Browsed by
Category: Books

Sentient Mining Robots, Interstellar Warfare, and an A.I. Revolution: The Corporation Wars by Ken MacLeod

Sentient Mining Robots, Interstellar Warfare, and an A.I. Revolution: The Corporation Wars by Ken MacLeod

Comments 0 Comment

The Corporation Wars Trilogy-smallScottish writer Ken MacLeod is the author of Cosmonaut Keep, The Cassini Division, Newton’s Wake, and roughly a dozen other science fiction novels. His books have been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula, Clarke, and British Science Fiction Awards. His Corporation Wars trilogy (Dissidence, Insurgence, and Emergence) is a fast-paced space opera told against a backdrop of interstellar drone warfare, virtual reality, and an A.I. revolution. In his review of the second volume at Locus Online, Russell Letson said:

MacLeod manages big Ideas (po­litical and futurological) and propulsive action without short-changing either side of that classic science-fictional tension-of-opposites, a trait he shares with Iain M. Banks and Charles Stross. I’m going add one more name and then duck be­hind the sofa: Heinlein.

I was sloppy about picking up the originals when they first appeared; that usually means I have to painstakingly track down out-of-print copies. But not this time! Orbit came to my rescue with a gorgeous (and gorgeously economical) 879-page omnibus brick: The Corporation Wars Trilogy. If you’re interested in an acclaimed space opera from a modern master, this is an excellent gift for yourself. Here’s the description.

In deep space, ruthless corporations vie for control of scattered mining colonies, and war is an ever-present threat.

Led by Seba, a newly sentient mining robot, an AI revolution grows. Fighting them is Carlos, a grunt who is reincarnated over and over again to keep the “freeboots” in check. But he’s not sure whether he’s on the right side.

Against a backdrop of interstellar drone combat Carlos and Seba must either find a way to rise above the games their masters are playing or die. And even dying might not be the end of it.

The Corporation Wars was published by Orbit on December 11, 2018. It is 896 pages, priced at $19.99 in trade paperback and $13.99 in digital formats. The cover was designed by Lisa Marie Pompilio.

If you’re in the market for fine value in reading, check out our recent coverage of fat omnibus editions here.

Future Treasures: Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone

Future Treasures: Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone

Comments 0 Comment

Empress of Forever-smallThe six novels in Max Gladstone’s Craft Sequence have earned him a reputation as a modern master of urban fantasy (not to mention a Hugo nomination.) His latest novel, Empress of Forever, is something very different. Delilah S. Dawson calls it “A classic space opera that impossibly becomes a thrilling dungeon crawl fantasy,” and if that’s not a perfect book blurb, I don’t know what is. In her feature review at The Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog yesterday, Nicole Hill wrote:

The comparisons this novel has drawn to Guardians of the Galaxy are understandable and well-earned — you won’t soon read a book more overloaded with outlandishly imaginative and downright fun set-pieces, including a battle involving space vessels made of stained glass… It’s a chess game played out across the stars, with a fearsome matched set of queens and a collection of pawns who are unforgettable.

Empress of Forever arrives in trade paperback from Tor next week. Here’s the description.

From Hugo Award finalist Max Gladstone comes a smart, swashbuckling, wildly imaginative adventure; the saga of a rag-tag team of brilliant misfits, dangerous renegades, and enhanced outlaws in a war-torn future.

A wildly successful innovator to rival Steve Jobs or Elon Musk, Vivian Liao is prone to radical thinking, quick decision-making, and reckless action. On the eve of her greatest achievement, she tries to outrun people who are trying to steal her success.

In the chilly darkness of a Boston server farm, Viv sets her ultimate plan into motion. A terrifying instant later, Vivian Liao is catapulted through space and time to a far future where she confronts a destiny stranger and more deadly than she could ever imagine.

The end of time is ruled by an ancient, powerful Empress who blesses or blasts entire planets with a single thought. Rebellion is literally impossible to consider — until Vivian Liao arrives. Trapped between the Pride ― a ravening horde of sentient machines ― and a fanatical sect of warrior monks who call themselves the Mirrorfaith, Viv must rally a strange group of allies to confront the Empress and find a way back to the world and life she left behind.

