New Books, 4 June 2024
Cerilli, Matteo: Lockjaw
(Penguin Random House Canada/Tundra 9781774882306, $17.99, 328pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult horror novel of two queer teens in a community that doesn’t accept them. When one is killed by a monster the other has to prove it’s real to clear herself and save the town.
Cobell, K.A.: Looking for Smoke
(HarperCollins/Heartdrum 9780063318670, $19.99, 416pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult thriller novel set on a Blackfeet reservation. A girl at a traditional Giveaway is murdered, and each of the four members of the Giveaway group have a complicated history with the murdered girl. A first novel.
Connor, Quinn: The Pecan Children
(Sourcebooks Landmark 9781728263908, $16.99, 352pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Southern gothic fantasy novel. Twin sisters, trying to save their farm and town, discover ghostly fires lighting up their pecan orchard, and troubling local folklore is revealed to be all too true.
dos Santos, Steven: Malicia
(Page Street 9781645677871, $18.99, 352pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult horror novel. Four teens all have their own agendas while making a documentary about an abandoned theme park off the coast of the Dominican Republic where a mass killing occurred.
If you are in the mood for a deeply dark YA fantasy, with plenty of terror, gore, and moments of blood splattered dismemberment, then Steven Dos Santos has you covered with his latest, Malicia.
—Colleen Mondor, Locus, April 2024
Ellis, Lindsay: Apostles of Mercy
(St. Martin’s 9781250274564, $30, 464pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
SF novel, third in the Noumena series begun in Axiom’s End. Cora Sabino develops an empathic relationship with an alien amygdaline, which might be key to saving Earth from a deadly alien race, longtime enemies of the amygdalines.
Elmendorf, Dana: In the Hour of Crows
(Harlequin/Mira 9780778310495, $28.99, 288pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Magical realism novel. In a small town in Appalachia, where people paint their doors blue to keep spirits away, and black ferns grow where death will follow, Weatherly Opal Wilder is a Death Talker, who can talk death out of the dying, once, never twice.
Fay, Constance: Fiasco
(Tor/Bramble 9781250330451, $18.99, 352pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
SF romance novel, second in a series begun in Calamity. Bounty hunter Cynbelline Khaw is ready to quit, but can’t pass up a bounty on the kidnapper who killed her cousin — but it means working with people she knew under an alias, and delivering a sexy medic to treacherous people.
Fraimow, Rebecca: Lady Eve’s Last Con
(Rebellion/Solaris UK 9781837861590, $16.99, 368pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/06/2024)
SF adventure novel. Sisters and small-time hustlers plot revenge on wealthy corporate heir Esteban Mendez-Yuki, after he broke one of their hearts. But Esteban’s sister throws a monkey wrench in their plans.
This is a novel about cons, not about heists. The stakes are played more for happiness and financial security than for life and limb, though once or twice life and limb is at hazard. Happiness and financial security are pretty high stakes, as most of us know, and Fraimow gives us an appealing protagonist in Ruthi (alias Evelyn Ojukwu), with a compelling voice. Her first-person narration is just self-aware enough to make it clear that Ruthi Johnson is absolutely driven by her emotions when it comes to this revenge, and perhaps isn’t thinking entirely clearly about… well, ever.
Gibson, Lena: The Long Haul: Pursuit of Hope
(Black Rose Writing 9781685134235, $24.95, 354pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/06/2024)
SF novel, the second book in the Train Hoppers series set in the arid west of the former US in 2195. Elsa and her friends flee for Canada, having found a source of propagatable seeds that could end the rule of GreenCorps with its controlled seed and water supply.
Hardwick, C. Stuart, ed.: Tales of the United States Space Force
(Baen 9781982193454, $18, 400pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/04/2024)
Anthology of new fiction and nonfiction. Story authors include Arthur C. Clarke, Larry Niven, David Brin, Jody Lynn Nye, Martin L. Shoemaker, and Marie Vibbert. Essays from William F. Otto, Michael Morton, and Hardwick.
Kaster, Allan, ed.: The Year’s Top Hard Science Fiction Stories 8
(AudioText/Infinivox, $9.99, 642pp, format: ebook, 06/04/2024)
Year’s best anthology of SF stories and novellas published in 2023. Authors include Tobias S. Buckell, Gregory Feeley, Carolyn Ives Gilman, Derek Künsken, Geoffrey A. Landis, Rich Larson, Yoon Ha Lee, Marissa Lingen, James Maxey, Alec Nevala-Lee, Dominica Phetteplace, Allen M. Steele, and Peter Watts.
Kim, Sophie: The God and the Gumiho
(Penguin Random House/Del Rey 9780593599662, $18, 416pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Fantasy romance novel set in Korea, book one in the Fate’s Thread series. Kim Hani, a retired, soul-devouring, nine-tailed fox working in a coffee shop, teams up with an annoying and unfairly handsome trickster god to kill an escaped demon before it can destroy the world.
Kölsch, Freddie: Now, Conjurers
(Sterling/Union Square & Co. 9781454951599, $19.99, 384pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult dark fantasy romance novel set in 1999 Massachusetts. When the body of one of their members is discovered half-devoured, a coven of queer teens takes on a wish-granting demon. A first novel.
Lee, Yoon Ha: Moonstorm
(Penguin Random House/Delacorte 9780593488331, $19.98, 352pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult SF novel, the first in the Lancers trilogy. Hwa Young was orphaned by Imperial forces and adopted by the empire that destroyed her home. Trying to shake her rebel past, she trains to be an Imperial pilot. Then Hwa uncovers a conspiracy that puts the entire world at risk, and she has to go back to her rebel roots to save her world.
