Black Gate

Ymir (Orbit, July 12, 2022). Cover by Arcangel

Rich Larson has enjoyed a vanishingly rare career phenomenon. He’s vaulted into the top rank of modern science fiction almost solely on the strength of his short fiction.

This used to be more common. In fact, it used to be the way to do it — you published a few dozen short stories in genre magazines, maybe got a series going, attracted a few sly looks from publishers, and next thing you know you had a book deal and a real writing career. That doesn’t happen any more. At least, not the way it used to.

Except for Rich Larson, apparently. He burst onto the scene in 2012, and sold over 100 stories in the next six years — more than one per month. In 2016 Gardner Dozois called him “one of the best new writers to enter science fiction in more than a decade.” Since then he’s been focusing on longer work, and in July of this year he published his third novel Ymir. Publishers Weekly says “The nonstop action and violence keep the pages flying. Fans of finely crafted, high-intensity sci-fi stories will enjoy.”

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The World Gives Way (Orbit, May 3, 2022). Cover design by Lisa Marie Pompilio

Here at the Black Gate rooftop headquarters there are few things as exciting as a good science fiction debut. (Maybe our Friday zeppelin races? Let’s call it a tossup.)

Marissa Levien’s The World Gives Way is one of the year’s strongest debuts. It made The New York Times list of Best Science Fiction Books of the Year, and Lacy Baugher at Culturess calls it “bleak, beautiful science fiction done right.” A.S. Moser at Strange Horizon says it’s “brave storytelling that uses the distorted mirror of science fiction to best effect.”

But my favorite review came from Martin Cahill at Tor.com, who calls it “incredible… The World Gives Way socks [readers] in the gut.” Here’s an excerpt.

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Andrew Paul Weston has described himself as a “Former Royal Marine, Police Officer & Crime & Intelligence analyst, cursed with an overactive imagination.” His muse and expertise drive him to write action-adventure that spans genres. Black Gate’s Fletcher Vredenburgh reviewed his internationally bestselling IX Series, military sci-fi that transports the lost Roman IX Legion across time & space to fight energy-eating monsters (book #1 The IX, book #2 Prelude to Sorrow, book #3 Exordium of Tears). And Joe Bonadonna covered Weston’s trilogy following the Devil’s hitman, Daemon Grim, set in Janet Morris’ Heroes in Hell ™ universe (book #1 Hell Bound, book #2 Hell Hounds, book #3 Hell Gate).

With The Siren’s Song (just released), Weston continues The Cambion Journal series which promises to be a six-novella series. It tracks Augustus Thorne, a “Cambion” (a half-demon, half-human hybrid). He’s cursed with a terrible hunger he can barely control, hunting and exterminating any Incubi and Succubae he can find.

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World Breakers (Baen mass market reprint, July 26, 2022). Cover by Dominic Harman

If you’re one of the (very few) folks who pay attention when I complain, you know that I frequently lament the decline of the mass market science fiction anthology. Book store shelves used to be full of ’em, and nowadays they’ve all but vanished. Folks don’t have an appetite for short fiction these days, at least not in the way they used to. And that’s a shame — anthologies are a great way to discover new writers, fil the time when you can’t commit to a longer work, and just read some great stories.

Tony Daniel and Christopher Ruocchio previously edited Star Destroyers (2018) for Baen, and with Baen senior editor Hank Davis, Ruocchio has produced nearly half a dozen others, including Space Pioneers (2018), Sword & Planet (2021), and Time Troopers (2022). Last year Daniel and Ruocchio released World Breakers, a collection of original stories of super tanks, and what did I find in my local bookstore last week but a handsome and affordable mass market edition. Civilization isn’t dead after all.

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Never the Wind (Titan Books, June 2022). Cover design by Julia Lloyd

I first learned about Francesco Dimitri’s new novel Never the Wind when I heard Paul Tremblay describe it as “”Susanna Clarke meets Robert Aikman,” not exactly a description I hear every day. Publishers Weekly calls it “truly spooky…plenty here to fascinate fans of cerebral horror.”

That was more than enough to pique my interest. I set out to learn more and quickly found Dimitri’s guest post at Mary Robinette Kowal’s blog, My Favorite Bit:, where he discusses the narrative use of magic. It certainly cemented my interest — but I also found the way he approached magic on the page fascinating, and enormously useful for anyone using the supernatural in fiction.

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