March Top Picks

The Erstwhile by Brian Catling
Release Date:  Mid Mar
Given that I ran a big event centred around Brian Catling’s first book The Vorrh, it will likely come as no surprise to anyone that I’m very excited that we’ll soon be getting copies of the sequel. It’s a term that I’m using somewhat cautiously though, since it’s unlikely to be a traditional follow-on story. I don’t even know if any of the characters from The Vorrh even make an appearance. Certainly The Vorrh itself does, and there are things from The Vorrh as well, but whether we’ll recognise them is another matter. The location of the book has shifted from Africa to London and features a cast of human and possibly not human characters and takes the reader from Bedlam Asylum to the Garden of Eden. Things that I’ve read about the book seem to indicate that this might be a more linear story than The Vorrh, but I wouldn’t bet on it. I’ve also no idea if you need to read The Vorrh before reading The Erstwhile, but I’ll be dropping everything to read it when it arrives so I’ll let you know. Meanwhile, if you’re like me and loved the strange, surreal and lyrical language and story of The Vorrh, then you’ll want to keep an eye on our social media for The Esrtwhile’s arrival in store.

Miranda and Caliban by Jacqueline Carey
Release Date:  Late Mar
There’s a lot of metafiction inspired by the plays of Shakespeare, and I pretty much like it all since I’m a Shakespeare tragic at heart. Some of the most interesting in my opinion is based on The Tempest. There is so much back story about Prospero, Miranda and Caliban before the play even starts. Their relationships are complex and long standing, but in the play we only arrive in time for climactic end of events that have been building for years and then mostly from the point of view of Prospero. All that is unknown and unsaid is fertile ground for conjecture. Jacqueline Carey‘s Miranda and Caliban takes us to Prospero’s island years before the play and shifts the focus away from Prospero to Caliban and Miranda as adolescents. Miranda is devoted to her father but is very lonely and Caliban his resentful servant/slave. Nevertheless a strange bond grows between them, and avoiding Prospero’s jealous and paranoid eye they set forth on a path that they both know to be doomed. Jacqueline Carey is famous for her dark, sensual fantasy and evocative and descriptive language and brings the best of it to this new exploration of Shakespeare‘s most mysterious trio.

Stars are Legion by Kameron Hurley
Release Date:  Early Mar
I’ll say up front than I’m a bit of a Kameron Hurley fanboy. I’ve featured her novels and essay collection in previous newsletters, so it’s no real surprise that I’m excited about this one. I’m not the only one though because there has been quite a lot of buzz about this book. Unlike most of her previous work, this one is high tech space opera and as far as I can tell is a standalone novel.  It begins on the outer edge of the galaxy with The Legion, a great fleet of  worldships migrating from star to star. Generations of civil war have destroyed some of the worldships and left others in poor repair and dying. If the war continues, failure of the worldships and extinction of their inhabitants is inevitable. On one of them, Zan awakes with no memory of who she is the company of people who say they are her family. They tell her she is special, and the only one who can board the worldship Mokshi and save the Legion. Deep in the mire of factions, intrigues and plots within plots Zan will have to figure out what is true and who to trust because it seems that she really could change everything. Stars are Legion is very much in the tradition of books like Frank Herbert‘s Dune and Dan Simmons‘ Hyperion in that while being space opera it pushes boundaries and shows remarkable imagination and world building.

Sins of Empire by Brian McClellan
Release Date: Mid Mar
To be honest, I don’t know if I need to say anything about this one at all. Brian McClellan‘s Powder Mage trilogy is still one of our best selling series, so his name on the cover is probably all that most of you need to know before deciding you want one. Nevertheless I’ll rattle off a bit about it anyway. It’s set in the same world as the Powder Mage series, but about ten years later and in the nation of Fatrasta. Keeping the peace in a part of the world know to be a haven for unsavoury characters, magical and otherwise, is no easy task and only the skill and ruthlessness of the Lady Chancellor hold the capital city of Landfall together. That’s about to change however, and revolution is in the air. The fate of the city, and by extension the nation now lies in the hands of a spy, a disgraced soldier and a mercenary general with a dubious past. Before people jump to conclusions about that, I should point out that this is not really a continuation of the Powder Mage series. At least not based on the first book. It’s told from new viewpoint characters though some, like Lady Vlora Flint did appear in the Powder Mage books. So no Taniel I’m afraid. This book could be read without reading the first trilogy, but you might find things like the magic system a bit under explained if you do. In any event, this is another terrific flintlock fantasy from an author who is rapidly becoming its defining voice. 

