Sci-Fi

Review: ASHES OF THE IMPERIUM by Chris Wraight (Black Library)

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Horus is dead. It’s time to pick up the pieces…

As the Siege of Terra ends, there are many loose ends – Traitors trying desperately to escape, a monumental vacuum of power to fill, and a crumbling galactic government to see to. Those who hold on to power must decide how to wield it, and a new structure must be put in place, all while desires to exact vengeance run high.

Horus is dead. Terra lies in ruins. The Emperor is silent. Amid the rubble of the Palace, shell-shocked survivors emerge into the light of an uncertain dawn. New powers are present now, ones that have travelled the length of the galaxy to bring salvation to the Imperium, though they are as readily cast as usurpers as redeemers. The survivors of the Traitors’ Grand Armada, now scattered and desperate to escape vengeance, are riven with doubt and dissension, and their gods too are silent. Amid all the grief and confusion, some hopeful souls believe the war to be over and an era of renewal just ahead. But wiser heads know that this war can never end, and that the only question remaining is who shall rise to power within the perilous new age, and who shall fall.

The Horus Heresy is over, but at terrible cost. The time period between the rebellion and the “present” day of Warhammer 40,000 has, thus far, not been much-covered in the fiction and lore sections of the various games WH40k-based books. I think the most I read about the period was included in the rulebook for Games Workshop’s short-lived, but very good, Inquisitor game (which introduced us to Eisenhorn). Even here, though, not much attention was paid to the aftermath of the Horus Heresy and Horus’s death. It was with great interest, therefore, that I started Chris Wraight’s latest Black Library novel. What I found was one of the best books BL has published in some time.
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Upcoming: EXIT PARTY by Emily St. John Mandel (Knopf/Picador)

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The covers for Exit Party, the highly-anticipated next novel by Emily St. John Mandel, were unveiled today by Knopf (North American publisher) and Picador (UK publisher). I spotted a listing for the book a few days ago in one of Knopf’s catalogues, and it immediately shot to the top of my Most Anticipated list (metaphorically — there isn’s an actual list). It’s not out until September, which feels very far away. Here’s the synopsis:

A novel of doubles, shadow worlds, and fractured timelines as a man disappears from a glittering Los Angeles party, and a woman — a gunrunner, an art collector, an operative of the State — searches for answers.

Los Angeles, 2031: The first spring after the collapse of the United States, peacekeeping troops withdraw from the city, the Jacaranda trees blossom, and the curfew is finally lifted. Ari Waker and her roommate pass the gauntlet of bomb-sniffing dogs, the shanty towns, and the Red Cross tents as they walk across Silverlake to a party. The mood is ecstatic inside the apartment, people drink and dance, a woman wears a silver dress, pleated like tinfoil. And then: A shift. A bewildered twin, an uncanny doppelganger stumbles through the crowd and out into the night, and Kareem, the party’s host, vanishes into thin air.

As Ari Waker unravels the mystery of this inexplicable night, Emily St. John Mandel unfurls a story that takes us from a future America splintered by civil war to the seaside cliffs of Greece where weapons dealers hide in an elegant resort, and from the domed city of Paris to a colony on the moon. An unforgettable literary feat, Exit Party is a novel about the price of safety, the perils of the surveillance state, a requiem for a world not unlike our own, and a breathtaking story of resilience in the face of cataclysmic change.

I’ve been a fan of the author’s ever since I read a (very) early ARC of Station Eleven, and have been an eager reader of every new novel that’s come out. The author’s previous novel, 2022’s Sea of Tranquility, was especially great so I’d recommend you give that a read as well, if you haven’t already.

Emily St. John Mandel’s Exit Party is due to be published by Knopf in North America (September 15th) and Picador in the UK (September 17th).

Also on CR: Reviews of Station Eleven, Last Night in Montreal, and Sea of Tranquility

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, BlueSky

Excerpt: YOUR BEHAVIOR WILL BE MONITORED by Justin Feinstein (Tachyon)

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The first excerpt for 2026 is from Your Behavior Will be Monitored by Justin Feinstein, which is due out in April via Tachyon Publications. Already generating a bit of buzz online, the novel wrestles with questions about “sentience, purpose, life, death, and how to make a really good commercial.” Here’s the synopsis:

Told entirely through questionably obtained company emails, chat transcripts, TED Talks, training sessions, and more, this all-too-probable future pits emotionally intelligent AI against emotionally stunted humans.

Megacorporation UniView is poised to cement their reputation as “the most trusted name in AI.” After pioneering the world’s first widely adopted AI bots, they are barreling toward an audacious new launch. That is, if they can pull it off in time.

Enter Noah. A down-and-out copywriter reeling from a midlife crisis, he isn’t the typical hire for a groundbreaking tech company full of brilliant engineers and run by a cutthroat CEO. But Lex, UniView’s Head of HR and one of their greatest successes, makes no mistakes ― her algorithm ensures it.

UniView’s latest venture ― a bot named Quinn that creates revolutionary personalized advertising ― needs expert training. Noah needs to teach Quinn ― which is a much better student than he ever could have hoped for ― the finer points of consumer motivation and the art of writing a catchy tagline.

