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Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog Selects the Best Novels of 2016

Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog Selects the Best Novels of 2016

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It’s the end of the year, the time when companies, magazines, and bloggers flood the airwaves with Year’s Best lists. Why do they bother? Because we love them! Lists, lists, lists. They’re the best.

One of my favorite genre sites, the Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog, is out with their annual Editor’s Picks for the Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of 2016, including Cixin Liu’s Death’s End, N.K. Jemisin’s The Obelisk Gate, and a debut novel, Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer.

Palmer’s long-in-coming debut crafts a distinctly unique vision of a future world — a 25th century where technology has created abundance, where religion is outlawed but personal spirituality is encouraged, where criminals are sentenced to wander the world making themselves useful. It’s an imagined outcome rooted in threads visible all around us even today. The story involves an unlikely meeting between a convict serving a family named Mycroft Canner; a “sensayer,” or spiritual guide, named Carlyle Foster; and Bridger, a young boy who seems to possess the power to make his every wish come true — a power that could completely destabilize a world that is the very definition of stability. With lush prose that recreates the feel of a period novel, this is one of the year’s most striking debuts. Read our review..

The list also includes several novels we’ve recently covered at Black Gate. Here’s a partial list.

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A Tale of Two Covers: Alan Baxter’s Crow Shine and Sarah Remy’s The Bone Cave

A Tale of Two Covers: Alan Baxter’s Crow Shine and Sarah Remy’s The Bone Cave

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This week’s Tale of Two Covers looks at two very similar covers, released a month apart late this year. (Click the images above for bigger versions.)

The first is Crow Shine, published by the Australian independent publisher Ticonderoga Publications on November 11, 2016. Crow Shine is the debut horror collection from Australian dark fantasy writer Alan Baxter, and it gathers stories from F&SF, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Postscripts, and multiple anthologies. You can read more about it at the Ticonderoga website, but unfortunately it doesn’t identity the cover artist.

The second is The Bone Cave, published in paperback yesterday by Harper Voyager Impulse. It’s the third volume in Sarah Remy’s Bone Magic series, following Stonehill Downs (2014) and Across the Long Sea (2015). See all the details at the publisher’s website here. Like Crow Shine, the cover artist is uncredited.

While both books clearly make use of the same base image, there are also interesting design differences. Note the lamp affixed to the rock in the cover on the left (missing on the right), and the skull at the base of the rock on the right. They’ve also gone with different color schemes — Crow Shine is a pale white, almost green, and The Bone Cave has colored the entire background red.

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Adventures in Earth’s Prehistory: Jane Gaskell’s Atlan Saga, Part III

Adventures in Earth’s Prehistory: Jane Gaskell’s Atlan Saga, Part III

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Paperback Library (Frank Frazetta)
Paperback Library (Frank Frazetta)

Tandem edition
Tandem edition

Hodder & Stoughton (Denvil)
Hodder & Stoughton (Denvil)

Paperback Library (second printing)
Paperback Library (second printing)

Book Three (or Two, depending on the publisher) of Jane Gaskell’s Atlan Saga bears the same title as the series: Atlan. The previous volume(s), reviewed here (The Dragon) and here (The Serpent), left off where our heroine Cija married the “Dragon” General Zerd. Having just received the throne of the fabled continent of Atlan in a bloodless conquest, Zerd was crowned emperor, effectively making Cija empress.

Atlan commences with a brief introduction by a deserter called Scar, recounting preceding events with his own first person narrative as he legs his way to the capital. Meeting up with a bird-riding officer in search of a disguise, they switch places. Now mounted, Scar (and the introduction) fast forward to the capital where we encounter the Empress Cija.

Being empress is not all it is cracked up to be. Cija is still very much a loner and even though she’s surrounded by courtiers and handmaidens, she is lonely. Zerd’s wandering eye soon has him distracted by other women, leaving Cija to her own devices. Unto this scene arrives her old lover Smahil, and a brief tryst follows.

This is probably the right time to reveal a spoiler I’ve avoided in my previous reviews: Smahil is Cija’s half-brother. This is something Cija did not know when they first became lovers, but by the time he arrives in the capital, she is well aware of their familial relationship, yet is so desperately lonely she still shares her bed with him.

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Future Treasures: The Mammoth Book of the Mummy, edited by Paula Guran

Future Treasures: The Mammoth Book of the Mummy, edited by Paula Guran

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the-mammoth-book-of-the-mummy-smallPaula Guran does interesting anthologies. She tends to focus on modern (21st Century) writers, which means she’s plowing a different field than all those vintage anthologies I love — and introducing me to a host of new writers.

Her newest is The Mammoth Book of the Mummy, containing 25 new and reprint tales “that explore, subvert, and reinvent the mummy mythos” from Joe R. Lansdale, Kage Baker, Paul Cornell, Terry Dowling, Karen Joy Fowler, John Langan, Helen Marshall, Keith Taylor, and many others. It arrives from Prime Books in trade paperback next month.

