Mini-Review: THE BURNING LIGHT by Bradley Beaulieu & Rob Ziegler (Tor.com)

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BeaulieuZiegler-BurningLightAn interesting post-apocalyptic sci-fi story

Disgraced government operative Colonel Chu is exiled to the flooded relic of New York City. Something called the Light has hit the streets like an epidemic, leavings its users strung out and disconnected from the mind-network humanity relies on. Chu has lost everything she cares about to the Light. She’ll end the threat or die trying.

A former corporate pilot who controlled a thousand ships with her mind, Zola looks like just another Light-junkie living hand to mouth on the edge of society. She’s special though. As much as she needs the Light, the Light needs her too. But, Chu is getting close and Zola can’t hide forever.

This was a pretty interesting novella. Set in a dilapidated New York City. There were a few moments when the story’s momentum dipped, but it was for the main a pretty well-paced, engaging story. This is an interesting sci-fi/dystopian story. Continue reading →

Review: NATCHEZ BURNING by Greg Iles (William Morrow)

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ilesg-pc1-natchezburningcaThe evil that men do…

Raised in the southern splendor of Natchez, Mississippi, Penn Cage learned all he knows of duty from his father, Dr. Tom Cage. But now the beloved family doctor has been accused of murdering the African American nurse with whom he worked in the dark days of the 1960s. Once a crusading prosecutor, Penn is determined to save his father, but Tom, stubbornly invoking doctor-patient privilege, refuses even to speak in his own defense.

Penn’s quest for the truth sends him deep into his father’s past, where a sexually charged secret lies. More chilling, this long-buried sin is only one thread in a conspiracy of greed and murder involving the vicious Double Eagles, an offshoot of the KKK controlled by some of the most powerful men in the state. Aided by a dedicated reporter privy to Natchez’s oldest secrets and by his fiancée, Caitlin Masters, Penn uncovers a trail of corruption and brutality that places his family squarely in the Double Eagles’ crosshairs.

With every step costing blood and faith, Penn is forced to confront the most wrenching dilemma of his life: Does a man of honor choose his father or the truth?

This series past me by, when Natchez Burning was first published. With the highly-anticipated final volume in the trilogy due out later this year, though, I was happy to get the opportunity to take part in the blog tour in honour of that upcoming release. Natchez Burning is a hefty book; packed with intrigue, mystery, secrets and violence. It’s an immersive, gripping and sometimes chilling novel. Continue reading →

Quick Review: THE APPROACH by Chris Holm (Mulholland)

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HolmC-H0-ApproachA great introduction to Michael Hendricks

When a strip-club mogul puts out a hit on a dancer who won’t give him off-the-clock attention, Hendricks takes a detour to Las Vegas to stop the job in its tracks. With tech genius Lester in his ear and a fake identity as cover, Hendricks has only one problem: he has no idea what the target looks like. Against the scorching heat of the city’s desert outskirts, a case of mistaken identity nearly turns fatal, but our principled hitman has a few tricks of his own up his sleeve.

To celebrate the release of Red Right Hand, the second novel featuring Michael Hendricks, Chris Holm has written a short story that serves as an excellent introduction or prequel to both the series as a whole, as well as the main character. It’s quickly-paced, has a good twist, and is very well written. We are given a good sense of what drives Hendricks, as well as his methods and skills.

I very much enjoyed this, and fully intend to read the novels ASAP. If you’ve been on the fence about trying the series, then The Approach should definitely convince you to give them a read. Definitely recommended.

Both novels — The Killing Kind and Red Right Hand — are out now, published in the US and UK by Mulholland Books.

Also on CR: Interview with Chris Holm (2012); Excerpt from The Wrong Goodbye

Guest Post: “Writing Strong Women” by M.R. Carey

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My latest novel, Fellside, had its UK release in April and it’s just come out in paperback. To commemorate this fact I’m spending the week running around on other people’s blogs (thanks, Civilian Reader!) shouting “look at me.”

It’s a time-honoured tradition, and to keep you from saying the same thing ten times over your publisher will usually come up with a list of possible themes or titles. On the list in front of me right now, about two-thirds of the way down, the following phrase appears:-

“Writing Strong Women”

It immediately made me wonder whether or not that’s something that I do. Continue reading →

Quick Review: DARK MATTER by Blake Crouch (Crown/Macmillan)

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CrouchB-DarkMatterUSA gripping multiverse thriller

“Are you happy with your life?”

Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the masked abductor knocks him unconscious.

Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits.

Before a man Jason’s never met smiles down at him and says, “Welcome back, my friend.”

In this world he’s woken up to, Jason’s life is not the one he knows. Hiswife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college physics professor, but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable. Something impossible.

Is it this world or the other that’s the dream? And even if the home he remembers is real, how can Jason possibly make it back to the family he loves? The answers lie in a journey more wondrous and horrifying than anything he could’ve imagined — one that will force him to confront the darkest parts of himself even as he battles a terrifying, seemingly unbeatable foe.

