Category Archives: Night Shade Books

New Acquisitions

Today a friend and I took my son hiking in Palo Duro Canyon while our wives stayed home doing whatever wives do when husbands are away. (I don’t want to know; that it involves spending money is enough.) This will tie into a Dispatches From the Lone Star Front post later in the week after another road trip.

When I go home, there was a package waiting for me. It contained a copy of Ari Marmell’s In Thunder Forged from Pyr Books. Along with Wrath-Breaking Tree (James Enge) and Kindred and Wings (Philippa Ballantine) that came Thursday and Nebula Awards Showcase (Catherine Asaro, ed.), which arrived last week, that’s four from Pyr in about ten days. The Marmell and Nebula Awards will be reviewed first since the former will be out in a couple of weeks, and the latter is out already. That’s not to say some of the other review copies Pyr has sent me won’t end up in the queue in the next couple of weeks.

I’ve also got several titles from Angry Robot in my ereader: The Blue Blazes by Chuck Wendig (which I’ve already started and am loving), iD by Madelaine Ashbury, and A Discourse in Steel by Paul S. Kemp.

Finally, I’m looking forward to diving into No Return by Zachary Jernigan. He was kind enough to send me a copy of his first novel. This one got some good advance buzz, and I love the cover. It’s up Blue Blazes.

Anyway, those are the novels from publishers and authors I’ve agreed to read and review. I still plan to increase the amount of short fiction I review. (Sooper Seekrit Project #2 requires me to do so.) I’m also going to stick in some novels just because I want to read them.

Think all that will keep me busy?

Further Details About Night Shade Books

Night Shade Books is Being Bought

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Editor Jeremy Lassen is reporting via Twitter that Night Shade Books is being bought by a larger publisher. Authors with Night Shade are being contacted. Lassen’s words were “being bought” not “being sold”, which I think is an interesting distinction. No word of the sale is one the Night Shade homepage as yet.

I’m sure more details will emerge over the next few days/weeks/months. I only hope the authors currently with Night Shade come through the process relatively unscathed. I say “relatively” because this has got to be a nerve wracking experience. Hopefully no one’s books will be orphaned by the new owners. Somehow I’m not gonna hold my breath. Regardless, Adventures Fantastic wishes all the Night Shade authors the best when the dust settles.

I’ll update as more details become available.

UPDATE: Jeff VanderMeer has posted on his Facebook page a partial copy of a letter he has received about the sale. It doesn’t look particularly promising. A transcript of what he posted is below; errors are on the part of author of the letter. VanderMeer says in the comments that he’s been advised not to sign, as have several other authors he doesn’t name.

NIGHT SHADE BOOKS
1661 TENNESSEE STREET #3H
SAN FRANSICO, CA 94107

April 1, 2013

Howard Morhain Litery Agency, Inc.

Dear Jeff & Ann Vandermeer,
Provided that a sufficient number of Night Shade authors agree to certain changes to their contracts with Night Shade, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc. and Start Publishing, LLC have agreed to acquire all Night Shade Books assets. To be clear, this is an acquisition of assets, not a purchase of the company as a whole. The revenue received from the sale would go towards paying off the debts of the company. If you sign below, and a sufficient number of other Night Shade authors and other creditors also agree to these terms, you will receive full payment to bring all royalties and overdue advances current.

Your payment would be in the amount of $0.00.

By signing this letter, you agree that:

END OF TRANSCRIPT

I’m not a lawyer, so I’m not entirely sure about this, but it sounds like the publisher is sacrificing the authors and their works on the altar of the publisher’s debts. I really hope I’m wrong. If there’s a Night Shade title you’ve been wanting, you might go ahead a get it now. No telling how much longer they’re going to be in print. I should probably get caught on reading Eclipse Online this weekend.

2012 in Retrospect: Publishing

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Rather than doing a single post about what I thought of the past year, I’m going to break things up into some smaller posts. There will be on short fiction and one on titles I especially enjoyed. But I thought I would start with publishers.

Last year, I wrote about the publishers I thought you should be reading this year. That list hasn’t changed much. The day before I posted that list, I gave reasons why I wasn’t going to be reading much from the main imprints. Those reasons haven’t changed much, either. If anything, they’re more valid than ever.

What I’m going to attempt to do here, in this present post, is to assess some of the things I said in those two posts.

First, I said I wouldn’t be buying many titles from the major publishers. What constitutes a major publisher is probably going to vary among individuals. That’s fine; it will give us something to talk about. So many publishers are trying to grab as many rights as they can from authors and paying them so little once you take a close look at the numbers, that I have trouble with supporting such a system, just as a matter of conscience. Add to that the fact that most of the major publishers are pricing their ebooks way too high, and in some cases as much or more than the paper editions, and I really don’t see the point.

