Here we are then… It’s another ‘On Our Radar’ post, this time covering the month of March! Because, our to-be-read lists are never quite long enough, right? This month we’ve included all the titles that have us excited or that we’ve seen and thought readers would find interesting. We’ve probably not included ‘every’ big fantasy release, but we’re getting pretty damned close!
As I said last month, these posts do take hours to create, so it would be wonderful, if you do find them useful, to let us know they are worth us continuing with by posting which titles you are excited about, the covers you’d like and whether we’ve turned you towards a title you’d previously not heard of, etc in the comments section or via Twitter/Facebook. Sharing would also be grand! 😀
Oh, and don’t forget that tomorrow will see the debut of our very first edition on Small Press ‘On Our Radar’, so do check back! 🙂
Books due for release in March 2016
The Last Days of Magic
Mark Tompkins
01/03/2015
What became of magic in the world? Who needed to do away with it, and for what reasons? Drawing on myth, legend, fairy tales, and Biblical mysteries, The Last Days of Magic brilliantly imagines answers to these questions, sweeping us back to a world where humans and magical beings co-exist as they had for centuries.
Aisling, a goddess in human form, was born to rule both domains and—with her twin, Anya—unite the Celts with the powerful faeries of the Middle Kingdom. But within medieval Ireland interests are divided, and far from its shores greater forces are mustering. Both England and Rome have a stake in driving magic from the Emerald Isle. Jordan, the Vatican commander tasked with vanquishing the remnants of otherworldly creatures from a disenchanted Europe, has built a career on such plots. But increasingly he finds himself torn between duty and his desire to understand the magic that has been forbidden.
As kings prepare, exorcists gather, and divisions widen between the warring clans of Ireland, Aisling and Jordan must come to terms with powers given and withheld, while a world that can still foster magic hangs in the balance. Loyalties are tested, betrayals sown, and the coming war will have repercussions that ripple centuries later, in today’s world—and in particular for a young graduate student named Sara Hill.
The Last Days of Magic introduces us to unforgettable characters who grapple with quests for power, human frailty, and the longing for knowledge that has been made taboo. Mark Tompkins has crafted a remarkable tale—a feat of world-building that poses astonishing and resonant answers to epic questions.
Chaos Choreography (InCryptid Series #5)
by Seanan McGuire
01/03/2016
Verity Price is back on the West Coast and getting back into the swing of the family business: cryptozoology. She’s rescuing cryptids from bad situations, protecting them from monster-hunters, and generally risking life and limb for the greater good, with her ex-Covenant partner/husband, Dominic, by her side. Her ballroom dance career is behind her…or so she thinks.
When Verity gets the call from the producers of Dance or Die, the reality show she almost won several years before, she finds the lure of a comeback impossible to resist, and she and Dominic are off to L.A. for one last shot at the big time.
Of course, nothing is that simple. When two of her fellow contestants turn up dead, Verity will need every ally she can find—and a couple she wasn’t looking for—in order to navigate the complicated steps of both the tango and a murder investigation without blowing her cover. It doesn’t help that her official family backup is her grandmother, Alice Price-Healy, who thinks “subtle” is something that happens to other people.
Winning this competition may have just become a matter of life and death.
Black City Saint
Richard A. Knaak
01/03/2016
For more than sixteen hundred years, Nick Medea has followed and guarded the Gate that keeps the mortal realm and that of Feirie separate, seeking in vain absolution for the fatal errors he made when he slew the dragon. All that while, he has tried and failed to keep the woman he loves from dying over and over.
Yet in the fifty years since the Night the Dragon Breathed over the city of Chicago, the Gate has not only remained fixed, but open to the trespasses of the Wyld, the darkest of the Feiriefolk. Not only does that mean an evil resurrected from Nick’s own past, but the reincarnation of his lost Cleolinda, a reincarnation destined once more to die.
Nick must turn inward to that which he distrusts the most: the Dragon, the beast he slew when he was still only Saint George. He must turn to the monster residing in him, now a part of him…but ever seeking escape.
The gang war brewing between Prohibition bootleggers may be the least of his concerns. If Nick cannot prevent an old evil from opening the way between realms…then not only might Chicago face a fate worse than the Great Fire, but so will the rest of the mortal realm.
Dragon Wizard (The Dragon Series 3)
S. Andrew Swann
01/03/2016
It has been a year since former thief Frank Blackthorne became Princess of Lendowyn and married a dragon. He’s coming to terms with his new life, but during the royal anniversary banquet, an elven prince reads a scroll of evil magic and Frank’s world is turned upside-down. Again.
