Release Week: One Hundred Years of Solitude, The Secret of Magic, Red Rising, Hang Wire, Dominion, Love Star, The Crane Wife, Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis, and Janis Ian's Stars

Posted on 2014-01-29 at 21:44 by Sam

JANUARY 22-28, 2014: Another huge week of releases, from the old and long missing (One Hundred Years of Solitude and Xenogenesis), to the new (The Secret of Magic, Red Rising, and Hang Wire), to alternate history and other bits around the edges, to a fantastic new multi-voice production of Janis Ian's Stars anthology. Also out this week is Lord of All Things translated from the prize-winning German edition, a highly anticipated YA sequel in Megan Shepherd's Her Dark Curiosity, the latest book in Jeaniene Frost's Night Huntress series, and a four of the fiction novels of the late Iain Banks. As usual the "Seen But Not Heard" list has a few items of note as well, with James Smythe's The Echo and James Cambias' A Darkling Sea among the latest added to the "missing in audio" lists. But! Some fantastic news as well: a recent Tantor photoset teasing their upcoming February titles includes both Ted Chiang's collection Stories of Your Life and Others and the intruguing Christopher Golden anthology Dark Duets; Michael J. Sullivan is hosting an Unfettered audiobook giveaway; the Recorded Books audiobook Humble Bundle has been expanded by three books, including Grace Krilanovich's The Orange Eats Creeps and Charles Portis' True Grit; and Jeff VanderMeer's giveaway of five copies of Annihilation continues as well. And! Out today, and therefore more properly fodder for next week's already crowded slate, is Clay and Susan Griffith's The Kingmakers, book 3 in their Vampire Empire trilogy. Read by James Marsters for Buzzy Multimedia, it's a title I was able to listen to just a bit early, and so expect to see more about that from me in short order. Enjoy!

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, narrated by John Lee for Blackstone Audio brings one of the seminal works of magical realism to audio. It is a bold choice to cast the multiple-award-winning -- yet very British -- Lee, whom I have personally enjoyed immensely on such works as China Mieville's Perdido Street Station and Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth, for this very Latin American work, as Blackstone has recently cast Armando Durán, Roxanne Hernandez, Marcelo Tubert, and Thom Rivera for other recent productions of the Colombian author's works. But Lee has shown himself quite up to the task of taking us into the world of the Buendía family. To quote Wikipedia for once instead of the book copy: "One Hundred Years of Solitude is a 1967 novel by Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez that tells the multi-generational story of the Buendía family, whose patriarch, José Arcadio Buendía, founds the town of Macondo, the metaphoric Colombia. The widely acclaimed book, considered by many to be the author's masterpiece, was first published in Spanish in 1967, and subsequently has been translated into thirty-seven languages and has sold more than 20 million copies. The magic realist style and thematic substance of One Hundred Years of Solitude established it as an important, representative novel of the literary Latin American Boom of the 1960s and 1970s, that was stylistically influenced by Modernism (European and North American), and the Cuban Vanguardia (Vanguard) literary movement."

Out last week in print and ebook and thus only briefly bemoaned for its short stay on the "missing in audio" list is The Secret of Magic By Deborah Johnson, Narrated By Peter Francis James for Penguin Audio. "In 1946, a young female attorney from New York City attempts the impossible: attaining justice for a black man in the Deep South. Regina Robichard works for Thurgood Marshall, who receives an unusual letter asking the NAACP to investigate the murder of a returning black war hero. It is signed by M. P. Calhoun, the most reclusive author in the country. As a child, Regina was captivated by Calhoun's The Secret of Magic, a novel in which white and black children played together in a magical forest. Once down in Mississippi, Regina finds that nothing in the South is as it seems. She must navigate the muddy waters of racism, relationships, and her own tragic past." The review in Booklist further adds to my interest: "What she discovers are parallels between life in Revere and Calhoun’s book. How much of the book is real, and how does it connect to the murder?" Now, is this "really" a magical realism novel? Or is someone trying to "trick" you into reading mimetic fiction? Does it matter? Why? I'm quite curious myself...