Human mummies, preserved by both accident and intent, have been found on every continent except Antarctica. These enigmatic remains of humanity have fascinated people for centuries. Shrouded in history they have acquired meaning and symbolism quite separate from their value as a source of historic knowledge, inspiring tales of reanimation, reincarnation, loves that outlive death, and curses that bring vengeance from the past.

As a figure of the supernatural the mummy has attained iconic status in the popular imagination. The Mammoth Book of the Mummy presents a collection of tales written for the twenty-first century ― including four brand-new stories ― that explore, subvert, and reinvent the mummy mythos. Some delve into the past, others explore alternative histories, and some bring mummies into our own world. Within these covers lie stories of revenge, romance, monsters, and mayhem, ranging freely across time periods, genres, and styles sure to please both mummy-lovers and those less wrapped up in mummy lore.

I published one Mummy story in Black Gate, Dan Brodribb’s hilarious “The Girl Who Feared Lightning” in BG 14 (“Nobody really talks about what mummies can and can’t do. They never really caught on like some monsters did. Poor branding.”) Here’ hoping Paula’s latest anthology will help mummies with that branding problem.

Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

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Vintage Treasures: Watership Down by Richard Adams

Vintage Treasures: Watership Down by Richard Adams

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watershipdown“I announce,” read the Times of London’s review in 1972, “with trembling pleasure, the appearance of a great story.”

This is not the typical language of a contemporary book review, but then the book in question, Watership Down, was not a typical book. It was and is a fantasy with wide crossover appeal, a mythic adventure with rabbits as the principal characters. That’s right, rabbits: those long-eared good-for-nothings whom we humans largely dismiss as being dumber than a box of rabbit-sized rocks.

Having read and adored the book in my early teens, I determined it was time to share it with my twelve-year-old son, who still craves his daily dose of bedtime story. And why not? I’d get to read a tale I had not revisited for more than thirty-five years, and I’d get to gauge my son’s reactions every step of the way.

To say he was impressed would be an understatement. As we approached the closing chapters, he wanted extra, before-bed reading time, but in the same breath kept exclaiming how he didn’t want to finish. “Are there more books about Hazel and Bigwig?” he asked. “Are there?”

Spoilers follow. If by some terrible chance you, gentle reader, have not read Watership Down for yourself, then please, close this page. Go do something else. Purchase a copy of Watership Down, for example. You can always return here once you’ve read to “The End.”

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New Treasures: The Death and Life of Zebulon Finch by Daniel Kraus

New Treasures: The Death and Life of Zebulon Finch by Daniel Kraus

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Daniel Kraus co-wrote Trollhunters with Guillermo del Toro, the basis for the Netflix animated series of the same name. He’s also the author of the horror novels Rotters and Scowler.

His latest project is a two-volume epic about an undead seventeen year old on a secret mission to assassinate Hitler. It began with The Death and Life of Zebulon Finch: At the Edge of Empire (October 2015), and concludes with The Death and Life of Zebulon Finch: Empire Decayed (October 2016).

Entertainment Weekly named the first volume one of the Top Ten Books of 2015, saying “Kraus’s globe-trotting dead kid is by turns cavalier, playful, and thoughtful, and his singular voice — a debonair turn-of-the-century murderer-turned-victim — is utterly riveting,” and Booklist called it “a giant-size epic [that] skillfully blends historical fiction, dark humor, and horror to push readers right to the brink.” There’s a definite YA feel to these books, although there’s also a macabre horror angle, so proceed with caution if you’re a little on the squeamish side.

Here’s the description for the first volume.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Cthulhu Casebooks & Nightmares

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Cthulhu Casebooks & Nightmares

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lovegrove_shadwellIn the early 1900’s, Maurice Leblanc had his French detective, Arsene Lupin, face off with Herlock Sholmes. I think you know who he’s battling – spelling disregarded. 1965’s A Study in Terror sent Holmes after Jack the Ripper on movie screens and in 1988, and Sax Rohmer biographer Clay Van Ash brought Holmes and Fu Manchu together in Ten Years Beyond Baker Street. Crossovers have become more and more popular over the years. James Lovegrove currently has Holmes interacting with the Cthulhu mythos.

I don’t do a lot of book reviews here at The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes because I generally don’t like to reveal spoilers. And it can be tough to talk about the strong points of a book without giving away key elements. But sometimes, especially with older books, that’s part of the price of the post. So, I’ll try to limit revelations in this one, but be warned: There be spoilers here!

Lovegrove, who has written several non-Holmes books, is part of Titan’s stable of new Holmes authors. Sherlock Holmes and the Shadwell Shadows is the first of a trilogy, with Sherlock Holmes & The Miskatonic Monstrosities due out in Fall of 2017 and Sherlock Holmes and the Sussex Sea Devils to wrap things up in November of 2018.

