Black Gate

T.L. Zalecki is one of the first speculative fiction authors to be published by Amazon’s Kindle Scout program. In order to receive an offer of publication, she had to post an excerpt of her book on their site and garner positive votes from browsing readers. Rising Tide: SIRENS Book 1 launched yesterday to strong sales rankings and a five star review average (nine reviews posted).

Forget whatever you think you know. History has been rewritten, and the future is in peril.

In a world where rising ocean levels swallow coastal cities and people scramble for resources on an overpopulated earth, the survival of the human race depends on biogenetic research to develop aquatic abilities. The year is 2098, and it has never been more dangerous for the elusive Sirens to be discovered.

Until now, the Sirens have remained hidden from the human world, inhabiting an obscure, undiscovered island in the Indian Ocean. Amid growing discontent among their youth, the Sirens, led by headstrong Mello Seaford, decide to test the waters of open society by striking a deal with the all-powerful megacorporation, DiviniGen Inc.

And they risk everything to do it.

Will the risk prove worth it, or will the Sirens be subjected to the diabolical whims of humanity?

I will interview this author in the near future to learn more about the Kindle Scout program and her experience with it, so watch this space!

Emily Mah is a writer and the owner of E.M. Tippetts Book Designs, a company that provides formatting, cover design, and editing services for independent authors and publishers.

Just two days ago, in my Monday post on the fantasy debut The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps, I noted that Tor has brought us some strong debuts over the past 18 months. And now here’s another promising fantasy debut from Ilana C. Myer, a high fantasy that tells the tale of a young woman who dares to defy a culture that says that only men can be poets and set their work to music, and who undertakes a dangerous quest to restore her world’s lost magic.

Her name was Kimbralin Amaristoth: sister to a cruel brother, daughter of a hateful family. But that name she has forsworn, and now she is simply Lin, a musician and lyricist of uncommon ability in a land where women are forbidden to answer such callings — a fugitive who must conceal her identity or risk imprisonment and even death.

On the eve of a great festival, Lin learns that an ancient scourge has returned to the land of Eivar, a pandemic both deadly and unnatural. Its resurgence brings with it the memory of an apocalypse that transformed half a continent. Long ago, magic was everywhere, rising from artistic expression — from song, from verse, from stories. But in Eivar, where poets once wove enchantments from their words and harps, the power was lost. Forbidden experiments in blood divination unleashed the plague that is remembered as the Red Death, killing thousands before it was stopped, and Eivar’s connection to the Otherworld from which all enchantment flowed, broken.

The Red Death’s return can mean only one thing: someone is spilling innocent blood in order to master dark magic. Now poets who thought only to gain fame for their songs face a challenge much greater: galvanized by Valanir Ocune, greatest Seer of the age, Lin and several others set out to reclaim their legacy and reopen the way to the Otherworld — a quest that will test their deepest desires, imperil their lives, and decide the future.

Last Song Before Night will be published by Tor Books on September 29, 2015. It is 416 pages, priced at $26.99 in hardcover, and $12.99 for the digital version. The cover is by Stephan Martiniere. Read more at Myer’s website here.

There’s nothing quite like an exciting debut fantasy novel. Fantasy is a genre of limitless potential, and every new writer takes us in a direction never before explored. Seth Dickinson’s The Traitor Baru Cormorant, to be published in hardcover by Tor in September, tells the tale of a young woman from a conquered people who tries to transform a vast empire from within.

Baru Cormorant believes any price is worth paying to liberate her people — even her soul.

When the Empire of Masks conquers her island home, overwrites her culture, criminalizes her customs, and murders one of her fathers, Baru vows to swallow her hate, join the Empire’s civil service, and claw her way high enough to set her people free.

Sent as an Imperial agent to distant Aurdwynn, another conquered country, Baru discovers it’s on the brink of rebellion. Drawn by the intriguing duchess Tain Hu into a circle of seditious dukes, Baru may be able to use her position to help. As she pursues a precarious balance between the rebels and a shadowy cabal within the Empire, she orchestrates a do-or-die gambit with freedom as the prize.

But the cost of winning the long game of saving her people may be far greater than Baru imagines.

The Traitor Baru Cormorant will be published by Tor Books on September 15, 2015. It is 400 pages, priced at $25.99 in hardcover, and $12.99 for the digital edition. The cover is by Sam Weber. Read an excerpt at Tor.com.