vast quicksand pits. They descend beneath the sands of the Bay itself, into a dark, unknown ocean littered with human bones and the remnants of human dreams. In this tale of murder, infamy, and Victorian intrigue, the tides of destiny shift relentlessly and rapidly as the stakes grow ever higher and the pursuit more deadly....

The Alchemist's Pursuit (Book 3 of The Alchemist by Dave Duncan (Ace Trade Paperback 03/03/2009) – I read some of Dave Duncan’s King’s Blades novels (Paragon Lost) a few years ago and really liked them. This book is the third (and final) in a medieval mystery/fantasy hybrid. Here’s the plot info:

Hampered by arthritis, Nostradamus is in no mood for granting favors or running about looking for trouble. But when his apprentice Alfeo's mistress asks him to investigate the murder of her beloved courtesan mentor-and promises a fortune in payment-he comes around. It appears that someone is murdering the courtesans of Venice. All were well-known, admired for their skills-and somehow connected by a sinister event involving one of the great families of the city.

While Nostradamus attempts to use the dark arts to solve riddles which confound explanation, Alfeo finds himself led by a possibly demonic force through a maze of deceit and death. And when the master and apprentice come to the end of their intertwined paths, there may be hell to pay

The Evil in Pemberley House by Philip Jose Farmer and Win Scott Eckert (Subterranean Press Hardcover September 2009) – The Evil in Pemberley House, an addition to Farmer's long-running Wold Newton cycle, plays with the Gothic horror tradition. Patricia Wildman, the daughter of the world-renowned adventurer and crimefighter of the 1930s and '40s, Dr. James Clarke "Doc" Wildman, is all alone in the world when she inherits the family estate in Derbyshire, England old, dark, and supposedly haunted.

But Farmer, characteristically, turns convention on its ear. Is the ghost real, or a clever sham? In Patricia Wildman, Farmer creates an introspective character who struggles to reconcile the supernatural with her rational scientific upbringing, while also attempting to work through unresolved feelings about her late parents. He sets the action at Pemberley from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice and ingrains the various mysteries in the Canon of the Sherlock Holmes stories.

The Evil in Pemberley House is a darkly erotic novel with broad appeal to readers of pulp and popular literature, particularly followers of Doc Savage, Sherlockians, and fans of Farmer's own celebrated Wold Newton Family.

A Magic of Nightfall (The Nessantico Cycle Book Two) by S.L. Farrell (DAW Hardcover 03/03/2009)– I’ve seen such good things about the first book in the series, so I was pleased when the MMPB arrived a couple of weeks ago. I’ll read that one and jump straightaway into A Magic of Nightfall.

The second novel in the Nessantico Cycle continues the epic tale of an empire at its height, yet poised on the brink of what could be a devastating descent into ruin. It is a story of murder and magic, of deception and betrayal, of Machiavellian politics, star-crossed lovers, and a realm facing war on every front.

Flinx Transcendent (A Pip & Flinx Adventure) by Alan Dean Foster (Del Rey Hardcover 05/19/2009) – Foster is an extremely prolific writer and this book brings his longest running series (Commonwealth which began with The Tar-Aiym Krang back in 1972) to a close:

From science fiction icon Alan Dean Foster comes the highly anticipated final Pip & Flinx adventure for fans of the green-eyed redhead with awesome mental powers and his miniature flying dragon. In this dazzling novel Foster answers all the questions that his fans have been asking about their favorite hero over the years, while saving the universe in the process.

Flinx Transcendent wraps up the storylines that Alan Dean Foster has been weaving through thirteen Pip & Flinx novels. Twice as long as any previous book in the series, this represents a major milestone in science fiction publishing.

Hayate X Blade Vol 2 by Shizuru Hayashiya (Tor/Seven SeasManga February 2009)

High-octane swordplay meets light yuri romance when bratty Hayate Nagi must take her twin sister's place in a succession of grueling girl-on-girl sword battles or risk expulsion from sword school!.