The basic premise of the book (yea, the trilogy) is that Watson made up the sixty stories in the Canon. He did so to cover up the real truth behind Holmes’ work. And that’s because the truth is too horrible to reveal. In a nutshell, Watson has written three journals, each covering events fifteen years apart, to try and get some of the darkness out of his soul.

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How Long Does it Take For Treasure to Become Vintage? The Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay

How Long Does it Take For Treasure to Become Vintage? The Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay

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There aren’t a lot of fantasy books that remind me of Christmas, but Guy Gavriel Kay’s Fionavar Tapestry, the trilogy that launched his fiction-writing career, is definitely one example.

I think it’s because the opening novel, The Summer Tree, was published by McClelland & Stewart in late October 1984, and by Christmas it seemed everyone I knew was talking about it. In 1984 I turned 20 years old, and started my last year of undergrad studies at the University of Ottawa. The bookstore I hung out in every Saturday was The House of Speculative Fiction, run by Pat Caven and Rodger Turner, and by December Pat — with whom I had long chats about books every week — was enthusiastically sharing the buzz about the book. “I’m told it starts slow,” she said, “but once they cross over into the fantasy world, it really picks up.”

There was a lot of attention paid to Guy Gavriel Kay’s first fantasy novel in Ottawa. He was something of a local celebrity. He was Christopher Tolkien’s co-editor on The Silmarillion, which was published to worldwide acclaim when Kay was just 23 years old. Although he lived in Toronto, where he returned to law school in 1975, and certainly didn’t hang out in any circles we knew (“He writes in a salon,” Pat told me, shaking her head), he was still Canadian. And in those days, a Canadian fantasy writer was a genuine novelty… especially a very good one, which it quickly became obvious Kay was.

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Future Treasures: The Skill of Our Hands, Book 2 of The Incrementalists, by Steven Brust and Skyler White

Future Treasures: The Skill of Our Hands, Book 2 of The Incrementalists, by Steven Brust and Skyler White

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I missed The Incrementalists, the new novel from Steven Brust (the Vlad Taltos series) and Skyler White (In Dreams Begin) when it came out in hardcover from Tor in 2013. But folks who were more on the ball than I did not — such as John Scalzi (“Secret societies, immortality, murder mysteries and Las Vegas all in one book? Shut up and take my money”) and David Pitt at Booklist, who wrote:

A secret society has existed for millennia, operating under the surface of society. The Incrementalists are improving the world by making slight adjustments that make human existence a bit better than it might have been… But now they have a major problem on their hands. One of their own, who recently died, might have been murdered, and the woman who was given her memories paradoxically doesn’t seem to be able to remember her. Even worse, it looks like the dead woman has somehow manipulated the Incrementalists (or, to be more precise, Phil, who has loved her for centuries) into putting her memories into a very specific young woman for a very specific and quite troubling, possibly catastrophic, reason… cleverly constructed, populated with characters readers will enjoy hanging out with, and packed with twists and nifty surprises. If you have to call it something, call it genius at work.

The second volume, The Skill of Our Hands, arrives in hardcover from Tor on January 24th.

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Unearthly Desires in an Unruly World: Cornelia Funke’s Living Shadows

Unearthly Desires in an Unruly World: Cornelia Funke’s Living Shadows

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In Living Shadows, the second book in Cornelia Funke’s wondrous Mirrorworld trilogy (currently being repackaged and reissued in the US as the Reckless trilogy), death haunts every page. We follow Jacob Reckless, our protagonist, as he attempts to rid himself of the moth devouring his heart. Given to him by the Red Fairy whom he carelessly betrayed, it begins to fill his body with excruciating pain. He must find an ancient crossbow belonging to an infamous witch slayer and a willing volunteer to shoot him in the heart. An equally ancient spell cast on it enables a third shot to resurrect its victim. Unfortunately, someone else intends to keep it for himself, and when Jacob encounters his dauntless rival, the world as he knows it threatens to crush his bones.

Funke bakes a layer cake of darkness and unconditional love with a haunting fairy tale icing that keeps you embedded in the story. You fall in love with the characters and feel their deepest emotions. In particular, Jacob’s simmering romance with his eternal companion, Fox (whose real name you learn once again in this volume) ensnares you. The moments where it comes close to a boiling point make you remember why fairy tale romance has captivated readers since the first storytellers entertained their audiences.

Theirs being the central romance in the story differentiates the series from so many others in the YA genre. Love triangles enchant their biggest fans and ensure the longevity of a series, but there comes a time when devoted YA readers roll their eyes. Focusing on one relationship betwen two compelling characters who fear each other’s deaths more than their own allows your imagination the freedom to savor their journey. When villains get in the way of their love, it’s just as fun of a ride, if not more.

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