Second, I said I would be reading more indie published authors. I have. The mistake I made was listing the authors whose work I intended to read. The reason that was a mistake is that I haven’t gotten to everyone on the list yet. Since I’m going to be focusing on small and indie presses in my column over at Amazing Stories (TM), those authors will be moving to near the top of the list.

Here’s the thing that might suprise some people. I haven’t really missed reading books published by the majors. I’ve still read a few here and there, and have a couple in my TBR stack. But for the most part, I’ve enjoyed the small press and indie published works I’ve read. I’m very selective about what I pick up these days simply due to time considerations. Most of these works have been as good as what the Big ~~6 5~~ However-many-are-left-after-the-mergers are publishing.

So I think my decision to read indie published works has been a good one, and I’ll keep doing it.

Now, as for publishers. I’m not going to numerically rank them. I’m going to stick to the same list, but I’ll add a couple of publishers to it. These are what I would call midsized publishers, in that they get national or international distribution and have major authors in their stables, but they haven’t been around for decades like some publishers have.

First, I included Prime Books as a runner-up because at the time I hadn’t finished any of their titles. While I still dip into their anthologies without reading them all the way through, I maintain that Prime is one of the best publishers around. I’ve got collections by Elizabeth Bear and Richard Parks to read, as well as many anthologies.

Orbit Books didn’t make the list last year because I hadn’t read any of their titles. That hasn’t changed much, but there are some titles I very much want to read, starting with the latest Joe Abercrombie. That alone puts Orbit on the list. The fact that they also publish John R. Fultz and Michael J. Sullivan, two other writers I’m looking forward to reading doesn’t hurt, either.

Next is Solaris and its companion imprint, Abaddon. This is Eric Brown’s publisher, and Brown is one of the best science fiction authors working today. He writes good space opera, and I love space opera.

Nightshade published some interesting books this year, most of which I still haven’t gotten around to reading yet, including titles Misere, Southern Gods, The Scourge of the Betrayer, and The Pillars of Hercules, plust the more recent Siren Depths and The Tainted City. Part of the reason I haven’t read these yet is time, but also because Nightshade no longer seems to be responding to requests for review copies. I try (and occasionally succeed) to post a review around the time the book comes out, and since I ended up buying these titles, the books had in some cases been out a while. The most significant thing Nightshade did this year, though, was to start the online publication, Eclipse Online, a continuation of their successful anthology series. I’ll talk about that more in the forthcoming short fiction post.

I probably read more books by Angry Robot this year than any other publisher, in part because of how their Robot Army program worked and in part because I really like their line. This is one publisher I’ll keep reading and reviewing, although I probably won’t read quite as many title from them this year simply due to time considerations. I had three titles I was planning to review when we ended up moving. In all the commotion, I never read them. I’m going to try to work them into the queue soon.

Pyr was top of my list last year, and this was another good year for them. Pyr seems to be shifting its focus a bit, publishing more science fiction and YA titles than fantasy in recent months, but that’s not a bad thing necessarily. I certainly don’t hold it against them. They are in business to make money, after all, and markets do change. I’ve got more titles from Pyr than any other publisher in the queue at the moment, mostly science fiction from Brenda J. Cooper, Mike Resnick, Allen Steele, and Mark Hodder.

These are all publishers who publish mass market and trade, and thus within the budgets of most readers. Among the more expensive collectible and limited edition publishers, Haffner Press stands out as my favorite, primarily because Haffner publishes some of my favorite authors. Cemetery Dance and Subterranean are the other two publishers I’ve bought a lot from this year.

These are the publishers I’ve read this year because these guys, from what I can tell, are not only publishing some of the best fantasy, science fiction, and horror, but they also have some of the best business practices around. With limited time and monetary resources, I want to get the best value I can and support the players (publishers and authors) I respect. These publishers and many of the indie authors I’ve read have more than provided that.

So as far as publishers go, these are the one I will stick with in 2013.

A Sneak Peek at Eclipse Online: K. J. Parker’s "One Little Room and Everywhere"

The Adventures Fantastic Interview: Martha Wells

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Martha Wells is the author of nine original novels, two media tie-ins (Stargate Atlantis), and various short stories and essays. Her latest novels are the first two Books of the Raksura, The Cloud Roads and The Serpent Sea (reviewed here and here). You can find her online at www.marthawells.com. She recently took a few minutes to sit down and answer a few questions.