Empress of Forever will be published by Tor Books on June 18, 2019. It is 480 pages, priced at $18.99 in paperback and $9.99 for the digital edition. The cover is by Tommy Arnold. Read an excerpt at Tor.com.

Help Hank Davis fill a Space Pirate Anthology

Help Hank Davis fill a Space Pirate Anthology

Comments 11 comments

The-Pirates-of-Zan-Ace-Double Leinster-smallIt always pays to check in early and often with Hank Davis, the mad genius editor at Baen Books behind The Baen Big Book of Monsters and The Best of Gordon R. Dickson, Volume 1. Here’s what he told me last month.

I was dorking around online, looking for stories and story ideas, and came across one of your Black Gate pages from way back in 2013, singing the praises of Leinster’s The Pirates of Ersatz/The Pirates of Zan, and bemoaning the dearth of space pirate novels. While I can’t do anything about the lack of space pirates in novel length, maybe the book will offset the lack.

Well, that certainly made me curious. When I asked him to elaborate, here’s what he said.

I’m going to be putting together an anthology of stories about space pirates, tentatively titled Cosmic Buccaneers, though that may change, and would appreciate suggestions from Black Gate readers of space pirate stories that have warmed the cockles of their heart. (Remind me to look up “cockle,” whatever that means.) Short stories preferred, though I could take a look at novelets — but probably can’t fit more than one or two in. And no novels, of course, even a great one like Murray Leinster’s great The Pirates of Ersatz/The Pirates of Zan.

And please no submissions of new stories. This is not a new story market and I’ll have to return any such submissions unread; sorry! And thanks for your help, and while the Internet Speculative Fiction Data Base is very helpful, please indicate where the story was pubbed or reprinted.

This is definitely good news for those of us who enjoy space pirate fiction (and really that’s everybody, right?).

He’s definitely come to the right place for ideas, anyway. If you’ve got a suggestion for a previously published space pirate story that belongs in the upcoming Cosmic Buccaneers, shout out in the comments and we’ll pass it along to Hank.

…

Read More Read More

New Treasures: Octavia Gone by Jack McDevitt

New Treasures: Octavia Gone by Jack McDevitt

Comments 0 Comment

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

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

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

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

Here’s the complete description.

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

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

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

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

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

See all our latest New Treasures here.

A Series that Embodies Delicious Steampunk Mystery: Newbury & Hobbes Investigation by George Mann

A Series that Embodies Delicious Steampunk Mystery: Newbury & Hobbes Investigation by George Mann

Comments 6 comments
The Affinity Bridge-small The Osiris Ritual-small The Immorality Engine A Newbury & Hobbes Investigation-small The Executioner's Heart A Newbury & Hobbes Investigation-small The Revenant Express A Newbury & Hobbes Investigation-small

The Newbury & Hobbes novels. Cover art by Viktor Koen

George Mann’s Newbury & Hobbes Investigations are a highly acclaimed steampunk mystery series. amNewYork called the opening volume “A riveting page-turned that mixes the society of manners in turn-of-the-century London with a gritty and brutal murder mystery,” and Entertainment Weekly says the books bring “industrial London to life like a Jerry Bruckheimer movie in book form.” Damn — I’m still not sure what these books are about, but I definitely want to read them.

There have been five so far.

#1: The Affinity Bridge (April 2010)
#2: The Osirus Ritual (June 2011)
#3: The Immortality Engine (July 2012)
#4: The Executioner’s Heart (July 2014)
#5: The Revenant Express (February 2019)

The most recent, The Revenant Express, arrived in February this year from Tor. Like the others, it’s a quick read, 237 pages, and available in both hardcover and digital formats. Here’s the description.