A Drop of Red (Vampire Babylon #4) by Chris Marie Green (Ace Trade Paperback 03/03/2009) – Vampires & Vampire Hunters in Hollywood – a tried and true story telling device. Although this is the fourth book in the Vampire Babylon, it is the first of a new trilogy/story-arc within Green’s vampire universe. In other words, not completely off-putting to new readers. Here’s the publisher info:

Hollywood stuntwoman-turned-vampire-hunter Dawn Madison, along with her comrades, managed to wipe out the Los Angeles Vampire Underground-and uncovered not only her own dark family heritage but also a terrible truth about the man she loves. Now she's determined to find the next vampire lair, hoping it will help her to make more sense out of her life.

When a new Underground is found in England, Dawn and a vampire-fighting team are dispatched to carry the fight to the enemy in London. Dawn knows by now how deceiving appearances can be-and she is about to find out that it's not only the beautiful people of Hollywood who are willing to bargain with evil . . .

Ice Song by Kirsten Imani Kasai (Del Rey Trade Paperback 05/19/2009) – Debut novel that sounds a mix of Le Guin’s Left Hand of Darkness, Jacqueline Carey, and Dan Simmons’s The Terror

Sorykah Minuit is a scholar, an engineer, and the sole woman aboard an ice-drilling submarine in the frozen land of the Sigue.What no one knows is that she is also a rare Trader, who can switch genders without warning. When a wealthy, reclusive madman known as the Collector abducts Sorykah’s infant twins to use in his dreadful experiments, Sorykah and her male alter ego, Soryk, must cross icy wastes and a primeval forest to get them back. Complicating the dangerous journey is the fact that Sorykah and Soryk do not share memories; each transformation is as much of a jolt as if awakening from a deep and dreamless sleep.

The world through which the sundered halves of Sorykah and Soryk travel is both familiar and surreal. Environmental degradation and genetic mutation run amok; humans have become distorted into animals and animal bodies mask a wild humanity. But it is also a world of unexpected beauty and wonder, where kindness and love endure amidst the ruins.

The Pretender's Crown (Book Two of The Inheritors' Cycle) by C. E. Murphy (Del Rey Trade Paperback 04/28/2009) – Sequel to last year’s The Queen’s Bastard, which I own but haven’t read.

Belinda Primrose is no longer anyone's pawn. Lured by the sensual dark magic of Dmitri, envoy to a neighboring throne, yet still drawn to the witchlord embrace of her former lover, Javier, Belinda has entered a realm where power and control go to those who can master and manipulate their fiercest desires. For the witchpower depends on the skill its wielder holds.

Escape from Hell by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle (Tor Hardcover 02/17/2009) – This is the “long-awaited” sequel to the popular author-duo’s award-nominated Inferno, which is a modern take on Dante’s classic epic poem.

The Novel covers the events after deceased science fiction writer Allen Carpentier turns back to try to help other damned souls as his guide, Benito Mussolini begins his climb out of the lowest circle of Hell towards Purgatory.

In it, Carpentier teams up with Sylvia Plath, becoming a modern-day Christ who harrows Hell and frees many of the damned. Notable persons encountered in this novel in addition to Plath include (in no particular order): Cho Seung-Hui, J. Robert Oppenheimer, Kenneth Lay, Carl Sagan, and Aimee Semple McPherson.

Enclave by Kit Reed (Tor, Hardcover 2/03/2009 – This is the final version of the ARC I received back in September, boy has time flown! I read the Baby Merchant by her and thought it was an interesting and thought provoking novel. As I re-read the info on this book, I became more interested.

The world is in chaos: war, plague, global ecological collapse. Parents everywhere seek sanctuary for their precious children, the future of mankind. For those who are rich and powerful enough, safety can be found—for a price—at the Clothos Academy. Run by a mysterious man known only as Sarge, set in a former monastery atop a sheer cliff on a tiny island somewhere in the Mediterranean, Clothos will admit only one hundred students before it is sealed off—perhaps permanently—from the terrors outside.

But all is not as it seems. The pupils are so-called starlets best known for their empty heads and eating disorders; troublemakers one step away from incarceration; and junior royals too embarrassing to be let out in public. And the staff isn’t much better, from the alcoholic doctor to an ancient monk with secrets of his own.

And the dangers from which these castaways are being protected? Prerecorded, ready to be trotted out whenever Sarge needs to terrify his little flock. And yet…

Some dangers are real, as two boys discover when they hack the Academy’s self-contained computer network and connect, for a brief but disastrous moment, to the outside world. Worse, a stranger has entered the Academy. And he has brought Death.

