Guest Post: “Progressive World-building: Screw Restoring Order to the Kingdom” by Jon Skovron

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SkovronJ-AuthorPicNow look, I love Shakespeare. Like, a lot. In fact, I was actually a classically trained actor who did a fair bit of Shakespeare back in the day (mostly the comedies, although I still think I could have killed it as Richard III). And not only did I act in Shakespeare, but my first Young Adult novel was called Struts and Frets. As in:

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more. It is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.

My book was mostly about a kid in high school who starts an indie rock band while dealing with his grandfather’s dementia. But throughout the story, he’s reading Macbeth for a school assignment, and passages from it keep coming up relevant to his life. Because for a play mostly about killing people, it’s remarkably thoughtful. Continue reading →

Interview with BRIAN EVENSON

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EvensonB-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Brian Evenson?

I’m a writer who grew you in the American West, mostly in Utah, but who has lived all over the place in the US as well as in France, Switzerland, and briefly in Mexico. My writing often has one foot in what people think of as literature and one foot happily in genre. I was raised Mormon, but was pressured out of that religion (and out of my first teaching job at a Mormon university, BYU) because of the nature of my first book, Altman’s Tongue, and am very happily non-religious now.

Tor.com will be publishing your new novella, The Warren, later this year. It looks rather interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

It’s a book told from the perspective of a solitary person within a ruined structure who has had other personalities loaded into his head as a way of preserving them as the mechanical systems of the structure begin to expire. The man character is trying to figure out who he is, whether he and his kind are likely to die out, and whether he is in fact human after all. I think the audience starts to figure things out along with him, sharing his journey and maybe understanding some things that he just can’t. Continue reading →

Trailer: THE GIRL WITH ALL THE GIFTS

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I loved M.R. Carey‘s The Girl With All the Gifts. I read it shortly after it was published, and consider it to easily be one of the best books of 2014. Above is the first full trailer for the movie adaptation, which will arrive in theatres soon. It is directed by Colm McCarthy, and stars Sennia Nanua, Gemma Arterton, Glenn Close and Paddy Considine. Here’s the synopsis:

The near future; humanity has been all but destroyed by a mutated fungal disease that eradicates free will and turns its victims into flesh-eating “hungries”. Only a small group of children seem immune to its effects.

At an army base in rural England, this group of unique children are being studied, subjected to cruel experiments by biologist Dr. Caldwell. Despite having been infected with the zombie pathogen that has decimated the world, these children retain normal thoughts and emotions. And while still being subject to the craving for human flesh that marks the disease these second- generation “hungries” are able to think and feel making them a vital resource in the search for a cure.

The children attend school lessons daily, guarded by the ever watchful Sergeant Parks. But one little girl, Melanie, stands out from the rest. Melanie is special. She excels in the classroom, is inquisitive, imaginative and loves her favourite teacher Miss Justineau.

When the base falls, Melanie escapes along with Miss Justineau, Sergeant Parks and Dr. Caldwell. Against the backdrop of a blighted Britain, Melanie must discover what she is and ultimately decide both her own future and that of the human race.

The novel is published by Orbit Books (UK/US), and is a must-read. You can read my review here. Carey’s latest novel, Fellside, is also published by Orbit, and is out now (UK/US).

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Review: HOPE & RED by Jon Skovron (Orbit)

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SkovronJ-1-HopeAndRedAn entertaining new fantasy series

In a fracturing empire spread across savage seas, two people will find a common cause.

Hope, the lone survivor when her village is massacred by the emperor’s forces is secretly trained by a master Vinchen warrior as an instrument of vengeance.

Red, an orphan adopted by a notorious matriarch of the criminal underworld, learns to be an expert thief and con artist.

TOGETHER THEY WILL TAKE DOWN AN EMPIRE.

There’s a lot to like in Hope & Red: the characters are interesting, often fun and they get caught up in a lot of action. The world is well-crafted and appropriately fleshed-out, but also leaves plenty still to be explored. While there were a couple of flaws, Hope & Red is entertaining, fast-paced and quite gripping. I enjoyed it. Continue reading →

New Books (May-June)

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Witchfinder-CityOfTheDead-01-Art crop

Featuring: Ramona Ausubel, Stephen Baxter, Peter S. Beagle, Matthew Blakstad, Marie Brennan, Gail Carriger, Joe Carter, Wesley Chu, Richard Cohen, Catherine Coulter, Justin Cronin, Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, Mark de Jager, Cindy Dees, Matthew Dunn, Brian Evenson, Bill Flippin, Frederick Forsyth, Tod Goldberg, Michael Hjorth, Jon Hollins, Emmi Itäranta, Cassandra Khaw, Jay Kristoff, Travis Langley, Alex Marshall, Hollie Overton, Terry Pratchett, Tim Pratt, Hans Rosenfeldt, Anthony Ryan, Jamie Sawyer, Adam Sisman, Martin Cruz Smith, Cass R. Sunstein, Michael Swanwick, K.B. Wagers, Ren Warom, Chris Whitaker, Walter Jon Williams