Posted in Release Week | Tagged adam christopher, andri snaer magnason, christopher kipiniak, cj sansom, daniel weyman, deborah johnson, dominion, gabriel garcia marquez, hang wire, janis ian, john lee, lovestar, luke daniels, octavia butler, one hundred years of solitude, patrick ness, pierce brown, red rising, stars, the crane wife, the secret of magic, tim gerard reynolds, xenogenesis

Whispersync Daily Deal: Richard Ellis Preston's Romulus Buckle (Chronicles of the Pneumatic)

Posted on 2014-01-25 at 19:24 by Sam

Saturday, January 25, 2014: Both books in Richard Ellis Preston’s Steampunk adventure series Chronicles of the Pneumatic are Kindle Daily Deals at $1.99 today, and both offer $1.99 Whispersync for Voice upgrades to their Audible editions, performed by Luke Daniels for Brilliance Audio.

Book one is Romulus Buckle & the City of the Founders. “In a postapocalyptic world of endless snow, Captain Romulus Buckle and the stalwart crew of the Pneumatic Zeppelin must embark on a perilous mission to rescue their kidnapped leader, Balthazar Crankshaft, from the impenetrable City of the Founders. Steaming over a territory once known as Southern California — before it was devastated in the alien war — Buckle navigates his massive airship through skies infested with enemy war zeppelins and ravenous alien beasties in this swashbuckling and high-octane steampunk adventure.”

Posted in Uncategorized, Whispersync Deals | Tagged luke daniels, richard ellis preston, romulus buckle

Whispersync Daily Deal: Celebromancy, Clive Barker's The Books of Blood, House of Bathory, and Cassandra Rose Clarke's The Assassin's Curse

Posted on 2014-01-24 at 15:12 by Sam

Friday, January 24, 2014: Four more deals to share today, starting with Celebromancy: Ree Reyes, Book 2 by Michael R. Underwood, narrated by Mary Robinette Kowal for Audible Frontiers, book two in the series after Geekomancy and on sale for $1.99 Kindle, offering a $1.99 Whispersync for Voice upgrade to the Audible edition. “Things are looking up for urban fantasista Ree Reyes. She’s using her love of pop culture to fight monsters and protect her hometown as a Geekomancer, and now a real-live production company is shooting her television pilot script. But nothing is easy in show business. When an invisible figure attacks the leading lady of the show, former child-star-turned-current-hot-mess Jane Konrad, Ree begins a school-of-hard-knocks education in the power of Celebromancy. Attempting to help Jane Geekomancy-style with Jedi mind tricks and X-Men infiltration techniques, Ree learns more about movie magic than she ever intended.”

Posted in Whispersync Deals | Tagged AudioGO, cassandra rose clarke, Celebromancy, Chris Patton, clive barker, crossroad press, Dick Hill, Geekomancy, House of Bathory, Kathleen Gati, Linda Lafferty, mary robinette kowal, Michael R Underwood, peter berkrot, Ree Reyes, simon vance, Tania Rodrigues, The Assassin's Curse, The Books of Blood

Release Week: Unfettered, Bloodchild and Other Stories, The Unreal and the Real, Dirty Magic, Snowblind, The Séance, A.C. Crispin's StarBridge, and Jonathan Lethem's Motherless Brooklyn