End of the Century (Part of the The Bonaventure-Carmody Sequence) by Chris Roberson (Pyr Trade Paperback January 2009) – Chris Roberson has been writing some entertaining novels over the past couple of years, and many of them can’t be pigeon-holed into one specific genre or subgenre. I loved Paragaea, which is part of this sequence:.

Three people. Three eras. One city. Endless possibilities. End of the Century is a novel of the distant past, the unimaginable future, and the search for the Holy Grail. Set in the city of London, the narrative is interlaced between three ages, in which a disparate group of heroes, criminals, runaways, and lunatics are drawn into the greatest quest of all time.

Kings and Assassins by Lane Robins (Del Rey Trade Paperback 04/21/2009) – This is a sequel to Maledicte:

Controlled by an aristocracy whose depraved whims bow to neither law nor god, the kingdom of Antyre is under siege from the only man who can save it. He is Janus Ixion, the new Earl of Last, a man whose matchless fighting abilities and leadership strike terror in Antyre’s powerful noble houses.

For Janus is the illegitimate son who has returned from the brutal slums to reclaim his birthright, and will go to any lengths to become king and reverse his country’s decline. But with a conquering foreign prince sowing chaos throughout the kingdom, Janus must battle the terrifying power of Antyre’s forgotten god, one who has gifted Janus’s vengeful wife with mysterious and dangerous skills. As Antyre nears irrevocable collapse, Janus’s manipulations and all-consuming ambition will force him and his country to choose between the rule of resurgent gods, or a victor’s throne of ashes.


Angels’ Blood (Guild Hunter Book 1) by Nalini Singh (Berkeley Paranormal Romance/Urban Fantasy Mass Market Paperback 03/03/2009) – Archangels, demons, and vampires, .oh my! Singh is New York Times bestselling author and this is the first in a brand new paranormal romance series. I’m slightly tempted to … I don’t know …

Vampire hunter Elena Deveraux is hired by the dangerously beautiful Archangel Raphael. But this time, it's not a wayward vamp she has to track. It's an archangel gone bad.

The job will put Elena in the midst of a killing spree like no other-and pull her to the razor's edge of passion. Even if the hunt doesn't destroy her, succumbing to Raphael's seductive touch just may. For when archangels play, mortals break

Coyote Horizon by Allen Steele (Ace Trade Paperback 03/03/2009) – Even though this book is part of his Coyote Horizon, the description gives the sense that it is approachable to new readers, which is good for somebody like me. The series itself has won some awards and is a generational tale of interplanetary colonization.


The planet of Coyote has become the last, best hope of humankind, but it has also become the principal point of contact with the hjadd, the alien race encountered by a European starship many years earlier. Although the hjadd have built an embassy near the original colony, they remain a mystery.

And as the colonists make preparations to explore the rest of the new world, ex-convict Hawk Thompson discovers more about the hjadd than anyone has learned before-and his knowledge will change human history . . .


Deader Still (Book 2 of Simon Canderous) by Anton Strout (Ace Mass Market Paperback 02/24/2009) – Another Urban Fantasy, this one bearing comparison to The Dresden Files. I glanced at the first page, the story opens at New York Comic-Con, so I’m interested. Here’s the plot info:

It's been 737 days since the Department of Extraordinary Affairs' last vampire incursion, but that streak appears to have ended when a boat full of dead lawyers is found in the Hudson River. Using the power of psychometry-the ability to divine the history of an object by touching it-agent Simon Canderous discovers that the booze cruise was crashed by something that sucked all the blood out of the litigators. Now, his workday may never end-until his life does

Deathwish (Cal Leandros Series, Book Four) by Rob Thurman (Roc Paperback 03/04/2009) For the longest time, I thought Rob Thurman was a man (not that it matters), but recently realized Rob is a man. This here’s the fourth in a relatively popular Urban Fantasy Series:

Half-human Cal Leandros and his brother Niko are hired by the vampire Seamus to find out who has been following him—until Seamus turns up dead (or un-undead). Worse still is the return of Cal’s nightmarish family, the Auphe. The last time Cal and Niko faced them, they were almost wiped out. Now, the Auphe want revenge. But first, they’ll destroy everything Cal holds dear...

