Adrian Tchaikovsky‘s Shadows of the Apt series is fantastic — so many fellow reviewers and SFF fans have waxed lyrical about his prose, his world-building and stories. Certainly, I thoroughly enjoyed the first novel in the series. I started it after the first four or five had been published, and while I was thoroughly taken with the series and characters, I think at the time I looked at the sheer number of pages involved in getting caught up and came over all read-shy… Shameful, really. As a result, despite picking up the whole series (some as ARCs, others I purchased to fill gaps), I have never finished reading it. I hesitate to set that for a personal goal, as I’m terrible at completing reading goals.

Anyway, back to the purpose of this post. As you can see at the top, there, Tor UK has re-jacketed the novels (actually for the second time). I found them on Amazon UK. They seem to only appear for the Kindle editions, so it’s possible this is an eBook-only set of new covers.

If you’ve never read Tchaikovsky’s work before, I strongly urge you to do so. Start with Empire in Black and Gold. Here’s the synopsis:

THE DAYS OF PEACE ARE OVER

The city states of the Lowlands have lived in peace and prosperity for decades: bastions of civilization and sophistication. That peace is about to end.

In far-off corners, an ancient Empire has been conquering city after city with its highly trained armies and sophisticated warming… And now it’s set its sights on a new prize.

Only the ageing Stenwold Maker, spymaster, artificer and statesman, can see the threat. It falls upon his shoulders to open the eyes of his people — as soon a tide will sweep down over the Lowlands and burn away everything in its path.

But first he must stop himself from becoming the Empire’s latest victim.

The Shadows of the Apt series includes: Empire in Black and Gold, Dragonfly Falling, Blood of the Mantis, Salute the Dark, The Scarab Path, The Sea Watch, Heirs to the Blade, The Air War, War Master’s Gate, Seal of the Worm

Adrian Tchaikovsky is also the author of three stand-alone novels: Guns of the Dawn, Children of Time, and the upcoming The Tiger and the Wolf. I think I’ll be reading Guns of the Dawn very soon — I feel like reading something substantial, but not committing to a big (new) series at the moment. That novel looks like it will certainly do the trick.

Also on CR: Interview with Adrian Tchaikovsky (2012); Guest Posts on “Nine Books, Six Years, One Stenwold Maker” and “The Art of Gunsmithing — Writing Guns of the Dawn“; Excerpt from Guns of the Dawn