AF: Why do you write?

MW: I think it’s a need for communication because when I was a kid there was that feeling that no on listens to you. I felt very isolated. There was organized fandom, but it was very difficult to find. The internet didn’t exist then, so it was very hard to find people who also liked science fiction and fantasy. I found science fiction and fantasy sections in bookstores and libraries but I never seemed to find any other people who read it. I think it comes from a need to communicate and express yourself.

AF: Why science fiction and fantasy as opposed to some other genre?

MW: I don’t really know. I always was attracted to it. One of the first books I tried to read as a kid was The Time Machine because it had our name on it. My parents had an old paperback copy with a pulp cover and it had our name on it. And also the library I grew up in had a children’s section and you were supposed to make a turn into the shelves for the rest of the children’s section. The science fiction and fantasy section was there along the rest of the wall, and I just went along it instead of taking the turn. So I ended up reading a lot of even though I was too young for it. Even so I think there were a lot of children’s books back then that were fantasy.

AF: Are you willing to say when “back then” was?

MW: I was born in 1964.

AF: Then we’re about the same age. I was born in 1966, so we probably read a lot of the same stuff.

MW: The one thing back then, I remember there being very few female characters. They were either the baby sitter type person or the person who had to be rescued or the person preventing the protagonist from going on the adventure kind of thing. So I think one thing in science fiction and fantasy, especially in Andre Norton’s books, there’s a lot more female protagonists. Even if there’s a male protagonist, there’s usually a woman or women to go along on the adventure, so I was probably looking for something like that. I like the boys’ adventure books, too, but I was feeling like this is not something you’re part of, this is something you’re looking at the outside of.

AF: So other than Norton, what writers have influenced you?

MW: Judith Tarr. F. M. Busby, who is a science fiction writer. Robert Heinlein. I read all the Heinlein juveniles. I read a little bit of Anne McCaffery, but not as much. I think she was coming in later for that period. There was a lot of children’s authors that I read that I’ve never seen anything by, I found them in the library, science fiction and fantasy authors that I never saw much of later. A whole bunch of those. I run into one of those, you see them in the used bookstore, and say “I loved that as a kid.” And Lord of the Rings, and Dune, too. I read those when I was way too young. A lot of the languages in my work comes from reading Lord of the Rings and getting the idea early on that yeah, there should be different languages here.

AF: That’s not the first time I’ve heard you say “I read that when I was too young.” How does going back and rereading some of those later as an adult, what’s that experience like?

MW: Sometimes you don’t really know why you liked the book, and sometimes you went right over your head. Like Malevil by Robert Merle, He wrote The Day of the Dolphin, I think that’s his most famous book. It’s a post apocalyptic novel set in France about a man who owns a small medieval castle. A few people are living there, and a nuclear bomb hits Paris. It’s about them ttrying to survive and recreate civilization It’s not one of the easy post apocalyptic novels, either. When they come out of the castle, everything is just burnt. They’ve got to try to get crops, and they’ve got just a few animals that have survived. At first they think they’re the only people, and later they find there’s another walled medieval they’re eventually able to get to. People survived in there. It was one of my parents’ books, and all I had was the Reader’s Digest condensed version, which they bowdlerized. I knew they were shorter, but I didn’t realize how much they bowdlerized. When you go back read the real book, you go, “Wow, there’s a lot of stuff in here.” It’s like 200 pages longer. They’ve taken out all the sex and a lot of other stuff. There’s a large section at the end. The book is told from the point of view of the man who owned the castle, Emmanuel, and there’s a guy who becomes a really good friend of his, who after Emmanuel dies, he’s got Emmanuel’s diary. He goes back through Emmanuel’s diary and puts in all the stuff that Emmanuel left out. That’s an interesting storytelling technique I’ve not see before. That was left out of the condensed version for sure. The other shoe hasn’t dropped on the rest of the story. That’s almost an illustration; you read the book and so much goes over your head. All the parts that would have gone over my head had been taken out. I didn’t see them until I got a copy years later.

AF: Congratulations on selling the third Raksura book.

MW: Thank you.

AF: I’m looking forward to it. Like I said a minute ago before we started recording, it’s going to be a long year because I really enjoyed those. I know you’re going to have edits and stuff to do. Are you working on anything now? Are you planning another book, or are you going to take a break? What can we look for from you or with your name on in the next few years?