The scroll’s spell causes a murderous rampage in a palace full of noble dignitaries, so it’s no surprise Frank’s visitors are angry. The Elf-King Timoras threatens war but Frank can’t do anything about it: because of the same bit of scroll magic, the ex-Dragon Lucille has taken over the princess’s body, unaware that Frank is still there, locked in her skull. And worst of all, the fate of everyone may soon rest on the shoulders of the man responsible for the whole mess, someone who should be safely dead…
Seer
Sonia Orin Lyris
01/03/2016
The debut of a stunning new talent. A poor, young woman rises to the heights of a crumbling empire, where she must speak hard truth to power in order to save a world from chaos.
Everybody Wants Answers. No One Wants the Truth.
The Arunkel empire has stood a thousand years, forged by wealth and conquest, but now rebellion is stirring on the borders and treachery brews in the palace halls. Elsewhere, in a remote mountain village, a young mother sells the prophesies of her sister, Amarta, in order to keep them and her infant child from starving. It’s a dangerous game when such revelations draw suspicion and mistrust as often as they earn coin.
Yet Amarta’s visions are true. And often not at all what the seeker wishes to hear.
Now in a tapestry of loyalty, intrigue, magic, and gold, Amarta has become the key to a ruler’s ambitions. But is she nothing beyond a tool? As Amarta comes into her own as a seer, she realizes she must do more than predict the future. She must create it.
The Devil You Know
KJ Parker
01/03/2016
The greatest philosopher of all time is offering to sell his soul to the Devil. All he wants is twenty more years to complete his life’s work. After that, he really doesn’t care.
But the assistant demon assigned to the case has his suspicions, because the philosopher is Saloninus–the greatest philosopher, yes, but also the greatest liar, trickster and cheat the world has yet known; the sort of man even the Father of Lies can’t trust.
He’s almost certainly up to something; but what?
Who Wants to Be the Prince of Darkness?
Michael Boatman
01/03/2016
Lucifer is enjoying his retirement in an obscure corner of Limbo when he learns of a plot by Gabriel, the current ruler of Hell, to use humanity’s greatest weapon against it – Television!
Cue the hottest reality game-show ever conceived: Who Wants To Be The Prince Of Darkness? Gabriel orchestrates an “Infernal takeover” of Earth by stealing unwitting mortal souls and sending them to a mostly empty Hell, hoping to reinvigorate the Infernal Realm.
Now Lucifer must find a living champion to seize control of Hell and free millions of stolen mortal souls before the theft becomes permanent. But who would ever want to be Hell’s champion?
Doom of the Dragon (Dragonships of Vindras 4)
Margaret Weis
01/03/2016
In three previous novels, Skylan lvorson overcame obstacles that would have defeated a lesser man, rising from obscurity to become the Chief of Chiefs of the fearsome Vindrasi who sail their living dragonships far and wide to raid and plunder for the glory of the gods. However, a cruel twist of fate struck him down before he and his beloved could complete their quest for the five sacred dragonbones that would summon the great dragon Ilyrion and save their people from destruction at the hands of an evil god. But even true death is denied him, and his destiny is unfulfilled. Caught between life and death, he must lead those who journeyed with him to battle the evil god and the vast army of the god and his human emperor. Skylan must fight as he never has before to win back his life and his love, while seeking the last Spiritbone, the key to summoning the ultimate victory before it can be snatched away by the forces of evil. Wei and Hickman have crafted a pulse-pounding fantasy adventure that brings this great saga to a rousing, satisfying conclusion that will stir the passions of their legions of fans.
Arkwright
Allen Steele
01/03/2016
Written by a highly regarded expert on space travel and exploration, Allen Steele’s Arkwright features the precision of hard science fiction with a compelling cast of characters. In the vein of classic authors such as Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and Arthur C. Clarke, Nathan Arkwright is a seminal author of the twentieth century. At the end of his life he becomes reclusive and cantankerous, refusing to appear before or interact with his legion of fans. Little did anyone know, Nathan was putting into motion his true, timeless legacy.
Convinced that humanity cannot survive on Earth, his Arkwright Foundation dedicates itself to creating a colony on an Earth-like planet several light years distant. Fueled by Nathan’s legacy, generations of Arkwrights are drawn together, and pulled apart, by the enormity of the task and weight of their name.
