Featuring: Joe Abercrombie, Jonathan Ames, Steve Cavanaugh, Marc Collins, Pip Drysdale, Kate Fagan, Snorri Kristjánsson, J. Robert Lennon, Arkady Martine, Ray Nayler, James Rickards, Olivia Waite

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Joe Abercrombie, THE DEVILS (Tor Books)

A notorious band of anti-heroes on a delightfully bloody and raucous journey

Holy work sometimes requires unholy deeds.

Brother Diaz has been summoned to the Sacred City, where he is certain a commendation and grand holy assignment awaits him. But his new flock is made up of unrepentant murderers, practitioners of ghastly magic, and outright monsters. The mission he is tasked with will require bloody measures from them all in order to achieve its righteous ends.

Elves lurk at our borders and hunger for our flesh, while greedy princes care for nothing but their own ambitions and comfort. With a hellish journey before him, it’s a good thing Brother Diaz has the devils on his side.

The latest novel from the best-selling author of the First Law and Age of Madness series. I still have a few of Abercrombie’s novels to catch up on (in chronological order, I’m at The Heroes). This new book has an entirely new setting, and I may read this before getting caught up. Looking forward to it — it’s already been garnering praise far and wide. The Devils is due to be published by Tor Books in North America (May 13th, 2025), on Gollancz in the UK (May 6th).

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Twitter
Review copy received via NetGalley

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Jonathan Ames, KARMA DOLL (Mulholland Books)

In this darkly humorous detective story, plagued by death on his conscience, Happy Doll has committed himself to a simple, spiritual life; that is, until a tragic and brutal murder forces his hand and sets him back on the bloody path of retribution and justice.

After narrowly escaping with his life at the hands of a murderous Hollywood pimp, detective Happy Doll, bullet-ridden but healing, has landed on a remote Mexican beach. In a humble shack and with his dog for company, Doll settles into a peaceful idyll of Buddhist study. But then trouble, as it always does, comes to paradise.  Doll is the witness to a murder for which he is framed, and now, with an expired passport and the Mexican authorities on his tail, he must sneak across the border back to L.A. by any means necessary, with the goal of bringing the true murderer to justice.

But it’s not just trouble that expels Doll from paradise!  His dark past reaches for him, like a hand from the grave, old enemies want him dead, including the Jalisco Cartel, and Doll, a reluctant instrument of mayhem, yearns to end this cycle of violence and tip the karmic scales in his favor. But how can he do this without getting blood on his hands?

Karma Doll marks the third installment in a madcap, bloody, and impossibly fun series, bringing us back in the good company of Happy Doll: a beloved, introverted anti-hero who has taken more hits to the head than a linebacker, yet still always manages to come out on top.

The third novel in Ames’s Happy Doll series of quirky mysteries. I really enjoyed the first book, but for some reason have managed to forget to read the second… I’ll rectify that ASAP, so I can read this new novel before it’s released. Karma Doll is due to be published by Mulholland Books in North America, on January 14th, 2025. (The first two books in the series are available in the UK, published by Pushkin Vertigo, so it’s a pretty safe bet that they’ll also release the third book.)

Follow the Author: Goodreads
Review copy received via NetGalley

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Steve Cavanagh, WITNESS 8 (Atria)

Something is wrong with Ruby Johnson.

A former resident of the ultra-elite Manhattan upper class, Ruby now works as a maid in the type of houses she used to live in. Unassuming, she sees everyone’s dirty secrets from the inside of their beautiful, renovated brownstones. But when Ruby witnesses a murder, she has wicked plans in mind that don’t involve telling the authorities the truth.

Eddie Flynn, streetwise ex con-artist-turned-defense attorney, is the only lawyer in New York City willing to take on hopeless cases. And none is more hopeless than John Jackson’s — the gun that killed his neighbor found, with Jackson’s DNA, in his own home. Flynn and his unconventional team will need to use every trick they know to keep an innocent man from being locked up. But to save his client’s life, Eddie must first protect his own, as the scariest organized criminals in the city are out for his head.

I have fallen so far behind on Cavanagh’s novels. I lost track a bit of him after I moved to Canada, but his North American publisher offered me this for review, the 8th Eddie Flynn novel, and it reminded me that I have a long way to get caught up. Maybe that’ll be my project for early 2025? We’ll see. Witness 8 is due to be published by Atria Books in North America (March 11th) and Headline in the UK (out now).