Posted on 2014-01-24 at 00:56 by Sam

JANUARY 15-21, 2014: This week brings an absolute feast for lovers of short stories, with picks including the star-studded Unfettered anthology and two collections, Octavia Butler's Bloodchild and Other Stories and Ursula Le Guin's The Unreal and the Real. In the "also out" listings there's more high quality short fiction, including a volume of Ellen Datlow's Best Horror of the Year, H.P. Lovecraft's Eldritch Tales, and a standalone "Day by Day Armageddon" story by J.L. Bourne, among others. As far as novels go, the week's no slouch, as there's also a highly anticipated new book from Jaye Wells, Dirty Magic, which starts a new series for the author of the Sabina Kane series, a new horror novel from Christopher Golden, a fantastic multi-voice production of John Harwood's The Séance, and! another off the "most missing in audio" list, the late A.C. Crispin's beloved StarBridge, along with the conclusion of Kate Elliott's Spiritwalker trilogy. AND! Jonathan Lethem's award-winning 1999 novel Motherless Brooklyn leads another strong week of fiction releases, which also includes Carthage by Joyce Carol Oates, Orfeo by Richard Powers, Stalin's Barber, and The Last Days of California. And! A strange fairy tale (or are they?) anthology, Red Caps. And! A non-fiction title of interest, The Second Machine Age, read by Jeff Cummings (Neal Stephenson's Some Remarks). Whew! In the "seen but not heard" category, though, there are some huge misses, led for me by Deborah Johnson's The Secret of Magic, Wendy Webb's The Vanishing, Simon Ings' Wolves, Jo Walton's What Makes This Book So Great, and Scott Sigler's Pandemic. Meanwhile: Recorded Books is offering the first Humble Audiobook Bundle (via Cory Doctorow); The Guilded Earlobe named his Top 20 Audiobooks of 2013; the upcoming week will see multiple releases of the fiction of Iain Banks (no "M.") and the mysteries of Ellery Queen; and Jeff VanderMeer's Annihilation is finally available for pre-order, both at Downpour.com (as reported late last week) and at Audible.com. 12 more days to wait! Though while you're waiting, you can enter VanderMeer's give-away of 5 download copies of the audiobook by answering the question: "Why you in particular should be added to the expedition going into Area X?"

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

I wish I had the time to ask the principals involved how this actually happened, how an already unlikely, star-studded charity anthology actually was produced in this fantastic production, read by some of the industry's most talented narrators. That anthology is Unfettered edited by Shawn Speakman, and includes stories by Terry Brooks, Patrick Rothfuss, Robert Jordan, Jacqueline Carey, R.A. Salvatore, Naomi Novik, Peter V. Brett, Tad Williams, David Anthony Durham, Brandon Sanderson, Robert V.S. Redick, Daniel Abraham, Kevin Hearne, Blake Charlton, Peter Orulian, Michael J. Sullivan, Carrie Vaughn, Lev Grossman, and more. Narrated for Audible by Peter Ganim, Marc Vietor, Bronson Pinchot, Jay Snyder, Tim Gerard Reynolds, and more, it's a stupendous addition to the library of fantasy anthologies. "You define life or it defines you. In Shawn Speakman’s case, it was both. Lacking health insurance and diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2011, Shawn quickly accrued a massive medical debt that he did not have the ability to pay. That’s when New York Times best-selling author Terry Brooks offered to donate a short story that Shawn could sell to help alleviate those bills -- and suggested he ask the same of his other writer friends. Unfettered is the result." [Continued below the images.]

Tor.com ran a feature including the first page of every story in the anthology, and Audible's made Michael J. Sullivan's story The Jester (A Riyria Chronicles Tale) available for free. Written in Sullivan's best-selling Riyria Revelations and The Riyria Chronicles oeuvre, it's narrated by the voice of those series in audio, the fantastic Tim Gerard Reynolds. The amount of generosity and then work which has gone into this is staggering; and its existence made it (just a bit) easier to let go of my Rothfuss-signed hardcover edition of the anthology, which I needed to sell so, er, I could afford things like this audiobook. A bit cyclical perhaps, but, in any case, dip in and enjoy this one.

