New Books: 19 September 2023
Blake, Kendare: Champion of Fate
(HarperCollins/Quill Tree 9780062977205, $19.99, 480pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Young-adult fantasy novel, first in the Heromaker series. An orphan raised by the Aristene, an order of mythical female warriors, Reed grew up surrounded by by her future sisters-in-arms and the incredible stories of their quests. She must pass one final test before initiation: shepherding her first hero to glory on the battlefield. Reed’s assigned hero is both infuriating and intriguing. When their strategic alliance turns into something more, it forces Reed to question the cost of becoming an Aristene, and Reed must choose between her hero or her order.
Condie, Ally: The Only Girl in Town
(Penguin Random House/Dutton 97805933327173, $19.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Young-adult novel. July Fielding is alone. Every single person in her small town of Lithia has disappeared. No family. No friends. No boyfriend. July’s only chance at unraveling the mystery of their disappearance is a series of objects, each a reminder of the people she loved most. And a mysterious message: GET TH3M BACK.
Connolly, John: The Land of Lost Things
(Simon & Schuster/Atria/Bestler 9781668022283, $28, 368pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Dark fantasy novel, second in The Book of Lost Things series. Phoebe, an eight-year-old girl, lies comatose following a car accident. Her mother Ceres sits by her bedside and reads aloud the fairy stories Phoebe loves, in the hope they might summon her back to this world. But an old house on the hospital grounds, a property connected to a book written by a vanished author, is calling to Ceres. Something wants her to enter, to journey to a land colored by the memories of childhood, and the folklore beloved of her father—a land of witches and dryads, giants and mandrakes; a land where old enemies are watching and waiting. The Land of Lost Things.
Dixen, Victor: The Court of Shadows
(Amazon Crossing 9781662505690, $28.99, 382pp, formats: hardcover, trade paperback, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Fantasy vampire novel, the first in the Vampyria Saga series. Translated from the French Vampyria: La Cour des Ténèbres (Robert Laffont 2020) by Françoise Bui.
Louis XIV transformed from the Sun King into the King of Shadows when he embraced immortality and became the world’s first vampire. For the last three centuries, he has been ruling the kingdom from the decadent Court of Shadows in Versailles, demanding the blood of his subjects to sate his nobles’ thirst and maintain their loyalty. Commoner Jeanne Froidelac witnesses the king’s soldiers murder her family and learns of her parents’ role in a brewing rebellion involving the forbidden secrets of alchemy. To seek her revenge, Jeanne disguises herself as an aristocrat and makes her way to Versailles.
Dunato, Jelena: Dark Woods, Deep Water
(Ghost Orchid Press 9781739234836, $16.99, 322pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 09/19/2023)
Fantasy novel inspired by Slavic folklore. A spoiled lady escaping an unwanted marriage, an aging warrior-prince on a deadly mission, and a resourceful rogue caught up in a botched heist all find themselves in an enchanted castle in a remote forest. As dawn approaches they learn that if any of them want to escape, one of them must die.
Edison, David: Sandymancer
(Tor 9780765379603, $30.99, 368pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Post-apocalyptic weird fantasy novel with hard SF elements, set in a world of dust where water is precious. Caralee has the secret power of making sand do her bidding, but accidentally summons a monster, a former god-king who broke the world 800 years ago, and has now stolen her best friend’s body.
Grecian, Alex: Red Rabbit
(Tor/Nightfire 9781250874689, $28.99, 464pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Horror novel. Every hired gun in Kansas is out to collect the bounty on Sadie Grace, the witch, including bona fide witch hunter Old Tom and his mysterious, mute ward, Rabbit. They’re joined by two vagabond cowboys and a recently widowed schoolteacher with nothing left to lose. In a stolen red stagecoach, encountering monsters more wicked than witches along the dusty trail, the ragtag posse is determined to get that bounty, or die trying.
Harrison, Rachel: Black Sheep
(Penguin Random House/Berkley 9780593545850, $27, 304pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Horror novel. Vesper Wright left home at 18 and never looked back—mostly because she was told that leaving the religious community she grew up in meant she couldn’t return. But then she receives an invitation to her beloved cousin‘s wedding, to be hosted at the family farm. Is the invitation a sweet gesture and and exception to the rule, or a trap? Doesn’t matter. Something inside her insists she go to the wedding, where she uncovers a terrifying secret.
Hawk, Shane & Van Alst Jr., Theodore, eds.: Never Whistle at Night
(Penguin Random House/Vintage 9780593468463, $17, 416pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Original anthology of 26 dark stories by Indigenous authors, in genres including SF, fantasy, horror, and crime. Many Indigenous people believe that one should never whistle at night. This belief takes many forms, but what all these legends hold in common is the certainty that whistling at night can cause evil spirits to appear — and even follow you home. These stories are a celebration of Indigenous peoples’ survival and imagination in all the things an ill-advised whistle might summon. Authors include Cherie Dimaline, Darcie Little Badger, Nick Medina, Waubgeshig Rice, and Rebecca Roanhorse. Introduced and contextualized by Stephen Graham Jones.
