Following the death of her mother, Fiona buys a new house in order to start a new chapter of her life, one with fewer reminders of painful memories. Unbeknownst to Fiona, this house has a melancholy history, and slightly more ghosts than she anticipated. In learning to live with her unexpected companions and their losses, Fiona might find a way to make peace with her own.
A day laborer hired to clean up a flooded creek outside of Boulder, Colorado uncovers what could be a valuable find—if it doesn’t kill him first.
Humanity has settled space and left Earth to its destruction. Connor and Ines have traveled back to Earth on a preservation project to find the human “jacks” that sacrificed their bodies to prop up the United States’s failing infrastructure. But the jacks hold a secret, one Connor would rather keep hidden than risk the truth being made public.
As a girl, Maggie dreamed of joining the Sisters, a group of women who enjoy the status and attention afforded by their beautiful wings. Now, years later, she has wings of her own. But an encounter in the woods forces her to reckon with her past—and the painful price her wings demanded.
Exile’s End is a complex, sometimes uncomfortable examination of artifact repatriation and cultural appropriation. An artifact of indescribable and irreplaceable beauty created by an “extinct” culture has been the basis of another culture’s origin stories. The race who created the artifact has survived on a distant world and has sent a representative to reclaim it, throwing everything into question.
Inspired by the SF camp in Danzhai, China, which is co-hosted by the Future Administration Authority (FAA) and Wanda Group.
Each of the Empire’s houses keeps secrets, even from themselves. For the bookish academics of the Sixth, every secret is a mystery, and every mystery is a puzzle to be solved or a paper to be published. Deep in the bowels of their house, one such secret is about to reveal itself. The study of the famed academic Donald Sex, sealed since the moment of his death, is about to open, and archivists are ready to dissect what he left behind. They are not ready for the macabre surprise that awaits them.
Enter Palamedes Sextus and Camilla Hect, age thirteen.
“Yellow and the Perception of Reality” by Maureen McHugh is a science fiction story about a woman who delves into the mystery of why and how her twin sister, a physicist, has been brain damaged in a lab accident in which two of her colleagues died.
In this biweekly series, we’re exploring the evolution of both major and minor figures in Tolkien’s legendarium, tracing the transformations of these characters through drafts and early manuscripts through to the finished work. This week’s installment takes a look at Théoden, son of Thengel, King of Rohan and a champion in the fight against Sauron.
King Théoden of Rohan is undoubtedly one of the most influential figures of the Third Age, despite the fact that his greatest deeds were accomplished in the last few weeks of his life. Without his stout courage and compelling leadership, Gondor and the West would surely have fallen into Shadow. Théoden’s career is brief but brilliant: one that, in the end, proves to be nothing short of glorious.
This post brought to you by my pet, Peeve.
One of the things writers have to do when they’re writing in any world that is not right here, right now, their own culture and their own world view, is to think about the language they’re using to evoke that world. It can seem tedious to have to consider every single word, but it’s part of the job. And no, many readers, who live in the same culture and have the same attitudes and are familiar with the same images, won’t notice.
But a few will. And the nature of those few is that they will let you know.
There’s a meme going around, I’ve seen it on Twitter and now it’s on a Discord I’m on, where you post the picture of the cover of a book you love every day for a week. It’s much better than asking what one book you love, but for anyone who reads a lot and has been reading a lot for some considerable time now, it’s too difficult to pare it down to seven books, from all the books there are.
Paring it down is a case of canon forming even when it’s “books I love,” because you want to be representative and that always means leaving things out that I love just as much. I am discriminating but wide ranging in my book love; I love a lot of books. Why, ha ha, I thought, walking over to the bookshelves, even if I limit myself to one per author I could almost find seven books I love just on the alphabetical-by-author fiction shelves under A! And indeed I could, with no trouble at all, and they were a fun mixed set. So I thought I might share them with you, and perhaps you could share your favourite books whose authors begin with A, and if this was fun we could go on through the alphabet, and if it wasn’t fun we could stop.
Welcome back to the Lovecraft reread, in which two modern Mythos writers get girl cooties all over old Howard’s sandbox, from those who inspired him to those who were inspired in turn.
This week, we’re watching the first two episodes of Lovecraft Country, airing on HBO August 16 and 23, 2020. Spoilers ahead (but go watch first, because this show is amazing).
[“At the dawn of time, just for a moment, everything was where and as it should be…”]
A girl’s quest to find her father leads her to an extended family of magical fighting booksellers who police the mythical Old World of England when it intrudes on the modern world…
We’re excited to share an excerpt from The Left-Handed Booksellers of London, a new fantasy from Garth Nix—publishing September 22nd with Katherine Tegen Books.
After over a decade of gory deaths, shocking twists, and memes of Rick screaming “Carl!” the original Walking Dead tv show is coming to end. As reported by Deadline, the long-running zombie apocalypse series will conclude with a 24 episode final season. But just like the walkers that shamble around the show, the franchise won’t be dying off so easily.