MW: I can’t really afford to take much of a break. I have a young adult novel that’s been going the rounds for about a couple of years now. It’s on a new round of submissions, so I’ve got my fingers crossed for that. I’m trying to decide what book I want to write next. I’ve got a short story I’ve been asked to writer for an anthology, so I need to write that. At this point I’m kinda trying to figure out what I want to do next, if I want to do another Raksura book or if I want to do something different. Right now my head is in that world, so I’m kinda interested in doing something there, but I have another set of characters that I came up with for a short story I could work with. I’m afraid people will be really disappointed. It’s like when you go back to a series set in a world but with different people. So I’m debating what I want to do.

AF: In a post on, I think it was The Night Bazaar, you talked about trying to get several novels started. And you talked a little bit about almost quitting, and I’m glad you didn’t. Thank you for not quitting. What were some of the other novels, and do you think you would ever go back to some of those, or previous series, or previous works, not necessarily series, but other novels.

MW: Parts of them went into The Cloud Roads. Not really parts, but actual elements. And elements of some of them went into Emillie and the Hollow World, which is the young adult novel I haven’t sold yet. There’s one part, it’s about 25,000 words, I’d really like to do something with it, but so much of it is now part of other books, it had to be thrown out. Some of them never developed very far. There were only three that did, and they ended up in different books.

AF: Shifting gears just a little bit, Adventures Fantastic tends to focus on heroic fantasy, historical adventure, and barbarians tend to be central characters in a lot of those stories. What qualities do you look for in a barbarian?

MW: In a barbarian? I don’t know. I dislike characters that are too unlikable. I mean the character can be snarky and obnoxious to a certain extent, but if they’re actually a bad person, I don’t tend to like that. I respect people’s right to write it, but it’s not something I care for too much. That’s why I like the Imaro books by Charles Saunders. I like that feel. Imaro is one of the few barbarian quote unquote characters who is actually a nice person. That’s what I like about those books. I guess I look for someone who is more like a Robin Hood type character who is sort of outside the law but whose actions I can read about and support and like. The gritty fantasy and stuff doesn’t grab me. It’s too much like reality.

AF: Last question: If you were conducting this interview, what question would you ask that I haven’t?

MW: That’s a hard one.

AF: Some people think it’s hard; some people think it’s easy.

MW: I’m not terribly good at self-promotion. That’s why when I write a blog post, I often have people ask me question. I don’t know what to write about. Give me a topic, and I’ll write.

AF: Okay, let me ask you this, and we’ll make this the last question. Who are the up and coming fantasy writers do you think people should be reading?

MW: Oh, Ben Aaronovitch wrote, it’s called Midnight Ride in the US, but the British title is Rivers of London. Moon Over Soho is the second one, and there’s a third one. I think it’s Whispers Underground that’s coming out in a few months. I really enjoyed his books. They’re kind of labeled as urban fantasy, but they’re more like fantasy and British procedurals like Frost and Morse. It’s a great combination. I really enjoyed them. I thought his take on mythology and the supernatural elements in London was really neat, and I had not seen that before. Saladin Ahmed. His book has just come out, Throne of the Crescent Moon. N. K. Jemisin.

AF: I was expecting you to say that because I knew you really liked her stuff.

MW: Yeah, the first trilogy has come out, and a duology is about to come out.

AF: Is it set in the same world, because I’ve not read her work.

MW: No, it’s a completely different world. I really liked Courtney Schafer’s book. I gave her a blurb for her fist novel called The Whitefire Crossing.

AF: I loved that one. It was one of the best I read last year

MW: It was really different. I’m really interested to see what she does later. And there’s a bunch of people I have on my stack that I haven’t read yet.

AF: Thank you very much.

MW: You’re welcome.

Across the Straits of Galahesh

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The Straits of Galahesh
Bradley P. Beaulieu
Nightshade Books
Trade Paperback $14.99 – 570 pages
various electonic editions $6.00

If you read my review of Beaulieu’s first novel, The Winds of Khalakovo, you know it was one of my favorites last year. Now the second volume in the series has hit shelves. Beaulieu was kind enough to send me a review copy of The Straits of Galahesh. I had wanted to have the book finished and this review posted about the time the books hit the shelves, which was a week ago. Unfortunately life has been happening at my house, and I’m a bit behind on several commitments.

However, you can still snag a copy. And you should. What follows are several reasons why, along with some spoilers for The Winds of Khalakovo. If you haven’t read it, skip the next few paragraphs.

Before I give those reasons, though, let me set the stage. Five years have passed since the end of the previous novel. Nasim is now a young man, seeking to understand his past and stop the Al-Aqim from ushering in the end of the world. Khalakovo is still occupied by Vostromo. Nikandr is traveling the Grand Duchy of Anuskaya, trying to stop the spread of the Rift. And Ataina, now a powerful Matra, has offered herself as a wife to one of the high ranking noblemen in the Empire of Yrstanla.

