Black Gate

I’ve been intrigued by many of Orbit’s recent releases, including Splintered Suns by Michael Cobley, John Gwynne’s A Time of Blood, Jamie Sawyer’s Eternity War, and especially Tade Thompson’s Wormwood Trilogy. Orbit has more than exceeded the post-expansion success we predicted for them two years ago, and I’m very glad to see it.

Best of all, they’re still taking chances on new authors, and they appear to be paying off nicely. Adrian Selby is a fine example. His second novel The Winter Road was released in November, and it seems to be nicely positioned to attract Game of Thrones fans. In his review James Latimer at The Fantasy Hive says “Selby’s books… are different, dark, uncompromising, ambitious, but brilliant.” Here’s the description.

The brutally powerful story of a daring warrior traveling a path that might bring salvation to her people… or lead her to ruin. For fans of Mark Lawrence, Andrzej Sapkowski, and Joe Abercrombie.

The Circle — a thousand miles of perilous forests and warring clans. No one has ever tamed such treacherous territory before, but ex-soldier Teyr Amondsen, veteran of a hundred battles, is determined to try.

With a merchant caravan protected by a crew of skilled mercenaries, Teyr embarks on a dangerous mission to forge a road across the untamed wilderness that was once her home. But a warlord has risen in the wilds of the Circle, uniting its clans and terrorizing its people. Teyr’s battles are far from over…

Adrian has a fondness for tales of mercenary companies, and for that reason Black Gate readers have compared him to Glen Cook. His debut novel Snakewood (2017) was the story of a legendary band of mercenaries, now retired, who are being hunted down and killed one by one; The Winter Road is a loose prequel, set about a hundred years earlier.

The Winter Road was published by Orbit on November 13, 2018. It is 496 pages, priced at $16.99 in trade paperback and $11.99 in digital formats. The cover is by Jaime Jones, whose previous credits include Peter Newman’s Vagrant trilogy. Read the complete first chapter of The Winter Road at the Orbit website.

Back in October, I managed to trap Parvus Press co-founder Colin Coyle in a bar long enough to get the scoop on his upcoming releases. There were plenty of interesting titles in the mix, but the one that really grabbed my attention was the debut fantasy novel by Nathan Sumsion, co-creator of the Terra Immortalis role playing game. Here’s what Colin shared then.

Necropolis PD is one of my favorite urban fantasies in a long time. It’s a cousin to both Butcher’s Dresden Files and Gaiman’s Neverwhere and I honestly feel that it brings a new flavor to a genre that has been heavily tread in recent years.

Necropolis PD is the tale of Jacob Green, trapped in the Meridian, a city of the dead, and pressed into service to solve a series of bizarre murders. Andy Whitaker at SFCrowsnest says Meridian “is a strange and compelling place. Don’t be fooled by the dark humour and strange environment… [Sumsion] might just have struck gold.” Here’s the description.

How do you solve a murder in the city of the dead?

Jacob Green was just an average college student. But three months ago, he ran through the wrong door and found himself trapped in the city of Meridian – a literal necropolis, concealed from the modern world, made up of forgotten places and populated entirely by the dead.

As the only living, breathing resident, Jake has struggled to scrape out an existence while waiting for the Necropolis Police Department to decide his fate, and it’s not looking good. But when an unusual string of crimes hits the city, Jake’s overseer and tormentor, NPD Detective Marsh offers him a deal: Jake’s life in exchange for helping them solve the worst series of crimes in the necropolis’ history.

Someone, or some thing is killing the dead, and if Jake can’t figure out who’s responsible, he could be next.

Necropolis PD is a hidden world fantasy that combines mystery, horror, magic, and more than a little humor. This book is perfect for the living and recently-departed alike.

Necropolis PD is the latest in the flourishing sub-genre of undead detective fiction. If you like it as much as I do, here’s a few more recent examples.

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There’s nothing like a good sci-fi horror tale. A lot of my favorite SF is horror, in fact — Alien, Dan Simmons’ Carrion Comfort, Stephen King’s The Stand, Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness.

The tale of an ill-fated mining expedition on an alien planet, Caitlin Starling’s debut novel The Luminous Dead looks like one of the most promising SF horror tales of the year. Liz Bourke at Tor.com says it’s “a gripping debut from a talented voice,” and Black Gate author Martha Wells calls it “A tense psychological thriller and a gripping survival story… a dark ride that’s worth every step.” Here’s Martin Cahill, from his review at The Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog.