This is classic, epic science fiction and engaging character-driven storytelling, which will appeal to devotees of the genre as well as fans of current major motion pictures such as Gravity and Interstellar.
Borderline
Mishell Baker
01/03/2016
A cynical, disabled film director with borderline personality disorder gets recruited to join a secret organization that oversees relations between Hollywood and Fairyland in the first book of a new urban fantasy series from debut author Mishell Baker.
A year ago, Millie lost her legs and her filmmaking career in a failed suicide attempt. Just when she’s sure the credits have rolled on her life story, she gets a second chance with the Arcadia Project: a secret organization that polices the traffic to and from a parallel reality filled with creatures straight out of myth and fairy tales.
For her first assignment, Millie is tasked with tracking down a missing movie star who also happens to be a nobleman of the Seelie Court. To find him, she’ll have to smooth-talk Hollywood power players and uncover the surreal and sometimes terrifying truth behind the glamour of Tinseltown. But stronger forces than just her inner demons are sabotaging her progress, and if she fails to unravel the conspiracy behind the noble’s disappearance, not only will she be out on the streets, but the shattering of a centuries-old peace could spark an all-out war between worlds.
No pressure.
United States of Japan
Peter Tieryas
03/03/2016
Decades ago, Japan won the Second World War. Americans worship their infallible Emperor, and nobody believes that Japan’s conduct in the war was anything but exemplary. Nobody, that is, except the George Washingtons – a shadowy group of rebels fighting for freedom. Their latest subversive tactic is to distribute an illegal video game that asks players to imagine what the world might be like if the United States had won the war instead.Captain Beniko Ishimura’s job is to censor video games, and he’s tasked with getting to the bottom of this disturbing new development. But Ishimura’s hiding something…He’s slowly been discovering that the case of the George Washington’s is more complicated than it seems, and the subversive videogame’s origins are even more controversial and dangerous than the censors originally suspected.
Radiance
Catherynne M. Valente
03/03/2016
Severin Unck is the headstrong young daughter of a world famous film director. She has inherited her father’s love of the big screen but not his exuberant gothic style of filmmaking. Instead, Severin makes documentaries, artful and passionate and even rather brave – for she is a realist in a fantastic alternate universe, in which Hollywood occupies the moon, Mars is rife with lawless saloons, and the solar system contains all manner of creatures, cults and colonies.
For Severin’s latest project she leads her crew to the watery planet of Venus to investigate the disappearance of a diving colony there. But something goes wrong during the course of their investigations; and her crew limp home without her.
All that remains of Severin are fragments. Can these snippets of scenes and shots, voices and memories, pages and recordings be collected and pieced together to tell the story of her life – and shed light on the mystery of her vanishing?
Clever, dreamy, strange and beautifully written – Radiance is a novel about how stories give form to worlds.
Fire Touched (Mercy Thompson 9)
Patricia Briggs
08/03/2016
Mercy Thompson has been hailed as “a heroine who continues to grow and yet always remains true to herself.”* Now she’s back, and she’ll soon discover that when the fae stalk the human world, it’s the children who suffer…
Tensions between the fae and humans are coming to a head. And when coyote shapeshifter Mercy and her Alpha werewolf mate, Adam, are called upon to stop a rampaging troll, they find themselves with something that could be used to make the fae back down and forestall out-and-out war: a human child stolen long ago by the fae.
Defying the most powerful werewolf in the country, the humans, and the fae, Mercy, Adam, and their pack choose to protect the boy no matter what the cost. But who will protect them from a boy who is fire touched?
Lady Midnight
Cassandra Clarke
08/03/2016
The Shadowhunters of Los Angeles star in the first novel in Cassandra Clare’s newest series, The Dark Artifices, a sequel to the internationally bestselling Mortal Instruments series. Lady Midnight is a Shadowhunters novel.
It’s been five years since the events of City of Heavenly Fire that brought the Shadowhunters to the brink of oblivion. Emma Carstairs is no longer a child in mourning, but a young woman bent on discovering what killed her parents and avenging her losses.
Together with her parabatai Julian Blackthorn, Emma must learn to trust her head and her heart as she investigates a demonic plot that stretches across Los Angeles, from the Sunset Strip to the enchanted sea that pounds the beaches of Santa Monica. If only her heart didn’t lead her in treacherous directions…
Making things even more complicated, Julian’s brother Mark—who was captured by the faeries five years ago—has been returned as a bargaining chip. The faeries are desperate to find out who is murdering their kind—and they need the Shadowhunters’ help to do it. But time works differently in faerie, so Mark has barely aged and doesn’t recognize his family. Can he ever truly return to them? Will the faeries really allow it?