Magic to the Bone and Sherlock House

Urban Fantasy is the it sub-genre of Fantasy & Science Fiction, if not in general. Right, my other bit of news is that everyday the sun rises. The latest book review I posted is from a new author; a woman author, and falls firmly within the Urban Fantasy arena – three elements/book types I wanted to read more of this year. In this case, the book is Devon Monk’s Magic to the Bone. While I enjoyed it, I wonder if the aspects of the book that didn't work for me are indicative of the subgenre or of Monk’s writing. Anyway, here’s a brief snapshot of the review:

We are firmly in Urban Fantasy/Paranormal Romance (at least as the genre label is known and used today) territory here: mystery, romance, and magic cobbled together in what amounts to a solid page turner. The novel is told in the first person through Allie’s engaging voice, but as the novel marches along, it becomes evident that Allie just might be an Unreliable Narrator. The tag line on the back of the novel indicates, “magic has a price” and in this case, for every spell Allie casts, part of her memory dissolves. Although she carries around a pen and pad to help keep her personal facts straight, when events are chaotic (for the most part the whole novel, but if they weren’t chaotic the novel wouldn’t exist, she doesn’t have the chance to record events as they happen. Monk has created an interesting, flawed protagonist who, for the most part, comes across as genuine and sympathetic.

In other late-breaking news, Mrs. Blog o’ Stuff and I have become somewhat addicted to House. This goes against, in some ways, my personal expectations. I’ve long been tired of hospital/doctor shows and the commercials on FOX with the deep-voiced announcer always saying “…on the next HOUSE” were a turn off. Mrs. o’ Stuff got sucked into an episode about a month or two ago and we’ve both been hooked on the USA re-runs ever since. Watching the show has made me realize how much I really enjoy mystery stories, at least in a filmed context (Criminal Minds, CSI (original), Without a Trace). This is pretty logical since I cut my teeth as a young kid reading The Three Investigators mysteries. Anyway, House the character comes across as snarky, cranky, brilliant, and humorous character. Kind of like Larry David from Curb Your Enthusiasm except smarter and intentionally snarky.

It’s been said many times how House is blatant stand-in for Sherlock Holmes. As a result, and coupled with how much I enjoyed the film Young Sherlock Holmes, I recently dug out Mrs. Blog o’ Stuff’s The Complete Sherlock Holmes from one of the many boxes of books in the various rooms in our house. When I get to reading it is a different story.

Books in the Mail (W/E 1/18/2009)

Penguin has started rolling out their February books, which help to make this a pretty sizable week. Here goes:

Outcast: (Fate of the Jedi Book One) by Aaron Allston (Hardcover 3/24/2009 Del Rey). Allston’s written some of the better Star Wars novel in the Expanded Universe, so its good to see him launching this new series, which picks up just after Legacy of the Force.

After a violent civil war, and the devastation wrought by the now-fallen Darth Caedus, the Galactic Alliance is in crisis -- and in need. From all corners, politicians, power brokers, and military leaders converge on Coruscant for a crucial summit to restore order, negotiate differences, and determine the future of their unified worlds. But even more critical, and far more uncertain, is the future of the Jedi.

In a shocking move, Chief of State Natasi Daala orders the arrest of Luke Skywalker for failing to prevent Jacen Solo's turn to the dark side and subsequent reign of terror as a Sith Lord. But it's only the first blow in an anti-Jedi backlash fueled by a hostile government and suspicious public. When Jedi Knight Valin Horn, scion of a politically influential family, suffers a mysterious psychotic break and becomes a dangerous fugitive, the Jedi become the target of a media-driven witch-hunt. Facing conviction on the charges, Luke has only one choice. He must strike a bargain with the calculating Daala: his freedom in exchange for his exile -- from Coruscant and from the Jedi Order.

Now, though forbidden to intervene in Jedi affairs, Luke is determined to keep grim history from being repeated. With his son, Ben, at his side, Luke sets out to unravel the shocking truth behind Jacen Solo's corruption and downfall. But the secrets he uncovers among the enigmatic Force mystics of the distant world Dorin may bring his quest -- and life as he knows it -- to a sudden end. And all the while, another Jedi Knight, consumed by the same madness as Valin Horn, is headed for Coruscant on a fearsome mission that could doom the Jedi Order . . . and devastate the entire galaxy.

