Release Week: Ted Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others, Glen Duncan's By Blood We Live, Iain Banks' Matter, and Octavia Butler's Patternmaster and Imago

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Release Week: Ted Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others, Glen Duncan's By Blood We Live, Iain Banks' Matter, and Octavia Butler's Patternmaster and Imago

Posted on 2014-02-14 at 05:19 by Sam

FEBRUARY 5-11, 2014: While much more quiet in terms of quantity -- in particular in concurrent new releases, as apparently every publisher had the same "FEBRUARY 4 OR BUST" idea this year -- there's some absolutely exquisite quality in this week's audiobooks haul, led by Ted Chiang's 2002 collection Stories of Your Life and Others, along with backlist titles from Iain Banks and Octavia Butler, and the only week delayed conclusion in audio for Glen Duncan's Last Werewolf trilogy, By Blood We Live. Highlights of the "also out this week" listings include M.D. Waters' Archetype, Matthew Quick read by Oliver Wyman, Neve Maslakovic read by Mary Robinette Kowal, Hugh Howey's Vonnegutian short story Peace in Amber, some blockbuster YA titles, and a pile of fiction including Michael Piafsky's "Tarot-inspired" debut, All the Happiness You Deserve. Meanwhile in the news department, Audible's "Begin at the Beginning" sale includes over 200 titles, so I picked some highlights including Tad Williams, Richard Kadrey, Mira Grant, and Paolo Bacigalupi; Mark Helprin's Winter's Tale (in audio narrated by Oliver Wyman) is set to come to theatres this Friday; and Wendy Webb's haunted house novel The Vanishing is set to come to audio this year as well. Enjoy!

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

In a memorable (to me!) SFFaudio column in June 2011, Jesse Willis asked "Where are all the Ted Chiang audiobooks?" Well, this week Tantor Audio finally answered with a fantastic production of the multiple-award-winning Chiang's 2002 collection Stories of Your Life and Others. Read by Todd McLaren and Abby Craden, with McLaren providing the majority of the narration ("Tower of Babylon", "Understand", Seventy-Two Letters", "The Evolution of Human Science", and "Hell is the Absence of God") and Craden offering fantastic turns on "Division by Zero", "Story of Your Life", and "Liking What You See: A Documentary". My initial reaction was the quite sophisticated: "Wow. So, Ted Chiang. Y'all told me, and now I know. I was warned in advance and yet still am amazed." It's hard to follow sf and not hear praise for the stories of Ted Chiang, and I'd been blown away by his multiple-award winning "Exhalation" a few years ago, but even so my jaw dropped and then fell further still as one story and then another, packed with science, math, and intense characters and situations emerged from this collection. In these stories I found clear inspirations for so many of my favorite current writers (J.M. McDermott's "Maze" and Jason Erik Lundberg's "Tower" stories, Ken Liu's "The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary") and also a stunningly original and unique genre to itself. From "Babylonian science fiction" to recursive brain augmentation, suicide and incompatible maths to alien language and simultaneity and the loss of a child, golems, "lookism", ... Capped by brief (yet fantastic) "Story Notes" at the end. Very, very highly recommended. Since his 2002 collection, Chiang has published several more major works, including "The Merchant at the Alchemist's Gate", "Exhalation" (in audio at EscapePod, originally podcast in StarShipSofa), a long novella The Lifecycle of Software Objects, and the novelette "The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling" -- more than enough for a second audiobook. Oh, Tantor... And did I mention that "Story of Your Life" is set for a film adaptation?

Stories of Your Life and Others By Blood We Live | [Glen Duncan]

I highlighted Glen Duncan's By Blood We Live in last week's seen but not heard listings, in particular a fantastic interview with the author by Matt Staggs for Suvudu. Well, it's here this week in a fantastic 4-narrator audiobook, read by Abby Craden, Amber Sealey, Steve West, and Rob Shapiro for Random House Audio. "First Glen Duncan gave us his monstrously thrilling, genre-reinventing The Last Werewolf: the tale of Jake, a werewolf with a profoundly human heart, considering bringing to an end the timeless legend of his kind.... Then Talulla Rising: Jake’s werewolf lover, mother to newborn twins, on the run from those who want her destroyed... And now By Blood We Live: a stunningly erotic love story that gives us the final battle for survival between werewolves and vampires, and one last searing - and brilliantly ironic - look at what it means to be, or not to be, human."

Previously only available (at least in the US) as a 5.5 hour abridgement, Matter: Culture, Book 8 by the late Iain M. Banks, narrated by Toby Longworth for Hachette Audio is now available in its unabridged edition. Not all of the Culture audiobooks are available in the US just yet, as Hachette has been bringing them over from the UK well behind their publication there. Excession, Inversions, and Look to Windward have yet to make their way here, though each has been published in the past year in the UK. Still it's a very welcome addition, and one of the (many) ways to read the Culture books starts right here: "In a world renowned even within a galaxy full of wonders, a crime within a war. For one man it means a desperate flight, and a search for the one - maybe two - people who could clear his name. For his brother it means a life lived under constant threat of treachery and murder. And for their sister, even without knowing the full truth, it means returning to a place she'd thought abandoned forever."

Matter: Culture, Book 8 | [Iain M. Banks] Patternmaster: The Patternist Series | [Octavia E. Butler]

Patternmaster: The Patternist Series By Octavia E. Butler, Narrated By Eugene H. Russell IV --. Listed by Audible as "Book 4" in the series (which is where it stands in the modified internal chronology), it was the first published, in 1976, and it's the one I've been waiting for to get started on the series in audio. "The Patternist is a telepathic race, commanded by the Patternmaster, whose thoughts can destroy, heal, rule. Coransee, son of the ruling Patternmaster, wants the throne and will stop at nothing to get it, including venture into the wild mutant-infested hills to destroy a young apprentice - his equal and his brother." Also out in Audible extremely welcome and well-produced series of audiobooks bringing Butler's works to audio this week: Clay's Ark: Patternist, Book 3 (narrated by Neal Ghant -- though it's the last remaining Butler novel not in audio, 1978's Survivor, which was the third published book in the Patternist series and which Butler later disowned and declined to return to print) and Imago, the concluding third book in her Xenogenesis trilogy, narrated by Barrett Aldrich.

ALSO OUT THIS WEEK:

Peace in Amber: The World of Kurt Vonnegut | [Hugh Howey] Archetype by M. D. Waters The Good Luck of Right Now by Matthew Quick

SEEN BUT NOT HEARD:

The Waking Engine David Edison Astra John C. Wright The Judge of Ages

  • Anthology: Handsome Devil: Stories of Sin and Seduction edited by Steve Berman with stories by Richard Bowes, Pat Cadigan, Theodora Goss, Elizabeth Hand, Tanith Lee, and Nick Mamatas (Prime Books, Feb 5) -- "For millennia, male infernal figures have been portrayed as both dazzling tempters and dark seducers. The alluring fantasy of Handsome Devil highlights Lucifer's role as the beautiful trickster who steals hearts (as well as souls), and features stories - both new and old - of tantalizing tempters, sexy incubi, demon lovers, and devils who beguile and betray."
  • Astra by Naomi Foyle (Jo Fletcher Books, February 6, 2014) — “Like every child in Is-Land, all Astra Ordott wants is to have her Security Shot, do her National Service and defend her Gaian homeland from Non-Lander ‘infiltrators’. But when one of her Shelter mothers, the formidable Dr Hokma Blesser, tells her the shot will limit her chances of becoming a scientist and offers her an alternative, Astra agrees to her plan. When the orphaned Lil arrives to share Astra’s home, Astra is torn between jealousy and fascination. Lil’s father taught her some alarming ideas about Is-Land and the world, but when she pushes Astra too far, the heartache that results goes far beyond the loss of a friend.” (via The BiblioSanctum) -- well, this one is heard in the UK but there's no US print or audiobook release in sight yet
  • Fiction: Pioneer Girl: A Novel by Bich Minh Nguyen (Viking Adult and Dreamscape Media, Feb 6, 2014) — “From an award-winning author, a novel about a Vietnamese American family’s ties to The Little House on the Prairie.” -- coming to audio Feb 18
  • The Waking Engine by David Edison (Tor, Feb 11, 2014) -- "Welcome to the City Unspoken, where Gods and Mortals come to die. Contrary to popular wisdom, death is not the end, nor is it a passage to some transcendent afterlife. Those who die merely awake as themselves on one of a million worlds, where they are fated to live until they die again, and wake up somewhere new. All are born only once, but die many times . . . until they come at last to the City Unspoken, where the gateway to True Death can be found." -- there's also an excerpt up at Tor.com for this debut novel, as far as I can tell the author's first professional publication of any kind
  • The Judge of Ages (Count to a Trillion Book 3) by John C. Wright (Tor, Feb 11, 2014) -- via Locus Online's always-fantastic coverage of new sf/f releases: "SF novel, third in a series following Count to a Trillion(2011) and The Hermetic Millennia (2012), about rival efforts to counter an alien menace that will arrive at Earth in another 4000 years.";  Macmillan’s site has this description with an excerpt; Paul Di Filippo reviewed the previous book for Barnes & Noble, describing it as a mix of Olaf Stapledon, Jack Vance, Philip José Farmer, and Jared Diamond: “It’s a heady brew that achieves an ever-oscillating balance between pulp action and philosophical gravitas.”
  • The Man Who Made Models: The Collected Short Fiction by R.A. Lafferty (Centipede Press, Feb 11, 2014)
  • The Tinker King by Trent, Tiffany (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, Feb 11, 2014) -- 'Science and magic mean danger in this sequel to The Unnaturalists, which School Library Journal called “an entertaining mix of steampunk and fantasy.”'
  • Collection: Ladies of the Night: Short Stories by Maggie McNeill by Maggie McNeill and Chester Brown (Feb 11, 2014) -- "This book, her first published collection, contains thirty-seven stories ranging from fantasy to reality and from comedy to horror, whose heroines are all quite different from one another but have one thing in common: membership in the world's oldest profession."
  • Fiction: Don't Start Me Talkin' by Tom Williams (Curbside Splendor Publishing, Feb 11, 2014) -- brought to my attention via Patrick Wensink, a "a comedic road novel about Brother Ben, the only remaining True Delta Bluesman, playing his final North American tour. Set in contemporary society, Brother Ben's protege Peter narrates an episodic "last ride" across the great forty-eight, laying bare America's complicated relationship with African American identity, music, and culture." Matt Bell, author of In the House upon the Dirt between the Lake and the Woods, says: "A master storyteller, Tom Williams enters the living history of Delta Blues and emerges with his own thrilling tall tale, alive with American music, American legend, American heart."
  • Fiction: Prayers for the Stolen by Jennifer Clement (Hogarth, Feb 11, 2014) — “Ladydi Garcia Martínez is fierce, funny and smart. She was born into a world where being a girl is a dangerous thing. In the mountains of Guerrero, Mexico, women must fend for themselves, as their men have left to seek opportunities elsewhere. Here in the shadow of the drug war, bodies turn up on the outskirts of the village to be taken back to the earth by scorpions and snakes.”