Glitz, glamours, and Shadowhunters abound in this heartrending opening to Cassandra Clare’s Dark Artifices series.
The Lyre Thief (Hythrun Chronicles)
Jennifer Fallon
08/03/2016
Her Serene Highness, Rakaia, Princess of Fardohnya, is off to Hythria, where her eldest sister is now the High Princess, to find herself a husband, and escape the inevitable bloodbath in the harem when her brother takes the throne.
Rakaia is not interested in marrying anyone, least of all some brute of a Hythrun Warlord she’s never met, but she has a plan to save herself from that, too. If she can just convince her baseborn sister, Charisee, to play along, she might actually get away with it.
But there is trouble brewing across the continent. High Prince of Hythria, Damin Wolfblade, must head north to save the peace negotiated a decade ago between the Harshini, Hythria, Fardohnya, Medalon and Karien. He must leave behind an even more dangerous conflict brewing between his wife and his powerful mother, Princess Marla.
…And in far off Medalon, someone has stolen the music.
Their quest for the tiny stolen lyre containing the essence of the God of Music will eventually touch all their lives, threaten everything they hold dear and prove to be far more personal than any of them can imagine.
Jani and the Great Pursuit
Eric Brown
10/03/2016
Jani and her stalwart companions Lieutenant Alfie Littlebody and Anand Doshi find themselves chased from India, via Greece, to London by the British authorities, Russian spies and a Hindu priest – who all want what Jani carries, the ventha-di: the key that will open the door to other worlds.
In London she attempts to rescue the imprisoned alien Mahran – the only person who might help her save the Earth from the invasion of the merciless Zhell, the self-styled Masters of the Cosmos.
But will she escape London and reach Tibet before the forces of evil capture her – and before she is betrayed by someone she considers loyal to her cause?
The Cold Between (Central Corps 1)
Elizabeth Bonesteel
10/03/2016
Deep in the stars, a young officer and her lover are plunged into a murder mystery and a deadly conspiracy in this first entry in a stellar military science-fiction series in the tradition of Lois McMaster Bujold.
When her crewmate, Danny, is murdered on the colony of Volhynia, Central Corps chief engineer, Commander Elena Shaw, is shocked to learn the main suspect is her lover, Treiko Zajec. She knows Trey is innocent—he was with her when Danny was killed. So who is the real killer and why are the cops framing an innocent man?
Retracing Danny’s last hours, they discover that his death may be tied to a mystery from the past: the explosion of a Central Corps starship at a wormhole near Volhynia. For twenty-five years, the Central Gov has been lying about the tragedy, even willing to go to war with the outlaw PSI to protect their secrets.
With the authorities closing in, Elena and Trey head to the wormhole, certain they’ll find answers on the other side. But the truth that awaits them is far more terrifying than they ever imagined . . . a conspiracy deep within Central Gov that threatens all of human civilisation throughout the inhabited reaches of the galaxy—and beyond.
The Spider’s War (Dagger and the Coin 5)
Daniel Abraham
10/03/2016
The final battle draws near, in the concluding volume of Daniel Abraham’s critically acclaimed Dagger and Coin series
Lord Regent Geder Palliako’s great war has spilled across the world, nation after nation falling before the ancient priesthood and weapon of dragons. But even as conquest follows conquest, the final victory retreats before him like a mirage. Schism and revolt begin to erode the foundations of the empire, and the great conquest threatens to collapse into a permanent war of all against all.
In Carse, with armies on all borders, Cithrin bel Sarcour, Marcus Wester and Clara Kalliam are faced with the impossible task of bringing a lasting peace to the world. Their tools: traitors high in the imperial army, the last survivor of the dragon empire and a financial scheme that is either a revolution or the greatest fraud in the history of the world.
Those Below: The Empty Throne Book 2
Daniel Polansky
10/03/2016
For centuries beyond counting, humanity has served the Others, god-like Eternals who rule from their cloud-capped mountain-city, building a civilization of unimagined beauty and unchecked viciousness.