Yes, she still loves Nikandr, and he, her. This is a political marriage. Not that this sits well with Nikandr. Remember the things I said in the review of Winds about the course of true love not running smooth. Well this is a longer book, and straits often contain rapids. I’m just saying.

The wedding is going to take place on the island of Galahesh, a quasi-independent state, which is cut in half by deep straits. The ley lines through the aether twist along the straights to such an extent that the airships can’t cross the straits. All personnel and material have to be lowered in elevators, transported across the straits by ferry, and raised by elevators. The straits act as an effective barrier between the Empire and the Grand Duchy. This becomes a major point in the plot, in part because the Matra can’t cross the straits either when they take the dark.

Nikandr still has his bond with Nasim. Nasim can no longer sense the spirit world. Soroush (at the beginning of the novel) is still being held by the Maharat. Atiana is one of the more powerful Matra. Nikandr’s father is now one of the Grand Duke’s most trusted advisers in spite Vostromo’s occupation of Khalakovo. And Grigory still needs to be taken out and hanged.

None of them will be the same after the events of this book. Provided they survive.

End of spoilers for Winds.

Sometimes a first novel hits the shelves that is above average, promising great things to come in future works, only to have the second novel disappoint. This can be because the author only had one good book in him/her, because there was more time to polish the first novel than the second due to publication schedules, or any number of other reasons.

That is not the case here. Straits is a more mature work than Winds. There is a great deal of action, and all of the action scenes are quite well done, but it seems to me the focus here is more on character. Don’t get me wrong; there was strong character development in Winds.

It’s just that Beaulieu has taken his character development to a new level. And not just with the three viewpoint characters: Nikandr, Atiana, and Nasim. The supporting cast of siblings, servants, soldiers, and others come alive as individuals. I found this to be particularly true of Soroush, the terrorist leader who was one of the central villains in the first book. Here he grows into one of the more heroic figures. In short Beaulieu has created a cast of characters who live, breath, and about whom the reader cares. He populates the book with them.

Then he kills them.

Not all of them, of course. A number survive. But no one’s survival is guaranteed. At no time does Beaulieu kill off a character gratuitously. Each death is logical and comes naturally from the events in the story. None of these characters die for cheap emotional manipulation. And once it sinks in that any one of these people may not make it to the last page, it heightens the suspense.

And there’s plenty of suspense. The book is structured so that each viewpoint character gets two or three chapters before another character gets their turn on stage. Each of these sections ends in such a way that you want to keep reading. The term “page-turner” is sometimes used derisively by the literati for reasons that aren’t entirely clear to me. It would seem to me that a writer who can make the reader want to keep turning the pages because he/she is engrossed in the story is a success, regardless of sales numbers.

This is not a predicatble novel. Several times the story went in a direction I wasn’t expecting. Not everything is as it seems. Straits is a dark novel, however. At times, very dark. There are scenes of human sacrifice, including children. If you like your fantasy full of rainbow colored unicorns, you might have problems with parts of this one.

There is not as much emphasis on politics as there was in Winds, although based on how this one ends, I suspect that won’t be the case with the third book. The story, although at a natural break, is far from over.

If you read The Winds of Khalakovo, then you will want to read The Straits of Galahesh. If you haven’t, then buy and read them both. This one is full of excitement, suspense, and betrayal. Lots of betrayal, some intentional, some not. I’ve read a great deal of fantasy in the last year, and almost all of it was good to great. The Straits of Galahesh was one of the best.

Odds and Ends

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I thought I’d pass along a few items of interest that have come across my computer screen in the last couple of days.

First, you may recall that I said Pyr books was the number one publisher you should be reading in 2012, and I stand by that statement. The latest electronic newsletter, Pyr-a-zine, has an interview with Jon Sprunk, whose Shadow trilogy concludes this month with Shadow’s Master (reviewed here). I would include a link, but the interview is an exclusive to the newsletter. Another advantage to the newsletter is it contains an exclusive discount on one of the Pyr titles. You can subscribe at the Pyr main page on their website.

Bradley P. Beaulieu is holding a giveaway to promote the forthcoming publication of The Straits of Galahesh. Night Shade Books was second on my list of publishers you should be reading, and Beaulieu’s debut novel, The Winds of Khalakovo was one of the main reasons why. There are some cool prizes in the giveaway, including tablets and ereaders. Details are here.

Beaulieu is also giving away copies of his short science fiction novel, Strata, that he co-wrote with Stephen Gaskell. The giveaway is next Tuesday and Wednesday, March 20 and 21. I recently reviewed Strata and found it to be exciting, fast-paced, and a lot of fun.

