+ Beddor, Frank : The Looking Glass Wars
(Dial 0-8037-3153-1, $17.99, 358pp, hardcover, September 2006, cover art Brian Flora)

Young-adult fantasy novel, first of a trilogy, inspired by Lewis Carroll's Alice books, revealing the true story of Alyss Heart who inspired Charles Dodgson's stories.
• It was first published in the UK in 2004.
• The series' elaborate official website has audio and text excerpts, a gallery, music, links to reviews, etc.
• The author is a former World Cup freestyle ski champion and an actor and producer whose credits include There's Something About Mary.
• Amazon has the Booklist review: "Beddor offers some intriguing reimaginings of Dodgson's concepts (such as looking-glass travel) and characters (the cat is an assassin with nine lives), but his transformation of Wonderland's lunacy into a workable world sometimes leads to stilted exposition on history, geography, and government. Even so, his attention has, happily, put Wonderland back on the map again."

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* Croggon, Alison : The Riddle: The Second Book of Pellinor
(Candlewick Press 0-7636-3015-2, $17.99, 17+490pp, hardcover, September 2006, jacket illustration Matt Mahurin)

Young-adult fantasy novel, the Second Book of Pellinor, about a young girl and her mentor trying to unravel the Riddle of the Treesong before their kingdom erupts in chaos.
• The first book in the trilogy, The Naming, was shortlisted for the 2003 Aurealis Awards in both the fantasy and horror novel categories.
• The publisher's site has this description, with a link to an excerpt.
• The author's website has numerous pages about the book, the series, the world (with maps, etc.), and reviews.
• SFF World has these reader reviews.

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* Gaiman, Neil : Fragile Things: Short Fictions and Wonders
(HarperCollins/Morrow 0-06-051522-8, $26.95, 31+360pp, hardcover, October 2006, jacket design Richard Aquan)

Collection of 31 stories and poems, most first published in various anthologies and magazines since 1997. One story is original to this volume, "How to Talk to Girls at Parties". Other titles include Hugo and Locus award winner "A Study in Emerald", and Locus Award winners "Forbidden Brides of the Faceless Slaves in the Nameless House of the Night of Dread Desire", "Closing Time", "October in the Chair", and "Sunbird".
• Gaiman's long introduction provides background on the writing of each story.
• Gaiman's webpage for the book has a description and a link to an audio excerpt. The publisher's page has a link to a text excerpt (from "A Study in Emerald").
• Amazon has the Publishers Weekly review, which calls it "disappointing", and the starred Booklist review, which concludes "One delight after another, 31 in all, with a thirty-second tucked into the author's introduction."
• Gary K. Wolfe reviews it in detail in the October issue of Locus Magazine.

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* Giller, Marc D. : Prodigal
(Bantam Spectra 0-553-38332-9, $12, 8+404pp, trade paperback, October 2006)

SF novel in the cyberpunk mode, sequel to the author's first novel Hammerjack (2005).
• Bantam's site has this description, with an excerpt.
• The author's website, www.hammerjack.net has this description.
• SF Weekly just posted this review by Paul Di Filippo.

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* Haarsma, PJ : The Softwire: Virus on Orbis 1
(Candlewick Press 0-7636-2709-7, $15.99, 262pp, hardcover, September 2006, jacket illustration Stephan Martiniere)

Young-adult SF novel about a 13-year-old boy, one of the settlers on the first ring of Orbis, who has the ability to communicate with computers through his mind. It's the first book in the "Virus on Orbis"
• The author's website leads to The Softwire's Rings of Orbis, with Quicktime clips introducing various special features.
• The publisher's site has this description with links to an excerpt and a discussion guide.
• Amazon has enthusiastic reader reviews.

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* Hamilton, Laurell K. : Strange Candy
(Berkley 0-425-21201-7, $23.95, 12+257pp, hardcover, October 2006, jacket illustration Craig White)

Collection of 14 stories, including several previously unpublished, one a new Anita Blake story. It's the author's first story collection.
• The author provides a book introduction, and introductions to each story.
• Hamilton's blog has this entry about the book's launch.
• The publisher's site has this description.
• Amazon has the Publishers Weekly review: "Fans will best appreciate the 14 often darkly humorous fictions in bestseller Hamilton's first story collection..."