But all that is about to change. Bas Alyates, grizzled general of a thousand battles, has assembled a vast army with which to contend with the might of Those Above. Eudokia, Machiavellian matriarch and the power behind the Empty Throne, travels to the Roost, nominally to play peacemaker – but in fact to inspire the human population toward revolt. Deep in the dark byways of the mountain’s lower tiers, the urchin Pyre leads a band of fanatical revolutionaries in acts of terrorism against their inhuman oppressors. Against them, Calla, handmaiden of the Eternals’ king, fights desperately to stave off the rising tide of violence which threatens to destroy her beloved city.
The story begun in Those Above comes to a stunning conclusion in this unforgettable battle for the hearts and minds of the human race, making The Empty Throne the most exciting epic fantasies of recent times.
Monstrous Little Voices: 5 Tales from Shakespeare’s Fantasy World
A. Tchaikovsky, J. Barnes, E. Newman, F. Meadows, K. Heartfelt
10/03/2016
It is the time of Shakespeare. Storms rage, armies clash, magics are done – and stories are made. Five new great and terrible tales reshape the Bard’s vision, a new set of stories that will be told and retold down through the centuries. In the Year of Our Lord 1585, all the major powers of the Mediterranean are at war. The throne of the Grand Duke of Tuscany is the prize, and every lord from Navarre to Illyria is embroiled in the fray. Prospero, the feared Sorcerer-Duke of Milan, is under pressure to choose a side, and witches stalk the night, steering events from the shadows. Even the fairy courts stand on the verge of breaking down. With wars and romances, magics and deceptions, discover five stories he never told, but could have. Stories of what happened next or what went before, of the things unseen or simply elsewhere in the world as Shakespeare’s own tales unfolded on the stage.
Harvest
William Honwood
10/03/2016
ONLY COURAGE CAN SAVE THEIR LANDS Winter has been unleashed upon the Hyddenworld by an angry Earth. And Judith, now the Earth’s unwilling ally and shield maiden, is powerless to intervene. Then while both human and Hydden lands wither, humans find their way into this secret realm – to destroy all that winter’s storms haven’t undone. The Hydden city of Brum now faces its darkest days; joining its greatest enemy to combat invaders. But ultimately, survival depends on its champions – Jack, Katherine and scrivener Bedwyn Stort. If they can locate a last gem, burning with fire and magic, devastation may be averted. But if the jewel fails to reach Juliet before winter’s end, human and Hyddenkind will pay the price. Yet his quest will cost Stort dearly. It requires him to finally let Juliet go; the epic love that’s sustained him. There is a solution, but is this buried too deep, lost beneath ice and snow?
The Paper Menagerie
Ken Liu
10/03/2016
Ken Liu has published almost 100 short stories and won nearly every genre award in existence. Here, he has selected his 15 favourite stories, including The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary (Finalist for Hugo, Nebula, and Sturgeon Awards), Mono No Aware (Hugo Award winner), The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species (Nebula and Sturgeon award finalists), and the most awarded story in Science Fiction and Fantasy history, The Paper Menagerie – the only story ever to win the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy awards.
Eleanor
Jason Gurley
10/03/2016
1962, Anchor Bend, Oregon.
The sea calls to Eleanor. Like the turn of the waves it
beckons her from the heart of the town she’s always
known, from her husband Hob and their young daughter,
Agnes, to the unfathomable depths of the ocean.
1985
Agnes’s daughter Eleanor is six years old. She shares
her name with the grandmother she never knew and
everything else with her identical twin, Esmerelda. But
to Agnes, only Eleanor is a constant reminder of the past.
1993
After a dark event leaves her family in tatters, Eleanor,
now fourteen, is left caring for her alcoholic mother,
whose grief has torn her apart. But when Eleanor’s
reality begins to unravel, she starts to lose her grip on
time itself, slipping from the present into strange other
lands where she’s in danger of losing herself altogether.
Eleanor is the story of choices that ripple through time
far beyond the moment they’re made. And what happens
when, just sometimes, bonds are so powerful they reach
beyond this world and into another…
Pieces of Hate (Assassins 2)
by Tim Lebbon
15/03/2016
For centuries Gabriel has been pursuing the assassin Temple, part-demon, part-man, seeking revenge for the slaughter of his family. Now he has picked up Temple’s scent again, and the Caribbean is set to become their latest battleground. But this sea is already red with the blood of pirates, and in such a period of turmoil and death the outcome of any fight is far from certain.