There’s a lot going on in Moonstorm. There’s the greed of empire, and its vicious determination to wipe out those who refuse to collaborate. There’s autocracy, and how adherence to one way of living in enforced; and how both empire and autocracy work together with militarism. Along with this there’s also the very personal experience of adolescent friendship.
—Alexandra Pierce, Locus, April 2024
Leif, Natalie: Take All of Us
(Holiday House 9780823456611, $19.99, 256pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult horror novel. A parasite in the water of a West Virginia town turns the infected into zombie-like shells. When the town is evacuated, Ian gets left behind and is determined to find out why. A first novel.
Linde, K.A.: The Wren in the Holly Library
(Entangled/Red Tower 9781649374073, $32.99, 400pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Fantasy romance novel, book one in the Oak & Holly Cycle. Thirteen years ago monsters emerged from the shadows and nearly destroyed the world, until the Monster Treaty was created. Kierse, a thief, breaks the treaty by entering the Holly Library, not realizing it’s the home of an alluring monster.
Malburi, C.G.: Markless
(Levine Querido 9781646143771, $19.99, 368pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel. In a society where worth is determined by the mark on your palm and the magic it grants, an unmarked witch is forced into dangerous royal service by a queen-to-be who hopes to escape a forced soulbond. A first novel.
Malfi, Ronald: Small Town Horror
(Titan Books 9781803365657, $27.99, 400pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Horror novel involving a haunting, and five childhood friends forced to return to their home town and reunite to confront their dark past and a possible curse put on them.
It’s hard to find fresh, unique ghost stories. It’s probably even harder to find original narratives – horror, mystery, crime, whatever – in which someone is forced to go back to their hometown to face their past. In Small Town Horror, author Ronald Malfi manages to do both.
—Gabino Iglesias, Locus, April 2024
McGuire, Seanan: Tidal Creatures
(Tordotcom 9781250333551, $29.99, 464pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Fantasy novel, third in the Alchemical Journeys series. The mortal aspect of the lunar god Aske is murdered on the UC Berkeley campus, and linguistics grad student Judy, who hosts the god Chang’e, investigates.
Morris, Molly: Annie LeBlanc Is Not Dead Yet
(St. Martin’s/Wednesday Books 9781250290069, $20, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult fantasy romance novel, set in a California town where every ten years, residents can enter a contest to resurrect the dead for 30 days. But there might be a loophole to keep the winner around for longer.
North, Claire: The Last Song of Penelope
(Orbit US/Redhook 9780316444101, $30, 400pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Fantasy novel based on Greek myth, the third in the Songs of Penelope series based on the story of Odysseus’s wife. Odysseus returns at last, but disguised as a beggar. He’s not just plotting revenge against all of Penelope’s suitors, but testing the loyalty of his queen.
Penelope, Leslye: Daughter of the Merciful Deep
(Orbit US/Redhook 9780316378222, $19.99, 416pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Historical fantasy novel mixing folklore and African American history in the American South in 1935. Jane, a mute young woman trying to save her all-Black town from being flooded by a dam, gets help from a man from a magical underwater realm, and the son of the town’s founder.
Ringle, Molly: Ballad for Jasmine Town
(Central Avenue Publishing 9781771683647, $17.99, 317pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/04/2024)
Urban fantasy novel, second in the Eidolonia series. Rafi, son of two half-humans counted as fae, drifts between both worlds, but even as he falls for a matter-witch, the truce between species is threatened by violence.
Roanhorse, Rebecca: Mirrored Heavens
(Simon & Schuster/Saga Press 9781534437708, $29.99, 608pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Epic fantasy novel, third in the Between Earth and Sky trilogy. Serapio, avatar of the Crow God Reborn and the newly crowned Carrion King, rules Tova, but a new prophecy is whispered, this one from the Coyote God. It promises Serapio certain doom if its terrible dictates are not fulfilled.
Rodgers, Erica Ivy: Lady of Steel and Straw
(Peachtree Teen 9781682636657, $19.99, 432pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel, inspired by The Three Musketeers, first book in the Waking Hearts duology. Ten years after a regicide, the immortal scarecrow Guardians who once guarded the crown must surrender themselves to the church of the Silent Gods, or face charges of treason. A first novel
Sathue, E.K.: youthjuice
(Soho Press/Hell’s Hundred 9781641295925, $25.95, 288pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
Satirical horror novel. A new marketing writer at a luxury skincare/wellness company gets addicted to the new moisturizer she’s asked to test, and discovers its gruesome secret ingredient.
Stufflebeam, Bonnie Jo: Grim Root
(Dark Matter INK 9781958598368, $17.99, 330pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 06/04/2024)
Cosmic horror novel about reality TV, and a competition for a bachelor filming in a secluded haunted house. A first novel.
Tchaikovsky, Adrian: Service Model
(Tordotcom 9781250290281, $28.99, 384pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 06/04/2024)
SF novel. A domestic robot gets a nasty idea downloaded into its core programming and murders its owner. It also now has the freedom to run away. Out in the wider world, it discovers human rule is disintegrating.
Tuli, Nisha J.: Fate of the Sun King
(Grand Central/Forever 9781538767672, $18.99, 560pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 06/06/2024)
Romantic fantasy novel, the third in the Artefacts of Ouranos series. With the Heart Crown now in her possession, Lor must navigate the dangers of being an heir on the run, knowing more than one power-hungry ruler is after her blood.
Weber, David & Holo, Jacob: The Thermopylae Protocol
(Baen 9781982193430, $28, 400pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 06/04/2024)
SF mystery novel, sixth in the Gordian Division series. When a ship from an uncharted universe explodes, it soon becomes apparent that someone is building a massive weapon away from the watchful eyes of the Gordian Division. Agent Cho and Detective Cantrell are deployed to get to the bottom of the mystery.