COMING SOON:

Broken Homes: A Rivers of London Novel | [Ben Aaronovitch] Honor's Knight (Paradox, #2)

  • The Copper Promise by Jen Williams (February 13, 2014) — (via The BiblioSanctum)
  • The Gospel of Loki by Joanne M. Harris (Feb 13, 2014) -- a retelling of Norse mythology from the point of view of Loki
  • The List Unseen: The Chronicles of Lumineia, Book 4 By Ben Hale, Narrated By Derek Perkins (Feb 14)
  • Lethe By Tricia Sullivan, Narrated By Imogen Church (Feb 14)
  • Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long By Robert A. Heinlein, Narrated By Tom Weiner for Blackstone Audio (Feb 15)
  • Fiction: The Sun and Other Stars: A Novel by Brigid Pasulka (Simon & Schuster, Feb 4, 2014) — Coming to audio from Dreamscape and purportedly available in physical formats on Feb 11, but I'm not sure of the digital publication date: “In the seaside town of San Benedetto, soccer (or calcio) is more than just a sport: it’s an obsession. Twenty-two-year-old Etto, however, couldn’t care less about soccer. His beloved twin brother Luca, a rising soccer star, died tragically in a motorcycle accident, and their Californian mother, unable to cope with her grief, drowned herself on the anniversary of Luca’s death. This has left Etto alone to tend the butcher shop—where his father barely seems to take in his presence and entrusts him with only the most basic tasks. But then Yuri Fil, a Ukrainian soccer star who Etto’s father idolizes, takes refuge from the paparazzi in a nearby villa, and Etto accidentally falls into Yuri’s orbit—and that of Yuri’s beautiful and tough sister, Zhuki. Under their influence, he begins to learn a few life lessons: that the game of soccer might not be a total waste of time, that he might not in fact be a total loser—and that San Benedetto, his father, love, and life itself might have more to offer him than he would have ever believed possible.”
  • Black Gum Godless Heathen by J David Osborne (Broken River Books, January/February 2014) — sequel to Low Down Death Right Easy
  • Fall of Angels: Saga of Recluce, Book 6 By L. E. Modesitt, Narrated By Kirby Heyborne for Tantor Audio (Feb 17)
  • Metro 2034 By Dmitry Glukhovsky, Narrated By Rupert Degas (Feb 18)
  • Like a Mighty Army (Safehold) by David Weber (Feb 18, 2014) — coming to audio read by Oliver Wyman
  • With Silent Screams (The Hellequin Chronicles) by Steve McHugh (Feb 18, 2014) -- read by James Langton for Brilliance Audio
  • The Book of Heaven: A Novel by Storace, Patricia (Pantheon, Feb 18, 2014)
  • Maul, Someone to Watch Over Me, and Lightborn by Tricia Sullivan, read by various narrators (Feb 18)
  • Serial: Heirs of Grace by Tim Pratt (47North, Feb 18) -- the first of five installments: "Recent art school graduate Bekah thought she’d hit the jackpot: an unknown relative died, and she inherited a small fortune and a huge house in the mountains of North Carolina. Trey Howard, the lawyer who handled the estate, is a handsome man in his twenties and they hit it off right away—and soon become more than friends. Bekah expected a pleasant year to get her head together and have a romantic fling. Problem is, the house is full of junk...and siblings she didn’t know she had are willing to kill her for it. More important, the junk in her new house is magical, she’s surrounded by monsters, and her life seems to be in mortal peril every time she ventures into a new room. As Bekah discovers more about her mysterious benefactor and the magical world he inhabited, she’s realizes that as tough and resourceful as she is, she might just be in over her head... Heirs of Grace is a tale of family and magic, action and wonder, blending the strong heroine, cheeky humor, and dark fantasy that have become the hallmarks of Tim Pratt’s writing."
  • Zine: Shimmer #18 guest edited by Ann VanderMeer (Shimmer, Feb 18) -- a new issue of Shimmer is always an event to notice, and this one looks to be a singular example of that noteworthiness, with stories by Ben Peek, Rachel Marston, Ramsey Shehadeh, Christine Schirr, Ben Godby, Annalee Newitz, Jeff VanderMeer, and Dustin Monk: "Guest-edited by the illustrious Ann VanderMeer, these eight juicy stories are a journey beyond the ordinary. Explore futures and footnotes, fragments and history. Read about mushrooms and missing limbs, shadows and books, atoms and souls."
  • Influx by Suarez, Daniel (Dutton Adult, Feb 20, 2014) -- coming simultaneously to audio, Narrated By Jeff Gurner for Penguin Audio (Feb 20)
  • Moth and Spark by Anne Leonard (February 20, 2014) -- Narrated By Christian Coulson for Penguin Audio
  • Third Strike: The Slayer Chronicles, Book 3 By Heather Brewer, Narrated By Alexander Cendese for Brilliance Audio (Feb 20)
  • Blood Kin by Steve Rasnic Tem (Solaris, Feb 25) -- "Steve Rasnic Tem's new novel "Blood Kin" is set in the southern Appalachians of the U.S., alternating between the 1930s and the present day. It's a dark Southern Gothic vision of ghosts, witchcraft, secret powers, snake-handling, Kudzu, Melungeons, and the Great Depression."
  • Meridian 144 By Meg Files, Narrated By Carly Robins — Scheduled Release Date: 02-25-14
  • Alabaster: Pale Horse by Caitlin Kiernan and Daniel Chabon (Feb 25, 2014)
  • The Undead Pool by Kim Harrison (Feb 25, 2014)
  • To Do or Die: Jump Universe, Book 4 By Mike Shepherd, Narrated By Michael McConnahie (Feb 25)
  • Honor’s Knight — Book 2 in the Paradox series — By Rachel Bach, Read By Emily Durante for Tantor (February 25, 2014) — “Rachel Bach presents the rollicking sequel to the science fiction novel Fortune’s Pawn.”
  • Tin Star by Cecil Castellucci (Roaring Brook, Feb 25, 2014) — “On their way to start a new life, Tula and her family travel on the Prairie Rose, a colony ship headed to a planet in the outer reaches of the galaxy. All is going well until the ship makes a stop at a remote space station, the Yertina Feray, and the colonist’s leader, Brother Blue, beats Tula within an inch of her life. An alien, Heckleck, saves her and teaches her the ways of life on the space station.”
  • Blades of the Old Empire: Book I of the Majat Code by Kashina, Anna (Angry Robot, Feb 25, 2014)
  • A Man Came Out of a Door in the Mountain by Adrianne Harun (Penguin, Feb 25, 2014) — “In isolated British Columbia, girls, mostly native, are vanishing from the sides of a notorious highway. Leo Kreutzer and his four friends are barely touched by these disappearances—until a series of mysterious and troublesome outsiders come to town. Then it seems as if the devil himself has appeared among them.” -- audiobook coming March 12, read by Dan John Miller for Tantor Audio
  • The Troop by Cutter, Nick (Feb 25, 2014)
  • The Happier Dead by Ivo Stourton (Feb 25, 2014)
  • Fiction: The Fall of Saints: A Novel by Wanjiku wa Ngugi (Feb 25, 2014) — “In this stunning debut novel, a Kenyan expat living the American dream with her husband and adopted son soon finds it marred by child trafficking, scandal, and a problematic past.”
  • Fiction: The Wives of Los Alamos: A Novel by TaraShea Nesbit, narrated by Tavia Gilbert -- Length:4 hrs and 59 mins -- Scheduled Release Date: 02-25-14
  • Non-Fiction: Pagan Britain by Ronald Hutton (Yale University Press, Feb 25) -- "What do we really know about Stonehenge and druids? Is the Uffington White Horse actually a cat? This study questions all claims about prehistoric rituals and religion." (hat tip to Dan Campbell)
  • Fiction Collection: Bark: Stories by Lorrie Moore, read by the author for Blackstone Audio: "A literary event—a new collection of stories by one of America’s most beloved and admired short story writers, her first collection in fifteen years."
  • The Last Weekend by Nick Mamatas (PS Publishing, February 2014) -- "You might think that there's nothing fresh or original in the current crop of zombie fiction, and you'd be right -- unless you read The Last Weekend. Nick Mamatas crafts a clever blend of multiple genres that is equal parts heartfelt, fearful, and funny. The Last Weekend is a headshot to a tiresome trope. I loved it!" (Brian Keene)

MARCH 2014:

17607897 Words of Radiance: The Stormlight Archive, Book 2 | [Brandon Sanderson]

  • The Shibboleth (The Twelve-Fingered Boy Trilogy) by John Hornor Jacobs (Carolrhoda Books, Mar 1, 2014) -- From the author of Southern Gods, the second book in The Twelve-Fingered Boy trilogy: "At the end of the first book of The Twelve-Fingered Boy Trilogy, Jack and Shreve are incarcerado—physically locked up. Shreve's back in the custody of the state of Arkansas, and Jack's somewhere in the clutches of Mr. Quincrux—both problems Shreve aims to rectify."
  • The Godmakers by Frank Herbert, read by To Be Announced for Blackstone Audio Mar 1)
  • Have Space Suit - Will Travel By Robert A. Heinlein, Narrated By Mark Turetsky for Blackstone Audio (Mar 1) -- it was available a bit early at Audible
  • Skinwalkers by Wendy W. Wager (Paizo, March 1) — this Pathfinder Tales novel from one of the “Inkpunks” will be available from Paizo on March 1, 2014
  • Kids: Half Bad (The Half Bad Trilogy) by Green, Sally (Mar 3, 2014) — via Kate Atkinson (the author of Life after Life) a new middle grade series about witches in modern-day England
  • Ghost Train to New Orleans (The Shambling Guides) by Mur Lafferty (Orbit, Mar 4, 2014) — sequel to The Shambling Guide to New York City
  • Night Broken (A Mercy Thompson Novel) by Patricia Briggs (Mar 4, 2014)
  • The Tropic of Serpents: A Memoir by Lady Trent (A Natural History of Dragons) by Marie Brennan (Mar 4, 2014)
  • Words of Radiance by Brandon Sanderson (Tor, March 4, 2014) — book 2 in The Stormlight Archive after The Way of Kings
  • Hope Rearmed by S.M. Stirling and David Drake (March 4, 2014)
  • Half-Off Ragnarok: An Incryptid Novel by Seanan McGuire (Mar 4, 2014)
  • Black Moon: A Novel by Calhoun, Kenneth (Hogarth, Mar 4, 2014) — a story of mass insomnia from an acclaimed short fiction writer
  • Murder of Crows: A Novel of the Others by Bishop, Anne (Mar 4, 2014)
  • Honor Among Thieves: Star Wars (Empire and Rebellion) by Corey, James S.A. (Mar 4, 2014)
  • The Weirdness: A Novel by Jeremy P. Bushnell (Melville House, Mar 4, 2014) — “At thirty, Billy Ridgeway still hasn’t gotten around to becoming a writer; he thinks too much to get anything done, really, except making sandwiches at a Greek deli with his buddy Anil. But the Devil shows up with fancy coffee one morning, promising to make Billy’s dream of being published come true: as long as Billy steals The Neko of Infinite Equilibrium, a cat-shaped statue with magical powers, from the most powerful warlock in the Eastern United States.”
  • Broken Blade (Fallen Blade, Book One) by Kelly McCullough, read by Paul Boehmer for Tantor Audio (Mar 4) -- "Once a fabled Blade of Namara, Aral Kingslayer fought for justice and his goddess alongside his familiar, a living shadow called Triss. Now with their goddess murdered and her temple destroyed, they are among the last of their kind. Surviving on the fringes of society, Aral becomes a drunken, broken, and wanted man, working whatever shadowy deal comes his way. Until a mysterious woman hires him to deliver a secret message—one that can either redeem him or doom him."
  • Notes from the Internet Apocalypse by Wayne Gladstone (Thomas Dunne and Blackstone Audio, Mar 4, 2014) — “When the Internet suddenly stops working, society reels from the loss of flowing data and streaming entertainment. Addicts wander the streets talking to themselves in 140 characters or forcing cats to perform tricks for their amusement, while the truly desperate pin their requests for casual encounters on public bulletin boards. The economy tumbles and the government passes the draconian NET Recovery Act.” and: “An oddly heartfelt journey through the wasteland of a techno-collapse. Gladstone takes an admittedly far-fetched and off-putting story idea and breathes startling life into it. He gambles here, but he wins. Give it a read.” —Patton Oswalt
  • The Barrow by Mark Smylie (Pyr, March 4, 2014) — “In this debut novel, Mark Smylie gives the world he created in his “Artesia” comic books, a new life. We start with a band of dangerously endearing rogues, a magical map, and a dangerous search for a wizard’s sword. My sense of adventure is at the ready. Bring on the emotional manipulation and unabashed violence. I’m ready for an epic quest!” (via Omnivoracious)
  • Indexing by Seanan McGuire, read by Mary Robinette Kowal (March 4, 2014) — published in prose last year (May 21, 2013)
  • Teen: Death Sworn by Leah Cypess (Greenwillow, Mar 4, 2014) — YA fantasy
  • Kids: Knightley and Son By Rohan Gavin, Narrated By Greg Wagland for Audible for Bloomsbury (Mar 4) — “Sherlock Holmes meets Dirk Gently with a touch of Doctor Who – this brand-new comedy thriller delivers big laughs and big adventures with real heart.”
  • The Memory of Sky (A Novel of the Great Ship) by Robert Reed (Prime Books, March 5) -- "Diamond is an odd little boy, a seemingly fragile child - who proves to be anything but. An epic story begins when he steps into the world his parents have so carefully kept him from, a world where gigantic trees each house thousands of humans and another human species, the papio, rule its far edges. Does Diamond hold the promise to remake one species and, perhaps, change all of the Creation?"
  • Prince of Shadows by Rachel Caine (Tantor Audio, March 5) -- published in print/ebook early February, Caine's retelling of Romeo and Juliet: "In the Houses of Montague and Capulet, there is only one goal: power. The boys are born to fight and die for honor and—if they survive—marry for influence and money, not love. The girls are assets, to be spent wisely. Their wishes are of no import. Their fates are written on the day they are born."
  • Boy, Snow, Bird: A Novel by Oyeyemi, Helen (Riverhead, March 6, 2014) — “From the prizewinning author of Mr. Fox, the Snow White fairy tale brilliantly recast as a story of family secrets, race, beauty, and vanity. In the winter of 1953, Boy Novak arrives by chance in a small town in Massachusetts, looking, she believes, for beauty—the opposite of the life she’s left behind in New York. She marries a local widower and becomes stepmother to his winsome daughter, Snow Whitman. A wicked stepmother is a creature Boy never imagined she’d become, but elements of the familiar tale of aesthetic obsession begin to play themselves out when the birth of Boy’s daughter, Bird, who is dark-skinned, exposes the Whitmans as light-skinned African Americans passing for white. Among them, Boy, Snow, and Bird confront the tyranny of the mirror to ask how much power surfaces really hold. Dazzlingly inventive and powerfully moving, Boy, Snow, Bird is an astonishing and enchanting novel. With breathtaking feats of imagination, Helen Oyeyemi confirms her place as one of the most original and dynamic literary voices of our time.”
  • Blood and Iron (The Book of the Black Earth) by Jon Sprunk (Pyr, March 11, 2014)
  • The Fell Sword (The Traitor Son Cycle, #2) by Miles Cameron (Orbit, March 11) — sequel to The Red King
  • The Detainee by Peter Liney (Jo Fletcher Books, March 2014) — “Admittedly, I’ve developed a bad attitude toward dystopian stories lately. So it’s quite meaningful that one of the books I’m most looking forward to this year will find me begging for “punishment satellites” to protect me on a shanty-laden island where mainland residents ship their garbage. And since a massive economic collapse, “garbage” includes the weakest members of society — like “Big Guy” Clancy, former muscle for a crime boss.” (via Omnivoracious)
  • Resistance by Jenna Black (Mar 11, 2014)
  • Working God’s Mischief (Instrumentalities of the Night) by Glen Cook (Mar 11, 2014)
  • Mentats of Dune by Brian Herbert (March 11, 2014)
  • Ruins (Partials, #3) by Dan Wells (March 11, 2014)
  • Teen: Daughter of Chaos by Jen McConnel (Month9Books, March 11, 2014) — a new paranormal YA novel from the author of the Bloomsbury Spark-published The Secret of Isobel Key — description via IPG: “There comes a time in every witch’s life when she must choose her path. Darlena’s friends have already chosen, so why is it so hard for her to make up her mind? Now, Darlena is out of time. Under pressure from Hecate, the Queen of all witches, Darlena makes a rash decision to choose Red magic, a path no witch in her right mind would dare take. As a Red witch, she will be responsible for chaos and mayhem, drawing her deep into darkness. Will the power of Red magic prove too much for Darlena, or will she learn to control it before it’s too late?”
  • Fiction: The Weight of Blood: A Novel by Laura Mchugh (Spiegel & Grau, Mar 11, 2014) — “For fans of Gillian Flynn, Scott Smith, and Daniel Woodrell comes a gripping, suspenseful novel about two mysterious disappearances a generation apart in the town of Henbane, deep in the Ozark Mountains.”
  • A Man Came Out of a Door in the Mountain by Adrianne Harun, read by Dan John Miller for Tantor Audio (March 12) -- published in print by Penguin on Feb 25 — “In isolated British Columbia, girls, mostly native, are vanishing from the sides of a notorious highway. Leo Kreutzer and his four friends are barely touched by these disappearances—until a series of mysterious and troublesome outsiders come to town. Then it seems as if the devil himself has appeared among them.”
  • Deadroads by Robin Riopelle (Night Shade Books, Mar 17, 2014)
  • Anthology: The Time Traveler’s Almanac by Ann VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeer (Tor, Mar 18, 2014)
  • The Pilgrims (The Pendulum Trilogy) by Will Elliott (Tor, Mar 18, 2014)
  • The Lascar’s Dagger: The Forsaken Lands by Glenda Larke (Mar 18, 2014)
  • Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett (Random House Audio, Mar 18, 2014) — US release for the latest and 40th Discworld novel, in which “the Disc’s first train come steaming into town.”
  • All Our Yesterdays by Cristin Terrill, narrated by Meredith Mitchell for Tantor Audio (Mar 18) -- "'You have to kill him.' Imprisoned in the heart of a secret military base, Em has nothing except the voice of the boy in the cell next door and the list of instructions she finds taped inside the drain. Only Em can complete the final instruction. She's tried everything to prevent the creation of a time machine that will tear the world apart. She holds the proof: a list she has never seen before, written in her own hand. Each failed attempt in the past has led her to the same terrible present—imprisoned and tortured by a sadistic man called "the doctor" while war rages outside."
  • Fiction: Not for Nothing by Stephen Graham Jones (Dzanc, Mar 18, 2014) -- a second person novel about a down on his luck man starting over in his small hometown
  • The Midnight Witch by Brackston, Paula (Mar 25, 2014)
  • Raising Steam (Discworld) by Terry Pratchett (Mar 25, 2014)
  • Lockstep by Karl Schroeder (Mar 25, 2014)
  • The Burning Dark by Adam Christopher (Mar 25, 2014)
  • Dawn’s Early Light: A Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences Novel by Ballantine, Pip and Morris, Tee (Mar 25, 2014)
  • Truth and Fear (The Wolfhound Century) by Peter Higgins (Mar 25, 2014)
  • Written in My Own Heart’s Blood: A Novel (Outlander) by Gabaldon, Diana (Mar 25, 2014)
  • Sunstone (Heartwood) by Robertson, Freya (Angry Robot, Mar 25, 2014)
  • The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton (Mar 25, 2014)
  • Floating Boy and the Girl Who Couldn't Fly by Stephen Graham Jones and Paul Tremblay (ChiZine, Mar 25, 2014)
  • Fiction: Every Day Is for the Thief: Fiction by Cole, Teju (Mar 25, 2014)
  • You Might Be a Zombie and Other Bad News by Cracked.com, read by Johnny Heller for Tantor Audio (Mar 27) -- "Some facts are too terrifying to teach in school. Unfortunately, Cracked.com is more than happy to fill you in."
  • Fiction: Frog Music: A Novel by Donoghue, Emma (Mar 27, 2014) — “Emma Donoghue’s explosive new novel, based on an unsolved murder in 1876 San Francisco.”
  • Minding the Stars: The Early Jack Vance, Volume 4 edited by Terry Dowling and Jonathan Strahan (Subterranean Press, March 31)
  • Code Zero (Joe Ledger, #6) by Jonathan Maberry (March 2014)
  • Anthology: KAIJU RISING (Kickstarter, March 2014)
  • Dirtbags by Eryk Pruitt (Immortal Ink Publishing, March/April 2014) — “The blame for a county-wide murder spree lies at the feet of three people broken by a dying mill town: Calvin, a killer; London, a cook; and Rhonda, the woman who loves them both. Neither they, nor the reader, see the storm brewing until it’s too late in this Southern Gothic noir (or Southern neo-noir) that adds a transgressive, chicken-fried twist to a story ripped straight from the pages of a true crime novel.”

