Black Mouth and Ghostwritten (Titan Books, July 2022, October 2022). Cover designs by Julia Lloyd
There’s nothing quite like a thoroughly unexpected discovery in a good bookstore.
I couldn’t find the last Dell Magazines at my local Barnes & Noble in nearby Geneva, Illinois. So before Christmas I made a snowy road trip to the B&N superstore in Naperville. I didn’t find the magazines I wanted (what the heck, B&N magazine clerks??), but the 20 minutes I spent browsing their Science Fiction & Fantasy section turned out to be enormously rewarding anyway.
Possibly the most consequential discovery I made was a small section of shelving real estate devoted to a horror writer I’d never heard of, Ronald Malfi. I ended up taking two of his books home with me, Black Mouth and Ghostwritten, and spending time this week tracking down the rest online.
The Justice of Kings and The Tyranny of Faith (Orbit, 2022 and 2023). Covers by Martina Fackova
When I wrote about Richard Swan’s debut fantasy novel The Justice of Kings back in October, I got an enthusiastic response. Wayne Ligon called it “My favorite fantasy this year, so far!” and BG blogger Sarah Avery said,
I’m a sucker for fantasy novels that care about the rule of law. I loved Sebastian de Castell’s Greatcoats series, about badass itinerant magistrates in a recently failed state, to no end. This one looks likely to scratch the same itch.
Hot on the heels of The Justice of Kings comes The Tyranny of Faith, due from Orbit on Valentine’s Day. Kirkus Reviews tells us, “While The Justice of Kings was pretty dark, this volume gets even grittier.” I know that’s just what you bloodthirsty lot were dying to hear.
S.B. Divya has made a heckuva splash in just a few years. She was the co-editor (with Mur Lafferty) of the Hugo-nominated Escape Pod, and her debut novella Runtime (Tor.com, 2016) was nominated for a Nebula. Her first novel Machinehood (Saga Press, 2021) was also nominated for a Nebula last year.
Needless to say, her upcoming novel Meru is highly anticipated. A far-future thriller of a woman who attempts the impossible to prove that mankind is ready to live among the stars, it’s already been called “a thrilling combination of traditional SF space travel and forward-thinking examinations of what ‘humanity’ will mean in the future” by Library Journal, and “rich and complicated [with] plenty of jaw-dropping space scenes” (Kirkus Reviews).
Meru will be released in trade paperback by 47North early next month.
Lone Wolf Definitive Editions, Volumes 1-3 (Holmgard Press). Covers by Alberto Dal Lago
Joe Dever started playing Dungeons and Dragons in 1976, barely three years after the first copies appeared in game shops in Lake Geneva. In 1984 he published his first Lone Wolf solo fantasy game book, Flight from the Dark; it became an international bestseller and launched a publishing phenomenon. By Dever’s death in 2016, the Lone Wolf series had been translated into 18 languages and sold over 12 million copies.
Unlike most other fantasy solo gamebooks — such as Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone’s classic Fighting Fantasy titles, Steve Jackson’s fabulous Death Test and its sequels, Tunnels and Trolls adventures like City of Terrors, George Dew’s excellent Legends of the Ancient World, and others — the Lone Wolf books could be played separately or back-to-back, as individual chapters in an epic solo campaign spanning 32 books.
Before his death Dever substantially rewrote the opening book Flight from the Dark, expanding it from 350 to 550 sections. The publishing company he founded, Holmgard Press, has now reissued the first five titles in hardcover Definitive Editions in the UK, and will be releasing paperback editions of the original gamebooks with brand new cover art — and all the original interior art by Gary Chalk — in the US on January 3.
The Best Horror of the Year, Volume Fourteen (Night Shade, December 20, 2022)
Here we are again. Ellen Datlow — arguably the most famous editor of horror short fiction in the world — has released her latest Best Horror anthology featuring her annual selection of tales, plus an invaluable overview of what happened last year in horror (books, magazines, awards etc.)
The present volume collects twenty-four stories and, once again, is a juicy treat for any lover of the genre.
I will focus on my own favorites, most of which were already among my own personal selection from the year 2021, while others had escaped my attention as a simple reader.
The Citadel of Forgotten Myths (Saga Press, December 6, 2022). Cover artist unknown.
No, your eyes don’t deceive you. That’s a brand new Elricnovel, arriving in hardcover next week.
Described as a prequel, The Citadel of Forgotten Myths takes place between the first and second books in the Elric Saga, Elric of Melniboné (published a whopping 50 years ago, in 1972) and The Sailor on the Seas of Fate (1976). It’s the first new Elric novel since The White Wolf’s Son, way back in 2005, and is highly anticipated.
Because of Moorcock’s stature in the field these days, the back cover of his new novel is strewn with glowing quotes from J. G. Ballard, The New Yorker and NPR — and I have to admit, that NPR quote is pretty darn good. It’s taken from a 2014 piece titled (of all things) These Nautical Reads Will Put Wind In Your Sails, and is written by novelist Jason Sheehan. Here’s the whole thing; it’s worth the read.