Bone Crossed (Mercy Thompson Book Four) by Patrica Briggs (Ace Hardcover 2/3/2009). Another Urban Fantasy series and one that interests me. I haven’t ready anything by Briggs yet, but I hope this new book will work well for new readers.

In a world where "witches, vampires, werewolves, and shape-shifters live beside ordinary people" (Booklist), it takes a very unusual woman to call it home. By day, Mercy Thompson is a car mechanic in Eastern Washington. By night, she explores her preternatural side. As a shape-shifter with some unusual talents, Mercy's found herself maintaining a tenuous harmony between the human and the not-so- human on more than one occasion. This time she may get more than she bargained for.

Dragon in Chains (Moshui, The Books of Stone and Water 1) by Daniel Fox (Del Rey Trade Paperback 1/27/2009). An Asian-flavored dragon fantasy; Fox is a pen name for Chaz Brenchley.

Set in an imaginary realm that resembles medieval China, Dragon in Chains renders the struggles of Chien, a just young emperor who has been usurped by a brutal rival. Exiled to a remote island, he is introduced into a sphere where magical minerals can bestow superhuman powers and where life is sometimes treated like a cheap thing. This mass market original is the series launch of a historical fantasy trilogy.

Truancy: Origins by Isamu Fukui (Tor Hardcover 3/3/2009). This is the prequel to the successful novel by the then teenaged Fukui. Truancy: Origins looks at two of the characters from the first novel, and how they came to be who there were in the dystopic totalitarian alternate future of Truancy.




Hazards (A Lucifer Jones Adventure) by Mike Resnick (Subterranean Press Hardcover June 2009). These stories take place in South America during circa 1934-1938.

Purple and Black by K.J. Parker (Subterranean Press Hardcover June 2009) – Parker’s work is held in fairly high regard by a number of people, one of whom is SFFWorld’s very on Hobbit (The Company and Devices and Desires). All I know about the book at this point is the following, directly from the publisher:

a series of missives between an adviser assigned to an outlying military outpost, and the emperor who sent him, consists of a number of official communiques (printed in purple ink) and back-channel communications (printed in black). Each set of letters is shuttled back and forth via sealed communication packets. As one would expect from Parker, the novella is darkly funny, gritty, and with a few twists along the way.

Wild Thyme, Green Magic by Jack Vance (Subterranean Press Hardcover June 2009) – Subterranean continues it’s line of Vance reprints, with this latest collection including an introduction by Jonathan Strahan and Terry Dowling. Here’s the list of stories:

• Introduction by Terry Dowling and Jonathan Strahan
• Assault on a City
• Rumfuddle
• The Augmented Agent
• Green Magic
• Ullward's Retreat
• Coup de Grace
• Chateau d'If
• The Potters of Firsk
• The World-Thinker
• Seven Exits from Bocz
• Wild Thyme and Violets
  

Books in the Mail (W/E 12/20/2008)

It’s Sunday, so you know what that mean’s here at the Blog o’ Stuff. I tell you, my millions…and millions, of readers the books I received for review the prior week. I of course can’t read all of them, but I don’t want to ignore them either. For shits and giggles, I’ll run a poll for the week - Which of these books is Rob least likely to read?

Mean Streets four novellas by Jim Butcher, Simon R. Green, Kat Richardson, and Thomas E. Sniegoski (Roc , Trade Paperback 01/06/2009) – Butcher’s story is (surprise, surprise) a Harry Dresden story, Green’s is a Nightside novella featuring John Taylor, Richardson’s is a Harper Blaine/Greywalker story and Sniegoski’s novella features Remy Chandler. All in all, it looks a solid collection of Roc’s top Urban Fantasy authors. I've read one and this contains the first of two Green stories in what I received this week.

Airs of Night and Sea (The Horsemistress Saga #3 novel) by Toby Bishop (Ace, Mass Market Paperback 12/30/2008) – This is the third book in a trilogy about women who ride flying horses. Driven by insane jealousy, Duke William is determined to found his own flying school, where the valuable flying horses of Oc will learn to bond with well-born young men-instead of arrogant women. Now, Larkyn Hamley and her beloved Black Seraph must gather all of their allies from the air to the ground. For if they do not soar now, none will ever see the skies again.

