Black Gate

Back in January I wrote about a conversation Colin Coyle, co-founder of Parvus Press, and I had in a bar at the World Fantasy Convention. One of the upcoming titles he told me about was The Ragged Blade, the debut fantasy novel from Christopher Ruz. The book’s editor, Kaelyn E. Considine, was kind enough to send me a copy of the finished book, and it looks fantastic. In an article titled “Why I Love The Ragged Blade” on the Parvus website, Colin pulls back on the curtain on how a small press acquires a book like this one.

One of the first books that was ever submitted to us was Century of Sand by Christopher Ruz. It was a previously self-published book that Ruz had released years prior. The book had some very positive reviews, but Ruz wasn’t sure how to go about selling it to a broad audience. He wanted to know if we wanted to pick it up and re-release it… Century of Sand was a tautly-paced book. It was a violin string on the verge of snapping. It was the work of a guy who was going to be a master at managing the rise and fall of mood, tension, and action in a book. But it wasn’t yet the best book it could be… when the Parvus team met to go through acquisitions, we all agreed we weren’t ready to take on the complexities of a re-release.

Two years later, Ruz sent me a brand new novel that he was querying… I called him right away and told him I thought it was time for us to tackle that Century of Sand challenge together and he readily agreed. It was a weird path to a publishing deal; I reject the book and then, two years later I end up buying it because of an entire different manuscript he sent. But publishing is a weird business, I’m a weird guy, and some of the best things in life are weird. Like pudding or bergamot.

So we picked up Century of Sand, Ruz threw away the opening third of the book, combined major characters, eliminated sub-plots, and all-but-completely rewrote anything that remained. And what we ended up with was The Ragged Blade, Book One of the Century of Sand by Christopher Ruz… I love this book. I love the broken father/daughter journey, the way this book is both expansive and intimate at the same time, and how every page of The Ragged Blade is a carefully composed work of true craft.

The Ragged Blade was published by Parvus Press on June 4, 2019. It is 459 pages, priced at $14.99 in trade paperback and $7.99 in digital formats. The cover is by Ronan Le Fur. See our previous Parvus Press coverage here.

June has some great SF and fantasy headed our way, but the title that’s grabbed my attention this month has already arrived: Ada Hoffman’s debut novel The Outside. Karin Tidbeck calls it “a fresh and mind-bending mix of cosmic horror and space opera,” and Publishers Weekly says it’s “a breezily told adventure that bursts with sheer fun… [a] beautifully smart, uncynical space opera.”

But my favorite review was a rave from Kate Sherrod at The Skiffy and Fanty blog. Here’s a snippet.

With a boffo combination of hard science fiction, cosmic Lovecraftian horror, both cyber- and god-punk, some ridiculously charismatic aliens, and a fascinating female protagonist somewhere on the autism spectrum, Ada Hoffman’s The Outside feels like it was made to order for us here at Skiffy and Fanty!…

In The Outside, Humanity has colonized the galaxy, but it hasn’t done it alone: our first step to the stars involved creating a dozen or so artificial intelligences so vastly powerful that they’ve come to be regarded as gods. These gods are served by a hierarchy of cybernetically-enhanced human “angels” who help them run the teeming variety of human-inhabited planets… Dr. Yasira Shien is a scientist-engineer, the finest student of a famous physicist who disappeared after the pair laid most of the groundwork for a new kind of reactor… Before we know it, disaster strikes on the station. In the chaotic and tragic aftermath, Yasira is torn from the small island of comfort she’s created for herself… haunted by a hundred deaths from her reactor’s mysterious failure, Yasira is whisked away by a stern batch of angels to go find her erstwhile mentor, Dr. Evianna Talirr, whose dimension-bending heresies may be a threat to Reality Itself™…

I enjoyed the roller coaster ride that is the plot, the feast of challenging ideas, and the fascinating characters. I also relished the mystery of the Outside, which could easily have become just another alternate space teeming with monsters but here balances on the more abstract and cerebral side even as it entertainingly warps reality… The Outside is quite possibly the best book I’ve read so far this year. Mad respect, Ms. Hoffman!

The Outside was published by Angry Robot on June 11, 2019. It is 400 pages, priced at $14.99 in trade paperback and $9.99 in digital formats. The cover is by Lee Gibbons.

See all our recent New Treasures here.

I’ve been a fan of Jack McDevitt since his second novel, the SF mystery A Talent for War (1989), the first of his long-running Alex Benedict series.

His latest is #8 in the series. Ricky L. Brown at Amazing Stories calls it “a blueprint for mystery writers”:

Alex’s uncle Gabe returns after being lost in space for over a decade, but time aboard the ship elapsed only a few weeks. In addition to dealing with his life awkwardly warping ahead eleven years, Gabe believes he is in position of an artifact that may lead to answers to the missing Octavia station. With the help of Alex and Chase, the search for answers launches into a fast-paced mystery with galactic proportions… Though this story ties into some of the elements following Coming Home, it is a stand-alone story with just enough backstory to keep the new reader involved. If this is your first introduction to McDevitt’s world of galactic archaeology, it is a great jumping in point…

Octavia Gone is a blueprint for mystery writers. Smart characters not only looking for answers, but growing from what they discover is satisfying, even if we might not like what they find.

Here’s the complete description.

After being lost in space for eleven years, Gabe finally makes his triumphant return to reunite with Alex and Chase and retrieve a possibly alien artifact — which may lead them to solve the greatest archaeological mystery of their careers, in the eighth installment of the Alex Benedict series.

After his return from space, Gabe is trying to find a new life for himself after being presumed dead—just as Alex and Chase are trying to relearn how to live and work without him. But when a seemingly alien artifact goes missing from Gabe’s old collection, it grants the group a chance to dive into solving the mystery of its origins as a team, once again.

When a lead on the artifact is tied to a dead pilot’s sole unrecorded trip, another clue seems to lead to one of the greatest lingering mysteries of the age: the infamous disappearance of a team of scientists aboard a space station orbiting a black hole—the Amelia Earhart of their time. With any luck, Alex, Chase, and Gabe may be on the trail of the greatest archaeological discovery of their careers…

In Octavia Gone, Nebula Award winner McDevitt, who Stephen King has called “the logical heir to Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke,” has created another terrific science fiction mystery in his beloved Alex Benedict series.

Octavia Gone was published by Saga Press on May 7, 2019. It is 384 pages, priced at $27.99 in hardcover and $7.99 in digital formats. The cover is by Stephen Youll.

See all our latest New Treasures here.