Shards of Earth and Eyes of the Void (Orbit, August 3, 2021, and November 22, 2022). Cover design by Steve Stone
Adrian Tchaikovsky is equally at home with ambitious epic fantasy (including his Echoes of the Fall trilogy, and the sprawling, 13-volume Apt series) and big-canvas science fiction (including Warhammer 40K and his Arthur C. Clarke award-winning Children of Time novels).
HIs latest is an ambitious space opera trilogy. It began with Shard of Earth, which BookPage labeled “one of the most stunning space operas I’ve read this year… glorious,” and Publishers Weekly called “dazzlingly suspenseful… a mix of lively fight scenes, friendly banter, and high-stakes intrigue.”
Next month the second installment Eyes of the Void drops, and the advance buzz for this one is just as rapturous. I usually avoid a series until at least three novels are in print, but I may have to make an exception for this one.
Hanuvar short stories by Howard Andrew Jones appeared in these fine magazines, and they lead to Aug 2023’s release of the novels!
We have exciting news to share about Howard Andrew Jones and Sword & Sorcery.
Howard Andrew Jones in Magazines
Howard Andrew Jones is a titan amongst the Black Gate staff, having served as Manager Editor of the paperback magazine from 2004 onward. He has also been a champion of adventure fiction, being the driving force behind the rebirth of interest in Harold Lamb’s historical fiction (assembled and edited 8 collections of Lamb’s work for the University of Nebraska Press). On the Sword & Sorcery front, he has been blogging about the genre for decades (and his posts on the now-obsolete Flashing Swords e-zine… and subsequently on Black Gate… regarding REVISITING THE NEW EDGE would eventually coin the term “New Edge S&S”). Howard Andrew Jones is currently the Editor for the sword-and-sorcery magazine Tales From the Magician’s Skull, published by Goodman Games.
HAJ in Books
Howard Jones’s debut historical fantasy novel, The Desert of Souls (Thomas Dunne Books 2011), was widely acclaimed by influential publications like Library Journal, Kirkus, and Publisher’s Weekly, made Kirkus’ New and Notable list for 2011, and was on both Locus’s Recommended Reading List and the Barnes and Noble Best Fantasy Releases list of 2011. Its sequel, The Bones of the Old Ones, made the Barnes and Noble Best Fantasy Release of 2013 and received a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly. He is the author of four Pathfinder novels, an e-collection of short stories featuring the heroes from his historical fantasy novels, The Waters of Eternity, and the Ring-Sworn trilogy from St. Martin’s, starting with For the Killing of Kings, which received a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, and concluding with When the Goddess Wakes, which received the same recognition.
Now There is Even More!
Baen Books signed Howard Andrew Jones to pen five books: The Chronicles of Hanuvar (the first book to arrive August 2023). Press release below.
Catalyst by Brandon Crilly (Atthis Arts, October 11, 2022). Cover artist uncredited.
Hello, Black Gate folks! Normally I spend my time here raving about other people’s books, but this time I’m in the very weird position of talking about my own. Yikes. Catalyst is my debut fantasy novel, releasing in October from Atthis Arts, and John has graciously invited me to talk a bit about the world of the book.
Catalyst centers on three estranged friends: Mavrin, a street magician who doesn’t believe in real magic, other than what the Aspects provide; Eyasu, labeled a heretic by the Aspects’ followers but determined to prove a secret history everyone else rejects; and Deyeri, a retired soldier whose adopted city is threatened by forces tied to that history. They begin the story in different corners of Aelda, a world that split apart at its core a little over three centuries earlier, and would have been destroyed completely if not for the intervention of the Aspects: massive, cephalopod-like beings the people of Aelda believe to be their gods, who have been circling the planet ever since providing atmosphere and holding what remains of Aelda together.
The Wraithbone Phoenix (Black Library, August 30, 2022). Cover uncredited.
Black Library’s new Warhammer Crime imprint has caught my eye recently. I heartily enjoy their Warhammer 40K novels — and we’ve covered them at Black Gate fairly extensively over the past 20 years — but there’s only so much bleak far future military SF you can include in your regular diet.
Or is there? In the last two years Black Library has branched out with new Warhammer Horror and Warhammer Crime imprints, which re-focus the galaxy-spanning genocidal conflicts of the Warhammer 40K era into far more personal tales of urban crime and supernatural intrigue, and they have reinvigorated my interest in the rich and consequential milieu. Some of the most exciting and well-crafted far-future SF of the past few decades has been published under the 40K banner, and I’m excited to see that tradition carry on with a new generation of talent.
The latest release to pique my interest is The Wraithbone Phoenix by Alec Worley, which arrives in trade paperback and audio formats next Tuesday. It’s the second tale featuring Baggit and Clodde, a fast-talking ratling and his ogryn pal, following the popular audio title Dredge Runners.
