Schedule Watch: Orbit, through to November 2008
The latest copy of the Orbit Books publication schedule came through from Sam Smith earlier in the week, with new titles through to November 2008. Seems like a good opportunity to pick up where I left off last time...
Glancing down the new listing, I see that Orbit are putting out a couple of new series. Well, new to the UK, anyway. The first is the Castings Trilogy by Australian author Pamela Freeman. Orbit have had great success in recent years by importing ready-published series from Down Under and releasing them in quick succession in the UK, which is a great business model for building a fan-base as it keeps the enthusiasm-levels fresh. Look for the first two of those, Blood Ties [Amazon] and Deep Water [Amazon] in June and October '08, with the third part to follow around about September '09 (according to the schedule on Pamela's website).
The second is a feisty-heroine supernatural romance type series that's already established in the US: the 'Mercedes Thompson' ("VW Mechanic and Shapechanger") books by Patricia Briggs. Moon Called [Amazon] will be first up, in June, followed by Blood Bound [Amazon] in July and Iron Kissed [Amazon] in August. Much more Jo's sort of thing that mine, I have to admit, but she does tend to throw anything really good at my head and demand that I read it, so you never know.
A few more feisty-heroine supernatural romance type titles in the offing as well, with new books from Jennifer Rardin, Lilith Saintcrow and Kelley Armstrong, so between these and the entire Gollancz Romancz list, Jo should be anticipating a full reading schedule herself next year.
But these are the titles that I'm personally looking forward to trying to shoe-horn into my reading schedule:
- Charlie Huston's new 'Joe Pitt' novel, Half the Blood of Brooklyn [Amazon] will be published in February. Good old supernatural investigation, without the excessive snogging and all the rest of that girly stuff. Much more my shot of bourbon... ;)
- The Execution Channel [Amazon] by Ken MacLeod appears in paperback in February as well. I've had the hardback on my 'godsdammit, you have got to make time for these...' shelf since publication. The paperback has to be read...
- A new Dresden Files title, Small Favour [Amazon] is out in April, the first time Orbit will have published Jim Butcher in hardback. So that's a double-dose of Harry Dresden early next year, then, what with the paperback of White Night [Amazon] appearing in January...
- Black Ships [Amazon] by debutant Jo Graham sounds like an intriguing historical fantasy: a girl with the power of oracle journeys the ancient Middle East in the company of an exiled Trojan prince... could be interesting.
That's pretty much the cream of the crop, personally speaking. And a good crop it looks like being, too, especially with the rest of the titles on the schedule - lots of new series fantasy and a few re-issues sprinkled in for good measure - weighing in as well.
Incidentally, any other publishers who happen to glance this way, by all means feel free to send me your schedules and I'll do my best to give 'em a similar once-over...
Recommended Reading: 'Dusk' and 'Dawn' by Tim Lebbon
Tim Lebbon's fantasy duology gets a definite recommendation from yours-truly: if you're a fan of dark, menacing, refreshingly cliché-free fantasy that puts an original twist on the classic tropes and has some fascinating characterisation along the way, then these are two titles that you should seriously consider.
Lebbon is primarily a horror writer - with over 20 published novel or novella-length titles to his name to-date - and in Dusk and Dawn he brings his horror writer's perspective and sensibilities to bear on the classic fantasy quest scenario. The result is a work of fantasy fiction that's midnight-dark, rock-salt gritty and bleaker than the Pennine Moors in mid-winter (I mentioned this to the author in an email. "They don't call me 'Grim Tim' for nothing!", he cheerily quipped in reply...)
His world - focusing in these two volumes on the continent of Noreela, but with hints that far distant lands lie beyond - is a pretty grim place, for a start. Three hundred years ago two psychotic, power-hungry Mages tried to take possessession of the natural magic of the land and twist it to their own ends. The land responded by withdrawing magic from the populace and as a result the natural order has been slowly decaying and dying for three centuries, until it's finally reached the crisis point that sparks the narrative.
Now, one young man might just hold the seed of magic within him; he might just be able to restore the power to the world and halt the worldwide rot, but the Mages have other ideas. After 300 years of exile in the frozen northern wastes they're intent on returning to Noreela to wreak bloody vengeance on the foes that exiled them so long ago. Because they've sensed that magic might be on the verge of return as well, and this time they want to make sure they take it for themselves, keep it, and use it to destroy everything they find in their path.
It sounds like a pretty standard fantasy scenario in many respects, but Lebbon has gone to a great deal of effort to make sure that his world is anything but fantasy-standard. There are no elves, dwarves, goblins or dragons here, nor any of the miriad cast of Tolkienesque stock stereotypes that litter so many fantasy novels.
