Angry Robot Launched Today in the USA and Canada!
Cue the drums and fanfare! One of the best SF / F / WTF publishers in the industry launched across the great pond today. 
Here are the titles that you can pick up in your closest bookstore (and if you can’t, give’em hell!):
Kell’s Legend by Andy Remic
Moxyland by Lauren Beukes
Sixty-One Nails by Mike Shevdon
Slights by Kaaron Warren
Triumff: Her Majesty’s Hero by Dan Abnett
Winter Song by Colin Harvey
Click the title-links for the reviews I’ve already posted, and click the author-links for the book-pages over at Angry Robot. There are also plenty of other reviews – check out this link.
Got an eBook Reader? Check out this link for all the details you’ll need and don’t forget to check out the official Angry Robot Store.
The guys have also launched an awesome competition – follow this link for the details;
And while you’re at it, ‘Like’ Angry Robot on Facebook and Follow them on Twitter – there’s plenty more awesomeness coming from them: in October, you can look forward to the following titles –
Angel of Death by J Robert King
The Bookman by Lavie Tidhar
The Crown of the Blood by Gav Thorpe
Edge by Thomas Blackthorne (John Meaney)
King Maker by Maurice Broaddus
Nekropolis by Tim Waggoner
Hope you all in the US and Canada are ready! Awesome times ahead!
Be EPIC!
Review: All of Yesterday’s Tomorrows by Corey Cotta
I feel pretty damn bad about having to do this post. 
Usually when I review a book I’ve read I can usually find plenty of good to talk about, aspects of the novel that I can tell you that I enjoyed, but this isn’t the case here. Unfortunately.
I received All of Yesterday’s Tomorrows a couple of months after I started the blog (yes, that long ago) and I did start reading it but put it down at page 29. I set the book aside because there just didn’t seem to be any emotion in the book – it was a dry read.
When I eventually came back to the book I read the next 40 pages in about 4 days – it seemed that the break I had taken from the book had really helped, and I was devouring the book, really enjoying it. (This has happened before, by the way – I had similar experiences with Robert Jordan’s The Eye of the World and Steven Erikson’s The Garden of the Moon; with both, I put them down after the first chapter because they just didn’t grab me for some reason)
Let me get into what the book is about quickly, before I go on; Here’s the blurb from Amazon:
It was supposed to be a relaxing vacation. Even though he can’t spend time in the warm waters of Belize, policeman Conrad Bishop is happy to spend time with his girlfriend, Amber, at a private beachfront home in Nantucket. After a tranquil evening walking the beach, Conrad wakes at 3:00 AM, turns on the television, and hears a disturbing news report about a deadly influenza plague—the direct result of a terrorist attack on the United States.
Rushing into his bedroom, he finds his girlfriend unconscious and suffering from a high fever. When he tries to take her to the hospital, the town is in a panic. Cars clog the road, and he’s forced to return to the beach house. Amber never regains consciousness, and by that evening, she is dead.
Grief stricken, Bishop is suddenly thrust into a world that changes by the minute. Terrorists attack every major city in the United States with car bombs and invade American embassies overseas. With a small group of survivors, Conrad struggles to stay alive. His fight will take him to the very steps of the White House and have him waging a valiant crusade to keep a dying nation alive.
When Corey got in contact with me and asked me if I would mind reviewing his novel, it was this blurb that attracted me – civilization has fallen (at least, in the US) and I would journey through this new world with an interesting-sounding character. And in the end, it was the characters that ultimately sunk the book for me.
You see, I found the characters to be, in a sense, not even there – Conrad had the most depth, and I really did enjoy him as a character: here we have a man who has suddenly lost everything and is thrust into a world that is beyond bewildering. But when the other characters were introduced I found myself wishing that there weren’t any other characters in the book; I could have read the book and finished it with just Conrad to take me through it. The first character that Conrad meets, Angie, was great until their group of two became larger – from there on it was like reading a report written by a particularly dry journalist. Here’s an excerpt that illustrates what I’m getting at, and brings up a couple of other issues, too: There are now a couple of characters that have joined forces with Conrad and Angie, and one of the characters has already announced that she has fallen pregnant.
“Lori, Conrad is the leader of the group. He saved me from certain death,” Angie commented. “Oh, by the way, everyone, I was going to wait until tomorrow, but I am pregnant also.”
Conrad smiled, and then he began to cry, as did everyone else. He was embarrassed, but then after a hug from Nikki and Michael, he felt more at ease with his emotions.
“It seems we are all baring our souls tonight,” Stacy said to the group.