…

Read More Read More

The Golden Age of Science Fiction: On Wings of Song, by Thomas M. Disch

The Golden Age of Science Fiction: On Wings of Song, by Thomas M. Disch

Comments 0 Comment

Cover by Malcolm Ashman
Cover by Malcolm Ashman

Cover by Michael Mariano
Cover by Michael Mariano

Cover by Lou Feck
Cover by Lou Feck

The Campbell Memorial Award, not to be confused with the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Author, was founded in 1973.  The award is a juried award and presented to the best SF novel published in the US. The award was founded by Harry Harrison in memory of the long-time editor of Astounding and Analog magazine. The first Campbell Memorial Award was presented to Barry N. Malzberg’s novel Beyond Apollo. The award is presented at the University of Kansas in Lawrence and over the years a weekend conference has grown up around the presentation of this award and the Sturgeon Award, which was founded in 1987 to honor short stories. In 1980, the award was presented on July 31.

Originally published from February through April in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Disch’s 1979 novel On Wings of Song takes place in a Balkanized United States, where Daniel Weinreb lives in an Iowa ruled by a conservative Christian movement which bans a variety of activities, including singing. After an ill-advised jaunt to Minneapolis to see a movie with a friend who disappears, Daniel finds himself harassed by his friend’s powerful father and eventually sent to a penal camp for a minor infraction.  While there, Daniel learns the secret of flying and its connection to singing. Freed from the prison camp, Daniel flees to New York to pursue a career as a singer and learn the art of flying, although his success leaves his idealism and hope in tatters.

…

Read More Read More

Cyborgs in Space: Hullmetal Girls by Emily Skrutskie

Cyborgs in Space: Hullmetal Girls by Emily Skrutskie

Comments 0 Comment

Hullmetal-Girls-smallerOnly the most desperate try to become Scela warriors. That’s because few humans survive being fused with the robotic exoskeletons. Yet Aisha sits with thirty others, waiting for her turn, while the body of her mentor, ripped in half, is carried past on its way to the incinerator.

She knows she’s probably going to die. But this is her last chance to save her siblings. Her younger brother is dying of a wasting disease, and treatment is expensive. She’ll also do anything to keep her younger sister from working in the dyeing plant that killed their mother. So that’s why Aisha has signed on for the chance to become a Scela. She has never wanted to be a soldier for the State. But if she can survive the process of becoming a cyborg, her salary will be enough to support her family.

The surgery is even worse than she’d imagined. But when she wakes, the full truth hits her – she hasn’t just signed away her human body. She’s also surrendered her mind. The exo seems to have a will of its own. And since the Scela fighters are literally the hands the State, the authorities can override her will at any time. She’s nothing but a tool, a drone. She can no longer control what her body does.

Of the thirty people in that waiting room, only Aisha and three others survive. It’s hard enough for each of them to control their own bodies individually. When the trainer flips a switch, yoking their minds together, all four are suddenly four places at once.

Aisha’s new teammate Key’s mind has been destroyed so badly, she can’t even remember why she signed up to become a Scela in the first place. Since she’s from the upper class, it makes no sense that she would risk her life to do so.

The only boy in the squad, Wooj, was caught in a felony and forced to become a Scela. While he managed to survive the procedure, there’s something wrong with his exo. Sometimes, it’s too loose. Others, the robot eclipses his humanity completely.

Praava’s life doesn’t matter. Only her older sister’s does. Praava knows her sister will solve the puzzle of the wasting disease and save humanity, but only if she has enough money for her research. That’s why she went under the blade.

With their vastly different backgrounds and agendas, these four will never be able to work together. Except they must, if humanity is going to survive.

…

Read More Read More

When Surviving the Apocalypse is Only the Beginning: The Road to Nowhere Trilogy by Meg Elison

When Surviving the Apocalypse is Only the Beginning: The Road to Nowhere Trilogy by Meg Elison

Comments 0 Comment
The Book of the Unnamed Midwife-small The Book of Etta-small The Book of Flora-small
The Book of the Unnamed Midwife-back-small The Book of Etta-back-small The Book of Flora-back-small

It’s good to see Meg Elison, who made such an impressive splash with her debut novel The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, finally start to connect with wider audiences.

The Book of the Unnamed Midwife (2014) won the 2014 Philip K. Dick award and was a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2016. The second novel in The Road to Nowhere Trilogy, The Book of Etta (2017) was also a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award. And in April of this year the highly anticipated third volume, The Book of Flora, was published in paperback by 47 North. As each book has arrived the acclaim and recognition for the series has grown, and when I checked tonight I was surprised and delighted to discover that the first book in the series had reached the #3 position in Amazon Kindle Best Sellers in Science Fiction.