APRIL/MAY/JUNE 2014:

the-girl-in-the-road-monica-byrne 

  • The Revolutions by Felix Gilman (Tor, Apr 1, 2014) — “Following his spectacularly reviewed The Half-Made World duology, Felix Gilman pens a sweeping stand-alone tale of Victorian science fiction, space exploration, and planetary romance in The Revolutions.”
  • Reign of Ash (Book Two in the Ascendant Kingdoms Saga) by Gail Z. Martin (Orbit, April 1, 2014) — follow-on to Ice Forged
  • The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison (April 1, 2014)
  • Cauldron of Ghosts (Crown of Slaves) by David Weber (April 1, 2014)
  • Baltic Gambit: A Novel of the Vampire Earth by E.E. Knight (April 1, 2014)
  • Covenant: The Books of Raziel by Benulis, Sabrina (Apr 1, 2014)
  • Peacemaker: Foreigner #15 by Cherryh, C. J. (Apr 1, 2014)
  • Salvage by Alexandra Duncan (Greenwillow, Apr 1, 2014) — “a thrilling, surprising, and thought-provoking debut novel that will appeal to fans of Across the Universe, by Beth Revis, and The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood. This is literary science fiction with a feminist twist, and it explores themes of choice, agency, rebellion, and family. Ava, a teenage girl living aboard the male-dominated, conservative deep space merchant ship Parastrata, faces betrayal, banishment, and death. Taking her fate into her own hands, she flees to the Gyre, a floating continent of garbage and scrap in the Pacific Ocean. This is a sweeping and harrowing novel about a girl who can’t read or write or even withstand the forces of gravity. What choices will she make? How will she build a future on an earth ravaged by climate change? Named by the American Booksellers Association as a Spring 2014 Indies Introduce Pick.”
  • Poetry Collection: Reel to Reel (Phoenix Poets) by Alan Shapiro (University of Chicago Press, Apr 7, 2014) — “Reel to Reel, Alan Shapiro’s twelfth collection of poetry, moves outward from the intimate spaces of family and romantic life to embrace not only the human realm of politics and culture but also the natural world, and even the outer spaces of the cosmos itself. In language richly nuanced yet accessible, these poems inhabit and explore fundamental questions of existence, such as time, mortality, consciousness, and matter. How did we get here? Why is there something rather than nothing? How do we live fully and lovingly as conscious creatures in an unconscious universe with no ultimate purpose or destination beyond returning to the abyss that spawned us? Shapiro brings his humor, imaginative intensity, characteristic syntactical energy, and generous heart to bear on these ultimate mysteries. In ways few poets have done, he writes from a premodern, primal sense of wonder about our postmodern world.”
  • Steles of the Sky (The Eternal Sky) by Bear, Elizabeth (Apr 8, 2014)
  • The Word Exchange: A Novel by Graedon, Alena (Doubleday and Blackstone Audio, Apr 10, 2014) — “In the not-so-distant future, the forecasted “death of print” has become a near reality. Bookstores, libraries, newspapers, and magazines are essentially things of the past, as we spend our time glued to handheld devices called Memes that not only keep us in constant communication but have become so intuitive as to hail us cabs before we leave our offices, order takeout at the first growl of our stomachs, change traffic lights and interface with home appliances–even create and sell language itself in a marketplace called the Word Exchange.”
  • Shipstar by Larry Niven and Gregory Benford (Tor, April 8, 2014)
  • Dreams of Gods & Monsters (Daughter of Smoke & Bone, #3) by Laini Taylor (April 8, 2014)
  • The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by North, Claire (Redhook, Apr 8, 2014)
  • Teen: The Here and Now by Ann Brashares (Delacorte, Apr 8, 2014) — from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series comes “An unforgettable epic romantic thriller about a girl from the future who might be able to save the world . . . if she lets go of the one thing she’s found to hold on to.”
  • Tales of the Radiation Age by Jason Sheehan, read by Nick Podehl (Brilliance Audio, April 8, 2014) -- published first as a Kindle Serial in 2013 and coming to paperback in late February 2014 from 47North: "In a post-apocalyptic America that has shattered into a hundred perpetually warring fiefdoms, anyone with a loud voice and a doomsday weapon can be king (and probably has been). Duncan Archer—con man, carpetbagger, survivor—has found a way to somehow successfully navigate the end of the world, with its giant killer robots, radioactive mutants, mad scientists, rampant nanotechnology, armed gangs, sea monsters, and 101 unpleasant ways to die."
  • Transhuman by Ben Bova (April 15, 2014)
  • Hollow World by Michael J. Sullivan (Tachyon and Recorded Books, April 15, 2014)
  • House of Ivy & Sorrow by Natalie Whipple (Harper Teen, April 15, 2014)
  • Kids: The Forbidden Library by Django Wexler (Apr 15, 2014)
  • The Jupiter War (The Owner) by Neal Asher (Night Shade Books, Apr 21, 2014) -- US release, published in 2013 by Tor UK
  • The Serpent of Venice: A Novel by Moore, Christopher (Apr 22, 2014)
  • Murder by Sarah Pinborough (April 24, 2014)
  • The City Stained Red by Sam Sykes (Gollanz UK, 17 Apr 2014) — from the author of Tome of the Undergates
  • Lagoon by Nnedi Okorafor (Hodder & Stoughton, April 2014) — “The Nigerian megacity of Lagos is invaded by aliens, and it nearly consumes itself because of it.”
  • The Moon King by Neil Williamson (Newcon, April 2014) — Debut novel: “The story of The Moon King grew out of its setting, the sea-locked city of Glassholm, which is a thinly veneered version of Glasgow, Scotland where I live. Glasgow is a city of mood swings, brilliant with sun and warm sandstone one minute and dour with overcast and rain soaked tarmac the next. Summer days are long and filled with light. The winter months pass mostly in darkness. Living here, your spirit is tied to the city’s mood. As soon as I hooked that almost bipolar sense to the idea of natural cycles, the story blossomed. In Glassholm, the moon never sets and everything, from entropy to the moods of the populace, is affected by its phasing from Full to Dark and back to Full again. I wanted to know what would life be like there, what quirks nature might throw into the mix. And what would happen if it was discovered that the cyclic euphorias and depressions were not natural after all.”
  • Black Cloud by Juliet Escoria (April 2014)
  • Immolation (Children, #1) by Ben Peek (Tor UK, Spring 2014) is “set fifteen thousand years after the War of the Gods. The bodies of the gods now lie across the world, slowly dying as men and women awake with strange powers that are derived from their bodies. Ayae, a young cartographer’s apprentice, is attacked and discovers she cannot be harmed by fire. Her new power makes her a target for an army that is marching on her home. With the help of the immortal Zaifyr, she is taught the awful history of ‘cursed’ men and women, coming to grips with her new powers and the enemies they make. The saboteur Bueralan infiltrates the army that is approaching her home to learn its terrible secret. Split between the three points of view, Immolation‘s narrative reaches its conclusion during an epic siege, where Ayae, Zaifyr and Bueralan are forced not just into conflict with those invading, but with those inside the city who wish to do them harm.”
  • Unwrapped Sky by Rjurik Davidson (Tor, April 15, 2014) — “Caeli-Amur: a city torn by contradiction. A city of languorous philosopher-assassins and magnificent creatures from ancient myth: minotaurs and sirens. Three Houses rule over an oppressed citizenry stirring into revolt. The ruins of Caeli-Amur’s sister city lie submerged beneath the sea nearby, while the remains of strange advanced technology lie hidden in the tunnels beneath the city itself.”
  • Valour and Vanity by Mary Robinette Kowal (Tor, Apr 17, 2014) — in Kowal’s latest “Jane and Vincent” (a.k.a. “Shades of Milk and Honey” series) Regency fantasy she sets her sights on the heist novel. Color me VERY intrigued.
  • The Furies: A Thriller by Mark Alpert (April 22, 2014)
  • The Forever Watch by David Ramirez (Thomas Dunne, April 22, 2014) -- "All that is left of humanity is on a thousand-year journey to a new planet aboard one ship, The Noah, which is also carrying a dangerous serial killer..." The novel is to be published in early May in the UK by Hoddard (with a fantastic cover)
  • Teen: The Inventor’s Secret by Andrea Cremer (Philomel, Apr 22, 2014) — “In this world, sixteen-year-old Charlotte and her fellow refugees have scraped out an existence on the edge of Britain’s industrial empire. Though they live by the skin of their teeth, they have their health (at least when they can find enough food and avoid the Imperial Labor Gatherers) and each other. When a new exile with no memory of his escape or even his own name seeks shelter in their camp he brings new dangers with him and secrets about the terrible future that awaits all those who have struggled has to live free of the bonds of the empire’s Machineworks. The Inventor’s Secret is the first book of a YA steampunk series set in an alternate nineteenth-century North America where the Revolutionary War never took place and the British Empire has expanded into a global juggernaut propelled by marvelous and horrible machinery. Perfect for fans of Libba Bray’s The Diviners, Cassandra Clare’s Clockwork Angel, Scott Westerfeld’s Leviathan and Phillip Reeve’s Mortal Engines."
  • Stay God, Sweet Angel by Nik Korpon (Perfect Edge, Apr 25, 2014) -- "Damon lives a content life, playing video games and dealing drugs from his second-hand store while his girlfriend, Mary, drops constant hints about marriage. If only he could tell her his name isn't really Damon. If only he could tell her who he really is. But after he witnesses a friend's murder, a scarlet woman glides into his life, offering the solution to all of his problems. His carefully constructed existence soon shatters like crystal teardrops and he must determine which ghosts won't stay buried - and which ones are trying to kill him - if he wants to learn why Mary has disappeared."
  • Thornlost (Glass Thorns) by Rawn, Melanie (Apr 29, 2014)
  • Peacemaker by Marianne De Pierres (Angry Robot, Apr 29, 2014)
  • Morningside Fall (Legends of the Duskwalker, Book 2) by Jay Posey (Angry Robot, Apr 29, 2014) — Second after 2013 debut novel Three: “Stark and powerful, THREE is a stunning debut. Reinventing the post-apocalyptic western as a journey across interior badlands as dangerous as the cyborg-haunted terrain his hero must cross, Posey has crafted a story that is impossible to put down.” — Richard E. Dansky, author of Snowbird Gothic
  • Grunt Life: A Task Force Ombra Novel by Weston Ochse (Apr 29, 2014
  • A Certain Exposure by Jolene Tan (Epigram Books, April 2014)
  • Non-Fiction: New Skills for Frazzled Parents by Dr. Daniel Amen, read by Stefan Rudnicki for Blackstone Audio (April 2014) -- From narrator Rudnicki: "This is a book every parent needs to read or listen to. A few kids could listen in. It's not difficult to understand, but it is life-changing. This book, and a few others coming up, are a Skyboat Media co-publication with Blackstone Audio. Look for this one on Downpour.com and elsewhere in April."
  • Afterparty by Daryl Gregory (TOR, April 2014) — “Before the first chapter even begins, there’s religion, drugs, and suicide — all presented in a crisp, engaging writing style that itself threatens to be addictive. Set in the near-future in a world in which smart drug recipes are opensourced, one church uses dependency on their sacriment, a mind-altering narcotic called “Numinous,” to keep followers in line. One of the drug’s creators tries to undo the damage. I’m so hooked!” (via Omnivoracious)
  • Authority: A Novel (The Southern Reach Trilogy) by Jeff VanderMeer (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, May 6, 2014) — “The bone-chilling, hair-raising second installment of the Southern Reach Trilogy. For thirty years, a secret agency called the Southern Reach has monitored expeditions into Area X—a remote and lush terrain mysteriously sequestered from civilization. After the twelfth expedition, the Southern Reach is in disarray, and John Rodriguez (aka “Control”) is the team’s newly appointed head. From a series of interrogations, a cache of hidden notes, and more than two hundred hours of profoundly troubling video footage, the secrets of Area X begin to reveal themselves—and what they expose pushes Control to confront disturbing truths about both himself and the agency he’s promised to serve.”
