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A Pair of Gonzo Mysteries from a Fantasy Master: Rich Horton on Pink Vodka Blues and Skinny Annie Blues by Neal Barrett, Jr.

A Pair of Gonzo Mysteries from a Fantasy Master: Rich Horton on Pink Vodka Blues and Skinny Annie Blues by Neal Barrett, Jr.

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Pink Vodka Blues-small Skinny Annie Blues-small

Neal Barrett, Jr. received a Hugo and Nebula Award nomination for his 1988 story “Ginny Sweethips’ Flying Circus,” and in 2010 he was named Author Emeritus by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. A discussion of his four Aldair novels — which Fletcher Vredenburgh called “a blast of strangeness and adventure” — broke out in the comments section of my 2013 post about Mark Frost’s The List of 7. And in his 2014 review of The Prophecy Machine, Fletcher wrote:

The late Neal Barrett Jr. wrote around thirty novels and seventy short stories. I’ve only read a little bit from his works, which include sci-fi and fantasy as well as crime fiction and magic realism. He seems to have slipped under the radar of most genre readers. On the other hand, everything I’ve read about the man marks him as one of those special authors held in high esteem by other writers.

As usual, Fletcher is bang on in his assessment. I haven’t read any of Barrett’s crime fiction either, and I’ve always been very curious about it.

But that’s why we have Rich Horton. Over at his website Strange at Ecbatan Rich reviews two of Barrett’s mid-90s mystery novels, Pink Vodka Blues (1992) and Skinny Annie Blues (1996), calling them ‘funny’ and ‘wild.’ That qualifies them for a closer look in my book.

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Future Treasures: The Freeze-Frame Revolution by Peter Watts

Future Treasures: The Freeze-Frame Revolution by Peter Watts

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The Freeze-Frame Revolution-smallPeter Watts is the author of the Rifters Trilogy, which Matthew David Surridge reviewed for us here, the Hugo and Locus Award-nominated Blindsight (2006), which Rich Horton called “Brilliant,” and the collection Beyond the Rift (2013).

His short fiction Sunflower Cycle kicked off in 2009 with the Hugo Award-winning “The Island.” There have been three tales in the series so far; you can read them all at Watts’ website. The fourth, the long novella The Freeze-Frame Revolution, arrives from Tachyon early next month.

“The Island” (The New Space Opera 2, July 2009) — Hugo Award Winner, Best Novelette
“Giants” (Extreme Planets, December 2013)
“Hotshot” (Reach for Infinity, May 2014)
The Freeze-Frame Revolution (Tachyon Publications, June 2018)

Publisher’s Weekly raved about the book, saying:

In this short, tight novel that contains vast science-fictional speculation, the human crew of the construction ship Eriophora spends 66 million years building interstellar wormhole gates, so they have lots of time to ponder issues of purpose. Sunday Ahzmundin, on a quest to find a missing crewmate, has to deal with another coworker, Lian, who is traumatized after the ship is damaged by one of the “occasional demons” that pop out of newly opened gates. Dropping in and out of suspended animation as scheduled by the Chimp, the AI that runs the ship, Sunday begins to uncover the secrets behind Lian’s subsequent death and the disappearances of other crew members, learning what hides beneath the ship’s closed and rigidly structured society… SF fans will love this tale of bizarre future employment and genuine wonder.

Here’s the description.

She believed in the mission with all her heart. But that was sixty million years ago. How do you stage a mutiny when you’re only awake one day in a million? How do you conspire when your tiny handful of potential allies changes with each shift? How do you engage an enemy that never sleeps, that sees through your eyes and hears through your ears and relentlessly, honestly, only wants what’s best for you? Sunday Ahzmundin is about to find out.

The Freeze-Frame Revolution will be published by Tachyon Publications on June 12, 2018. It is 192 pages, priced at $14.95 in trade paperback and $7.99 for the digital edition. Order copies directly from the Taychon website.

Into the Grimness: Shadows Linger by Glen Cook

Into the Grimness: Shadows Linger by Glen Cook

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SHDWSLN1984Let me start off with a warning: there will be spoilers galore in this and all future Black Company posts. There’s just no way to avoid them at this point. So if you haven’t read the books, do us all a favor and read them.