An Unattractive Vampire
Jim McDoniel
15/03/2016
Thought vampires were dead? Well of course they are, but Jim McDoniel proves that don’t have to be boring. Or sparkly.” Veronica Belmont and Tom Merritt, “Sword & Laser”
Jim McDoniel s debut novel, “An Unattractive Vampire,” is a darkly comic urban fantasy of ancient horrors in suburban cities. After three centuries trapped underground, thousand-year-old Yulric Bile also known as the Cursed One, the Devil s Apprentice, He Who Worships the Slumbering Horrors awakens only to find that no one believes he is a vampire. Apparently he s just too ugly modern vampires, he soon discovers, are pretty, weak, and, most disturbing of all, good. Determined to reestablish his bloodstained reign, Yulric sets out to correct this disgusting turn of events or, at the very least, murder the person responsible. With the help of pert vampire-wannabe Amanda; Simon, the eight-year-old reincarnation of his greatest foe; and a cadre of ancient and ugly horrors, Yulric prepares to battle the glamorous undead. But who will win the right to determine, once and for all, what it truly means to be a vampire?
A Painted Goddess (A Fire Beneath the Skin 3)
Victor Gischler
15/03/2016
When the gods go to war, who will stand against their divine fury?
In the thrilling conclusion to the A Fire Beneath the Skin trilogy, the enchanted kingdom of Helva faces a nightmarish future of endless bloodshed, and Rina Veraiin—a young warrior-duchess armed with mysterious, magical tattoos—must use her fantastic powers to save her home from eternal war.
As her far-flung friends scour Helva for additional tattoos to increase her formidable abilities, Rina reckons with an enigmatic death priest…the one whose contract grants her extraordinary magic but demands an awful price. When her debt comes due, can Rina make the ultimate sacrifice?
Deities clash and allies succumb as Rina strives to fulfill her obligation and confront her strange and shocking destiny. Becoming an ink mage taxed Rina’s resources to their very limits; now she must become something else, something more, something awesome and terrible.
If she fails, her world will fall.
Son of the Morning
Mark Alder
15/03/2016 (<- US. Released 2015 in UK)
Lauded by fellow authors, a five star ‘SFX recommends’ title, adored by the bloggers, Mark Alder’s debut novel of angels, demons, kings and the Hundred Years War marks the beginning of a hugely exciting new series.
Edward III stands in a burnt English church, destroyed in a French raid. A raid on his land, a raid on him. He is in debt and surrounded by doubters, only victory against France will save his throne.
But Philip of Valois can put 50,000 men in the field. He has sent his priests to summon the very angels themselves to fight for France. Edward could call on God for aid but he is a usurper. What if God truly is on the side of the French?
But for a price, Edward could open the gates of Hell and take an unholy war to France …
Mark Alder has brought the epic fantasy of George R.R. Martin to the vivid historical adventure of Bernard Cornwell and has a created a fantasy that will sweep you to a new vision of the Hundred Years War.
The Stealers’ War (Far-Called Trilogy 3)
Stephen Hunt
17/03/2016
Weyland has been at war. Invaded by a technologically advanced enemy, the cities sacked, and what fragile peace remained torn apart by a civil war.
All anyone should want is a return to peace.
But Jacob Carneham still wants his revenge; and if he can lure the invaders into the mountain he can have it. He can kill them all.
If he does, there may never be peace again.
If he doesn’t, Weyland will never be free of the threat of invasion.
The northern horse lords are planning an attack. A future Empress is fighting to save her daughter. Jacob’s son is trying to restore peace and stability to Weyland, alongside the rightful King. And behind it all is a greater struggle, which may spell the end for them all . . .
Snakewood
Adrian Selby
17/03/2016
Once they were a band of mercenaries who shook the pillars of the world through their cunning, their closely guarded alchemical brews and stone cold steel. Whoever met their price won. Now, their glory days behind them and their genius leader in hiding, the warriors known as the ‘Twenty’ are being hunted down and eliminated one by one. A lifetime of enemies has its own price.
World’s End (Pendulum Trilogy 3)
Will Elliott
22/03/2016 (<- US. Released 2012 in UK
Vous has ascended to godhood and Eric and Aziel return to the castle to defeat the Arch Mage. The sky dragons offer Eric a throne, and objects of great power – but what do they want in return?
Meanwhile, at World’s End, the haiyens have made contact. They say they have come to help, but is it possible they have another agenda?