  • The Causal Angel by Hannu Rajaniemi (Tor, May 6, 2014) — Follow-on to The Quantum Thief and The Fractal Prince: “With his infectious love of storytelling in all its forms, his rich characterization and his unrivaled grasp of thrillingly bizarre cutting-edge science, Hannu Rajaniemi swiftly set a new benchmark for SF in the 21st century. Now, with his third novel, he completes the tale of the many lives, and minds, of gentleman rogue Jean de Flambeur.”
  • The Sea Without a Shore by David Drake (May 6, 2014) — Lt. Leary series
  • The Crimson Campaign (The Powder Mage Trilogy, Book 2) by Brian McClellan (Orbit, May 6, 2014)
  • Midnight Crossroad by Charlaine Harris (May 6) — “The first novel in this supernaturally nuanced trilogy has me curious to see what Charlaine Harris is immersing herself in now that Sookie has ridden off into the sunset. Not much information on Charlaine’s website, just that it’s set in a ‘mysterious Texas town.’” (via Paul Goat Allen’s “The Most Anticipated Sci-fi and Fantasy Releases of 2014″ for Barnes & Noble)
  • The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Steadfast by Jack Campbell (May 6)
  • The Falconer (The Falconer, #1) by Elizabeth May (May 6, 2014) — US release for fantasy novel published in 2013 in the UK
  • The Silk Map: A Gaunt and Bone Novel by Willrich, Chris (Pyr, May 6, 2014)
  • Graphic novel: All You Need Is Kill: The Graphic Novel by Nick Mamatas, Lee Ferguson, Fajar Buana, and Zack Turner, based on the novel by Hiroshi Sakurazaka (VIZ Media/Haikasoru, May 6, 2014)
  • After the End (After the End, #1) by Amy Plum (May 6, 2014)
  • The Oversight by Fletcher, Charlie (Orbit, May 6, 2014) — “Once there were hundreds of members of the Oversight, the brave souls who guard the borders between the mundane and the magic. Now there are only five. When a vagabond brings a screaming girl to the Oversight’s London headquarters, she could answer their hopes for new recruit, or she could be the instrument of their downfall.”
  • Mirror Sight: Book Five of Green Rider by Britain, Kristen (May 6, 2014)
  • King of Ashes: Book One of The War of Five Crowns by Raymond E. Feist (May 6, 2014)
  • The Bees: A Novel by Laline Paull (Ecco, May 6, 2014) — “The Handmaid’s Tale meets The Hunger Games in this brilliantly imagined debut set in an anciet culture where only the queen may breed and deformity means death.”
  • Fiction: Wonderland by D’Erasmo, Stacey (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, May 6, 2014) — “This breakout novel from a brilliant stylist—dropping us into the life a female rock star—centers on that moment when we decide whether to go all-in or give up our dreams.”
  • Queen of the Dark Things: A Novel by C. Robert Cargill (Harper Voyager, May 13, 2014) — follow-on to Dreams and Shadows
  • Dead but Not Forgotten By Charlaine Harris (editor), Toni L. P. Kelner (editor) with stories by MaryJanice Davidson, Seanan McGuire, and more (Audible Frontiers, May 13, 2014) — “Charlaine Harris’ smash-hit Sookie Stackhouse series may have reached its conclusion, but the world of Bon Temps, Louisiana, lives on in this all-new collection of 15 stories.”
  • Renegade (MILA 2.0, #2) by Debra Drizza (May 13, 2014)
  • Fiction: The Last Illusion: A Novel by Porochista Khakpour (Bloomsbury USA, May 13, 2014)
  • Sworn in Steel: A Tale of the Kin by Douglas Hulick (May 6, 2014)
  • Jade Sky by Patrick Freivald (JournalStone, May 16) — via K.H. Vaughan on a SF Signal Mind Meld of “books we can’t wait to read in 2014″ — “Matt Rowley hasn’t been human for years. A commando for the International Council on Augmented Phenomena, he hunts down superhuman monsters the military can’t handle. But his abilities come with a price: bloodthirsty whispers that urge him to acts of terrible violence. An encounter with a giant, angelic being with wings of smoke and shadow casts him into a world of inhuman brutality, demonic possession, and madness, where he must choose between his family and his soul.”
  • The Three: A Novel by Sarah Lotz (Little, Brown and Company, May 20, 2014) — “Four simultaneous plane crashes. Three child survivors. A religious fanatic who insists the three are harbingers of the apocalypse. What if he’s right?” — Lotz is South African novelist I first heard about either from Lauren Beukes (and later forgot) and most recently from Nnedi Okorafor’s fine essay African Science Fiction is Still Alien
  • The Severed Streets by Cornell, Paul (May 20, 2014)
  • The Man with the Compound Eyes: A Novel by Ming-Yi, Wu (May 20, 2014) — published last year in a more limited release by Harvill Secker, a Taiwanese eco-dystopia: “We haven’t read anything like this novel. Ever. South America gave us magical realism – what is Taiwan giving us? A new way of telling our new reality, beautiful, entertaining, frightening, preposterous, true. Completely unsentimental but never brutal, Wu Ming-Yi treats human vulnerability and the world’s vulnerability with fearless tenderness” — Ursula Le Guin
  • A Dance of Shadows (Shadowdance) by David Dalglish (May 20, 2014)
  • Cyador’s Heirs (Saga of Recluce) by L. E. Modesitt (May 20, 2014)
  • She, Sniper by Hunter, Stephen (May 20, 2014) — a thriller which gets on my list by dint of being narrated by Mary Robinette Kowal
  • Defenders by McIntosh, Will (May 27, 2014)
  • Artemis Awakening by Jane Lindskold (Tor, May 27, 2014)
  • Thief’s Magic (Millennium’s Rule) by Trudi Canavan (May 27, 2014)
  • City of Heavenly Fire (The Mortal Instruments, #6) by Cassandra Clare (May 27, 2014)
  • The Girl in the Road by Monica Byrne (Random House/Crown, May 2014) — “traces the harrowing twin journeys of two women forced to flee their homes in different times in the near future. The first, Meena, is a Brahmin-caste student whose odyssey takes her from the coastal city of Mumbai toward Djibouti across a futuristic but treacherous bridge that spans the Arabian Sea. The second, Mariama, escapes from slavery as a small child in Mauritania, joining a caravan heading across Saharan Africa toward Ethiopia.” A big-name blurb is in from none less than Kim Stanley Robinson: “The Girl in the Road is a brilliant novel–vivid, intense, and fearless with a kind of savage joy. These journeys–Meena’s across the Arabian Sea and Mariama’s across Africa–are utterly unforgettable.”
  • My Real Children by Jo Walton (Tor, May 2014) — “story about one woman and the two lives that she might lead”
  • The River of Souls by Robert McCammon (Subterranean Press, May 31, 2014) -- via Nathan Ballingrud, the latest installment in the Matthew Corbett series of historical thrillers: "The year is 1703. The place: the Carolina settlement of Charles Town. . Matthew Corbett, professional “problem solver,” has accepted a lucrative, if unusual, commission: escorting a beautiful woman to a fancy dress ball. What should be a pleasant assignment takes a darker turn when Matthew becomes involved in a murder investigation. A sixteen-year-old girl has been stabbed to death on the grounds of a local plantation. The suspected killer is a slave who has escaped, with two family members, into the dubious protection of a nearby swamp. Troubled by certain discrepancies and determined to see some sort of justice done, Matthew joins the hunt for the runaway slaves. He embarks on a treacherous journey up the Solstice River, also known as the River of Souls.  He discovers that something born of the swamp has joined the hunt… and is stalking the hunters with more than murder in mind. What follows is a shattering ordeal encompassing snakes, alligators, exiled savages, mythical beasts, and ordinary human treachery. The journey up the River of Souls will test the limits of Matthew’s endurance, and lead him through a nightmarish passage to a confrontation with his past, and a moment that will alter his life forever. Gripping, unsettling, and richly atmospheric, The River of Souls is a masterful historical adventure featuring the continuing exploits of a young hero the USA Character Approved Blog has called 'the Early American James Bond.'"
  • Sword of the North (The Grim Company, Book 2) by Luke Scull (Roc Hardcover, June 1) — “In The Grim Company, Luke Scull introduced a formidable and forbidding band of anti-heroes battling against ruthless Magelords and monstrous terrors. The adventure continues as the company—now broken—face new dangers on personal quests….”
  • Veil of the Deserters (Bloodsounder’s Arc #2) by Jeff Salyards (Night Shade Books, June 3, 2014)
  • Ruin and Rising (The Grisha, #3) by Leigh Bardugo (Jun 3, 2014)
  • Mr. Mercedes: A Novel by King, Stephen (Scribner, Jun 3, 2014)
  • The Merchant Emperor (The Symphony of Ages) by Elizabeth Haydon (Jun 3, 2014)
  • On Her Watch (Don’t Tell) by Rie Warren (Jun 3, 2014) — “The year is 2070 and all hell has broken lose. The rebellion has started and the government is trying desperately to regain control of the territories formerly known as the United States.”
  • Non-Fiction: Wild Connection: What Animal Courtship and Mating Tells Us about Human Relationships by Jennifer L. Verdolin (Prometheus Books, Jun 3) -- "A specialist in animal behavior compares the courtship rituals and mating behaviors of animals to their human equivalents, revealing the many and often surprising ways we are both similar to and different from other species."
  • Cibola Burn (The Expanse) by Corey, James S. A. (Jun 5, 2014)
  • Blood Will Follow by Snorri Kristjansson (Jo Fletcher Books, Jun 5) -- follow-on to Swords of Good Men
  • California Bones by Greg van Eekhout (Tor, Jun 10, 2014)
  • The Leopard by K.V. Johansen (Pyr, June 10, 2014) — “Part one of a two-book epic fantasy, set in a world as richly drawn as J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, but with Mideastern and Eastern flavors.” (via The BiblioSanctum)
  • Memory of Water: A Novel by Emmi Itäranta (Harper Voyager, Jun 10, 2014) — “An amazing, award-winning speculative fiction debut novel by a major new talent, in the vein of Ursula K. Le Guin. Global warming has changed the world’s geography and its politics. Wars are waged over water, and China rules Europe, including the Scandinavian Union, which is occupied by the power state of New Qian. In this far north place, seventeen-year-old Noria Kaitio is learning to become a tea master like her father, a position that holds great responsibility and great secrets. Tea masters alone know the location of hidden water sources, including the natural spring that Noria’s father tends, which once provided water for her whole village.”
  • The Girl with All the Gifts by M.J. Carey (Orbit, June 10, 2014) — “Melanie is a very special girl. Dr Caldwell calls her ‘our little genius’. Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don’t like her. She jokes that she won’t bite, but they don’t laugh.” — link to cover
  • Head Full of Mountains by Brent Hayward (ChiZine, Jun 15, 2014) — “When Crospinal’s ailing father dies, he is left utterly alone in the pen, surrounded by encroaching darkness. The machines that tended to him as a child have long ago vanished, and the apparitions that kept Crospinal company are now silenced. Struggling with his congenital issues, outfitted in a threadbare uniform, he has little choice but to leave what was once his home, soon discovering that nothing in the outside world is how he had been told it would be. In his quest for meaning and understanding, and the contact of another, Crospinal learns truths about himself, about his father, and about the last bastion of humanity, trapped with him at the end of time.”
  • Shattered: The Iron Druid Chronicles by Kevin Hearne (Jun 17, 2014)
  • Teen: Dark Metropolis by Jaclyn Dolamore (Disney Hyperion, Jun 17, 2014)
  • The Long Mars: A Novel (Long Earth) by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter (Jun 17, 2014) -- had been called "The Long Childhood" but new title looks confirmed
  • The Quick: A Novel by Lauren Owen (Random House, Jun 17, 2014) — “An astonishing debut, a novel of epic scope and suspense that conjures up all the magic and menace of Victorian London”
  • The Blasted Lands (Seven Forges, Book 2) by James A. Moore (Osprey, June 24, 2014) -- "The Empire of Fellein is in mourning. The Emperor is dead, and the armies of the empire have grown soft. Merros Dulver, their newly-appointed – and somewhat reluctant – commander, has been tasked with preparing them to fight the most savage enemy the world has yet seen. Meanwhile, a perpetual storm ravages the Blasted Lands, and a new threat is about to arise – the Broken are coming, and with them only Death."
  • Prince of Fools (The Red Queen’s War, #1) by Mark Lawrence (Ace, June 2014)
  • Anthology: The End is Nigh: The Apocalypse Triptych #1 edited by John Joseph Adams and Hugh Howey (June 2014) — via io9, “Contributors include Nancy Kress, Paolo Bacigalupi, Daniel Wilson, Elizabeth Bear, and many other incredible authors (full disclosure: io9 editor Charlie Jane Anders and myself (Annalee Newitz) are also contributing stories).”