And speaking of The Straits of Galahesh, it’s in my list of titles to review. It’s number 3 on the list, after Echo City by Tim Lebbon and Trang by Mary Sission. Echo City is for the David Gemmell Awards, but I’ll post a link to the review here when it goes live. Trang is science fiction, so that review will be posted over at Futures Past and Present. After that, I’ll review The Alchemist of Souls by Anne Lyle, which hits shelves here in the US at the end of the month.

With all the novels I’ve been reviewing, I’ve had very little time to read any short fiction or work on my own writing. As a result I’m going to cut back on the number of novels I review once I fulfill my current commitments (approximately 3 others not listed). I’m also going to punctuate the novel reviews and other posts with some short fiction centric posts, like the one the other day on the current issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies. I’ll still accept review copies, but I’m going to be a lot pickier for the next few months. There’s a lot of great short fiction I want to read (and hopefully write). Working in academia means I don’t have much time during the academic year as I would like, which is why the frequency of posts here and at Futures Past and Present have slowed down since the middle of January.. Things should pick back up during the summer.

Sailing the Serpent Sea

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The Serpent Sea
Martha Wells
Night Shade Books
Trade Paper, 342 p., $14.99

If you’ve read The Cloud Roads, or my review of it, or just looked at the cover of either it or The Serpent Sea, you can probably guess that I’m using the term “sailing” in the title of this review somewhat loosely.

I’ve been looking forward to this book since I read The Cloud Roads last year, and Night Shade Books was gracious enough to send me a review copy. It should be hitting store shelves any day now, if it hasn’t already. I’ve not seen a copy yet, but that doesn’t mean the book isn’t available. You should pick up a copy (of both if you haven’t read the first one). That way you can join me in one of my New Year activities, looking forward to the next book in the series.

The story picks up shortly after the close of The Cloud Roads, with the Indigo Cloud court returning to their ancestral home. This happens to be a Mountain Tree, and the name means exactly what it says. It’s a tree that’s purt near the size of a mountain, as we would say where I hail from. There are entire forests of these things, and they have branches wide enough for herds of herbivores to live on. The sequences with the Mountain Tree, brief though they were, reminded me of Alan Dean Foster’s Midworld, one of my favorite creations.

Unfortunately, Moon, Stone, Jade, and some of the others don’t get to enjoy their new home for long. The tree is dying. Sometime within the last turn, the Three Worlds equivalent of a year, someone broke into the tree and took the seed containing the life essence of the tree, and as a result the tree is dying. Fortunately, the thieves left enough of a trail for them to follow.

What they find is more than any of them expects, with wonders and surprises outside the predictable. Part of the story involves tracking the thieves, but the bulk of it involves trying to retrieve the seed once they locate the parties responsible for taking it. Along the way they encounter a number of races, most we’ve not seen before.

Whereas much of the excitement and suspense in The Cloud Roads came from the threat of the Fell and some intense aerial combat scenes, in The Serpent Sea the suspense comes from the group’s efforts, especially Moon and Stone’s, to locate the seed and retrieve it. The book is no less suspenseful. It’s every bit as good as the first without being repetitive.

Nor is this just a suspenseful novel. The characters continue to grow, as do their relationships, and Wells makes it all look easy. Even some of the characters who only show up for one or two scenes come across as individuals.

Of course, since this book is told from Moon’s point of view, his character development is where the emphasis is. Much of this revolves around Moon trying to make a place for himself in the court, something that becomes harder after the group visits a neighboring court. Moon commits a faux paus that results in Jade having to engage another queen in combat. By the time the book is over, Moon will experience a number of things and will grow into a true leader.

A few weeks ago, Martha Wells wrote in a post on The Night Bazaar, that after her last contract ended in 2007 and five novels “died on the vine”, she was on the verge of giving up writing for good when the book that became The Cloud Roads resurrected itself. I’m glad it did, and I hope those other novels come back and are published, either by Night Shade, someone else, or Martha herself. There was a time, more in science fiction than in fantasy, where authors created detailed worlds or universes, such as Known Space (and especially Ringworld), Dune, or more recently Karl Schroeder’s Virga, places unique and filled with that sense of wonder that seems to be missing from so much of contemporary fantastic literature. The Cloud Roads and The Serpent Sea are brim full of sense of wonder. It would have been a shame if Martha had given up before these books got published. Kudos to Night Shade for publishing her, and the other new writers they’ve brought into print. It’s one of the reasons I listed Night Shade as a publisher to read in 2012.

