Stephen Baxter, Iron Winter
(Orion/Gollancz Aug 2012)

The third and concluding book in the Northland series, set in an alternate past where medieval traders, scholars, and ordinary people struggle to keep civilization and themselves alive in the face of a coming ice age.

 




Elizabeth Bear, Shoggoths in Bloom
(Prime Books Nov 2012)

The latest story collection from this versatile author includes 20 stories from the past six years, with one original, ‘‘The Death of Terrestrial Radio’’, and an introduction by writer Scott Lynch. Also features both of her Hugo Award-winning stories ‘‘Tideline’’ and ‘‘Shoggoths in Bloom’’.

 




Gregory Benford & Larry Niven, Bowl of Heaven
(Tor Oct 2012)

Two giants of hard SF come together to begin an ambitious new duology about spacefaring humans discovering a ‘‘Big Smart Object’’: a huge bowl-shaped structure that moves through space powered by a captive star. ‘‘One of those dream-team arrangements that publishers and readers, um, dream about… the first half of a hefty two-decker novel of exploration, alien encounter, and Holy-Cow-Will-Ya-Lookitthat! engineering.’’ [Russell Letson]

 




Libba Bray, The Diviners
(Little, Brown Sep 2012)

The celebrated YA author returns to fantasy with the first of a planned quartet of sprawling adventures set in a 1920s New York menaced by supernatural evil. ‘‘Bray’s finest and most assured work yet, The Diviners is an undeniable standout of the year.’’ [Gwenda Bond]

 




Tobias S. Buckell & Joe Monti, eds., Diverse Engines
(Tu Nov 2012)

This YA anthology features a dozen dystopian stories (with three reprints, and a novel excerpt from Daniel H. Wilson’s Robopocalypse), including original stories by K. Tempest Bradford, Malinda Lo, Ken Liu, Greg van Eekhout, and more.

 




Peter Dickinson, Earth and Air: Tales of Elemental Creatures
(Small Beer Press/Big Mouth House Sep 2012)

This collection of six original middle-grade fantasy ‘‘Tales of Elemental Creatures’’ concludes the Elemental series begun with Water: Tales of Elemental Spirits and Fire: Tales of Elemental Spirits (both prior volumes co-written with Robin McKinley). ‘‘Read it with your mind open, senses alert… and prepare for a marvelously bumpy ride.’’ [Faren Miller]

 




Kate Griffin, Stray Souls
(Orbit Oct 2012)

Griffin (a pen name for Catherine Webb) launches the new Magicals Anonymous series, a spin-off from the Matthew Swift books, about an urban shaman and a ragtag group of misfit supernatural beings trying to save the soul of London itself. Griffin ignores ‘‘the standard fictional divisions between mundane and occult… to reveal a potent mix of horror, humor and raw power in things we tend to take for granted.’’ [Faren Miller]

 



Liz Grzyb & Talie Helene, eds., The Year’s Best Australian Fantasy & Horror 2011
(Ticonderoga Aug 2012)

This anthology gathers 31 stories (and one poem) representing the best of genre writing by Australian authors, with stories by Peter M. Ball, Lee Battersby, Stephen Dedman, Terry Dowling, Richard Harland, Margaret Mahy, Tansy Raynor Roberts, Lucy Sussex, Kaaron Warren, and others, plus a ‘‘Year in Review’’ essay by the editors and an obituary of Sara Douglass by Lucy Sussex.

 




Elizabeth Hand, Errantry
(Small Beer Press Nov 2012)

The third collection from one of our most talented fantasists includes ten stories from the past half a dozen years, including World Fantasy Award winner ‘‘The Maiden Flight of McCauley’s Bellerophon’’, which ‘‘never quite verges into fantasy or SF (though there are bits to permit such a reading), but… ends up feeling a little like both, and it’s this negotiation between modes that has become increasingly one of Hand’s trademarks in the past few years.’’ [Gary K. Wolfe]

 




Lisa L. Hannett & Angela Slatter, eds., Midnight and Moonshine
(Ticonderoga Nov 2012)

An original collection of 13 collaborations (one a reprint) by a pair of up-and-coming Australian authors. The tales are interwoven and linked by the travels of Odin’s raven Mymnir across time and space, from ancient Vinland to modern America.

 




Rudy Rucker, Turing & Burroughs: A Beatnik SF Novel
(Transreal Books Sep 2012)

This ‘‘Beatnik SF Novel’’ exemplifies Rucker’s overstuffed, gonzo approach to SF, presenting an alternate history where computing legend Alan Turing escapes assassination and becomes the lover of Beat writer William Burroughs – which leads inevitably to the pair shapeshifting, raising the dead, and tampering with hydrogen bombs at Los Alamos.

 




Brandon Sanderson, The Emperor’s Soul
(Tachyon Publications Nov 2012)

This gripping novella, loosely connected to the author’s acclaimed novel Elantris, concerns a thief captured and given a daunting magical task: to Forge a new soul for the emperor before the people discover his soulless state and the empire collapses into turmoil.

 




Robert Shearman, Remember Why You Fear Me
(Chizine Publications Nov 2012)

One of our strangest and most eclectic horror writers presents 20 stories, six original, running the gamut from the satirical, to the terrifying, to the surreal, including World Fantasy Award nominee ‘‘Damned If You Don’t’’ and British Fantasy Award finalists ‘‘George Clooney’s Mustache’’ and ‘‘Roadkill’’. Shearman’s previous collections have won World Fantasy and Shirley Jackson Awards.

 




Charles A. Tan, ed., Lauriat: A Filipino-Chinese Speculative Fiction Anthology
(Lethe Aug 2012)

This original anthology gathers 14 stories by Filipino-Chinese authors, with stories drawing on both cultures and the intersections between them. ‘‘The best are quite good – my favorites being ‘The Perpetual Day’ by Crystal Koo, about a community which cannot go to sleep, and ‘The Stranger at my Grandmother’s Wake’ by Fidelis Tan.’’ [Rich Horton]

 




Ann VanderMeer, ed., Steampunk III: Steampunk Revolution
(Tachyon Publications Oct 2012)

The third volume in an impressive series of new and classic steampunk works includes 27 stories (three original) and four essays (three original), with fiction by Christopher Barzak, Jeffrey Ford, N.K. Jemisin, Caitlín R. Kiernan, Nick Mamatas, Cherie Priest, Vandana Singh, Karin Tidbeck, Carrie Vaughn, and others.