Although Charles R. Saunders passed back in May, word of his death didn’t make the rounds until early September. It breaks my heart that Saunders isn’t a household name. His fiction, particularly the Imaro series, and non-fiction were widely influential and eye-opening, even if not many fantasy readers today know his name. In the last few years we’ve seen more and more Africa-inspired epic fantasy, a subgenre Saunders helped define and shape four decades ago. We have been blessed with books from the diaspora and the continent, game changers like Marlon James’s Black Leopard, Red Wolf, C. T. Rwizi’s Scarlet Odyssey, and now Andrea Hairston’s Master of Poisons.
Denis Villeneuve’s Dune is the latest adaptation of Frank Herbert’s science fiction epic, and after months of teases and images, Warner Bros. has finally released the first trailer for the film.
A biweekly series, The Ursula K. Le Guin Reread explores anew the transformative writing, exciting worlds, and radical stories that changed countless lives. This week we’ll be covering all of Le Guin’s short YA novel(la) Very Far Away from Anywhere Else. My edition is the 2004 Harcourt paperback.
We have come, perhaps, to one of the strangest books Le Guin wrote—at least at first glance. A YA novel written in 1976 that has probably the most uninteresting back-cover copy ever attached to one of her works…
There’s a meme going around, I’ve seen it on Twitter and now it’s on a Discord I’m on, where you post the picture of the cover of a book you love every day for a week. It’s much better than asking what one book you love, but for anyone who reads a lot and has been reading a lot for some considerable time now, it’s too difficult to pare it down to seven books, from all the books there are.
Paring it down is a case of canon forming even when it’s “books I love,” because you want to be representative and that always means leaving things out that I love just as much. I am discriminating but wide ranging in my book love; I love a lot of books. Why, ha ha, I thought, walking over to the bookshelves, even if I limit myself to one per author I could almost find seven books I love just on the alphabetical-by-author fiction shelves under A! And indeed I could, with no trouble at all, and they were a fun mixed set. So I thought I might share them with you, and perhaps you could share your favourite books whose authors begin with A, and if this was fun we could go on through the alphabet, and if it wasn’t fun we could stop.
2020 marks the 25th anniversary of the start to Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files series, and to commemorate that milestone, he announced earlier this year that he’ll be releasing two long-awaited installments, each of which was accompanied with a live-action trailer.
The next installment of the series is Battle Ground, and during this year’s virtual Dragon Con, he debuted the trailer for the novel.
She swallowed a star, and the Sisterhood called her the Eater...
We’re so pleased to share Sam Weber’s stunning cover art for Star Eater, a new fantasy from Nommo Award finalist Kerstin Hall! A tale of power, ambition, and blood, Star Eater will be available from Tordotcom Publishing on June 22, 2021.
Following the death of her mother, Fiona buys a new house in order to start a new chapter of her life, one with fewer reminders of painful memories. Unbeknownst to Fiona, this house has a melancholy history, and slightly more ghosts than she anticipated. In learning to live with her unexpected companions and their losses, Fiona might find a way to make peace with her own.
Today is Star Trek Day, which CBS is using to celebrate the anniversary of the premiere of the original series back in 1966. In addition to panels about all of the established shows in the franchise, the network used the opportunity to talk about one upcoming project, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, a spinoff of its CBS All Access series Star Trek Discovery.
Today is the anniversary Star Trek’s debut on CBS in 1966, and to celebrate, the network is holding “Star Trek Day”, using the occasion to host a number of panels about the franchise.
Along with those panels is a new trailer for the upcoming third season of Star Trek: Discovery, which debuts on CBS All Access on October 15th.
I’ve been revisiting some more old favourites.
Michelle Sagara has been writing her Chronicles of Elantra series for the last fifteen years. This year sees the publication of the first of a pair of prequel novels, The Emperor’s Wolves. I had the opportunity to read a review copy, and it sent me off to re-read all fifteen of the Chronicles of Elantra, starting with Cast in Shadow.
This post brought to you by my pet, Peeve.
One of the things writers have to do when they’re writing in any world that is not right here, right now, their own culture and their own world view, is to think about the language they’re using to evoke that world. It can seem tedious to have to consider every single word, but it’s part of the job. And no, many readers, who live in the same culture and have the same attitudes and are familiar with the same images, won’t notice.
But a few will. And the nature of those few is that they will let you know.
Charlie Jane Anders is writing a nonfiction book—and Tor.com is publishing it as she does so. Never Say You Can’t Survive is a how-to book about the storytelling craft, but it’s also full of memoir, personal anecdote, and insight about how to flourish in the present emergency.
Below is the sixteenth chapter, “How to Write a Political Story Without Falling on Your Face.” You can find all previous chapters here. New chapters will appear every Tuesday. Enjoy!