Shadows Linger (1984) amps up the proto-grimness of Cook’s seminal epic fantasy series, at the same time taking much of the focus away from the titular Black Company and the previous book’s narrator, Croaker. It’s a surprising approach when so much of the initial book’s story was about the company itself as an almost living thing, complete with its own complicated history and traditions. It works though, due to Cook’s jaundiced view of human nature, and skill at crafting a harsh, noir atmosphere and setting.

At the end of The Black Company, ex-nobleman and all-around badass Raven realized that Darling, the nine year-old girl the Company rescued, was the White Rose. It was prophesied that the White Rose, who in centuries past had defeated and imprisoned the Dominator and the Lady, would be reincarnated when the need for her again arose. Now is that time.

Shadows Linger begins nine years after the close of The Black Company. The Company has become the Lady’s fire brigade, marching back and forth across her vast empire, forever extinguishing any signs of rebellion. Resistance leaders are hunted down and killed and the peace of iron-fisted repression is enforced. Still, the Company holds on to a sliver of its members’ humanity.

The Lady’s service has not been bad. Though we get the toughest missions, we never have to do the dirty stuff. The regulars get those jobs. Preemptive strikes sometimes, sure. The occasional massacre. But all in the line of business. Militarily necessary. We’d never gotten involved in atrocities. The Captain wouldn’t permit that.

The Dominator, the Lady’s husband and once the the North’s resident Dark Lord, remains imprisoned in the Barrowlands, held in place by spells, soldiers, and a dragon. Something, though, is stirring and it seems as if he is preparing to somehow escape his bonds. An investigation leads members of the Company and two of the Taken, the Lady’s own ringwraith sort of wizards, to Juniper. Juniper exists in the most remote part of the North on a bay that is free from ice only half the year. There, a strange black castle has been growing year by year. Somehow it is connected to the Barrowlands and the Dominator.

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New Treasures: Wonderblood by Julia Whicker

New Treasures: Wonderblood by Julia Whicker

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Wonderblood-smallThere have been a lot of intriguing fantasy debuts already in 2018, and to really stand out you need to do something different. Julia Whicker’s Wonderblood, set in a post-apocalyptic America where magic is openly practiced, sounds like it will fit the bill nicely.

Margot Livesey calls it “A stunning debut… Julia Whicker evokes an apocalyptic America where medicine is illegal, everyone is searching for portents and only a severed head can offer protection.” That’s plenty different, anyway. Wonderblood was published in hardcover last month by St. Martin’s Press.

Set 500 years in the future, a mad cow-like disease called “Bent Head” has killed off most of the U.S. population. Those remaining turn to magic and sacrifice to cleanse the Earth.

Wonderblood is Julia Whicker’s fascinating literary debut, set in a barren United States, an apocalyptic wasteland where warring factions compete for control of the land in strange and dangerous carnivals. A mad cow-like disease called “Bent Head” has killed off millions. Those who remain worship the ruins of NASA’s space shuttles, and Cape Canaveral is their Mecca. Medicine and science have been rejected in favor of magic, prophecy, and blood sacrifice.

When traveling marauders led by the bloodthirsty Mr. Capulatio invade her camp, a young girl named Aurora is taken captive as his bride and forced to join his band on their journey to Cape Canaveral. As war nears, she must decide if she is willing to become her captor’s queen. But then other queens emerge, some grotesque and others aggrieved, and not all are pleased with the girl’s ascent. Politics and survival are at the centre of this ravishing novel.

Wonderblood was published by St. Martin’s Press on April 3, 2018. It is 304 pages, priced at $26.99 in hardcover and $13.99 in digital formats. The cover was designed by Ervin Serrano.

The 2017 Nebula Award Winners

The 2017 Nebula Award Winners

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The-Stone-Sky-N.K.-Jemisin-smaller All Systems Red-small The-Art-of-Starving-Sam-J-Miller-medium

I turned 54 years old today. And as a birthday present to me, just as it does every year, the Science Fiction Writers of America gave out the 52nd Annual Nebula Awards. This year they were presented at the SFWA Nebula Conference in Pittsburgh, PA, at the Pittsburgh Marriott City Center.

Unlike the last 2015 and 2016 events (which were held in Chicago), I was unable to attend, but they somehow went on without me. Here’s the complete list of winners.