Regenesis by CJ Cherryh (DAW, Hardcover 01/06/2009) – This is a sequel to her Hugo-award winning Downbelow Station and Cyteen. I read Downbelow Station when it was the SFFWorld Science Fiction Book Club Selection back in September 2006 and it left me feeling rather meh and nonplussed. It is a genre classic and no doubt a great many people are looking forward to Regenesis



Just Another Judgement Day (The Tenth Novel of the Nightside) by Simon R. Green (Ace, Hardcover 01/06/2009) – Green is an extremely prolific author who goes between several subgenres of Speculative Fiction. The Nightside novels are his take on the ever-growing Urban Fantasy subgenre and since this is the 10th, he’s obviously doing something right. I tried one of his Deathstalker novels years ago and felt neither here nor there about it, but have wanted to give his writing another try so this seems a good book with which to go.



In Shade and Shadow (The Tenth A Novel of the Noble Dead) by Barb and JC Hendee (Roc, Hardcover 01/06/2009) –I’ve been curious about the Noble Dead for a while and this may be an opportunity to give the series a try, since this book in particular is the first of second series in this world. Considering the series began as mass market paperback originals (like E.E. Knights terrific Vampire Earth saga and Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files, so things seem to be going well for the Hendees. Here’s the snippet:
After escaping the castle of ancient vampires with Magiere and Leesil, Wynn Hygeorht has returned to Calm Seatt, home of the Guild of Sagecraft, bearing texts supposedly penned by vampires from the time of the Forgotten History and the Great War. Her superiors seize both the ancient texts and her personal journals, dismissing her tales of the undead as delusional fancies.

But the guild's scholars have not dismissed the texts. Without Wynn's consent, they begin sending the texts out to scriptoriums for copying. Then one night several pages disappear — and the two sages charged with conveying these pages are murdered. Suspicious of the Guild, separated from the only friends she fully trusts, and convinced the Noble Dead are responsible for the killings, Wynn embarks on a quest to uncover the secrets of the texts, unaware of her allies from unexpected quarters....


The Stepsister Scheme (Princess Series #1) by Jim C. Hines (DAW Books, Mass Market Paperback January 2009) – After a successful ‘revisionist humorous’ trilogy detailing the exploits of Jig the Goblin, Jim C. Hines turns his pen to the fairytale princess most often associated with the Disney films. Here, the princesses and their life “happily ever after” are given a modern twist as Charlie’s Angels type kick-butt women. I’ve been intending to try his novels for a while and this seems a great spot. Jim runs a great blog / LiveJournal, particularly the now defunct lol cats book cover features and seems an affable and generous writer.


Getting to Know You by David Marusek (Del Rey, Trade Paperback 12/30/2008) – I received the ARC of this back in September and with the publication date ‘round the corner, the final Trade Paperback version arrived. David Marusek has been on my radar since his debut novel, Counting Heads, was released almost two three years ago now, to much acclaim. His short stories have won awards (Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award) and acclaim as well. This collection was originally offered as a limited edition by Subterranean Press last year.

The Vacant Throne (Throne of Amenkor #3) by Joshua Palmatier (DAW Books, Mass Market Paperback January 2009) – Joshua sent me the trilogy two weeks ago and I received the third of the trilogy this past week in paperback from DAW.

The city is on the brink of starvation, and the trading ships sent out to bring back supplies needed to feed the city have disappeared without a trace. Both Varis and Eryn, the former Mistress, are obsessed with a vision they alone share of Amenkor invaded by an unknown enemy, the harbor watchtowers destroyed, wrecked ships sinking in waters stained red with blood, even as the city itself is engulfed in flames. . . .

Then their vision comes true, and, forced to draw on all of Amenkor's remaining resources, both ordinary and magical, Varis must fight a desperate battle for the city's survival against these ruthless invaders known as the Chorl. But victory is not without its price. And perhaps that price is too high, as the very heart and soul of Amenkor's power, the Skewed Throne, is irrevocably damaged--totally drained of the magic, knowledge, life force, and memories of previous rulers.