JULY 2014 and LATER:

the-magicians-land-cover

  • All Those Vanished Engines by Paul Park (Tor, Jul 1, 2014)
  • The Rhesus Chart (A Laundry Files Novel) by Charles Stross (Jul 1, 2014)
  • Tower Lord (A Raven’s Shadow Novel) by Anthony Ryan (Jul 1, 2014)
  • The Shadow Throne: Book Two of the Shadow Campaigns by Django Wexler (Jul 1, 2014)
  • Shattering the Ley by Palmatier, Joshua (DAW Hardcover, Jul 1, 2014)
  • Unwept: Book One of The Nightbirds by Tracy Hickman and Laura Hickman (Jul 1, 2014)
  • How to Tell Toledo from the Night Sky by Lydia Netzer, read by Joshilynn Jackson (St. Martin’s Press / Macmillan Audio, July 1) — Netzer’s follow-on to her brilliant 2012 novel Shine Shine Shine, reunited with the same fine narrator
  • Skin Game (The Dresden Files #15) by Jim Butcher (Roc, July 3, 2014)
  • Armada by Ernest Cline (July 3) — “Cline wowed the world with Ready Player One in 2011, a brilliant debut that was pure geek gold: a glorious fusion of near future science fiction, epic fantasy quest, and unlikely love story, that above all else is an homage to the 1980s. Millions of readers worldwide have been anxiously awaiting his second novel, which evidently chronicles the adventures of a video game geek named Zack, who is conscripted into a top-secret government program and must save the world from an alien invasion.” (via Paul Goat Allen’s “The Most Anticipated Sci-fi and Fantasy Releases of 2014″ for Barnes & Noble)
  • Half a King by Joe Abercrombie (Del Rey, July 8, 2014) — “A classic coming-of-age tale, set in a brilliantly imagined alternative historical world reminiscent of the Dark Ages with Viking overtones, the book tells the story of Yarvi, youngest son of a warlike king. Born with a crippled hand, he can never live up to his father’s expectations of what a real man should be and his destiny is not the throne but the Ministry, not the sword and shield but the book and the soft word spoken.”
  • Resistance by Samit Basu (Titan, Jul 8, 2014) — follow-on to Turbulence
  • A Plunder of Souls (The Thieftaker Chronicles) by D. B. Jackson (Jul 8, 2014)
  • The Return of the Discontinued Man (A Burton & Swinburne Adventure) by Mark Hodder (Jul 8, 2014)
  • The Path to Power (The Tarnished Crown Series) by Miller, Karen (Jul 8, 2014)
  • California: A Novel by Edan Lepucki (Little, Brown and Company, Jul 8, 2014) — “The world Cal and Frida have always known is gone, and they’ve left the crumbling city of Los Angeles far behind them. They now live in a shack in the wilderness, working side-by-side to make their days tolerable despite the isolation and hardships they face. Consumed by fear of the future and mourning for a past they can’t reclaim, they seek comfort and solace in one other. But the tentative existence they’ve built for themselves is thrown into doubt when Frida finds out she’s pregnant.”
  • Collection: Her Husband’s Hands and Other Stories by Adam-Troy Castro (Prime Books, July 8, 2014)
  • Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Sweterlitsch, Thomas (Jul 10, 2014) — “A decade has passed since the city of Pittsburgh was reduced to ash. While the rest of the world has moved on, losing itself in the noise of a media-glutted future, survivor John Dominic Blaxton remains obsessed with the past. Grieving for his wife and unborn child who perished in the blast, Dominic relives his lost life by immersing in the Archive—a fully interactive digital reconstruction of Pittsburgh, accessible to anyone who wants to visit the places they remember and the people they loved. Dominic investigates deaths recorded in the Archive to help close cases long since grown cold, but when he discovers glitches in the code surrounding a crime scene—the body of a beautiful woman abandoned in a muddy park that he’s convinced someone tried to delete from the Archive—his cycle of grief is shattered.”
  • Full Fathom Five by Max Gladstone (Tor, Jul 15, 2014)
  • The High Druid’s Blade: The Defenders of Shannara by Terry Brooks, narrated by Simon Vance (Del Rey, July 15) -- postponed from its original March release date; the second book, The Darkling Child, will publish in August 2015
  • The Book of Life (All Souls Trilogy, #3) by Deborah Harkness (July 15, 2014)
  • The Outsorcerer’s Apprentice by Holt, Tom (Jul 15, 2014)
  • Foxglove Summer by Ben Aaronovitch (Gollancz, 17 Jul 2014) -- the fifth book in the Peter Grant series, with a sixth on the way next year, and contracted for books 7 and 8
  • The Seventh Miss Hatfield by Anna Caltabiano (Gollancz, July 21) -- debut novel from 17-year-old author Caltabiano which "follows Rebecca, a young American unhappy with her life.  When her mysterious neighbour Miss Hatfield invites her in, Rebecca isn’t entirely sure why she says yes. A short while later, Rebecca becomes immersed in her neighbour’s peculiar world – not only does she discover that Miss Hatfield is immortal, but that she has century-spanning plans, which will soon involve Rebecca."
  • Magic Breaks (Kate Daniels) by Ilona Andrews (Jul 29, 2014)
  • Teen: The Young World by Weitz, Chris (Jul 29, 2014)
  • The Islands of Chaldea by Diana Wynne Jones and Ursula Jones (Greenwillow, Summer 2014) — “Fans of the late writer Diana Wynne Jones – who died in March 2011 – are in for an unexpected treat. In the summer of 2014, Greenwillow will publish a new title from the acclaimed science fiction and fantasy author. Titled The Islands of Chaldea, the book is a standalone novel unconnected to any of the author’s earlier works. It is also the result of an unusual, asynchronous collaboration between the writer and her younger sister, Ursula Jones.”
  • World of Trouble: The Last Policeman, Book 3 by Ben H. Winters (Quirk Books, July 2014) — the third and concluding book in Winters’ Edgar Award winning and Philip K. Dick Award nominated Last Policeman trilogy
  • The Magician’s Land by Lev Grossman (Viking Adult, August 5, 2014) — book three after The Magicians and The Magician King – “The stunning conclusion to the New York Times bestselling Magicians trilogy. Quentin Coldwater has been cast out of Fillory, the secret magical land of his childhood dreams. With nothing left to lose he returns to where his story began, the Brakebills Preparatory College of Magic. But he can’t hide from his past, and it’s not long before it comes looking for him. Along with Plum, a brilliant young undergraduate with a dark secret of her own, Quentin sets out on a crooked path through a magical demimonde of gray magic and desperate characters. But all roads lead back to Fillory, and his new life takes him to old haunts, like Antarctica, and to buried secrets and old friends he thought were lost forever. He uncovers the key to a sorcery masterwork, a spell that could create magical utopia, a new Fillory—but casting it will set in motion a chain of events that will bring Earth and Fillory crashing together. To save them he will have to risk sacrificing everything. The Magician’s Land is an intricate thriller, a fantastical epic, and an epic of love and redemption that brings the Magicians trilogy to a magnificent conclusion, confirming it as one of the great achievements in modern fantasy. It’s the story of a boy becoming a man, an apprentice becoming a master, and a broken land finally becoming whole.”
  • The Galaxy Game by Karen Lord (Del Rey, Aug 5, 2014)
  • The Fifth Season (The Broken Earth) by Jemisin, N. K. (Orbit, Aug 5, 2014) — “This is the way the world ends. Again.”
  • Revenant by Kat Richardson (August 5) — “The ninth installment of Richardson’s Greywalker saga, featuring private investigator Harper Blaine, should be a blockbuster of a novel. I absolutely loved this series, which blends hardboiled mystery with supernatural fiction and is comparable to the work of classic writers including Raymond Chandler and Algernon Blackwood. With the conclusion of this series looming, I’m curious to see where Richardson takes her iconic protagonist.” (via Paul Goat Allen’s “The Most Anticipated Sci-fi and Fantasy Releases of 2014″ for Barnes & Noble)
  • The Widow’s House (The Dagger and the Coin) by Abraham, Daniel (Aug 5, 2014)
  • The House of the Four Winds (Dragon Prophecy) by Mercedes Lackey and James Mallory (Aug 5, 2014)