The Mammoth Book of the Mummy by Paula Guran
Release Date:  Mid Mar
There is something about the mummy that sets it apart from other classic horror creatures. Mummified bodies, either through intent or accident have been found on almost every continent. Unlike their monster movie compatriots, mummies are real. There is something morbidly fascinating about them, something defiant of death. The how and why, the true cost and purpose of such defiance is fertile ground for the imagination and in The Mammoth Book of the Mummy, editor Paula Guran has collected an eclectic selection of examples. In here you will find stories of reanimation, reincarnation, revenge and even romance from a diverse collection of writers including Joe Landsdale, Gail Carriger, Paul Cornell, Karen Joy Fowler, Kim Newman as well as one of my favourite Australian specfic writers Angela Slatter. It’s a mixture of styles and genres that explores, expands, subverts and by degrees reinvents the mystique that has always attached to the preserved dead and the people who created them.

The Story of Hong Gildong by Minsoo Kang
Release Date:  Early Mar
Do you know much about Korean folklore? I don’t, which is why the new Penguin Classics book The Story of Hong Gildong caught my eye. It begins with the birth of Hong Gildong, the second son of an important noble. Because he is a second son and his mother is lowborn, little respect is given to him. He is however a remarkable boy. Quick and strong with a sharp mind and a latent talent for magic he should be an asset to his family. Instead he is forced to flee his home after an assassination attempt. Eventually he joins and later become the leader of a band of outlaws who defend the people from the corrupt officials. It’s a familiar archetype but I’m interested is seeing a different interpretation of it. This new translation with notes is by Korean American academic Minsoo Kang. According to the introduction The Story of Hong Gildong is the quintessential Korean classic. I’m intrigued and I imagine some of you are too. 

The Everything Box by Richard Kadrey
Release Date:  Early Mar
Richard Kadrey is a bit of a store favourite. His most popular books are his Sandman Slim urban fantasy series, mostly because of his irreverent approach to the genre and the fact that his characters feel like they’ve walked out of a Tarantino movie. With that in mind we come to his new book The Everything Box. It’s basically a classic American heist story told via urban fantasy. It begins with an angel surveying the wreckage of the Biblical great flood and observing that there are still some people who have survived. This has been anticipated, and he has been sent (a very important job for a junior angel and certainly one that will really help his career) to deal with the leftovers. He has brought with him something to enact the final end of humanity, but unfortunately while he has been admiring the handiwork of the Almighty one of the wretched creatures he was supposed to wipe out appears to have stolen it. He turns his face to the heavens and utters a word that will echo through the millennia “Crap”.  Fast forward twenty thousand years or so and a thief named Coup, famous for his skills at stealing magical objects from the equally magic people and creatures who usually own them, has just got a new job. Some scary evil folks want him to steal something from some other scary evil folks and if he fails or gets caught he’s pretty much dead. Coup has to assemble a team and plan the most dangerous job of his career, steal the box, save the day and get the girl. The problem is that the job feels like a set-up, the box could spell the end of humanity and the girl doesn’t like him very much. It’s Ocean’s Eleven with Kadrey‘s trademark humour, demons, dragons and a demented angel. It’s also enormously good fun.

Medusa Chronicles by Stephen Baxter and Alastair Reynolds
Release Date:  Mid Mar
In 1971 Tor published a novella by Arthur C Clarke called A Meeting With Medusa. It began with the testing of a craft designed to explore the atmosphere of Jupiter. The craft crashes, injuring the pilot, Commander Howard Falcon, who takes a over a year to recover. Eventually a new craft is built and Falcon descends into the clouds of Jupiter. He makes tentative contact with enormous creatures that inhabit the planet, but is forced to flee when it becomes apparent that the creatures are taking an interest in the ship, which due to the size of the aliens places it in too much danger. As the ship leaves Jupiter it is revealed that Commander Falcon was so badly injured by the original accident that he is now a cyborg, more machine than man and lacks much of the passion for exploration and humanity he used to have.  This was a lot to fit into a novella, and while Clarke set out some ideas for post-humanism and first contact, he left them mostly unexplored. With the approval of the Clarke estate, Stephen Baxter and Alistair Reynolds have taken the novella as a start point and continued the journey of Commander Falcon as he explores the universe and the nature of his own condition, more and less than human. This is unique collaboration of three great science fiction writers writing forty years apart, which would be enough to make it interesting. When you consider who it is, it pretty much becomes a must for any serious science fiction fan.