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* Klass, David : Firestorm
(Farrar Straus Giroux 0-374-32307-0, $17, 289pp, hardcover, September 2006, jacket art Cliff Nielson)

Young-adult SF thriller, first in the "Caretaker Trilogy", about a 17-year-old boy who learns that his parents aren't really his parents, that he has special powers and has been sent back from the future to save the planet.
• The publisher's site has this description with links to PDF and audio excerpts.
• Amazon has reviews from School Library Journal ("The relentless pace, coupled with issues of ecology, time travel, self-identity, and sexual awakening, makes for a thrilling and memorable read") and Booklist (which calls it an "eco-fantasy series"), while Publishers Weekly just published a starred review in its October 9th issue: "The plot bears a strong similarity to the Terminator films, but its muscular tone and drip-by-drip reveal of secrets make it a total thrill ride, and one with a profound message."

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* Langan, Sarah : The Keeper
(HarperTorch 0-06-087290-8, $6.99, 382pp, mass market paperback, September 2006)

Horror novel, the author's first novel, about the inhabitants of a dying town in Maine haunted by the ghost of a young woman.
• The book was just published in the UK as a hardcover.
• The author's website has news, background on the author, etc. The publisher's description includes a link to an excerpt.
• Amazon has the Publishers Weekly review, which calls it "assured but overstuffed" and concludes "This is horror on a big scale, akin to the more ambitious work of Stephen King, and though Langan's enormous imagination can slow her narrative, this effective debut promises great things to come."
• Ed Bryant reviewed it in the July issue of Locus Magazine: "The Keeper is an extremely ambitious work, and it glitters from a multitude of facets, not the least of which is convincing me that I don't wish to move to small-town Maine anytime in the near future..."

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* McCarthy, Cormac : The Road
(Knopf 0-307-26543-9, $24, 241pp, hardcover, October 2006)

Literary post-apocalypse novel by the author of All the Pretty Horses and Blood Meridian, concerning a father and son walking through a burned-out America.
• The author's official site is a bit out of date, but his publisher-hosted site has quotes from reviews and leads to this description and more praising quotes.
• Amazon has Publishers Weekly's starred review, from its July 24th issue: "McCarthy establishes himself here as the closest thing in American literature to an Old Testament prophet, trolling the blackest registers of human emotion to create a haunting and grim novel about civilization's slow death after the power goes out." Amazon also has 51 customer reviews averaging 5 stars.
• Other online reviews include William Kennedy's in New York Times and Ron Charles' in Washington Post.

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* Pratchett, Terry : Wintersmith
(HarperTempest 0-06-089031-2, $16.99, 323pp, hardcover, October 2006, jacket art Bill Mayer)

Fantasy novel in Pratchett's Discworld series, third in a young-adult trilogy following The Wee Free Men (2003) and A Hat Full of Sky (2004). In this volume young witch Tiffany Aching, now 13, has attracted the attention of a boy, an elemental spirit called Wintersmith.
• The publisher's site has this description with links to a text excerpt, tour schedule, interview, and essay.
• Amazon has the starred Booklist review by Holly Koelling: "yet another rollicking, clever, and quite charming adventure is brought to readers, who will find themselves delighted again--or for the first time--by Pratchett's exuberant storytelling."
• Carolyn Cushman reviewed it in the August issue of Locus Magazine.

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* Reaves, Michael, & Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff : Mr. Twilight
(Ballantine Del Rey 0-345-42338-0, $7.99, 342pp, mass market paperback, October 2006, cover illustration Chris McGrath)

Fantasy/horror novel about a contemporary battle with supernatural entities, triggered by an explosion in a New York bookshop specializing in rare books.
• The publisher's description is also on the Amazon page.
• Reaves' site notes the this is Book II of "The Trine", following Hell on Earth (2001).

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* Snyder, Maria V. : Magic Study
(Luna 0-373-80249-8, $21.95, 392pp, trade paperback, October 2006)

Romantic fantasy, sequel to Poison Study (2005), about a young woman, once kidnapped into service of the royal family, now returning home after 14 years.
• The author's site has this excerpt.
• The publisher's site has this description, an excerpt, and a deleted scene.
• Amazon has the Publishers Weekly review: "Snyder's lively, charming mix of romance and fantasy is sure to gain her new fans."

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