Posted in Release Week | Tagged ac crispin, bloodchild, christopher golden, dirty magic, jaye wells, jonathan lethem, motherless brooklyn, octavia butler, patrick rothfuss, peter berkrot, shawn speakman, snowblind, starbridge, terry brooks, the seance, unfettered, unreal and the real, ursula le guin

Whispersync Daily Deals: The Secret of the Water Knight, Cold Hearted Son of a Witch, and "Einstein Must Die!"

Posted on 2014-01-23 at 16:15 by Sam

Thursday, January 23, 2014: A small crop of Whispersync deals today, one from the Kindle Daily Deal list and two more from the “countdown deals” lists.

I’ll start with the daily deal, which is a young reader audiobook coming in at just under 2.5 hours. The Secret of the Water Knight By Rusalka Reh, Narrated By Cris Dukehart for Brilliance Audio. $1.99 Kindle and a $0.99 Whispersync for Voice upgrade:

“Ten-year-old Kat has a terrible fear of swimming. She’s tried everything, but to no avail: The feeling of water closing over her head sends her into a panic every time. So when her parents plan a summer vacation to an island, Kat is understandably less than thrilled. Yet the moment she arrives on the beach, she senses there is something very unusual about this place. When she finds a strange whistle floating in the surf, she knows her instinct is right: From that moment on, she can understand the island’s animals when they speak. And what they have to say is extraordinary.…”

The other two books are both “countdown” deals, and both audiobooks are self-published indie releases. I’ll start with Cold Hearted Son of a Witch: Dragoneers Saga, Book 2 By M. R. Mathias, Narrated By Christine Padovan. Currently on sale for $0.99 on Kindle (goes up to $2.99 in 4 days) and has a $1.99 Whispersync upgrade price:

“Zahrellion, Rikky, and their dragons embark on a quest to find the special mushrooms Mysterian needs to save Prince Richard from Gravelbone’s poison. Meanwhile, Jenka and his loveable dragon, Jade, escort the King’s Rangers back to Kingsmen’s Keep. When Jenka and the half-elvish mute, Lemmy, find a map at the Temple of Dou, they follow it and find more trouble than they bargained for.”

Lastly, Einstein Must Die!: Fate of Nations, Book 1 By Chris Kohout, Narrated By Corey Snow which is currently on sale at $1.99 Kindle, but is set to go up to $3.99 in a few days. Either way, it has a $1.99 Whispersync for Voice upgrade to the Audible edition:

“1910 AD - Impending war with England has given Nikola Tesla the chance to build his dream: a weapon to end all wars. The American steam-powered Beowulf tank is larger than a house, and carries enough firepower to face an army. Beowulf also has a mechanical brain, embedded with the consciousness of Colonel Browning, America’s best military strategist.”

Posted in Whispersync Deals

Whispersync Daily Deal: The Secret of Ji, Books 1 and 2, by Pierre Grimbert, translated by Matt Ross and Eric Lamb, narrated by Michael Page

Posted on 2014-01-21 at 14:29 by Sam

Tuesday, January 21, 2014: So. We’ve had quite a run of these “Whispersync Daily Deals” of late, yesterday’s Zoo City following Sunday’s The Golem and the Jinni. Today brings another fantastic pair of fantasy audiobooks, the first two books in The Secret of Ji series, read by the masterful Michael Page for Brilliance Audio. These come from the fantastic French mind of Pierre Grimbert, translated ably by Matt Ross and Eric Lamb for AmazonCrossing. Originally published in France to high acclaim (le prix Ozone, le prix Julia-Verlanger) beginning in 1997, The Secret of Ji: Six Heirs and The Orphans’ Promise (Secret of Ji, Book Two) are the first two books of the series, both published in English last year. The next two books are due out later this year.