Key, Justin C.: The World Wasn’t Ready for You
(Harper 9780063290426, $28, 288pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Horror short story collection. Justin C. Key expands and subverts the horror genre to explore issues of race, class, prejudice, love, exclusion, loneliness, and what it means to be a person in the world, while revealing the horrifying nature inherent in all of us.
Kilmer, Maureen: Hex Education
(Penguin Random House/Putnam 9780593422397, $17, 336pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Cozy fantasy novel. 20 years ago, three freshman witches accidentally burned down their college dorm. Soon after they scattered, their secret kept safe. Now they have been invited back to commemorate the anniversary of the fire, disrupting Sarah Nelson’s mundane suburban mom life and her luxury real estate agent career, and suddenly her magic doesn’t want to be controlled.
Koja, Kathe: Dark Park
(Meerkat Press 9781946154750, $14.95, 92pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 09/19/2023)
Near-future horror/SF novel with possible fantasy elements, a sequel to Dark Factory. Visionary filmmaker Sergey Kendricks tracks Ari Regon and Felix the DJ through the chaos of stardom and celebrity culture, while Max Caspar quests deeper into the unstable gaming landscape of Birds of Paradise, pursued and idolized by fans and haters alike.
Lyons, Meredith: Ghost Tamer
(CamCat Books 9780744302790, $27.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, trade paperback, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Humorous horror novel. Aspiring comedian Raely, the sole survivor of a disastrous train wreck, realizes she has a ghostly tag-along as well as a demonic spirit and a pesky ghost hunter after her. A first novel.
Ma, Coco: Nightbreaker
(Penguin Random House/Viking 9780593621462, $19.99, 448pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Young-adult near-future urban fantasy novel. Rei Reynold attends an exclusive New York prep school, but unlike her classmates, she welcomes nightfall, when she can secretly hunt Deathlings, the creatures that prowl New York City after dark, and killed her parents years ago. She’s practicing to qualify for and win the Tournament, a competition to join the city’s Deathling hunters. But there are many factions and rivals involved, including her ex-boyfriend, the ruling elite, and some who want the city to fall.
Pedreira, David: The Never Wars
(Blackstone Publishing 9798200884063, $15.99, 368pp, formats: hardcover, trade paperback, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
SF novel. A group of disgraced special forces soldiers are given one last chance. They are sent on a dizzying time-quest: orbit a black hole to slow down time and fight Earth’s battles in the future. If they complete ten missions, they’ll be redeemed as citizens in good standing.
Purdie, Kathryn: The Forest Grimm
(St. Martin’s/Wednesday Books 9781250873002, $20, 352pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Young-adult fantasy novel drawing on various fairy tales. Despite warnings from her fortune-teller grandmother, Clara and her close friend Axel embark on a dangerous journey into the Forest Grimm, a place where fairy tales come to life with deadly twists. They seek a magical book with the power to reverse the curse on their village, and save Clara’s mother.
Reid, Ava: A Study in Drowning
(HarperTeen 9780063211506, $19.99, 384pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Young-adult fantasy romance novel. Rival students investigating a reclusive fantasy author’s legacy find her house a crumbling wreck, and forces mortal and magical are working against them.
Scalzi, John: Starter Villain
(Tor 9780765389220, $28.99, 272pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
SF supervillain novel. Divorced substitute teacher Charlie lives with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, his greatest ambition to open a pub downtown, if only the bank would approve his loan. Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie.
Jake had enemies, and now they’re coming after Charlie. Aided by unionized dolphins, hyper-intelligent talking spy cats, and a terrifying henchperson, it’s up to Charlie to win the war his uncle started against a league of rich, soulless supervillains backed by multinational corporations and venture capital.
Schwartz, Leanne: A Prayer for Vengeance
(Page Street 9781645678885, $18.99, 359pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 09/19/2023)
Young-adult fantasy novel. The prayers of an autistic boy accidentally free a female soldier from the stone statue form she was trapped in for centuries. Now she is determined to kill the immortal holy leader Milo who imprisoned her, though he believed the statue was a miracle, not a trap. A first novel.
Wilson, F. Paul: Double Dose
(Crossroad Press/Gordian Knot Books 9781637896945, $16.99, 382pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 09/19/2023)
SF thriller novel, second in the Duad series begun in Double Threat, involving reworked elements of Healer, plus cosmic horror elements from the Secret History novella “Wardenclyffe”. Rhys and Daley track down the second half of the Pendry film, learn the secrets of the clan’s Tesla tower, and discover the catastrophic details of the plan to bring the Visitors back to Earth. Meanwhile, Daley and her symbiont Pard — a voice in her head that gives her the gift of healing — want to help victims of “the horrors” but the powers that be won’t let them.