There was so much buzz surrounding this book in the lead-up to its publication. So much, in fact, that I started to get nervous. Having now finished the novel, though, it’s very easy to see why so many people have been recommending it: it’s superb. Crouch, author of the Wayward Pines novels, has penned a fantastic sci-fi mystery. Continue reading →

Quick Review: EVERYTHING BELONGS TO THE FUTURE by Laurie Penny (Tor.com)

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PennyL-EverythingBelongsToTheFutureAn interesting novella of future politics and society

Time is a weapon wielded by the rich, who have excess of it, against the rest, who must trade every breath of it against the promise of another day’s food and shelter. What kind of world have we made, where human beings can live centuries if only they can afford the fix? What kind of creatures have we become? The same as we always were, but keener.

In the ancient heart of Oxford University, the ultra-rich celebrate their vastly extended lifespans. But a few surprises are in store for them. From Nina and Alex, Margo and Fidget, scruffy anarchists sharing living space with an ever-shifting cast of crusty punks and lost kids. And also from the scientist who invented the longevity treatment in the first place.

I quite enjoyed this novella. Set some distance in the future, but still recognizable and relatable. Inequality has worsened, the wealthy able to extend their lives considerably. Readers are introduced to a bohemian group of anarchists, who do what they can in their quest to make life even a little bit more fair. Introduced to someone with links to the rejuvenation formula, though, they plan a much larger, more audacious plan to address this future society’s inequality. Unfortunately for the group, there are forces already maneuvering to bring them down… Continue reading →

Interview with LAURIE PENNY

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PennyL-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Laurie Penny?

Back-of-a-napkin CV? I’m a writer and a political journalist, I live in London, and I come from the internet, just like you. I’m 29 years old, a pinko queer feminist social justice warrior, and a huge nerd.

Your new novella, Everything Belongs to the Future, will be published by Tor.com in October. I enjoyed it quite a bit. How would you introduce it to a potential reader?

It’s a near-future quasi-dystopian anarchist fable about biotechnology, surveillance, state violence, love and time. It’s got a cool weapon in it, and also some dirty bits.

What inspired you to write the novella? 

I’ve been interested in the politics and practical applications of biotechnology for a long time, and a scientist friend challenged me to write a story about anti-ageing treatments. Then it was a question of following the characters where they led.  Continue reading →

New Books (August-September)

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Featuring: James Barclay, J. Patrick Black, Lila Bowen, Edward Cox, Blake Crouch, John French, Mira Grant, Mark Hill, Gregg Hurwitz, Greg Iles, Eowyn Ivey, Vic James, K.V. Johansen, Owen Laukkanen, John le Carré, Jill Leovy, Tim O’Mara, Susan Perabo, Sarah Perry, Anthony Riches, George Saunders, Amy Schumer, Alan Sepinwall, Matt Zoller Seitz, Michael Tolkin, Neely Tucker, Karine Tuil, Wendy N. Wagner, Django Wexler, Colson Whitehead, Fran Wilde Continue reading →

Upcoming: THE BOOK OF MIRRORS by E.O. Chirovici (Century/Atria)

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ChiroviciEO-BookOfMirrors

I am really looking forward to this novel. Already sold in 38 territories, UK-based Romanian author E.O. Chirovici‘s first novel in English, The Book of Mirrors, sounds great. You can read a short piece about it from the Guardian here. Here’s the synopsis:

When big-shot literary agent Peter Katz receives an unfinished manuscript entitled The Book of Mirrors, he is intrigued. 

The author, Richard Flynn is writing a memoir about his time at Princeton in the late 80s, documenting his relationship with the famous Professor Joseph Wieder. 

One night in 1987, Wieder was brutally murdered in his home and the case was never solved. 

Peter Katz is hell-bent on getting to the bottom of what happened that night twenty-five years ago and is convinced the full manuscript will reveal who committed the violent crime.

But other people’s recollections are dangerous weapons to play with, and this might be one memory that is best kept buried.

Unfortunately, we have quite some time to wait before we’ll be able to get our mitts on the book: The Book of Mirrors is due to be published on January 26th, 2017 in the UK by Century; and in February 2017 in North America, by Atria Books. Well, given that it’s September already, I suppose it’s not that far away. It just feels like it…

Guest Post: “The Ties That Bind” by Brad Beaulieu

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BeaulieuB-AuthorPicCropWhen I first started writing Of Sand and Malice Made, I didn’t have a small novel in mind, or even a set of interconnected novellas. It began only with a single story, “Irindai”, which eventually sold to Ragnarok Publications for their Blackguards anthology. But as I developed that first story I knew it wouldn’t be the last in the series. I started having more and more thoughts about where I could take the story’s primary mover, a djinni-like creature name Rümayesh. I thought more about the sons of the trickster god that were working against her. I thought more about the new character, Brama, a two-bit thief who got pulled into something much larger and more dangerous than he ever expected. And I thought about what it could all mean for the heroine of the series, Çeda. Continue reading →