  • The Great Abraham Lincoln Pocket Watch Conspiracy: A Novel by Jacopo della Quercia (St. Martin’s Griffin, Aug 5, 2014)
  • Dark Lightning by John Varley (Ace, Aug 5) -- "On a voyage to New Earth, the starship Rolling Thunder is powered by an energy no one understands, except for its eccentric inventor Jubal Broussard. Like many of the ship’s inhabitants, Jubal rests in a state of suspended animation for years at a time, asleep yet never aging."
  • Fish Tails: A Novel by Sheri S. Tepper (Harper Voyager, Aug 5, 2014)
  • Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and his Years of Pilgrimage: A novel by Haruki Murakami and translated by Philip Gabriel (Knopf, Aug 12, 2014) — Published in Japan last year: “Tsukuru Tazaki’s life was irreparably changed when his relationships with his high school best friends became severed during Tsukuru’s college days. Now at 35, Tsukuru’s girlfriend Sara suggested to Tsukuru to go and talk to these high school friends in person to mend the relationships, and to discover the real reason behind the friends’ decision to reject Tsukuru. Tsukuru visited his friends in Nagoya and Finland one by one, and uncovers the real reason as to why their relations were broken off.”
  • Radiance by Catherynne M. Valente (Tor, Aug 12, 2014)
  • Fool’s Assassin by Robin Hobb (Aug 12, 2014)
  • The Broken Eye (Lightbringer #3) by Brent Weeks (Orbit, August 26, 2014)
  • Lock In by John Scalzi (Tor, Aug 26, 2014)
  • The Getaway God (Sandman Slim) by Richard Kadrey (Aug 26, 2014)
  • The Chaplain’s War by Brad Torgersen (Baen, 2014) — debut novel
  • The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin, translated by Ken Liu (Tor Books, 2014) — the first of an announced trilogy of translated editions of this 400,000-copy-selling Chinese sf series
  • Frostborn (Thrones & Bones #1) by Lou Anders (Random House Children’s Books, August 2014) — longtime Pyr editor Anders’ debut novel, a young reader book which “introduces Karn, who would rather be playing the board game Thrones and Bones, and Thianna, half-frost giant, half-human, who team up when they are chased by wyverns, a dead Viking sea captain, and a 1200-year-old dragon.”
  • Acceptance: A Novel (The Southern Reach Trilogy) by Jeff VanderMeer (Sep 1, 2014)
  • City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett (Crown/Broadway and Recorded Books, September 9, 2014) — “a second-world story of spies, subterfuge, and statesmanship set in a nation of dead gods.” — latest IndieBound and Amazon listings
  • Anthology: Phantasm Japan: Fantasies Light and Dark, From and About Japan edited by Nick Mamatas (Haikasoru, Sep 16, 2014) — another original trade paperback anthology edited by Mamatas for VIZ Media’s Haikasoru sf/f prose imprint after 2012′s well-received The Future is Japanese
  • Clash of Eagles by Alan Smale (Del Rey, 2014) — “His novella of a Roman invasion of ancient America, “A Clash of Eagles” in the Panverse Two anthology (edited by Dario Ciriello), won the 2010 Sidewise Award for Alternate History, and he has recently sold a trilogy of novels set in the same universe. The first book, CLASH OF EAGLES, will appear from Del Rey in 2014.”
  • Deadly Curiosities by Gail Z. Martin (Solaris, Summer 2014) — “It’s official! I’ll be writing a new urban fantasy novel for Solaris Books called “Deadly Curiosities” (from my short story universe of the same name) that will come out in summer, 2014!”
  • The Scorched Earth by Drew Karpyshyn (Summer 2014) — sequel to 2013 novel Children of Fire
  • Echopraxia by Peter Watts (August 16, 2014) — “We are going to the Sun, rs and Ks. Whereas the last time out we froze in the infinite Lovecraftian darkness of the Oort, now we are diving into the very heart of the solar system— and man, there’s gonna be a hot time in the ol’ town tonight.”
  • All That Outer Space Allows (The Apollo Quartet, Book 4) by Ian Sales (Whippleshield, August 2014) -- "I plan to have copies available for Loncon 3 in August, but we’ll see how the research and writing goes. I suspect it may be the hardest of the four to write – and Then Will The Great Ocean Wash Deep Above was no picnic… Meanwhile, I have a bunch of other projects on the go."
  • Anthology: Burnt Tongues edited by Chuck Palahniuk, Richard Thomas, and Dennis Widmyer (Medallion Press, August 2014) -- "This collection of transgressive short stories will be out in August. Cover art by Jay Shaw. With an introduction by Chuck Palaniuk. Stories by Neil Krolicki, Chris Lewis Carter, Gayle Towell, Tony Liebhard, Michael De Vito, Jr., Tyler Jones, Phil Jourdan, Richard Lemmer, Amanda Gowin, Matt Egan, Fred Venturini, Brandon Tietz, Adam Skorupskas, Bryan Howie, Brien Piechos, Jason M. Fylan, Terence James Eeles, Keith Buie, Gus Moreno, and Daniel W. Broallt."
  • Consumed: A Novel by David Cronenberg (Sep 2, 2014) — debut novel from the acclaimed filmmaker: “the story of two journalists whose entanglement in a French philosopher’s death becomes a surreal journey into global conspiracy.”
  • The Mirror Empire (Worldbreaker Saga, Book 1) by Kameron Hurley (Angry Robot, September 2014) -- "On the eve of a recurring catastrophic event known to extinguish nations and reshape continents, a troubled orphan evades death and slavery to uncover her own bloody past… while a world goes to war with itself."
  • The Winter Long (October Daye, #8) by Seanan McGuire (September 2014)
  • Mortal Beauty (Immortal Game, #1) by Ann Aguirre (September 2014)
  • Kids: The Eighth Continent by Matt London (Razorbill, September 2014) — via PW Book Deals: “Debut novelist Matt London sold his middle-grade series, the 8th Continent, to Gillian Levinson at Razorbill. Agent Sara Crowe at Harvey Klinger handled the three-book, world-rights deal for the author. Razorbill said the humorous series was pitched as “Despicable Me meets Where in the World Is Carmen San Diego?”; it follows a brother and sister trying to turn the Great Pacific Garbage Patch into “a utopic eighth continent.””
  • Hawk by Steven Brust (Tor, Oct 7, 2014)
  • Broken Soul by Faith Hunter (Oct 7, 2014) -- presumably the next Jane Yellowrock book
  • Those Above by Daniel Polansky (Hodder & Stoughton, Oct 9, 2014) -- "You've seen him do crime - low fantasy by way of HBO's The Wire. You knew it as Low Town, the crime-ridden city where only death is certain. But you've never seen him do epic fantasy. Until now. From the acclaimed author of THE STRAIGHT RAZOR CURE comes this spectacular new series - epic fantasy, as only Daniel Polansky can imagine it."
  • Graphic Novel: In Real Life by Cory Doctorow and Jen Wang (First Second, Oct 14, 2014) -- from the announcement: "a graphic novel about gaming and gold farming for young adults based on Doctorow's award-winning story Anda's Game, adapted by Jen Wang, creator of the amazing graphic novel Koko Be Good."
  • Kids: Centaur Rising by Jane Yolen (Henry Holt, Oct 21, 2014)
  • A Vision of Fire by Gillian Anderson and Jeff Rovin (Simon451, October 2014) — “first in the EarthEnd trilogy” by the X-Files actress and her co-author Rovin
  • The Undying by Ethan Reid (Simon451, October 2014) — a dystopia
  • Chimpanzee by Darin Bradley (Resurrection House, Fall 2014) — “a delightfully weird existential near-fi conspiracy theory romance”
  • Heraclix and Pomp by Forrest Aguirre (Resurrection House, Fall 2014) — “an alternative history fantasy set in the Eastern Europe. It features a golem, a faery, and a mad scientist (well, more of 17th century alchemist/demonologist, but it’s the same trope)”
  • Rooms by Lauren Oliver (Fall 2014)
  • Collection: The Nickronomicon by Nick Mamatas (Inssmouth Free Press, Fall/Winter 2014) — collects all of Mamatas’ Lovecraft-inspired fiction into a single volume, including a new, never-before-published novella, titled “On the Occasion of My Retirement.”
  • Anthology: Shattered Shields edited by Jennifer Brozek and Bryan Thomas Schmidt (Baen, Nov 4) — a military fantasy anthology with headliners Glen Cook (Black Company), Larry Correia, John Marco, Elizabeth Moon (new Paksenarrion), David Farland (new Runelords), Catherine Asaro, Sarah A. Hoyt, Robin Wayne Bailey.
  • Anthology: The End is Now: The Apocalypse Triptych #2 edited by John Joseph Adams and Hugh Howey (December 2014) — via io9