Above artwork: Witchfinder: City of the Dead #1 (crop), by Julian Totino Tedesco (Dark Horse Comics)

Continue reading →

Quick Review: THE HATCHING by Ezekiel Boone (Atria/Gollancz)

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BooneE-HatchingUSA fast-paced, gripping thriller

Deep in the jungle of Peru, a black, skittering mass devours an American tourist party whole. FBI agent Mike Rich investigates a fatal plane crash in Minneapolis and makes a gruesome discovery. Unusual seismic patterns register in a Indian earthquake lab, confounding the scientists there. The Chinese government “accidentally” drops a nuclear bomb in an isolated region of its own country. The first female president of the United States is summoned to an emergency briefing. And all of these events are connected.

As panic begins to sweep the globe, a mysterious package from South America arrives at Melanie Guyer’s Washington laboratory. The unusual egg inside begins to crack. Something is spreading…

The world is on the brink of an apocalyptic disaster. An virulent ancient species, long dormant, is now very much awake. But this is only the beginning of our end…

There has been a lot of hype surrounding this novel, and I think most of it is justified. It’s an entertaining, fast-paced and gripping thriller about the end of the world. Unlike many novels in this genre, though, it is not zombies or vampires or some disease that is killing swathes of the global population. Rather, it is spiders. Lots and lots and lots of spiders… Continue reading →

Guest Post: “Travel in Both Directions” by Malka Older

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OlderM-AuthorPicInfomocracy takes place across 17 different locations, only one of them in the United States. This is largely a function of the fact that, as someone who worked or consulted for international organizations for years, that was what my life was like. Over one ten month period in 2011-2012, I went to eleven different countries – three of them twice. So it made sense to me, while I was writing, that activists, anarchists, and political operatives working on a global election would have a similar itinerary. Continue reading →

Guest Post: “Finding Burroughs” by Ren Warom

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WaromR-AuthorPicMy first encounter with Burroughs was in the drawling, high-pitched lectures of Tom the Priest in Drugstore Cowboy. Of course, now I know Burroughs better, I figure he was playing himself. Not Tom, then: Bill. Bill the Priest. El Hombre Invisible. A modern day Buffalo Bill with words for bullets, playing out his last stand forever on the sun-baked, hard-packed desert of postmodern expression.

I saw Naked Lunch the movie before I read the book. God I love that movie, it’s one hell of a trip. I didn’t dig the book though, total DNF on the first try. Then I went to MMU as a mature student in my early twenties as a single mum of one, and I sort of collided with Burroughs headlong, ended up tangled together like I was trying be the same damn person. Continue reading →

Interview with CHRISTOPHER HUSBERG

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HusbergC-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Christopher Husberg?

Well I’m a soon-to-be published fantasy author, which is sort of a surreal thing to say! I’m also a husband, stay-at-home dad, desultory blogger, Dota 2 hobbyist, and self-proclaimed expert on all things regarding Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Pastimes include reading, hiking, running, watching great movies and TV, and generally having fun times with family and friends.

Your debut novel, Duskfall, will be published by Titan Books later this year. The first in your Chaos Queen series, it looks rather interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader?

It depends on the person! One of the things I like about Duskfall is that I think it has quite a bit to offer. Want action? It’s got an amnesiac assassin trying to escape his former employers as well as his dark past. Want magic? There’s a young woman who develops a crippling addiction to psimancy (the magic in the books) and has to learn how to curb her dependency or succumb completely — and either way, she’ll likely change the world while she’s at it. Want something more existential? There’s a priestess investigating a heretical uprising, the leader of which turns out to be her own sister. Oh, and it’s got vampires. Something for everyone! Continue reading →

Guest Post: “Buffy, Books and Roleplay: On Childhood Influences” by Paul Krueger

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KruegerP-AuthorPicAs a fantasy author who grew up in the 90’s and 00’s, I come to you with all the classic touchstones you’d expect: Harry Potter, obviously. Scott Pilgrim. Animorphs. Buffy, Angel… hell, the whole Whedon canon. I watched VHS copies of the original cut of Star Wars until the tapes wore out, because that was a thing that could happen to screen media back then. I stayed up late on Saturdays to sneak episodes of Cowboy Bebop and Trigun on our spare TV upstairs. Was I anyone’s first choice for Homecoming king? Not so much. But who cared, when I’d gotten my hands on a new Gotrek & Felix paperback?

I could probably fill a whole book with a tour of my pop cultural influences — after all, Stephen King did it, and the result was one of the best texts on the craft of writing in the past twenty years. But today, dear Civilian Readers, I’d like to talk to you about another corner of my history where I cut my teeth as a writer: in the lost world of message board-based online roleplay. Continue reading →