Back in 2016, Slate called The Book of the Unnamed Midwife the 2014 Sci-Fi Novel that Eerily Anticipated the Zika Crisis. More germane to those of us looking for a good story, Sci-Fi Scary labeled it “moving and intelligent work. Brutal and chilling at times, but also hopeful and very human. It immersed me right from the start and kept me gripped to the last page.” Now that the series is a proper trilogy, we’ll get to work baking it a cake.

All three volumes are available in trade paperback from 47 North. Click the images above for apocalypse-sized versions.

Vintage Treasures: The Weird Tales Anthologies

Vintage Treasures: The Weird Tales Anthologies

Comments 3 comments
Weird Tales Peter Haining-small More Weird Tales Peter Haining-small

Weird Tales and More Weird Tales (Sphere, 1978). Covers by Les Edwards

Weird Tales is unquestionably the most storied and respected American fantasy magazine. It first appeared in March 1923, and published its last issue in Spring 2014 — a nearly 91-year run. That’s impressive by any standard.

Of course, Weird Tales isn’t measured purely by its longevity. The three greatest pulp fantasy writers — Robert E. Howard, H.P. Lovecraft, and Clark Ashton Smith — did their most important work in its pages, and it also published classic fiction by Edmond Hamilton, C.L. Moore, Henry Kuttner, Algernon Blackwood, E. Hoffmann Price, Robert Bloch, Manly Wade Wellman, Seabury Quinn, Ray Bradbury, Fritz Leiber, Eric Frank Russell, Fredric Brown, Mary Elizabeth Counselman, Theodore Sturgeon, and hundreds of others. It remains the most collectible and desirable fantasy pulp, and individual issues sell for hundreds (sometimes thousands) of dollars.

There have been numerous anthologies and collections gathering much of the best work from Weird Tales over the years. Most were produced by Arkham House, the publishing house founded in 1939 by August Derleth and Donald Wandrei to preserve the work of H.P. Lovecraft. Arkham mined Weird Tales for decades, issuing many hardcover volumes, and in the process preserved the work of many fine writers. Many of their reprints are now highly collectible on their own, which doesn’t help those of us looking for an inexpensive introduction to the glories of Weird Tales.

Fortunately for folks like you and me, there are a number of affordable and highly readable books out there that can do the job. Here’s a dozen to get you started.

…

Read More Read More

IMHO: A Personal Look at Dystopian Fiction — Part One

IMHO: A Personal Look at Dystopian Fiction — Part One

Comments 10 comments
George Orwell 1984-small George Orwell Animal Farm-small Brave New World Aldous Huxley-small

For the sake of this 2-part article, and not wanting to rely on memory alone, I’ve used a brief synopsis of each novel mentioned here, courtesy of Wikipedia.

I haven’t read a dystopian novel in decades. Why? First, because I’ve read enough of them and after a while I got burned out. Second, because I started to see the direction in which our governments and our world were and are heading. Reality intruded upon fiction, and such novels began to depress me, even if they ended on a happy, upbeat and optimistic note. I now read for escapism, to be entertained, or educated if I’m reading history or biographies.

During the Depression of the 1930s, and even through WWII, escapist entertainment was extremely popular, especially in films, because people wanted to forget, even for a few hours, what was happening in the real world. Today, in the Information Age, we are bombarded by both real and fake news, and by the landslide of dark, world events. And yet, dystopian fiction, in both literature and the cinema, are more popular now than ever. Is this the new escapist entertainment for the 21st century? Perhaps. Now, I don’t know what every writer and film maker had or has in mind, but I do know that in the past, authors always had a clear agenda: they were writing cautionary tales.

What I intend to do with the first part of this 2-part article is to introduce readers to early and perhaps all but forgotten dystopian novels that I’ve read. These are books I think should not be forgotten, books that are must-read novels. Part 2 will deal with more recent fiction, as well as an “incomplete/partial” list of films. So let’s begin, shall we?

…

Read More Read More