Outfitted in a state of the art suit monitors and feeds her — and shields her presence from the mysterious, monstrous Tunnelers that dwell within the plane — Gyre’s life depends on the reliability of the tech and the skill of her team of handlers, who are ostensibly steering her toward the safest paths from the surface… Except there is no team, there’s just Em. Brilliant, cold, and tactical, Em has no qualms with using drugs on Gyre without her consent, manipulating her, and keeping her in the dark (both literally and metaphorically) as she works toward her own ends.

Together, Gyre and Em delve into one of the most dangerous cave systems on the planet, for a purpose that Gyre doesn’t know and Em won’t reveal. And though she’s certainly isolated on her journey, Gyre may not be alone in the dark.

That’s just a hint of the horrors lurking within The Luminous Dead, the fantastic horror sci-fi debut from Caitlin Starling. It’s a novel as claustrophobic as the premise suggests… As danger closes in on all sides, we’re never quite sure who love, who to hate, or who to trust.

And oh what dangers there are: treacherous drops, vicious riptides flowing through underground pools, an alien fungus that infects everything it touches, and the Tunnelers, ravenous creatures drawn to disturbances in the rock, Gyre’s suit batteries running low, missing supply checkpoints, and more. There is much to fear down in the dark.

The Luminous Dead was published by Harper Voyager on April 2, 2019. It is 414 pages, priced at $16.99 in trade paperback and $11.99 for the digital edition. The cover is by Alejandro Colucci. Read a generous 35-page sample (the complete first three chapters) here.

I’ve spent much of 2019 in a lengthy tour of modern space opera, and it’s been very eye-opening. I’m getting ready to wrap up and turn my attention to another subgenre (YA thriller? Weird Western? SF noir? So many to choose from!), but I can squeeze in one more, I think. And that’s likely to be Michael Cobley’s Splintered Suns, since the reviews I’ve read certainly make it sound like it’s got the goods. Namely lost artifacts, narrow escapes, ancient mysteries, and — especially! — giant space monsters. Here’s a sample from the January review at The Tattooed Book Geek.

Captain Brannan Pyke of the Ship, Scarabus and his riff-raff and ragtag crew… are contracted by their employer Van Graes to steal a tracking device, the Angular Eye from the City of Cawl-Vesh on the desert planet Ong. Van Graes is a collector of ancient alien artefacts and he hopes that The Angular Eye can be used to locate the wreck of an ancient ship and the wealth of knowledge and treasure that it holds. Millennia ago, the ship, the Mighty Defender of the Arraveyne Empire was the only ship to escape the collapse of the Arraveyne Imperium. However, during the escape, the ship caught the attention of the Damaugra (a mythical sentient metal monster made of coils and tentacles). The Damaugra relentlessly chased the ship through space, damaging it beyond repair and causing it to crash on the planet Ong. Where its wreckage has remained buried and hidden in the vast desert ever since.

I’m pretending that I’m interested because of the rich backstory and powerful mythic overtones, but really I was sold the moment I read mythical sentient metal monster and tentacles. Read into that what you will.

If you’re looking for a more balanced (i.e. tentacle-free) review, here’s Eric Brown in his December wrap-up of the best new SF at The Guardian.

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Here’s a not very shocking statement: we still need to focus on diversity in sci-fi and fantasy.

My hope is that many of you will read that and think, Yeah, tell me something I don’t know. But I imagine many of you would also agree with me that it needs to be said, given how many people still openly disagree with the push to see more works published by creators from marginalized groups, whether that marginalization is based on race, age, sexual orientation, etc.

Take an anthology like New Suns: Original Speculation Fiction by People of Color. The title openly proclaims the editor and publisher’s intent: to highlight PoC authors who are doing phenomenal work in SFF, in the same vein as the Disabled People Destroy series. The outpouring of support for these anthologies is awe-inspiring, especially considering the apparent risk, I suppose, in alienating some readers – often those who don’t acknowledge the need for these anthologies, and the smart business sense in producing them.

Some people, apparently, aren’t paying attention to trends in speculative fiction, or maybe not understanding why these trends exist. Collecting and producing works by authors from diverse groups is a response not just to a need, but to a burning desire for these works. The success of Black Panther and Captain Marvel are obvious examples of this, but we see it in prose fiction, comics, video games, and more. Uncanny Magazine raised almost $60,000 for Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction on Kickstarter last year, virtually tripling their funding goal. Why? People are tired of watching or reading stories about the same kinds of characters, in settings based on the same (dare I say it) Eurocentric framework.

Not everyone – there’s still a market for a rehashing of Tolkien or Brooks or Vance, if that’s your thing – but enough people to make this sort of thing viable. And authors like Rebecca Roanhorse, Fran Wilde, Nnedi, Okorafor, Saladin Ahmed, Bogi Takács and more aren’t just generating buzz because of their identities – it’s because they’re amazing creators, producing work that’s well-written AND fresh.

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