Author: Civilian Reader

Quick Review: REMOTE CONTROL by Nnedi Okorafor (Tor.com)

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OkoraforN-RemoteControlAn intriguing novella about belonging, community, and what drives us

An alien artifact turns a young girl into Death’s adopted daughter…

“She’s the adopted daughter of the Angel of Death. Beware of her. Mind her. Death guards her like one of its own.”

The day Fatima forgot her name, Death paid a visit. From hereon in she would be known as Sankofa — a name that meant nothing to anyone but her, the only tie to her family and her past.

Her touch is death, and with a glance a town can fall. And she walks — alone, except for her fox companion — searching for the object that came from the sky and gave itself to her when the meteors fell and when she was yet unchanged; searching for answers.

But is there a greater purpose for Sankofa, now that Death is her constant companion?

I’ve been a fan of Nnedi Okorafor’s work since Lagoon. Since then, I’ve always kept my eyes open for new fiction by the author. I’m happy to report that Remote Control is an excellent sci-fi novella, and I really enjoyed reading it. Continue reading →

Upcoming: THE LAST WATCH by J.S. Dewes (Tor Books)

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DewesJS-D1-LastWatchUSFirst spotted this when the cover was revealed earlier this week. Then I did some digging, and think The Last Watch by J.S. Dewes sounds rather interesting. The first novel in the Divide series, it’s pitched as a space adventure that is like “The Expanse meets Game of Thrones“, I’m looking forward to giving it a try:

The Divide.

It’s the edge of the universe.

Now it’s collapsing — and taking everyone and everything with it.

The only ones who can stop it are the Sentinels — the recruits, exiles, and court-martialed dregs of the military.

At the Divide, Adequin Rake, commanding the Argus, has no resources, no comms — nothing, except for the soldiers that no one wanted.

They’re humanity’s last chance.

J.S. Dewes’s The Last Watch is due to be published by Tor Books in North America and in the UK, on April 20th, 2021.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Twitter

Upcoming: THE FOUR WINDS by Kristin Hannah (St. Martin’s Press)

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HannahK-FourWindsUSI spotted The Four Winds in a Macmillan catalogue, and my eye was caught first by the cover — doing its job, and making me stop to read the synopsis, which only increased my interest in reading Kristin Hannah‘s upcoming novel. Due to be published by St. Martin’s Press in February 2021, here’s the synopsis:

An epic novel of love and heroism and hope, set against the backdrop of one of America’s most defining eras — the Great Depression.

Texas, 1934. Millions are out of work and a drought has broken the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as the crops are failing, the water is drying up, and dust threatens to bury them all. One of the darkest periods of the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl era, has arrived with a vengeance.

In this uncertain and dangerous time, Elsa Martinelli — like so many of her neighbors — must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or go west, to California, in search of a better life. The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American Dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.

Looking forward to reading this. The Fourth Wind is due to be published by St. Martin’s Press in North America in February 2021. (At the time of writing, I couldn’t find a UK publisher, but the North American edition is available for pre-order.)

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads

Quick Review: THE AUTUMN REPUBLIC by Brian McClellan (Orbit Books)

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McClellanB-PM3-AutumnRepublicThe conclusion to the Powder Mage trilogy

Tamas, Taniel, and Adamat have been betrayed and Adro now lies in the hands of a foreign invader. But it remains the duty of the powder mages to defend their homeland unto death…

The capital has fallen…
Field Marshal Tamas returns to his beloved country to find that for the first time in history, the capital city of Adro lies in the hands of a foreign invader. His son is missing, his allies are indistinguishable from his foes, and reinforcements are several weeks away.

An army divided…
With the Kez still bearing down upon them and without clear leadership, the Adran army has turned against itself. Inspector Adamat is drawn into the very heart of this new mutiny with promises of finding his kidnapped son.

All hope rests with one…
And Taniel Two-shot, hunted by men he once thought his friends, must safeguard the only chance Adro has of getting through this war without being destroyed…

Brian McClellan’s first two Powder Mage novels were great — I remember devouring them both. With great characters, an interesting magic system, and a balanced blend of action and political mystery, they ticked pretty much all of my reading buttons. For some reason, I left The Autumn Republic for quite some time before reading it (the author has written an entire other trilogy since this one). I enjoyed it, but it didn’t pack the kind of punch I expected from the end of a trilogy. Continue reading →

Very Quick Review: SCIONS OF THE EMPEROR (Black Library)

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HHP-ScionsOfTheEmperorA short collection of stories to add colour to some of the Primarchs

From their shadowed origins to the desperate battles that ensued when half of them rebelled against their father, the Sons of the Emperor – the vaunted primarchs – were among the greatest of humanity’s champions. They were warriors without peer and heroes whose deeds became legend. From a tale of Ferrus Manus in his earliest days to mysterious murders that lead Rogal Dorn into peril on the eve of the Siege of Terra, the eight tales in this volume lay bare key moments in the lives of these mighty heroes.

CONTENTS
Canticle by David Guymer
The Verdict of the Scythe by David Annandale
A Game of Opposites by Guy Haley
Better Angels by Ian St Martin
The Conqueror’s Truth by Gav Thorpe
The Sinew of War by Darius Hinks
The Chamber at the End of Memory by James Swallow
First Legion by Chris Wraight

Each of these stories adds a bit of colour and depth to what we know about the Primarchs. There are eight stories, so they don’t cover all of the Emperor’s sons, but a good range is featured. I enjoyed these. Continue reading →

New Books (July-August)

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Featuring: Kurt Andersen, Nicholas Bowling, Craig Brown, Gregory Brown, Bridget Collins, S.A. Cosby, Nicola DeRobertis-Theye, Will Ferguson, Victoria Gosling, Guy Haley, Elizabeth Hand, Anthony Horowitz, Clifford Jackman, R.F. Kuang, Byron Lane, Ellery Lloyd, Melissa Maerz, Una Mannion, David Mitchell, Sylvain Neuvel, Nnedi Okorafor, Kristina Pérez, David Polfeldt, C.L. Polk, Andrzej Sapkowski, Ginger Smith, K.M. Szpara, Nghi Vo, Chris Wraight

Continue reading →

Interview with KRISTINA PÉREZ

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PerezK-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Kristina Pérez?