The city's last hope lies with its sometime ally, the city of Venitte, rumored to be home to the only throne that is twin in power to Amenkor's, the two created at the same time by a magical working which no one can now duplicate.

The Vampire Agent (A The Annals of Alchemy and Blood #2 novel) by Patricia Rosemoor and Marc Paoletti (Del Rey , Mass Market Paperback 12/30/2008) – On the sultry streets of New Orleans, Captain Scott Boulder and Leah Maguire are about to begin a deadly mission. The traumatized, genetically altered subjects of a Department of Defense experiment gone wrong have escaped, among them Rachel Ackart, a beautiful, seductive, and powerful woman–who is now under the dangerous influence of Andre Espinoza de Madrid, a vampire of incomparable evil and power.

Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor by Matthew Stover (Del Rey, Hardcover December 30, 2008) – Any year with oneMatthew Stover is cause for reading celebration; a year with two Stover novels is just awesome. His Star Wars novels are the cream of the crop, and his novelization of Episode III is head and shoulders above the film itself. This is Stover’s crack at the original heroes (Luke, Leia, Han, Chewie, Lando) with the story set shortly after Return of the Jedi. Clearly, this will be put atop the “To Be Read” pile.

Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader are dead. The Empire has been toppled by the triumphant Rebel Alliance, and the New Republic is ascendant. But the struggle against the dark side and the Sith order is not over. Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, Lando Calrissian, and their faithful comrades have had little time to savor victory before being called on to defend the newly liberated galaxy.

Powerful remnants of the vanquished Empire, hungry for retaliation, are still at large, committing acts of piracy, terrorism, and wholesale slaughter against the worlds of the fledgling Republic. The most deadly of these, a ruthless legion of black-armored stormtroopers, do the brutal bidding of the newly risen warlord Shadowspawn. Striking from a strategically advantageous base at the planet Mindor, they are waging campaigns of plunder and destruction, demolishing order and security across the galaxy—and breeding fears of an Imperial resurgence. And another reign of darkness beneath the boot-heel of Sith despotism is something General Luke Skywalker cannot and will not risk.

Mobilizing the ace fighters of Rogue Squadron—along with the trusty Chewbacca, Threepio, and Artoo-Detoo—Luke, Han, and Leia set out to take the battle to the enemy at the site of its stronghold, and neutralize the threat before it's too late. But their imminent onslaught against Mindor will be playing directly into the hands of their cunning new adversary. Lord Shadowspawn is no freshly anointed Sith Chieftain, but in fact a vicious former Imperial Intelligence officer—and Prophet of the Dark Side. The Emperor's death has paved the way for Shadowspawn's return from exile in the Outer Rim; and mastery of ancient Sith knowledge and modern technology has given him the capability to mount the ultimate power play for galaxy-wide dominion. Dark prophecy has foretold that only one obstacle stands in his way, and he is ready—even eager—for the confrontation.

All the classic heroes, all the explosive action and adventure, all the unparalleled excitement of Star Wars come breathlessly alive here, as the further adventures of Luke Skywalker continue.

Eclipse Two edited by Jonathan Strahan (Night Shade Books , Trade Paperback December 2008) – I thought (Eclipse One) was a strong collection. When the TOC for this volume was announced it caused a considerable stir and a great deal of undue ire aimed at Jonathan Strahan. Regardless of that, new stories from Jeff Ford, Alastair Reynolds, Ted Chiang, and Margo Lanagan are always good things.

Here’s the TOC:

Introduction - Jonathan Strahan
The Hero - Karl Schroeder
Turing's Apples - Stephen Baxter
Invisible Empire of Ascending Light - Ken Scholes
Michael Laurits is: Drowning - Paul Cornell
Night of the Firstlings - Margo Lanagan
Elevator - Nancy Kress
The Illustrated Biography of Lord Grimm - Daryl Gregory
Exhalation - Ted Chiang
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom - David Moles
The Rabbi's Hobby - Peter S. Beagle
The Seventh Expression of the Robot General - Jeffrey Ford
Skin Deep - Richard Parks
Ex Cathedra - Tony Daniel
Truth Window: A Tale of the Bedlam Rose - Terry Dowling
Fury - Alastair Reynolds


The Jennifer Morgue (Book Two of the Laundry Series) by Charles Stross (Ace, Trade Paperback 01/06/2009) – This I’ve a handful of stuff by Stross, most recently (Saturn’s Children) but have yet to read any of these stories which sound like a really cool marriage of James Bond and Cthulu.