They all sat silent for a time, each person thinking his or her own thoughts.
“Lori, there is a man named Mel Connor, and his wife is named Lucy. They live in town,” Michael remarked.
Everyone congratulated Angie on her pregnancy.
“Two babies – this town is getting overcrowded,” Angie commented.
Everyone decided to call it a night. Conrad went up to the roof to relieve Simon, who was on watch.
Now, there’s a couple of things that should leap out immediately:
There is no real emotion at all – we are told that Conrad smiles, we don’t experience it with him. We are told that he starts crying but we don’t feel it.
Also, this seems like quite a dramatic moment – but instead of the moment being explored, Michael tells Lori about two other people that members of the group have met; Conrad doesn’t even have a moment with Angie, and he’s the father.
And the dialogue also came across as robotic; I didn’t get a sense that these people were really happy for Angie and Conrad because we are only told that they are happy, we don’t feel it with them. This also isn’t the only example I can give you – one other event that comes to mind takes place before Conrad meets Angie – he comes across two German Shepard’s and decides to look after them and train them; I was expecting that Conrad would form an emotional bond with the dogs, since they were now the only living things that he was spending time with, and not only didn’t this happen but at one point the dogs completely disappear from the narrative and then reappear later much later, almost as if they were forgotten and then remembered.
Since characters are the most important aspect of any work of fiction I just couldn’t go on reading this novel – I wasn’t connecting with any of the characters, I couldn’t sympathize with them, and I wasn’t experiencing them emotionally.
It’s not all bad, though. Corey obviously put plenty of thought into this novel; there are myriad details really add to the atmosphere of the novel and illustrate what the characters have to go through, for example, Conrad and Angie cut their hair as short as possible so that they don’t have to waste water washing their hair. The novel is filled with awesome little nuggets like this and I was also impressed with the landscape detail that Corey employed – the settings were quite vivid and I was effortlessly imagining the places as Conrad travelled through what had been the USA.
Another thing, and this might seem small, is that the story itself was memorable – after almost two years I didn’t need to re-read what I had read to get back into the novel, and that’s pretty important in my opinion.
Ultimately, though, the most important aspect of the novel -the characters themselves- let me down, to such a degree that I lost interest completely and stopped reading the novel. I will probably pick up the novel again some time and give it another go and my opinion might change, but at the moment, this novel was just too disappointing. I was expecting not only a descriptive and memorable read (which I did get) but an emotional read, too, but I felt very little while reading this novel.
4 / 10
Check out the positive reviews of the novel here; visit Corey Cotta’s website here, and order your copies here.
Be EPIC!
Mark Newton’s German deal & City of Ruin Paperback Cover
Awesome news from John Jarrold!
PRESS RELEASE – GERMAN DEAL FOR MARK CHARAN NEWTON.
Volker Busch at VGS Egmont has acquired German rights in two fantasy novels by Mark Charan Newton from Jon Mitchell, Rights Manager at Pan Macmillan. Julie Crisp acquired World rights in the books from agent John Jarrold. The books will be published on Egmont’s ‘Lyx’ imprint. Other authors on the Lyx list include Jacqueline Carey, Jennifer Fallon, Tanya Huff, R. A. Salvatore, and Seanan McGuire.
NIGHTS OF VILLJAMUR was first published by Macmillan/Tor UK in 2009, and CITY OF RUIN followed this year. VGS will publish the first novel around the end of 2011, with the second following.
‘Mark’s reputation is quickly growing across the world, and we’re both delighted with this deal,’ said John Jarrold. ‘Congratulations to Jon Mitchell and Macmillan!’
Kickass news indeed, even though I can’t read more than ten words of German. Mark definitely deserves it and even though I’m sure plenty of readers in Germany have already enjoyed Mark’s work, Nights of Villjamur and City of Ruin are sure to garner many more fans for him. Congrats, Mark!
And here, as promised, is the awesome cover to the paperback edition of City of Ruin; the man on the cover is none other than Brynd and he looks incredible, much better than the Anime-esque Brynd seen on the hardcover of City of Ruin, in my opinion.
Be EPIC!
Spotlight: The Reapers are the Angels by Alden Bell
After finishing The Passage last week, I’m seriously looking forward to reading this book – there have been an veritable avalanche of positive reviews (always a plus) but the main reason I want to read this is that we seem to be seeing something happening in ‘genre’ fiction, and while it’s too early to tell exactly what ‘it’ is, I’m excited.