Gosh, I’m not sure I’ve had enough coffee yet to properly answer that question. Improper answer: half-Argentine, half-Norwegian native New Yorker. Literary agent, medievalist, and the author of fantasy and sci-fi novels.

Your new novel, Bright Raven Skies, will be published by Imprint in August. It’s the third novel in your Sweet Black Waves trilogy: how would you introduce the series to a potential reader? And what can fans of the first two books expect from the new one?

Pitched as Graceling meets The Mists of Avalon, the Sweet Black Waves trilogy is a Tristan and Iseult retelling that stars Branwen, Iseult’s lady’s maid and nascent sorceress. Fans of the series know that you wouldn’t like Branwen when she’s angry, and let’s just say that she’s having a very hard time keeping her darker urges — and magic — under control. Continue reading →

Upcoming: THE FUTURE IS YOURS by Dan Frey (Del Rey)

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FreyD-TheFutureIsYoursUSTechnology, prediction and friendship collide in Dan Frey‘s upcoming The Future is Yours. I spotted this today on Edelweiss, and think it has a really intriguing premise. The author has described it as “like The Social Network with a time-travel twist, told as a digital epistolary.” Here’s the official synopsis:

Two best friends create a computer that can see one year into the future. But what they can’t predict is how it will tear their friendship — and society — apart.

Ben Boyce and Teddy Chaudry are outsiders struggling to find their place in Silicon Valley. But when Ben reads Teddy’s graduate dissertation about an obscure application for quantum computing, he has a vision of a revolutionary new technology: a computer that can see forward through time by communicating with its future self.

The two friends quit their jobs and team up to form a business, building a company that will deliver their groundbreaking device to consumers around the world. Rival tech giants try to steal their innovation, while government agencies attempt to bury it — but Ben and Teddy are helped by their own cutting-edge technology, staying a step ahead of the competition and responding to challenges before they arise.

As the tension mounts, Ben and Teddy’s friendship begins to fracture under the weight of ambition, jealousy, and greed. Most frightening of all, they discover the dark side of the machine they’ve created — the ways in which viewing the future sets them on a path toward unavoidable disaster of epic, apocalyptic proportions. Unless they can disrupt the technological system they’ve created, there won’t be any future at all.

Told through emails, texts, transcripts, and blog posts, this bleeding-edge tech thriller chronicles the social costs of innovation and asks how far you’d be willing to go to protect the ones you love — even from themselves.

Dan Frey’s The Future is Yours is due to be published by Del Rey in North America and in the UK, in February 2021.

Follow the Author: Goodreads, Twitter

Upcoming: PROJECT HAIL MARY by Andy Weir (Del Rey)

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WeirA-ProjectHailMaryUSThe Martian was hugely successful when it was released and the movie adaptation announced. The movie is one of my favourites from the past few years, but for some reason I have not, yet, read any of Andy Weir‘s novels (despite owning The Martian and Artemis). I did enjoy the author’s short story Randomize, though. Anyway, that’s a bit of a long-winded way to get to the point: Weir’s next novel, Project Hail Mary, has been announced! With that snazzy cover to the right, I think it sounds quite good — and sure to appeal to fans of The Martian. Here’s the synopsis:

A lone astronaut must save the earth from disaster in this incredible new science-based thriller…

Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission — and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish.

Except that right now, he doesn’t know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it.

All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.

His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, he realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Alone on this tiny ship that’s been cobbled together by every government and space agency on the planet and hurled into the depths of space, it’s up to him to conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.

And thanks to an unexpected ally, he just might have a chance.

Part scientific mystery, part dazzling interstellar journey, Project Hail Mary is a tale of discovery, speculation, and survival to rival The Martian — while taking us to places it never dreamed of going.

Really looking forward to this. Project Hail Mary is due to be published by Del Rey in North America and in the UK, in May 2021.

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Twitter

Quick Review: TRUE STORY by Kate Reed Petty (riverrun/Viking)

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PettyKR-TrueStoryUKHCAn interesting, timely debut novel

After a college party, two boys drive a girl home: drunk and passed out in the back seat. Rumours spread about what they did to her, but later they’ll tell the police a different version of events. Alice will never remember what truly happened. Her fracture runs deep, hidden beneath cleverness and wry humour. Nick — a sensitive, misguided boy who stood by — will never forget.

That’s just the beginning of this extraordinary journey into memory, fear and self-portrayal. Through university applications, a terrifying abusive relationship, a fateful reckoning with addiction and a final mind-bending twist, Alice and Nick will take on different roles to each other — some real, some invented — until finally, brought face to face once again, the secret of that night is revealed.

Startlingly relevant and enthralling in its brilliance, True Story is by turns a campus novel, psychological thriller, horror story and crime noir, each narrative frame stripping away the fictions we tell about women, men and the very nature of truth.

Kate Reed Petty’s debut had quite the buzz when review copies first started circulating. It’s timely mystery about the events of a fateful night during high school, and how it has changed the lives of those involved and caught on the edge. Told through a variety of styles, it’s an interesting examination of how we frame our own stories, who has the right to tell certain stories, and how they shape our lives. Continue reading →