Instead we're introduced to an assortment of weird and wonderful creatures and beasties: organic-mineral machinery, narcotic fledge demons, giant sentient tumble-weeds (which are a lot more unpleasant than they sound), sand-dwelling swarmiform nasties; a whole menagerie of twisted things that are symptomatic of a land whose spirit is dying and slowly going insane.
Through this blighted world, the main characters - for the main part as screwed-up a bunch of misfits and misanthropists as ever you're likely to find in fantasy fiction - stumble onwards towards their dimly-perceived, largely instinctive goals; lacking the bog-standard mentor-guidance that so many fantasy heroes are so conveniently provided with; lacking any incredible powers of survival above and beyond their own wits and skills.
And they need to draw on all those wits and skills to survive, beset as they are by implacable, genuinely deadly enemies on all sides: not only do they have to contend with the Mages and their Krote armies, but they also have to evade the fatal attentions of the Red Monks; an order of quasi-religious, sociopathic killers bent on eradicating all traces of magic from Noreela in order to ensure that the Mages can never be victorious.
The plot itself is tight, tense and genuinely suspenseful; right up to the denouement you really have no definite idea which way things are going to go. And that, in itself, is something of an achievement given how familiar so many readers are with the Campbellian uber-hero plot mechanism that lies at the core of so many fantasy sagas, whatever their external window-dressing.
The one thing that the first two Noreela books don't come equipped with though, is laughs. As I've said already, this is dark, grim stuff; reading both volumes in one sitting might actually be too much, however tempted you might be. And by page 300 of volume two I guarantee your psyche will be crying out for something, anything to lighten the tone, but Lebbon is relentless; once again demonstrating his horror writers' skills by driving you to the edge of despair along with the characters in the book.
So, to conclude: yes, I'd recommend Dusk and Dawn if you like your fantasy dark and egdy, but do have a Terry Pratchett - or a Robert Rankin, or a Tom Holt, or something - on hand for light relief afterwards. You might just need it...
Author Info: www.timlebbon.net / www.noreela.com
Ordering Info: Amazon.co.uk - Dusk / Dawn
Publication Info: Dusk - Bantam US, Jan 2006 / Dawn - Bantam US, March 2007
Disclosure: Tim Lebbon is a website client of mine, yes. But I only ever call 'em the way I find 'em.
New Arrivals - mid December '07
Another trip to the post office at the weekend, and another personal selection of titles of note from those in the the P.O. Box this time around:
Last Argument of Kings by Joe Abercrombie
The third and final part of Mr Abercrombie's The First Law, one of the most refreshingly lo-fi fantasy series I've read for years; a wonderful blend of down-and-dirty action, skullduggery, treachery, intrigue and a very dark, witty humour throughout.
I can honestly say that I've enjoyed every word of the saga so far, and can't wait to get stuck into the denouement, which I know has already garnered very positive mentions from some of my genre-blogging compadres.
Just the small Matter of the new Iain M. Banks to finish first, and then I'll be on with this one over the Yuletide break. Will report back anon, and I'll be gutted if this one doesn't make my Books of the Year for 2007 (but hey, no pressure..!)
The Escapement by K.J. Parker
Another trilogy-concluder and another prime example of exactly the sort of character-driven, plot-rich, trope-twisting, wit-infused, magic-free fantasy writing that I find myself enjoying more and more as time goes by; from another of my very favourite authors, too.
I do have to admit though, that on reading the second part of the Engineer saga, Evil for Evil, earlier in the year, I did experience a momentary worry that Parker may have gone off the boil, just a little. Evil for Evil was very long (600+ pages, iirc) and although it was intriguingly convoluted, many of the twists and turns seemed to lead in circles around one or two developmental loci; as a result I didn't feel that the characters or plot developed quite as much as they could have over the course of so large a book.
But The Escapement is reassuringly shorter, weighing in at 407 pages, and I'm hoping that it will be much pithier, and sharper, than its predecessor; everything is now set up for the trigger to be sprung, the fully-formed mechanism to leap into life and the final twist-action to be engaged. Hopefully I'll find time for this one shortly after finishing Last Argument of Kings (although I'll probably try to read a couple of issues of Postscripts in-between, as a palate-refresher...)
Classical Comics: Henry V (Original Text) adapted from William Shakespeare
The folks at Classical Comics very kindly sent me a copy of the full-text version of their debut publication: a graphic adaptation of Bill Shakespeare's Henry V.
If you're not familiar with the Classical Comics project, check out this item on UKSFBN, which explains how they're working to bring classic works of literature to a wider audience by means of publishing two - or in Shakespeare's case, three - editions of a particular title; the idea being that reluctant readers, or those uncomfortable with tackling no-modern English from a standing start - can begin with a simplified, 'Plain Text' edition and then work their way up to the 'Full Text' at their own pace.
And I do love a bit of Shakespeare, me, having studied Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet at school and found it surprisingly accessible, once you get your head around the archaic - yet in places utterly enchanting - linguistic gymnastics required for full appreciation. So I'm looking forward to tucking into Agincourt etc. next time I have a bit of free head-space...