The Last Mortal Bond (Chronicles of the Unhewn Throne 3)
Brian Staveley
24/02/2016
DEATH IS NEAR, ARMIES ARE GATHERED, AND THE FUTURE RESTS ON A KNIFE-EDGE The Annurian Empire is losing a war on two fronts – and it’s unclear who is in command. Adare is stationed in the thick of battle and now calls herself Emperor. However, she can’t hold back the nomadic Urgul forces for much longer. She needs her brilliant general, Ran il Tornja, but will he betray her again? Her brother Kaden is the true heir, yet he’ll accept a Republic to save his divided people. And he faces something even more terrible than war. He’s unmasked Ran il Tornja as a remnant of an ancient race who attempted to destroy mankind. The general plans to finish what they started, and is amassing all the power he needs. The empire calls on the Kettral, its toughest soldiers, but their order has been decimated. Its last fighters are in disarray, but could they still turn the tide of war? Most disturbingly of all, capricious gods walk the earth in human guise. And their desires could seal the fate of a world.
Shadow and Flame (The Ascendant Kingdoms Saga 4)
Gail Z Martin
24/03/2016
From Gail Z. Martin, one of the most exciting writers of fantasy adventure, comes the fourth and final novel in the epic Ascendant Kingdoms saga.
Blaine McFadden and his allies have brought magic back under mortal command and begun to restore order to the beleaguered kingdom of Donderath. Now, new perils and old enemies gather for a final reckoning. Foreign invaders, a legendary dark mage and vengeful immortals fight Blaine’s battered forces for control of the continent, and Blaine’s weary army is the only thing standing between a kingdom struggling to rise from the ashes and a descent into fury and darkness.
The Trouble With Fate
Leigh Evans
24/03/2016
WHAT SHE DOESN’T KNOW MIGHT KILL HER: Hedi looks normal. Yet that’s taken effort. Her fellow Starbucks baristas don’t see her pointed ears, fae amulet or her dark past, and normal is hard for a half-fae, half-werewolf on the run. Hedi’s life changed ten years ago, when her parents were murdered by unknown assassins. She’s been in hiding with her loopy aunt Lou since, as whatever they wanted she’s determined they won’t get it.
Things change when wolves capture Lou, forcing Hedi to steal to free her – for if she can offer up a fae amulet like her own they may trade. But it belongs to a rogue werewolf named Robson Trowbridge, who betrayed Hedi on the night of her greatest need. Over forty-eight hours, Hedi will face the wires of Creemore, discover the extent of her fae powers and possibly break her own heart in the process.
The Immortal Throne
Stella Gemmell
24/03/2016
The emperor is dead…long live the emperor! The fervent hope of the victorious rebels and the survivors of the uprising that liberated the City from tyranny is that the accession of Archange to the imperial throne will usher in a new era of freedom, peace and stability. If only that were so…As the City struggles to return to something resembling normal life after the devastation brought on by the rebellion, word arises of a massive army gathering to the north. No one knows where it has come from or who leads it, but it soon becomes apparent that its sole purpose is to destroy the City and annihilate all – man, woman and child – who live within its battered walls. And while warriors go forth to fight and die on the battlefield in defence of their homeland and all that they believe in, bitter family feuds and ancient rivalries, political and personal betrayals, and mindless murder surface within the palaces and corridors of power: it seems the City is under siege – from both without and within…With this new novel, Stella Gemmell brings the astonishing story of the City to a spectacular climax and confirms her place as a master of the genre.
The Machinery (The Machinery Trilogy 1)
Gerrard Cowan
24/03/2016
The Machinery knows all.
For ten millennia, the leaders of the Overland have been Selected by the Machinery, an omnipotent machine gifted to the world in darker days.
The Overland has thrived, crushing all enemies. But the Machinery came with a prophecy: it will break in its ten-thousandth year, Selecting just one leader who will bring Ruin to the world. That time has arrived.
Katrina Paprissi is an Apprentice Watcher, charged with seeking out any who doubt the power of the Machinery. But as the Machinery nears breaking point, her own doubts begin to surface. She must travel to its home in the depths of the mysterious Underland, to see if Ruin really is coming for them all…
Eagle in Exile (The Hesperian Trilogy #2)
Alan Smale
25/03/2016
In AD 1218, Praetor Gaius Marcellinus was ordered to conquer Nova Hesperia and make it a Roman province. But outside the walls of the great city of Cahokia, his legion was destroyed. Accepted by his captors, Marcellinus vowed to fight with them against all enemies, Roman or native. After successfully repelling an invasion by the fearsome Iroqua tribes, the Cahokians are weakened, and Marcellinus knows that the divided people of Nova Hesperia will be unable to resist the might of Rome. But rival factions threaten to tear Cahokia apart, and the empire he once served will not give up its dream of conquest. Even as Marcellinus struggles to unite his new comrades, a new legion is preparing to set sail…
Javelin Rain (Shadow Ops)
Myke Cole
29/03/2016
Javelin: the loss of a national security asset with strategic impact
Rain: a crisis of existential proportions
Javelin Rain incidents must be resolved immediately, by any means necessary, no matter the cost…
Being a US Navy SEAL was Jim Schweitzer’s life until the day he was killed.