But when corporate competitors force UniView to accelerate its timeline to market, guardrails around the AI loosen just as Quinn seems to be learning a bit too much.

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Upcoming: PLATFORM DECAY by Martha Wells (TorDotCom)

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New Murderbot incoming! Platform Decay by Martha Wells, the eighth novel in the superb Murderbot Diaries series, is due to be published by TorDotCom in May 2026! Like many people, I have been a fan of the series since the first book — All Systems Red, first published in 2017 — and have eagerly looked forward to each new book (and short story) that Wells has written. Platform Decay is no different; I’m really looking forward to this. If you haven’t had the opportunity, yet, I would also highly recommend Apple TV’s adaptation of the books.

Here’s the synopsis:

Everyone’s favorite lethal SecUnit is back in the next installment of Martha Wells’ bestselling and award-winning Murderbot Diaries series.

Having someone else support your bad decision feels kind of good.

Having volunteered to run a rescue mission, Murderbot realises that it will have to spend significant time with a bunch of humans it doesn’t know.

Including human children. Ugh.

This may well call for… eye contact!

(Emotion check: Oh, for f—)

Martha Wells’s Platform Decay is due to be published by TorDotCom in North America and in the UK, on May 5th, 2026.

Also on CR: Reviews of All Systems Red, Artificial Condition, Rogue Protocol, Exit Strategy, Network Effect, and Fugitive Telemetry

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, BlueSky

Upcoming: CHILDREN OF STRIFE and GREEN CITY WARS by Adrian Tchaikovsky

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Adrian Tchaikovsky has to be one of the hardest-working authors in SFF. Not only that, his novels are consistently excellent and varied — he writes across seemingly all speculative genres, offering up many twists and original takes on classic and new tropes. I wanted to quickly spotlight two of his novels coming out in 2026, highlighting just a bit of this breadth of interest and imagination.

CHILDREN OF STRIFE (Tor UK / Orbit)

The far-future. After Earth fell, ark ships had hunted for a new home. They sought lost worlds terraformed in Earth’s forgotten past. A ship crewed by maverick humans, spiders and a spectacularly punchy mantis shrimp captain is about to rediscover one such world, and an ark.

Then human crewmate Alis wakes to discover that she, her captain and the ship’s intelligence are the only ones left on their ship. But what happened to those who left to explore the ark . . . and the world below?

This is the fourth novel in the Children series, which started with the Clarke Award-winning Children of Time. I’ve read the first two books in the series, and loved both. Hopefully, I’ll manage to get around to reading Children of Memory before Strife is published. Really looking forward to this. Children of Strife is due to be published by Tor Books in the UK (March 12th) and Orbit in North America (March 17th)

Also on CR: Review of Children of Ruin

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GREEN CITY WARS (Tor Books)

Down these mean streets a beast must walk…

Meet Skotch. Racoon, P.I.―Yours for a few buttons as long as the job isn’t too illegal, whatever that means.

A mouse has gone missing. Normally this wouldn’t raise any hackles, nor any alarms, but this mouse has something that everyone seems to want, though nobody appears particularly eager to say what that something is.

The fee is good―perhaps too good. Certainly not something Skotch can easily turn down.

If only Skotch can work out where the mouse is hiding, what he’s hiding, and why his secrets are upsetting a lot of animals caught up in the Green City wars.

This upcoming noir novel has a fantastic pitch: “Philip Marlowe meets Redwall.” The cover for the North American edition, featured above, is pretty great, but it’s that pitch that cemented my interest in reading this. Really looking forward to this one. Green City Wars is due to be published by Tor Books in North America (June 23rd, 2026) and in the UK (June 25th).

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, BlueSky

Quick Review: NOBODY’S BABY by Olivia Waite (TorDotCom)

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Detective Dorothy Gentleman investigates the surprising (impossible?) appearance of a baby on the Fairweather…

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.

A wild baby appears! Dorothy Gentleman, ship’s detective, is put to the test once again when an infant is mysteriously left on her nephew’s doorstep. Fertility is supposed to be on pause during the Fairweather’s journey across the stars — but humans have a way of breaking any rule you set them. Who produced this child, and why did they then abandon him? And as her nephew and his partner get more and more attached, how can Dorothy prevent her colleague and rival detective, Leloup, a stickler for law and order, from classifying the baby as a stowaway or a piece of luggage?

This is the second novella starring Dorothy Gentleman, a ship’s detective on the HMS Fairweather, an interstellar passenger liner transporting people to a new life on a new planet. Gently paced, well-written and engaging, it’s another very good read from Waite, and fans of the first are sure to enjoy this. Continue reading →

Excerpt: THE UNIVERSE BOX by Michael Swanwick (Tachyon)

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Next year, Tachyon Publications are due to publish The Universe Box, a new collection of 21 superb short stories by Michael Swanwick. To whet readers’ appetites for the collection, the publisher has provided CR with an excerpt from the title story. First, here’s the synopsis:

Discover the vast worlds and pocket universes of Michael Swanwick (Stations of the Tide), the only author to win science fiction’s most prestigious award five times in six years. In his dazzling new collection, the master of speculative short stories returns with tales in which magic and science improbably coexist with myth and legend. With two stories original to this collection, Swanwick aptly demonstrates with poignant humor why he is widely respected as a master of imaginative storytelling.