Honourable Mentions:
I'd absolutely love to find the time to read the latest issues of Interzone, Black Static and Murky Depths - all of which have turned up this month - but alas, I'm still working my way through the latest issue of Uncut (I'm a subscriber, so I have to read that one...) so they'll just have to wait a bit longer, I'm afraid.
Hey, I know, I'll sneak 'em into the suitcase for the trip to the in-laws' over Xmas, see what can be done... I'm sure nobody will mind if I read a bit at the dinner table next Tuesday, eh? :)
Recommended Reading: 'The Ticking' by Renee French
File this one under 'odd... very odd'. The Ticking is a hardback graphic novel (in the sense of it being an illustrated story with panels and short captions) by cartoonist and illustrator Renée French.
It's a very sweet, sad, and somewhat disquieting story about a lad called Edison Steelhead, who is born with a hereditary facial deformity and whose father, as a result, takes him away to be raised on a remote island, far from what he assumes will be the mockery and laughter of a cruel and intolerant society.
The rest of the story tells of how Edison grows up, becomes an illustrator, becomes brother to a chimpanzee, and eventually runs away from home to avoid the same plastic surgery that his father had in order to be normalised. Which isn't so much of a spoiler as it might sound, because the plot really isn't the point of this simply told yet complex tale, which is much more an invitation to further thought than a mere comic narrative.
Full marks also to publisher Top Shelf, who really know how to grab a potential reviewer's attention. The book was packaged rather intriguingly for a start (excuse the ropey photography, I'm hoping to improve after a quick impromptu lighting lesson the other week):
...and inside the wrapping I found two further Renée French pocket books: a short tale about a gang of bizarre little rodents called Micrographica (a print version of the online comic featuring the same fuzzy characters), as well as Edison Steelhead's Lost Portfolio: Exploratory Studies of Girls and Rabbits which is, if anything, even stranger than The Ticking itself.
Definitely one for fans of indie comics, pencil illustrations and weird little stories that you somehow can't seem to get out of your head for quite some time after you've read them...
Happy Cthulumas!
My guaranteed-best-of-the-year seasonal greetings card arrived early this year, and it's another corker from Les Edwards (in his Edward Miller guise), which manages to skillfully combine his love of Lovecraftian horror with the seasonal tradition of pantomine...
All together now: "It's behiiiind yoooouuuu!"
Cover Artistry: 'The Ten Thousand' by Paul Kearney (Solaris, UK)
A couple of weeks ago, Solaris Books unveiled the cover of the forthcoming (September 2008) Paul Kearney novel The Ten Thousand [Amazon] over on the Solaris blog.
Here's the cover art, with illustration by Chris McGrath:
I love the overall atmosphere that Chris has created here: the colour, tone and texture of the piece is just terrific, as is the depth of the image; with several layers of action and interaction, giving the impression of an ongoing action sequence. I like the overall design as well: the composition and layout adds to and enhances the aesthetic of the cover; typography is suitably strong and stark, not fussy or over-fancy.
Paul Kearney writes very gritty, often dark epic / heroic fantasy, with very strong military content and I think this whole package reflects that general approach very well; certainly much better than any the earlier covers for his Monarchies of God series, which played up the fantasy elements much more, or his Sea Beggars books, which I think maybe tried too hard to play down the fantasy elements and disguise themselves as nautical fiction.
I will admit that when I first saw this cover - I run Paul's website, and he sent me the cover a few weeks back to have a look at - I was rather dubious about pretty-boy on the right-hand side there. But I'm sure there are all sorts of perfectly valid, marketing-driven reasons why a cover ought to include a jolly good-looking chap like that. Maybe there are particular market segments that the publisher wants to appeal to, or maybe the cover is also intended for use in the US market, where character portraits are much more commonly used.
But still... surely that guy is just too darned pretty to have fought in and survived the sort of conflicts that the hardened mercenary warriors in The Ten Thousand will have been involved in? Then again, I haven't read the book yet, so maybe he looks exactly right. We'll see.
Although, with reference to my previous post, I do think that putting the main character in a full-face helm, like the ones the figures in the background are all wearing, would have been better. That would have allowed the reader to associate more strongly with the imagery; imagining themselves inside that helm, marching into battle on some far-flung field... rather than wondering who the male model is, and how he managed to wander into the middle of a battle without getting his stubble-jawed head lopped off...
So, to summarise: a very good cover indeed, with terrific artwork and great atmospheric effect. Well-designed and nicely laid out; only slightly let down by the portrait effect and the male-model subject matter. But I'm sure I'll get over it, because I've read the first few chapters of The Ten Thousand, courtesy of Mr K, and the story so far is shaping up very, very nicely indeed...
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