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Review copy received via Edelweiss

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Marc Collins, EIDOLON: THE AURIC HAMMER (Black Library)

Lord Commander Primus Eidolon has claimed many titles along the annals of his infamy. He is the Exemplar and the Risen, the Soul-Severed, and the Auric Hammer. Now, fallen far from his primarch’s grace, he carves a path to Terra, where the culmination of Horus’ grand heresy awaits.

Coaxed and goaded by the wiles of the warp – and an entity whose whispered truths stretch even his credulity – Eidolon finds himself stranded around the world of Tatricala, where the ghosts of his past haunt every fated step. Now he must choose which life he wants to lead… and how much of his soul he is willing to sacrifice for it.

If Eidolon cannot banish his daemons, then they will surely take him for their own.

I’m glad Black Library are still publishing some Horus Heresy fiction — with the series-proper completed, there was a rather large literary hole that needed filling in. I’ve enjoyed Marc Collins’s books in the past (short stories and novels), so I have high hopes for this. Eidolon: The Auric Hammer is out today, published by Black Library in North America and in the UK.

Follow the Author: Goodreads, Twitter

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Pip Drysdale, THE CLOSE-UP (Gallery)

A struggling author discovered the dark side of fame when a stalker begins reenacting violent events from her thriller…

When Zoe Ann Weiss moves to Los Angeles to pursue her dream of becoming a writer, her whole future is wide open. But then Zach, the bartender and aspiring actor she’s falling for, ghosts her. Her debut novel, a thriller, fails. And she has writer’s block worse than ever before. Now, three years later, Zach is famous and Zoe is… not.

She’s facing her thirtieth birthday, a dead-end job at a flower shop, and a demanding agent, terrified she’ll never get her life back on track. But when she goes to make a flower delivery and Zach is at the address, it’s like no time has passed at all. They start casually dating in secret, her writer’s block disappears, and Zoe begins to wonder: Zach inspired her first novel, so why can’t he inspire her second?

But then the inevitable happens and photos are leaked, landing Zoe in the press. Her first novel goes viral, and now everyone seems to know her name. Except the problem with everyone knowing your name is that everyone knows your name — including the mysterious stalker obsessed with Zach. A stalker who begins reenacting violent events from Zoe’s book, step by step, against her…

Probably unsurprising that this one caught my attention — the connection to LA/entertainment. I haven’t read any of Drysdale’s other novels, so I’m not sure what to expect, but I have high hopes. Looking forward to reading it, and hope to get it read-and-reviewed before publication. The Close-Up is due to be published by Gallery Books in North America and in the UK, on December 3rd.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram
Review copy received via Edelweiss

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Kate Fagan, THE THREE LIVES OF CATE KAY (Atria)

An elusive bestselling author decides to finally her true identity after years of hiding her past.

Cate Kay knows how to craft a story. As the creator of a bestselling book trilogy that struck box office gold as a film series, she’s one of the most successful authors of her generation. The thing is, Cate Kay doesn’t really exist. She’s never attended author events or granted any interviews. Her real identity had been a closely guarded secret, until now.

As a young adult, she and her best friend Amanda dreamed of escaping their difficult homes and moving to California to become movie stars. But the day before their grand adventure, a tragedy shattered their dreams and Cate has been on the run ever since, taking on different names and charting a new future. But after a shocking revelation, Cate understands that returning home is the only way she’ll be a whole person again.

I spotted this a while ago in the publisher’s catalogue, but then forgot about it. I happened to catch an Atria instagram post saying it was available on NetGalley, so thought I’d give it a try. Looking forward to reading it. The Three Lives of Cate Kay is due to be published by Atria Books in North America and Bloomsbury in the UK, on January 7th, 2025.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, Twitter
Review copy received via NetGalley

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Snorri Kristjánsson, THE SILENT EMPEROR (Solaris)

“I am shadow, and I am terror. They call me Silent Claw.”

Aemilius and his new comrades in the Hidden Legion have a new mission: to infiltrate the villa of a powerful politician and foil a plot against him.

Posing as a servant to their host’s “cousin” and her “children” — the Legion’s latest recruits, a pair of adorable orphans trained in murder and espionage — Aemilius must keep his cover, while helping expose a killer who always seems one step ahead of them.

As his newfound magical powers slowly unfold, he begins to hear the thoughts of animals and finds unexpected new allies, including a housecat with an inflated sense of its own importance.

He’ll need all the help he can get, as the Legion find themselves locked in a desperate fight for survival against a foe with even darker and more terrible powers than those they faced in Alexandria.