As I mentioned, there are a number of races in the Three Worlds. I hope when Martha is done telling the story of Moon, or if she just wants to take a break, she’ll introduce us to more of them. The Three Worlds is a fascinating place, and I, for one, am eager to explore more of it. With these books Wells is writing at the top of her game, and given their breath, originality, and complexity, this series is showing indications it could become one of the landmark series of the genre.

Four Publishers You Should be Reading in 2012

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Yep, that’s right. I said “publishers”, not “authors”. The reason for this wording is these are the publishers I think are publishing the most innovative, original, and/or best written stuff in the fantasy and science fiction fields, with a dash of horror thrown in for spice.

I’m limiting my list to four (plus a runner-up) because these are the publishers whose books I’ve most enjoyed this year. If you’ve read my post from yesterday, you can probably guess which ones won’t be on there. I’m deliberately not including small presses that publish pricey limited editions, even if they also publish trade editions. I’m limiting the list to imprints you can find in a local bookstore. Also, there’s at least one publisher not on the list because I simply didn’t get around to reading any of their books this year, and that’s Orbit. I’ve enjoyed things they’ve published in the past, and have several books in the TBR stack from them. What I’ve read of Orbit’s line I’ve generally enjoyed, and I expect that to be the case with what I have on hand.

One thing to note about all the publishers on the list. Roughly a decade, to use round figures, is about as long as any of these publishers have been around, although one or two have existed slightly longer than that. Some are much younger. All of them are lean, efficient, and not afraid to take chances with what they publish. And their books don’t look like all their other books.

Here’s the way I’m structuring this list. I’ll list the publishers in reverse order, starting with the runner-up (along with an explanation of why that publisher isn’t number 5), with a few recommendations from their line along with a list of some of what I’ll be reading from them in the coming months. I’ll confine myself to three, at most four, recommendations and TBRs, even though in most cases the actual number is greater. Links will be to the books’ webpages, not any reviews I’ve posted; there’ll be a comprehensive list of reviews at the end of the post. For series, I’ll only list the first volume. A book’s being included in the TBR listing is not a guarantee I’ll review it here or at Futures Past and Present.

Let’s get started, shall we?

Runner-up: Prime Books. The reason I’m calling Prime the runner-up is somewhat awkward. You see, I haven’t actually finished any of their books, at least none that I’ve bought in the last few years. Not that I’ve disliked any of the books, but that they’ve all been anthologies, and I have a really bad habit of dipping into an anthology between novels, reading a selection of stories, then putting the anthology down for an extended period of time before coming back to it. So I’ve got a number of anthologies sitting around unfinished. (I really need to break that habit.) Prime does publish novels, and I have some in the TBR list (which I promise I will finish). Their ebooks are reasonably priced, with most in the $4.95 range, and unlike many higher priced ebooks from larger publishers, the TOCs are interactive. Highlights of what I have read portions of include Rich Horton’s annual Best Science Fiction and Fantasy series, which I’m waay behind on, and Paula Guran’s annual Best Dark Fantasy and Horror series, which I’m not as far behind on. Many of the their recent anthologies have been themed reprint anthologies.
Recommendations: It’s hard to recommend something you haven’t finished, but you could hardly go wrong with any of the Year’s Best, either the science fiction and fantasy or the dark fantasy and horror.
TBR: When the Great Days Come by Gardner Dozois, Heart of Iron by Ekaterina Sedia, Mechanique by Genevieve Valentine

Number 4: Abaddon/Solaris These are two imprints of the same company, with the former having a dark focus and the latter a less grim tone. Either way, you can’t go wrong. There’s enough solid science fiction, fantasy, and horror in a wide variety of subgenres here to keep anyone busy. The company is British, so many of the author’s names might not be familiar to American readers. Don’t let that stop you; British authors have a slightly different perspective on things, which I find quite refreshing at times. Check their website, and I’m sure you’ll find several things appealing.
Recommendations: Hawkwood’s Voyage (in the omnibus Hawkwood and the Kings) by Paul Kearney, Engineering Infinity edited by Johnathan Strahan, and Viking Dead by Toby Venables
TBR: Engineman by Eric Brown, The Ten Thousand by Paul Kearney, The Recollection by Gareth L. Powell, Solaris Rising edited by Ian Whates