In engaging stories, Mischling the thief races through time to defeat three trolls before the sun rises for the first time and turns the inhabitants of her city into stone. A scientist is on the run from assassins, because her research in merging human intelligence with sentient AI is too dangerous. An aging veteran obtains a military weapon from his past: a VR robotic leopard in which he rediscovers the consequences of the hunt. In the biggest heist in the history of the universe, a loser Trickster (and the girlfriend who is better than he deserves), sets out to violate every trope and expectation of fiction possible.

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Excerpt: THE HEIST OF HOLLOW LONDON by Eddie Robson (Tor Books)

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Next month, Tor Books are due to publish The Heist of Hollow London, the latest novel from Eddie Robson; a twisty dystopia that blends Severance with Ocean’s Eleven. The publisher has kindly provided CR with an excerpt to share with our readers.

First, though, here’s the synopsis:

In games of betrayal everyone loses.

Arlo and Drienne are ‘mades’—clones of company executives, deemed important enough to be saved should their health fail. Mades work around the clock to pay off the debt incurred by their creation, though most are Reaped—killed and harvested for organs when their corporate counterparts are in medical need.

But when the impossible happens and the too-big-to-fail company that owns them collapses, Arlo and Drienne find themselves purchased by a scientist who has a job for them.

The reward: Debt paid off, freedom from servitude, and enough cash to last a lifetime.

The job: Infiltrate a highly secure corporate reclamation facility in the heart of dead London and steal a data drive.

They’re going to need a team.

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Upcoming: OUTLAW PLANET by M. R. Carey (Orbit)

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In November, Orbit Books are due to publish Outlaw Planet, a new stand-alone science fiction novel by M. R. Carey! I’ve been a fan of the author’s work since The Girl With All the Gifts, and am very much looking forward to reading this — although, it has reminded me that I have fallen a little behind, and must get around to reading the author’s Pandominion duology. Here’s the synopsis for the new novel:

Sometimes the fate of entire worlds can be decided by a woman with nothing to lose, and the smartest gun in the multiverse in her hand…

This is the story of Bess — or Dog-Bitch Bess as she came to be known. It’s the story of the gun she carried, whose name was Wakeful Slim. It’s the story of the dead man who carried that gun before her and left a piece of himself inside it. And it’s the tale of how she turned from teacher, to renegade, and ultimately to hero.

This is also the tale of the last violent engagements in an inter-dimensional war — one of the most brutal the multiverse had ever seen.

This is how Bess learned the truth about her world. Came to it the hard way, through pain and loss and the reckless spilling of blood, and carried it with her like a brand on her soul. And once she knew it – knew for sure how badly she’d been used – she had no option but to do something about it.

M. R. Carey’s Outlaw Planet is due to be published by Orbit Books in North America and in the UK, on November 18th.

Also on CR: Guest Post on “Writing Strong Women”; Review of The Girl With All the Gifts

Follow the Author: Goodreads, BlueSky

Upcoming: GODFALL by Van Jensen (Grand Central / Bantam)

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In January 2026, readers will be able to read Godfall, the latest novel (and first in a series) by Van Jensen. Actually, readers will be able to read it in a new edition. After a buzzy Hollywood bidding-war (won by Ron Howard), the novel is getting re-published. In a weird coincidence, I stumbled across both of the new editions on the same day. Both of the covers are certainly eye-catching, and they led me to the book’s synopsis, which ultimately made me put this on my To-Read shelf. (The option news also helped pique my interest.) Jensen also wrote some of the DC New 52 series that I read, back when they all kicked off (The Flash and Green Lantern Corps).

Really looking forward to it. Here’s what it’s about:

When a massive asteroid hurtles toward Earth, humanity braces for annihilation — but the end doesn’t come. In fact, it isn’t an asteroid but a three-mile-tall alien that drops down, seemingly dead, outside Little Springs, Nebraska. Dubbed “the giant,” its arrival transforms the red-state farm town into a top-secret government research site and major metropolitan area, flooded with soldiers, scientists, bureaucrats, spies, criminals, conspiracy theorists — and a murderer.

As the sheriff of Little Springs, David Blunt thought he’d be keeping the peace among the same people he’d known all his life, not breaking up chanting crowds of conspiracy theorists in tiger masks or struggling to control a town hall meeting about the construction of a mosque. As a series of brutal, bizarre murders strikes close to home, Blunt throws himself into the hunt for a killer who seems connected to the Giant. With bodies piling up and tensions in Little Springs mounting, he realizes that in order to find the answers he needs, he must first reconcile his old worldview with the town he now lives in — before it’s too late.

Van Jensen’s Godfall is due to be published by Grand Central Publishing in North America (January 13th, 2026) and Bantam in the UK (January 8th).

Follow the Author: Website, Goodreads, Instagram, BlueSky