This is the second novel in Kristjánsson’s Hidden Legion series (after the eponymous first book, which received surprisingly little in the way of publicity push). I’m a fan of the author’s work, and am looking forward to getting caught up on this series — it’s a great premise! The Silent Emperor is due to be published by Solaris Books in North America and in the UK, on November 19th.

Also on CR: Interview with Snorri Kristjánsson (2013); Excerpt from Blood Will Follow; Guest Posts on “Don’t Worry, It’s Not My Blood” and “The Undertaking”

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, Twitter
Review copy received via NetGalley

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J. Robert Lennon, BUZZ KILL (Mulholland)

When the shadowy circumstances of a relative’s death are brought to light, Jane and Lila are plunged into the recesses of an underground drug operation with links to a burgeoning fascist movement.

The Pool sisters have gone into business together: a down-home if unequal P.I. enterprise. That is, until Lila is tipped off to an explosive piece of news. An old friend of their Aunt Ruth’s — a lawyer and academic who’d committed suicide years ago — believes that Ruth was murdered. Prior to her death, Ruth had represented a chemist who’d been struggling to patent a dangerous synthetic opioid. But once the client, Travis Nutt, was poised to lose, he went rogue and unleashed the adulterant as a street drug with the power of cartel funding behind him. Can the twins now bring this cult-like billionaire to justice?

Meanwhile, the rest of the Pool family is staying busy. Jane, newly divorced, and doing things for herself for a change, has been invited to attend a writers conference. Teenaged Chloe becomes the victim of a deepfake campaign, and secretly pursues her own aggressors. And old Harry has stumbled on a piece of unknown history that opens a door in his personal life.

This is the sequel to Lennon’s Hard Girls, which I also have (and really need to get around to reading). Sounds great, as does the first in the series, and I’m really looking forward to reading them as soon as I can. Buzz Kill is due to be published by Mulholland Books in North America, on March 18th, 2025.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, BlueSky
Review copy received via NetGalley

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Arkady Martine, ROSE/HOUSE (TorDotCom)

‘I’m a piece of the architecture, Detective. How should I know how humans are like to die?’

Basit Deniau’s houses were haunted to begin with.

A house embedded with an artificial intelligence is a common thing: a house that is an artificial intelligence, infused in every load-bearing beam and fine marble tile with a thinking creature that is not human? That is something else altogether. But now Deniau’s been dead a year, and Rose House is locked up tight, as commanded by the architect’s will.

Dr. Selene Gisil, a former protégé, is the sole person permitted to come into Rose House once a year. Now, there is a dead person in Rose House. It is not Basit Deniau, and it is not Dr. Gisil. It is someone else. But Rose House won’t communicate any further.

No one can get inside Rose House, except Dr. Gisil. Dr. Gisil was not in North America when Rose House called in the death. But someone did. And someone died there.

And someone may be there still.

The latest novella from the author of the acclaimed Teixcalaan series. Sounded interesting, and I started it pretty soon after receiving the book (I’ll certainly have finished it by the time this post went live). It’s an interesting novella, packed with interesting ideas, but it also didn’t quite click for me — the pacing seemed off, and some passages/scenes weren’t as well-written as I would have expected from Martine. Nevertheless, certainly worth checking out. Rose/House is due to be published by TorDotCom in North America and in the UK, on March 13th, 2025.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, Twitter
Review copy received via NetGalley

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Ray Nayler, WHERE THE AXE IS BURIED (MCD)

All systems fail. All societies crumble. All worlds end.

In the authoritarian Federation, there is a plot to assassinate and replace the President, a man who has downloaded his mind to a succession of new bodies to maintain his grip on power. Meanwhile, on the fringes of a Western Europe that has renounced human governance in favor of ostensibly more efficient, objective, and peaceful AI Prime Ministers, an experimental artificial mind is malfunctioning, threatening to set off a chain of events that may spell the end of the Western world.

As the Federation and the West both start to crumble, Lilia, the brilliant scientist whose invention may be central to bringing down the seemingly immortal President, goes on the run, trying to break out from a near-impenetrable web of Federation surveillance. Her fate is bound up with a worldwide group of others fighting against the global status quo: Palmer, the man Lilia left behind in London, desperate to solve the mystery of her disappearance; Zoya, a veteran activist imprisoned in the taiga, whose book has inspired a revolutionary movement; Nikolai, the President’s personal physician, who has been forced into more and more harrowing decisions as he navigates the Federation’s palace politics; and Nurlan, the hapless parliamentary staffer whose attempt to save his Republic goes terribly awry. And then there is Krotov, head of the Federation’s security services, whose plots, agents, and assassins are everywhere.