Now, his escape from the government that brought him back from the dead has been coded ‘Javelin Rain’. Schweitzer and his family are on the run from his unit and, while he may be immortal, his wife and son are not.
It’s up to Jim to keep his family safe and free from the clutches of his former masters, whose plans could spell disaster not only for him, but for the entire nation…
Hex
Sarah Blackman
30/03/2016
Alice is a motherless child, born to a motherless child, and raised with neither care nor grace. Her response to this multiple abandonment is a lifelong obsession with her best friend Ingrid, or Thingy, as Alice calls her, and a sort of fantastic narcissism wherein she figures herself as the nexus of a supernatural world she understands through a blend of mountain lore, indigenous Cherokee legend, and the dangerous idiom of the fairy-tale girl who enters the forest despite being warned. The novel is written in blended parts and is crafted as an address to Thingy’s daughter, Ingrid the Second, who is now in Alice’s care. Alice attempts to tell Ingrid the story of her life: her friendship with Thingy; her troubled relationships with her father, a small-town sexual troubadour; her stepmother, a hard-minded business woman who treats all interactions as commerce; her marriage to her husband Jacob, a silent figure of tremendous will; and her growing suspicion that Ingrid is another girl-child around whom disaster accumulates. Simultaneously, Alice tells the child the kind of bedtime stories she herself has used to make sense of her world. For Alice, and thus in Hex, the line between fantasy and reality is nonexistent, the mountain is older than its geology, and the world a limbo in which everything that has ever happened is coming around again. Hex is a novel about violence-the violence of the fist, of the womb, of the story. It is also a novel about language and how we use it to build a world when the one we find around us is irretrievably broken.
The Mortal Tally (Bring Down Heaven 2)
Sam Sykes
31/03/2016
Akin to the works of both Fritz Leiber and Scott Lynch but bringing it’s own energy and humorous vigour the writing of Sam Sykes sets itself apart from the dour feel of Grimdark fantasy and brings a fresh vigour to fantasy fiction.
In this sharp and darkly mysterious novel Lenk and his fellow adventurers must find their way through the silk-trading city of C’Jer Daal as demons and gods stalk the streets in a battle for dominion even as the thieves guilds go to war for their own petty ends.
Mixing wild magics, exciting swordplay, mystery and an irrestible, if scurrilous, sense of humour this is a hugely exciting new direction for fantasy. Full of adventure and extreme imagination it nevertheless manages to weave in a surprising subtlety and sensitivity in it’s characterisation.
Paperback Releases
Day Shift by Charlaine Harris
The Gracekeepers by Kirsty Logan
Sword of Destiny by Andrzej Sapkowski
The Warring States by Aidan Harte
Ruin by John Gwynne
Half a War by Joe Abercrombie
Jennie Ivins
Richard Marpole
Yes… I did include a few Science Fiction titles I’m excited about slip in too 😀
I’m keen to read Stella Gemmell’s follow-up to The City. Having already read Monstrous Little Voices, I wholeheartedly recommend that too.
The City got really mixed reviews – some people absolutely loved it (saying best series in ages) and others struggled with it. I need to check it out!
I enjoy these monthly posts and go through them carefully to see if there might be something I’d like to read.
Thank you ^_^
Hi, are you sure William Horwood’s Harvest isn’t US only?
I’ve had the paperback of that book for 2 years, and I got the follow up (“Winter”, last book in the series) last year.
Maybe it’s a re-release, then.
Probably US only… oops O:)
I do enjoy these posts and the opportunity to learn about upcoming titles that I might not have known about previously. One such title is The Machinery by Gerrard Cowan. I find the cover art intriguing and the story quite interesting.
Thank you for the work you do on this site.
That is one that stood out to me too 🙂 I thought it looked a bit Sci-Fi-y, but I’m assured it is more Fantasy based with a bit of Sci-Fi in it, so I’m really excited 😀
K.J. Parker’s THE DEVIL YOU KNOW is fantastic. Highly recommend it.