Number 3: Angry Robot This is another British publisher, and the youngest imprint on the list. Yet in the short time they’ve been around, Angry Robot has embarked on an aggressive program of publishing some of the most ambitious genre-bending books on the market. Their authors come from all over the English speaking world, and some of their most acclaimed titles are by authors from places other than the US or Great Britain. They’re beginning to get nominations for the some of the major awards in the field, including the Hugo and the Ditmar, and winning the Arthur C. Clarke and World Fantasy. This is an imprint to watch. They’re having an ebook sale for the month of January, so now’s your chance to check them out and see what all the commotion is about.
Recommendations: Winter Song by Colin Harvey, Roil by Trent Jamieson, The Crown of the Blood by Gav Thorpe
TBR: The World House by Guy Adams, Book of Secrets by Chris Roberson, Walking the Tree by Kaaron Warren

Number Two: Night Shade This is the publisher on my list that’s been around the longest, but in my opinion they’re only getting better. I didn’t read a great many of their books this year, and the science fiction I read wasn’t exactly to my taste although I understand the appeal of those particular titles. But the fantasy was some of the best I’ve read in years. The characters were all well-drawn, complex individuals, most of whom you could cheer for, including some of the villains, or perhaps I should say antagonists since most weren’t entirely evil. The plots were involved and often twisty, with plenty of action and suspense. Nightshade seems to be focusing on developing new authors at the moment, although one of my favorite authors, who hadn’t been able to get a publishing contract the last few years has signed with them and they’re continuing to reprint much of Glen Cook’s backlist, for which they are to be lauded. All but one of their titles that I read were the first volumes in new series, which is a good thing. I’m excited about what they’ve got coming up this year and will be reading more of their books than I did this past year.
Recommendations: The Winds of Khalakovo by Bradley P. Beaulieu, The Whitefire Crossing by Courtney Schafer, The Cloud Roads by Martha Wells
TBR: Miserere by Teresa Frohock, Southern Gods by John Horner Jacobs, The Serpent Sea by Martha Wells (which I’m reading right now, look for the review in a couple of days)

Number One: Pyr If you read books from only one publisher in 2012, this is the one you should read. This is by far the most impressive and innovative line in all SFF publishing, although the others on this list are giving them increasing competition. If you’ve read many of their books, you understand why editor Lou Anders won the Hugo for Best Editor – Long Form last year. I’ve not read a single book published by Pyr that I haven’t thoroughly enjoyed, something I can’t say about any other publisher. That’s not to say everything they publish is compatible with my taste. They have a few items in their lineup that I can tell are not my thing. And that’s okay; in fact, that’s how it should be. A good publisher will a wide enough selection of product that most readers can find something they like, not cater to a narrow audience. While they tend to focus on series (only makes economic sense), Pyr also publishes stand alone novels and a few anthologies. Their focus has shifted since their inception from science fiction to fantasy, and they’re publishing some of the most exciting fantasy around, especially if you like the heroic variety, which I do.
Recommendations: The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie, Twelve by Jasper Kent, Wolfsangel by M. D. Lachlan, Shadow’s Son by Jon Sprunk
TBR: Blackdog by K. V. Johansen, Ghosts of Manhattan by George Mann, City of Ruins by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Shadow’s Lure by Jon Sprunk

These are the publishers I think are the best in the field right now, and the ones I’ll be reading the most in 2012. That’s not to say I won’t be reading other publishers. I will, just like I listed the indie published authors I’ll be reading in the coming months in a previous post. As I said there, please be patient. That’s a lot of books to read and will require time to complete, and I have other books in the TBR listing from some of these publishers that I didn’t list. I’m sure some of you have your own ideas of which publishers are the ones to be reading, and I’m sure they aren’t the same as mine. That’s okay. Feel free to post a comment letting me know which ones they are. As much good stuff is out there, I’m bound to have overlooked something.

For those who ~~have too much time on their hands~~ might be interested, here are links to the reviews I’ve posted of books by these publishers, arranged by publisher.

Abaddon/Solaris: Hawkwood’s Voyage and The Heretic Kings by Paul Kearney, Engineering Infinity by Jonathan Strahan, Viking Dead by Toby Venables

Angry Robot: Debris by Jo Anderton, Empire State by Adam Christopher, Darkness Falling by Peter Crowther, Winter Song by Colin Harvey, Roil by Trent Jamieson, The Crown of the Blood and The Crown of the Conqueror by Gav Thorpe

Nightshade: The Winds of Khalakovo by Bradley P. Beaulieu, The Whitefire Crossing by Courtney Schafer, The Cloud Roads by Martha Wells

Pyr: “Traveler’s Rest” by James Enge,Twelve, Thirteen Years Later, and The Third Section by Jasper Kent, Wolfsangel and Fenrir by M. D. Lachlan, Shadow’s Son by Jon Sprunk