This September, Gollancz are due to publish Soulstealer by Miles Cameron, the first novel in the Soulflake fantasy series! The excellent cover by Fran Vegas was unveiled earlier this week by Grimdark Magazine, along with the synopsis, and both the artwork and plot caught my attention. Here’s what it’s about:
Bekka Trevelyan is an arcanist, and the first woman to be made a Gentleman Scholar of Arcany at the University of Kabakak. Her graduate work was in refining a device to measure the potency of the winds of magic. Over her Yule holidays from teaching, she travels east on a field trip to test her theory about the Winds in the true Wyld. Instead, she finds herself swept up in the investigation of a kidnapping of an indigenous woman and her child by a demon that has possessed the body of a tracker.
Tam Warden was a war hero, and then a sort of government enforcer. He gave up rank and fame to marry across class lines. But government isn’t done with him yet. He’s called back to action to investigate Bekka’s claims – discreetly. This is delicate work, because the truth could unbalance the nation.
Essa Bateman is a mercenary spy, a hard woman with no attachments and very few ethics. Few, it turns out, is more than ‘none.’ She sees the ripples of unrest from the underbelly of society, but deciding what to do about them is a different beast entirely.
In a world where gunpowder is manufactured from the souls of executed criminals, and the ultra-rich seek immortality at any price, where children labour in factories and the desperate poor turn to vampirism, where slavery is rampant and gangs rule the streets…
A few people are about to be heroes. They just don’t know it yet.
But maybe, just maybe, the Revolution is coming.
Mile Cameron’s Soulstealer is due to be published by Gollancz in the UK, on September 3rd. The author’s sci-fi series, Arcana Imperii, is also published in the UK by Gollancz, and in North America by Saga Press. (He is also a prolific historical fiction author, as Christian Cameron.)
Also on CR: Excerpt from Storming Heaven, Guest Post on “How I do Research”
Civilian Reader 