Novel

The Stone Sky, N.K. Jemisin (Orbit)

Novella

All Systems Red, Martha Wells (Tor.com Publishing)

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Birthday Reviews: Adam-Troy Castro’s “MS Found Paper-Clipped to a Box of Jujubes”

Birthday Reviews: Adam-Troy Castro’s “MS Found Paper-Clipped to a Box of Jujubes”

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Cover by Amy Sterling
Cover by Amy Sterling

Adam-Troy Castro was born on May 20, 1960.

Castro has been nominated for the Nebula Award 8 times in the three short fiction categories, beginning with a Best Novella nomination for “The Funeral March of the Marionettes” and most recently for the novella “With Unclean Hands.” “The Funeral March of the Marionettes” was also nominated for the Hugo Award, and Castro later shared a Hugo nomination with Jerry Oltion for “The Astronaut from Wyoming.” Castro and Oltion would go on to win the Seiun Award for “The Astronaut from Wyoming” in 2007. He won the Philip K. Dick Award for the novel Emissaries from the Dead in 2009. Four of his stories have topped the Analog Readers Poll, including “The Astronaut from Wyoming,” “Sunday Night Yams at Minnie and Earl’s,” “With Unclean Hands,” and “The Coward’s Option.”

“MS. Found Paper-Clipped to a Box of Jujubes” was an original story included in Castro’s 2000 collection An Alien Darkness. It is the only time it has been published and was one of three stories first published in that collection.

It is only natural to look at a Ferris wheel and think about what would happen if it broke loose from its moorings. Of course, the reality of the situation would be deadly and horrific, but Castro paints a more surrealistic scene in “MS Found Paper-Clipped to a Box of Jujubes.”

Joe and Mary Sue are riding on a Ferris wheel, ignoring pretty much everything except for each other, when the wheel jumps from its holder and begins to roll down the midway and eventually out of the fairgrounds, gaining speed as its goes and causing Mary Sue to fall out of the wheel (unharmed). Joe just goes along for the ride as police try to stop the runaway wheel, treating it more like a speeding driver than anything else. Eventually, the wheel goes on to achieve cross-dimensional status and the wheel’s riders begin to work to regain control of the ride.

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Win One of Ten Copies of Todd McAulty’s The Robots of Gotham

Win One of Ten Copies of Todd McAulty’s The Robots of Gotham

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Todd McAulty was the most popular writer to appear in the print version of Black Gate magazine. Locus said “Todd McAulty is Black Gate‘s great discovery,” and in their wrap-up of our entire 15-issue run, Free SF Reader wrote: “McAulty appears to be world class… If I was crazy enough to want to be an editor, I’d be trying to poach him, or wheedle work out of him, or kidnap him and have him chained up and guarded by a woman with blunt weaponry.”

We’ve been waiting for a long time for a full-length novel from Mr. McAulty, and at long last the wait is almost over. His massive debut The Robots of Gotham, a fast-paced thriller set in a world on the verge of total subjugation by machines, will be published next month by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Early buzz has been mounting fast — Julie E. Czerneda calls it “Incredible,” Publishers Weekly says it “maintains breathless momentum throughout,” James Enge says it’s “The sort of book that makes people SF addicts for life,” and bestselling author Daniel H. Wilson calls it “A thrilling ride.” Early reviews from the public have been breathless as well — Joe Crowe was the very first to rate it at Goodreads, saying,

The whole story is a thrilling action flick in book form, with cool robots and conspiracies and things blowing up. Read it while walking in slow-motion away from an explosion.

You’ll have to wait until June 19th to buy the hardcover…. or if you can’t wait, jump over to The Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog, where they’re giving away 10 advance copies! You’ll need a Twitter account to be eligible, but how hard can that be? Easier than surviving the coming robot apocalypse, that’s for sure. While you’re contemplating, click the image above to see the beautiful ‘splosiony cover in full detail, with the end flap text and all those cool blurbs.

The Robots of Gotham will be published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt/John Joseph Adams Books on June 19, 2018. It is 688 pages, priced at $26 in hardcover and $12.99 for the digital version. The cover was designed by Mark R. Robinson. Get all the details here.

Birthday Reviews: Wendy Rathbone’s “The Beautiful People”

Birthday Reviews: Wendy Rathbone’s “The Beautiful People”

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Cover by J.K. Potter
Cover by J.K. Potter

Wendy Rathbone was born on May 19, 1960.