The second novel by the award-winning author of The Mountain in the Sea. I haven’t had a chance to read the author’s debut novel, yet, but I have read the author’s novella for TorDotCom, The Tusks of Extinction, which I enjoyed. This sounds particularly interesting, so very much looking forward to reading it. Where the Axe is Buried is due to be published by MCD in North America and Weidenfeld & Nicolson, on April 1st, 2025.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, Twitter
Review copy received via Edelweiss

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James Rickards, MONEYGPT (Portfolio)

A telling prediction for how AI will endanger global economic markets and security

In November 2022, OpenAI released GPT-4 in a chatbot form to the public. In just two months, it claimed 100 million users — the fastest app to ever reach this benchmark. Since then, AI has become an all-consuming topic, popping up on the news, in ads, on your messenger apps, and in conversations with friends and family. But as AI becomes ubiquitous and grows at an ever-increasing pace, what does it mean for the financial markets?

In MoneyGPT, Wall Street veteran and former advisor to the Department of Defense James Rickards paints a comprehensive picture of the danger AI poses to the global financial order, and the insidious ways in which AI will threaten national security. Rickards shows how, while AI is touted to increase efficiency and lower costs, its global implementation in the financial world will actually cause chaos, as selling begets selling and bank runs happen at lightning speed. AI further benefits malicious actors, Rickards argues, because without human empathy or instinct to intervene, threats like total nuclear war that once felt extreme are now more likely. And throughout all this, we must remain vigilant on the question of whose values will be promoted in the age of AI. As Rickards predicts, these systems will fail when we rely on them the most.

MoneyGPT shows that the danger is not that AI will malfunction, but that it will function exactly as intended. The peril is not in the algorithms, but in ourselves. And it’s up to us to intervene with old-fashioned human logic and common sense before it’s too late.

As some readers of CR will have noticed, I am not a fan of crypto and pretty much anything that goes with it. That sentiment is shared by “AI”. So, naturally, after reading the synopsis for Rickards’s new book, I wanted to read it. I’ll be getting to it very soon (if I haven’t already by the time this post goes live). MoneyGPT is due to be published by Portfolio in North America and Penguin Business in the UK.

Follow the Author: Goodreads
Review copy received via NetGalley

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Olivia Waite, MURDER BY MEMORY (TorDotCom)

A mind is a terrible thing to erase…

Welcome to the HMS Fairweather, Her Majesty’s most luxurious interstellar passenger liner! Room and board are included, new bodies are graciously provided upon request, and should you desire a rest between lifetimes, your mind shall be most carefully preserved in glass in the Library, shielded from every danger.

Near the topmost deck of an interstellar generation ship, Dorothy Gentleman wakes up in a body that isn’t hers — just as someone else is found murdered. As one of the ship’s detectives, Dorothy usually delights in unraveling the schemes on board the Fairweather, but when she finds that someone is not only killing bodies but purposefully deleting minds from the Library, she realizes something even more sinister is afoot.

Dorothy suspects her misfortune is partly the fault of her feckless nephew Ruthie who, despite his brilliance as a programmer, leaves chaos in his cheerful wake. Or perhaps the sultry yarn store proprietor — and ex-girlfriend of the body Dorothy is currently inhabiting — knows more than she’s letting on. Whatever it is, Dorothy intends to solve this case. Because someone has done the impossible and found a way to make murder on the Fairweather a very permanent state indeed. A mastermind may be at work — and if so, they’ve had three hundred years to perfect their schemes…

Told through Dorothy’s delightfully shrewd POV, this novella is an ode to the cozy mystery taken to the stars with a fresh new sci-fi take. Perfect for fans of the plot-twisty narratives of Dorothy Sayers and Ann Leckie, this well-paced story will leave readers captivated and hungry for the series’s next installment.

I ended up reading this pretty much as soon as I got the DRC, and after a slightly strange start (the tone seemed off, but it quickly changed) I ended up really enjoying it. I think a lot of people are going to like this one, and I think there’s definitely scope for more in the same setting. Murder By Memory is due to be published by TorDotCom in North America and in the UK, on March 18th, 2025.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, Twitter
Review copy received via NetGalley