New Books, 16 June 2024
Breakwell, James: The Gods of Spenser Island
(Rebellion/Solaris UK 9781786189967, $15.99, 384pp, formats: trade paperback, 06/18/2024)
SF thriller novel, second in the series The Chosen Twelve. A colony world with the last 12 humans, all of them children, struggle to create a new civilization on the alien island that is now their forever home—a place full of monsters and the deadly robots brought with them on the colony ship.
Briggs, Patricia: Winter Lost
(Ace 9780593438985, $30, 416pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Urban fantasy novel, 14th in the Mercy Thompson series. Mercy goes to Montana to help her brother, but ends up trapped in a wilderness lodge with strangers, facing ancient magics.
Brooks, Sarah: The Cautious Traveller’s Guide to the Wastelands
(Macmillan/Flatiron 9781250878618, $28.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Historical fantasy novel set on the grand Trans-Siberian Express train which journeys across a dangerous magical landscape. On the train’s last trip, something went horribly wrong, though no one seems to remember what exactly happened. Now, the train is about to embark again, with a new set of passengers. A first novel.
Brooks adds yet a third, historical element to the mix by setting her novel at the end of the 19th century, aboard an elite trans-Siberian train from Beijing to Moscow, which affords her the opportunity to introduce a classic cross-section of travelers, as well as to offer some sly commentary on class, religion, nationalism, and even corporate greed.
Buckell, Tobias S. & Klecha, David: The Runes of Engagement
(Tachyon Publications 9781616964160, $17.95, 288pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/18/2024)
Military science fantasy novel, a mashup pitting the US military against legendary monsters from fantasy and roleplaying games. Portals open in the sky and let orcs, trolls, and dragons fall through — but one platoon of marines gets trapped on the wrong side of the portals in a hostile fantasy world.
Chandrasekera, Vajra: Rakesfall
(Tordotcom 9781250847683, $27.99, 304pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Fantasy novel told in non-linear fragments. Two friends grow up in the wake of the Sri Lankan civil war, then reincarnate over multiple lifetimes, deep into the future and the edge of human possibility.
Chen, Amber: Of Jade and Dragons
(Penguin Random House/Viking 9780593622759, $20.99, 480pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel, the first in the Fall of the Dragon series. Teen Aihui Ying’s dreams of becoming an engineer like her father are threatened by his murder, but disguised as her brother she infiltrates the Engineers Guild and finds an unexpected ally.
Chevalier, Tracy: The Glassmaker
(Penguin Random House/Viking 9780525558279, $32, 416pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Historical novel with fantasy elements. Orsola Rosso is the eldest daughter in a family of glassblowers on Murano. She teaches herself the craft despite women not being allowed, and Orsola and her family move slowly through time from the 15th century to the present.
Dearnley, Elizabeth, ed.: Deadly Dolls: Midnight Tales of Uncanny Playthings
(British Library 9780712355704, $3.81, 318pp, formats: ebook, 06/20/2024)
Anthology of 14 short horror stories from 1817 to 2022, including possessed puppets, artificial suitors, and figures that blur the lines between human and doll. Number 50 in British Library Tales of the Weird series.
DiLouie, Craig: How to Make a Horror Movie and Survive
(Orbit US/Redhook 9780316569316, $19.99, 400pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Horror novel. Max Maurey, famous horror director, is stymied by a limited budget until he discovers an old camera that filmed a very real Hollywood horror — but it came with a cryptic warning, and sometimes wails.
Dodes, Rachel & Mechling, Lauren: The Memo
(Harper Perennial 9780063319356, $17.99, 317pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/18/2024)
Literary fantasy novel. Jenny is 35 and feeling like she’s going nowhere compared to her college friends. Turns out they all got a secret memo with guidance toward success, and she missed hers. But now she’s offered a chance to do parts of her life over. A first novel.
Doorley, Scott & Carter, Carissa: Assembling Tomorrow: A Guide to Designing a Thriving Future
(Penguin Random House/Ten Speed Press 9781984858184, $35, 320pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Collection of essays and short stories depicting possible futures, exploring how to use readily accessible tools to both mend the mistakes of the past and shape the future for the better. Part of the Stanford d.School Library series.