Although Rathbone has published several short stories and some novels, she may be best known for her poetry, which has been collected in Moon Canoes: The Selected Poetry of Wendy Rathbone, Autumn Phantom, Turn Left at November, Dead Starships, and Unearthly: The Collected Poetry of Wendy Rathbone. Rathbone’s poetry has been on the Rhysling ballot three times.

The only publication of “The Beautiful People” was in the 1998 anthology Bending the Landscape: Science Fiction, edited by Nicola Griffith and Stephen Pagel.

Rathbone’s story looks at the relationship between Noah, a plain bartender, and Tam, the talented and attractive singer in a band. Both characters are outliers in a world in which people can undergo treatment to improve their looks and gain the appearance of perpetual youth. Noah refrains because he blames the treatments for his sister’s suicide and Tam avoids the treatment because he feels he doesn’t need them to look good.

As their relationship progresses, including marriage, Noah remains steadfast in his belief that the treatment is wrong and takes something out of people, while Tam seems to be increasingly concerned about his own imperfections, which Noah describes as extremely minor. However, Tam is a performer and feels the need to keep up with his competition and his bandmates, all of whom have undergone the treatment and are “naturally” impeccable, while he needs to groom himself to achieve even a semblance of a perfection he doesn’t feel.

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In 500 Words or Less: Waypoint Kangaroo by Curtis C. Chen

In 500 Words or Less: Waypoint Kangaroo by Curtis C. Chen

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Waypoint Kangaroo
By Curtis C. Chen
St. Martin’s Press (320 pages, $25.99 hardcover, $13.99 eBook, June 2016)

I met Curtis C. Chen at my first time out to the Nebulas (about this time last year), and I remember chatting with him in the con suite about Waypoint Kangaroo and its sequel, Kangaroo Too. The premise alone was enough for me to add it to my reading list right away: a covert agent in the near-future forced to go on vacation to Mars, but who can’t seem to avoid trouble. Oh, and he can open a window to a pocket dimension at will, which is why he’s so valuable – because otherwise, he’s a bit of a screw-up. But you know how reading lists get; they’re huge, and I never quite got to reading Waypoint, and felt like a jerk when I hung out with Curtis again at Can*Con and still hadn’t picked it up.

Now that I finally have, I feel even more like a jerk. Why?

Because the next time I write a science fiction adventure novel, I want to do it like Curtis C. Chen.

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Birthday Reviews: Jonathan Maberry’s “Red Dreams”

Birthday Reviews: Jonathan Maberry’s “Red Dreams”

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Dead Man's Hand
Dead Man’s Hand

Jonathan Maberry was born on May 18, 1958.

Maberry won the 2007 Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel for Ghost Road Blues, which was also nominated for Best Novel. The next year he won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Nonfiction with David F. Kramer for their book The Cryptopedia: A Dictionary of the Weird, Strange & Downright Bizarre. In 2012, he won the Bram Stoker for Best Young Adult Novel for Dust & Decay, and again the following year for Flesh & Bone. In 2015, he shared a Bram Stoker Award for Best Graphic Novel with Tyler Crook for Bad Blood.

“Red Dreams” original appeared in Dead Man’s Hand: An Anthology of the Weird West, edited by John Joseph Adams in 2014. In 2017, Maberry included it in his collection Wind Through the Fence and Other Stories.

Set in the American West of 1876, the story follows Jonah McCall, who has been leading a band of mercenaries against a Cheyenne tribe led by Walking Bear, in hopes of earning the bounty placed on the head of each member of the tribe. When the “Red Dreams” opens, McCall has wiped out the Cheyenne and won the bounty, but at the cost of all of his own men. He and his horse, Bob, are the only survivors on the empty Wyoming desert where they watch a meteorite fall through the atmosphere.

Alone on the desert, McCall begins to reflect on his history with the Cheyenne, dating back to an enormous raid that massacred women, children, and the elderly, to the recent destruction of Walking Bear’s war party. Although McCall only sees himself doing his job and what is right for the local white settlers, his thoughts show him as an antihero. Maberry doesn’t indicate that Walking Bear was any less damaged than McCall, but Walking Bear’s thoughts and deeds aren’t being presented in the story, at least not by a reliable narrator. What is clear is that McCall has no personal animosity towards Walking Bear, but rather does hold him in a grudging respect.

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