On reddit’s /r/Fantasy last month I wrote a little appreciation, Recommended fantasy that you may have missed: Pierre Grimbert’s Six Heirs: The Secret of Ji, newly translated this year from the prize-winning French editions: “One of the (American) translators was a student in France looking for something to read, and found not much fantasy in the bookstores other than translations of US and British fantasy. Then he found Grimbert’s The Secret of Ji series, and started work on translating the first book. I found the two books translated so far (Book 2 is “The Orphan’s Promise”) to be quite well done, recommended for fans of Michael J. Sullivan’s Riyria series among others. There’s definitely some common ground — delightful characters, continent-spanning intrigues through the eyes of smaller players, etc. — as well as some distinctly French flavors and world-building. For example, time is given in metric: decidays are a couple of our hours, decads for 10 day “week” ish lengths, etc. Assassin cults, low magic, hardened good-guy warriors, animal telepathy, and of course a pair of youngsters coming of age on adventure’s trail. The books are not likely to be “found” in any bookstores, as few stock Amazon-published titles. (These are published by Amazon’s “AmazonCrossing” imprint for books in translation, not its 47North sf/f imprint.) But they can be ordered there (the book is in the IndieBound catalog for example) and sometimes found (or requested) in libraries. They’re also available in audio, read by Michael Page, and that’s how I experienced the books. Page is the narrator also of Scott Lynch’s The Lies of Locke Lamora, Robert V.S. Redick’s Chathrand Voyage, Steven Erikson’s Malazan Books of the Fallen, David Drake’s Lord of the Isles, and (in the US) Joe Abercrombie’s The Heroes; his narrations on all of these has been superb and his work on The Secret of Ji is no exception.”

The translator I mention is Matt Ross, whom I had a chance to interview (podcast) after the publication of the second book. He’s also become a friend, and now I don’t have to bug him about getting together to hand me a copy of the second audiobook after all. So: do head over and pick up the first book on the cheap — $1.99 Kindle plus $0.99 Audible — and give it a listen. Before midnight, you’ll be back for book two.

Posted in Whispersync Deals | Tagged matt ross, michael page, pierre grimbert, secret of ji

Whispersync Daily Deal: Zoo City by Lauren Beukes, read by Justine Eyre

Posted on 2014-01-20 at 18:59 by Sam

Monday, January 20, 2014: It’s almost hard to believe that for just $1.99 Kindle and a mere $0.99 Whispersync for Voice upgrade to the Audible edition that you can enjoy one of the more oustanding contemporary fantasy audiobooks of the last decade, Zoo City By Lauren Beukes, Narrated By Justine Eyre for Angry Robot on Brilliance Audio. The minimal description doesn’t nearly do the book justice, but let’s start there: “Zinzi December has a Sloth on her back, a dirty 419 scam habit, and a talent for finding lost things. But when a little old lady turns up dead and the cops confiscate her last paycheck, she’s forced to take on her least favourite kind of job: missing persons.”

Let’s next go to Dave’s review: ""Urban Fantasy That Does Flinch” — “Fans of China Mieville and William Gibson take note: Lauren Buekes’ “Zoo City” is every bit gritty noir as it is urban fantasy, and it shoots along like bullets through a warm night sky. Which means, this story is not a story for the faint of heart. It culminates in one of the roughest blood baths I’ve ever listened to. The worldbuilding is everything you’d want it to be —particularly the ghettoization of the Zoos — and Beukes turns a phrase better than most and writes broken characters with heart. Her Zinzi is an antihero who despite all her flaws and failings, somehow manages to make us care about her. That said, the ending fell a bit short for me — not so much a payoff of counterfeit bills, but more like a stage magician who closes out her stunning show with a rabbit trick. It’s not bad, and there’s resolution, but it left me wishing for something different. If you ever wondered what might have happened if James Ellroy was raised in Johannesburg by a witch who moonlighted writing 419 scam emails on the side, this is your ticket. All in all, well worth the listen, and I’m eager to see where Beukes takes us next.”