UNDATED or 2015:

  • Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh, read by the author for Simon & Schuster Audio — out in print/ebook in late October 2013
  • Anthology: Carbide Tipped Pens edited by Ben Bova and Eric Choi (Tor, 2014) -- a an original hard sf anthology with stories from Gregory Benford, Nancy Fulda, Aliette de Bodard, Liu Cixin (translated by Ken Liu), Daniel H. Wilson, and more
  • All the Worlds Against Us (Jon and Lobo) by Mark L. Van Name (Baen) — Audible Frontiers has produced the previous books in the series, under fantastic narrations by Tom Stechschulte
  • Tsarina by J. Nelle Patrick (2014)
  • The Thousand and One: Book II of The Crescent Moon Kingdoms by Saladin Ahmed (2014?)
  • Sleeping Late on Judgement Day (Bobby Dollar #3) by Tad Williams (DAW, 2014) -- I've thoroughly enjoyed the first two Bobby Dollar books (The Dirty Streets of Heaven and Happy Hour in Hell) and am looking forward to finally finding out what the hell is going on among the big powers.
  • Ebon (Pegasus, #2) by Robin McKinley (2014?)
  • The Doors of Stone (Kingkiller Chronicle #3) by Patrick Rothfuss (DAW, 2014?)
  • Shadows of Self (Mistborn, #5) by Brandon Sanderson (Tor, 2014?)
  • Edge of Eternity (The Century Trilogy #3) by Ken Follett (2014?)
  • The Winds of Winter (A Song of Ice and Fire, #6) by George R.R. Martin (2015?)
  • The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi (Knopf, 2015) — “Knopf has acquired a new novel by Paolo Bacigalupi, the science fiction writer whose 2009 book “The Windup Girl” sold 200,000 copies and was considered one of the top novels of the year. The new book, “The Water Knife,” is set in a lawless, water-starved American Southwest in the not-too-distant future.”
  • Because You’ll Never Meet Me by Leah Thomas (Bloomsbury USA, 2015) — first novel from 2010 Clarion Workshop graduate
  • The Philosopher’s Zombie by Robert J. Sawyer (April 2015)
  • Anthology: The End has Come: The Apocalypse Triptych #3 edited by John Joseph Adams and Hugh Howey (June 2015) — via io9
  • John Claude Bemis is set to launch a new Steampunk/alchemist series for young readers, to be published by Disney/Hyperion starting in 2015
  • The Skull Throne (Demon Cycle, #4) by Peter V. Brett (2015?)
  • The Scarlet Gospels by Clive Barker (St. Martin’s Press, 2015) — “Originally planned as a collection of short stories, the project changed to focus on Harry D’Amour going up against Pinhead. The novel has been in works for more than a decade and we’ll be able to read it in 2015, courtesy of St. Martin’s Press: ‘Clive is delighted to announce that St Martin’s Press has acquired world English rights to publish The Scarlet Gospels, his upcoming novel featuring Pinhead and Harry D’Amour. St Martin’s anticipates a winter 2015 publication date.’”
  • The City of Mirrors (The Passage, #3) by Justin Cronin
  • The Uninvited by Cat Winters (William Morrow) — via PW Book Deals: “Lucia Macro at HarperCollins’s William Morrow imprint acquired world English rights to Cat Winters’s novel, The Uninvited. The book, which Morrow compares to The Night Circus and The Thirteenth Tale, is a paranormal work set during the influenza pandemic of 1918. Winters, who was represented by Barbara Poelle at the Irene Goodman Literary Agency, was a finalist for the YALSA’s 2014 Morris Award, for her novel In the Shadow of Blackbirds.”
  • How to Invent a Language by David Peterson (Penguin) — via PW Book Deals: “For Penguin Press, Elda Rotor took world rights to David Peterson’s How to Invent a Language. Peterson has created languages for shows like HBO’s Game of Thrones and Syfy’s Defiance, and the book will be a guide for anyone looking to craft a new tongue. Agent Joanna Volpe at New Leaf Literary & Media represented Peterson.”
  • Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie — sequel and book two in the planned trilogy which started with Ancillary Justice
  • Teen: The Burning Depths by James P. Smythe (Hodder, February 2015) -- "Centuries ago, the Australia left a dying Earth in search of an inhabitable planet its colonists could call home. But no such planet was ever discovered. Law and order gave way to rioting and chaos as gangs began battling for control of the ship and its dwindling resources, and the Australia was left to drift, directionless, through the emptiness of space. Seventeen-year-old Chan, fiercely independent and self-sufficient, keeps her head down and lives quietly, careful not to draw attention to herself amidst the violence and disorder. Until the day she makes an extraordinary discovery – a way to return the Australia to Earth. But doing so would bring her to the attention of the fanatics and the murderers who control life aboard the ship, putting her and everyone she loves in terrible danger. And a safe return to Earth is by no means certain."
Posted in Release Week | Tagged by blood we live, glen duncan, hugh howey, iain m banks, imago, matter, octavia butler, patternist, stories of your life and others, ted chiang, the last werewolf, xenogenesis