Goyer, Tricia: Breath of Bones
(Enclave 9798886051261, $26.99, 288pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 06/18/2024)
Historical fantasy novel set during the second world war. Journalist Kateřina Dubová joins forces with Josef Loew, a descendant of the famous Rabbi Loew who made a golem to protect Jews in 16th-century Prague, but they may have created a dangerous entity they can’t control.
Hocking, John C.: Conan: City of the Dead
(Titan Books 9781803366562, $27.99, 512pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Tie-in volume based on the character created by Robert E. Howard. Combines the classic Conan and the Emerald Lotus, where the seeds of a deadly, addictive plant grant sorcerers immense power, but turn its users into inhuman killers. Plus the all-new, original Conan and the Living Plague, where a Shemite wizard seeks to create a serum to use as a lethal weapon, but instead he unleashes a hideous monster on the city of Dulcine.
Kliewer, Marcus: We Used to Live Here
(Simon & Schuster/Atria/Bestler 9781982198787, $28.99, 320pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Horror novel about visitors who won’t leave, involving a missing child, a haunting, and a mysterious door. Based on a story first told on Reddit. A first novel.
Lima, Ananda: Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil
(Tor 9781250292971, $24.99, 192pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Collection/fix-up novel of linked stories involving a Brazilian American writer who sleeps with the devil at a Halloween party, and continues to see him throughout her life. A first collection.
Lin, Rosalie M.: Daughter of Calamity
(St. Martin’s 9781250287380, $29, 352pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Historical fantasy novel set in 1930’s Jazz age Shanghai. Showgirl Jingwen works nights charming wealthy patrons, along with running money for her grandmother, the surgeon for the most powerful gang in the city. Then someone starts targeting showgirls — the attacker stealing their faces. A first novel.
McCauley, Kyrie: Bad Graces
(HarperCollins/Tegen Books 9780063243095, $19.99, 320pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Young-adult thriller with fantasy elements, inspired by The Tempest and Greek mythology. A group of young women whose yacht is wrecked off the North American coast has to deal with starvation, exposure, and a strange predator lurking in the forest, as their bodies begin to inexplicably change.
Miller, Anacostia: The Last Leviathan
(Hot Tree Publishing 9781922679819, $18.99, 424pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/19/2024)
Romantic fantasy pirate novel. Maeve, a princess longing for freedom, finds refuge on a pirate ship with a hunky captain who shape-shifts into a sea dragon.
Neff, Henry H.: The Witchstone
(Blackstone Publishing 9798212015547, $26.99, 350pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Humorous fantasy novel. Lazlo, a demon in trouble for not doing his job, has his own agenda. He decides to help a young woman with a family curse break it, and things get wild and funny.
Rao, Kritika H.: The Unrelenting Earth
(Titan Books 9781803365275, $17.99, 528pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audio, 06/18/2024)
Epic near-future science fantasy novel inspired by Hindu philosophy, the second in the Rages trilogy begun in The Surviving Sky. Ahilya and Iravan risk everything — their lives, their culture, and their fragile marriage — in pursuit of the earth-shattering truth about their existence.
Refermat, Emily: The Invisible War
(Black Rose Writing 9781685134341, $21.95, 284pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/20/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel. Garrison, 14, is forced to go to his grandmother’s hobby farm in the rural Midwest. When technology stops working he starts to deal with the people around him, and realizes the farm isn’t what it seems. A first novel.
Rhea, Belicia: Voracious
(Dark Matter INK 9781958598252, $14.99, 184pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/18/2024)
Psychological horror novella. A pregnant teen, her boyfriend missing and presumed dead, is having visions of a bug-filled apocalypse. No one believes her, until her therapist starts having similar symptoms. The book includes the title novella plus two short stories.
Stred, Steve: When I Look at the Sky, All I See Are Stars
(DarkLit 9781998851294, $16, 130pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/24/2024)
Horror novella. Accomplished psychiatrist Dr. Rachel Hoggendorf thinks she has seen it all, until David arrives, claiming to be 400 years old and possessed by a demon. She diagnoses him with multiple personalities and begins treatment, but he starts to share details he shouldn’t know, and lashes out violently.