When he's not trying to save the world from unearthly horrors, Bob Howard — an agent for the British supersecret organization known simply as The Laundry — has time sheets to complete and field liaison meetings to attend. (And don't get Bob started on how much he despises corporate PowerPoint presentations!)

In The Jennifer Morgue, Lovecraft meets Ian Fleming in this highly anticipated new "Bob Howard" adventure from Charles Stross, author of the 2005 Hugo Award-winning novella "The Concrete Jungle."

In 1975, the CIA made an ill-fated attempt to raise a sunken Soviet ballistic missile submarine from the depths of the Pacific Ocean. At least, "ill-fated" was the information leaked to the press. In reality, the team salvaged a device, codenamed "Gravedust," that permitted communication with the dead — the very long dead. Enter Ellis Billington, glamorous software billionaire, who has acquired Gravedust by devious means. Billington plans to raise an eldritch horror, codenamed "Jennifer Morgue," from the vasty deeps, and communicate with this dead warrior for the purpose of ruling the world. Worse still, he's prepared occult defenses that can only be penetrated by one agent walking a perilous path.

But James Bond doesn't work for the Laundry. Instead, they send Bob Howard, geekish demonology hacker extraordinaire. Bob must inveigle his way aboard Billington's yacht, figure out what the villain is up to, and stop him. But there's a fly in Bob's ointment by the name of Ramona Random — a lethal but beautiful agent for the Black Chamber, the U.S. counterpart to The Laundry. Billington's yacht is docked in the Caribbean, and Her Majesty's Government is not allowed to operate in this area without an American minder. The Black Chamber has sent Ramona to ride shotgun on Bob, but Ramona has her own agenda that conflicts with her employer's . . .

Bob and Ramona become entangled (literally), and are then captured by Billington and used to further his insidious plot. But let's not forget Bob's significant other, Dr. Dominique "Mo" O'Brien, also an agent of The Laundry, who has been trained especially for this mission. Can these intrepid agents stop Billington from raising the dead horror and thus save the world from total domination? The Jennifer Morgue takes the reader on a wild adventure through the worlds of Lovecraft and Ian Fleming, non-Euclidian mathematics and computer hackerdom — sort of like Austin Powers, only more squamous and rugose — with fast cars and faster women.

In addition to the novel-length The Jennifer Morgue, this volume also includes an added bonus story, Pimpf, featuring agent Bob Howard in the world of virtual gaming, along with a thought-provoking Afterword entitled The Golden Age of Spying.

Beyond the Shadows (The Night Angel Trilogy #3) by Brent Weeks (Orbit, Mass Market Paperback December 2008) – I read the first two (The Way of Shadows and Shadow’s Edge) last month and really enjoyed them, so I’m really looking forward to this novel. This series and author is also drawing quite a bit of positive attention in the SFFWorld forums. I think Weeks might be the most impressive fantasy writer to emerge in 2008 and if this final volume lives up to the promise of the first two, then that might becomes will.

This Is Not A Game by Walter Jon Williams (Orbit, Hardcover March 24, 2009) – Williams is a terrific and smart writer; I enjoyed the novel he published with NightShade Books earlier this year, Implied Spaces. Here’s the synopsis::
This Is Not a Game is a novel built around the coolest phenomenon in the world.

That phenomenon is known as the Alternate Reality Game, or ARG. It's big, and it's getting bigger. It's immersive and massively interactive, and it's spreading through the Internet at the speed of light.

To the player, the Alternate Reality Game has no boundaries. You can be standing in a parking lot, or a shopping center. A pay phone near you will ring, and on the other end will be someone demanding information.

You'd better have the information handy.

ARGs combine video, text adventure, radio plays, audio, animation, improvisational theater, graphics, and story into an immersive experience.

Now, one of science fiction's most acclaimed writers, Walter Jon Williams, brings this extraordinary phenomenon to life in a pulse-pounding thriller. This is not a game. This is a novel that will blow your mind.