Posted in Whispersync Deals | Tagged justine eyre, lauren beukes, zoo city

Whispersync Daily Deal: The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker

Posted on 2014-01-19 at 16:39 by Sam

Sunday, January 19, 2014: I would call it one of the best debuts of the year; then one of the best audiobooks of the year; then, simply, one of the best books of the year: The Golem and the Jinni: A Novel By Helene Wecker, Narrated By George Guidall for HarperAudio, a Kindle Daily Deal today at $1.99 and offering $4.99 Whispersync for Voice upgrade to the Audible edition:

“Helene Wecker’s dazzling debut novel tells the story of two supernatural creatures who appear mysteriously in 1899 New York. Chava is a golem, a creature made of clay, brought to life by a strange man who dabbles in dark Kabbalistic magic. When her master dies at sea on the voyage from Poland, she is unmoored and adrift as the ship arrives in New York Harbor. Ahmad is a jinni, a being of fire, born in the ancient Syrian Desert. Trapped in an old copper flask by a Bedouin wizard centuries ago, he is released accidentally by a tinsmith in a Lower Manhattan shop.”

Posted in Whispersync Deals | Tagged george guidall, helene wecker, the golem and the jinni

Whispersync Daily Deal: Tony DiTerlizzi's The Search for WondLa, read by Teri Hatcher

Posted on 2014-01-17 at 14:44 by Sam

Friday, January 17, 2014: Among today’s Kindle Daily Deal hail is a young reader book of interest: The Search for WondLa By Tony DiTerlizzi (co-author of the Spiderwick Chronicles), Narrated By Teri Hatcher (yes, that Teri Hatcher — how DiTerlizzi has got Mark Hamill, Alan Cumming, and Teri Hatcher as narrators is either a stroke of good fortune or a deal with the devil) for Simon & Schuster Audio. Available today for $1.99 in Kindle, it offers a $4.95 Whispersync upgrade to the unabridged audio at Audible:

“When a marauder destroys the underground sanctuary that Eva Nine was raised in by the robot Muthr, the 12-year-year-old girl is forced to flee aboveground. Eva Nine is searching for anyone else like her, for she knows that other humans exist, because of an item she treasures: a scrap of cardboard on which is depicted a young girl, an adult, and a robot, with the strange word, WondLa. Tony DiTerlizzi honors traditional children’s literature in this totally original space-age adventure - one that is as complex as an alien planet, but as simple as a child’s wish for a place to belong.”

Posted in Whispersync Deals | Tagged teri hatcher, The Search for WondLa, Tony DiTerlizzi, WondLa

Pre-order update: Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer

Posted on 2014-01-16 at 20:51 by Sam

Not that I’ve been checking every week for a couple of months or anything, but: one thing I snuck into an update of this week’s release week coverage is that there’s finally a pre-order page at Downpour.com for Annihilation (Southern Reach, Volume 1) by Jeff VanderMeer, read by Carolyn McCormick for Blackstone Audio, due out February 4 concurrent with the Farrar, Straus, & Giroux print/ebook release:

I last reported on this audiobook late last month when McCormick, the voice of The Hunger Games audiobooks, was confirmed as the narrator. Annihilation is the first of a trilogy of “Southern Reach” novels all being published in 2014: “For thirty years, Area X has remained mysterious, remote, and concealed by the government as an environmental disaster zone even though it is to all appearances pristine wilderness. For thirty years, too, the secret agency known as the Southern Reach has monitored Area X and sent in expeditions to try to discover the truth. Some expeditions have suffered terrible consequences. Others have reported nothing out of the ordinary. Now, as Area X seems to be changing and perhaps expanding, the next expedition will attempt to succeed where all others have failed. What is happening in Area X? What is the true nature of the invisible border that surrounds it?”

Also since my last update, print publisher FSG launched a new website, with an excerpt, a high-resolution map, blurbs, and info on VanderMeer’s upcoming book tour. Check it out! I can’t wait to hear McCormick bring the expedition team to life, but I’ve got 18 and a half more days to wait. But who’s counting, anyway…

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged annihilation, carolyn mccormick, jeff vandermeer