Thanks to Chloe Healy from Pan Mac I’ve got plenty for you to check out regarding the novel:
Check out this page at Pan Macmillan for reviews;
Here is a link to Alden’s A-Z – definitely worth a look if you want to get a good sense of what Alden’s about.
Want to know what Alden’s literary influences are? Have a read at this link;
Here is a list of Alden’s Top 10 Zombie movies – some excellent choices here, as well a s a couple that I still need to watch, too;
Here’s an interview with Alden over at Fantasy Book Review;
Here’s also a pretty damn cool booktrailer for the novel – can’t wait for my copy to arrive!
And finally, here a link to an excerpt of The Reapers are the Angels – I myself haven’t read it yet because I want to wait for the book to arrive.
Hope you’re looking forward to this as much as I’m am! If you’d like to order the book, click here for Amazon US and here for Amazon UK, and follow this link to Alden’s website.
Be EPIC!
Terry Brooks and Peter V Brett Chat on Suvudu
Since this happened in the early hours of this morning (well okay, not *that* late, but I would have been buggered at work today if I had stayed awake for it) I thought I’d post it for you.
Terry has long been one of the giants of Fantasy and I shouldn’t have to even give you a refresher on who the man is, and the same can already be said of Peter; his debut in 2008, The Painted Man, secured him a legion of fans, and when The Desert Spear hit shelves earlier this year, that trend definitely continued.
Here’s a link to the chat – Betsy Mitchell, Editor-in-Chief of Del Rey Books, chaperoned the two (not that they needed it, but some would say that Fantasy authors in general need chaperones, 
) and there were also fans that joined the chat and got to ask these two authors the questions weighing on their minds. .
I’ve saved the chat into a Word Doc so I can read it during my lunch break today.
Thanks to Suvudu for bringing this to us!
Be EPIC!
John Jarrold’s Corner: The Quantum Thief Gathering Praise
Got this info from John Jarrold and I have to say, I’m impressed.
First of all, this is an SF debut, and secondly, the author, Hannu Rajaniemi, is also a string theorist (string theory is kickass, by the way) and a technology consultant – impressive on it’s own!
But here are some snippets from reviews for you to read:
John says: I wouldn’t usually post reviews to reviewers (!) but both Simon Spanton at Gollancz and I are hugely delighted with this listing of encomiums for THE QUANTUM THIEF by JJLA client Hannu Rajaniemi, which Gollancz publish on September 30.
‘If you dropped Greg Egan’s hard physics chops into a rebooted Finnish version of Al Reynolds with the writing talent of a Ted Chiang you’d begin to get a rough approximation of the scale of his talent. It made the hair on the back of my neck stand up when I read it. Hard to admit, but I think he’s better at this stuff than I am. And The Quantum Thief is the best first SF novel I’ve read in many years’ CHARLES STROSS
‘A brilliant first novel. The Quantum Thief, like so much of the best space opera of this century, is a prodigy house, where propositions are instant heritage, and arguments are eyeclick’ JOHN CLUTE, STRANGE HORIZONS
‘The mix is something like 40% Dancers at the End of Time and 60% Charlie Stross. The book has Stross’s inventiveness, and deep intelligence, and farseeing imagination, alongside Moorcock’s stylish feel and flow. This is one of the SF novels of 2010 that everybody is talking about; if you have any interest at all in contemporary hard SF you will read it. There will be awards’ ADAM ROBERTS
TQT has been heavily trailed as ‘the’ big SF debut novel of the year. These accounts are correct. The Quantum Thief is a crazy joyride. It’s the sort of book you’d get if Scott Lynch and Greg Egan teamed up, with the characters and black humour of the former mixed in with the hardcore physics of the latter. The story unfolds briskly with barely a pause for breath, the plot is gripping, the ideas complex but thought-provoking, and there are all the requisite shocking revelations and intriguing plot twists you could wish for. The Quantum Thief is a bravura debut novel, a confident and accomplished work that reinvigorates the genre. It is easily the best SF debut since Richard Morgan’s Altered Carbon’ THE WERTZONE
‘Comes together piece by piece in the mode of M. John Harrison’s Light – and it’s every bit the equal of that modern-day genre masterpiece. Beneath the science, you see, beneath the staggering speculative wonder of it all, Hannu Rajaniemi has a knack for spare, no-nonsense storytelling that approaches the poetic at times. The Quantum Thief is a revelation, in the end, and make no mistake: we have here the sci-fi debut of 2010’ THE SPECULATIVE SCOTSMAN
I’ve got a copy of The Quantum Thief, so I guess I’d bloody well get to it, huh?
Be EPIC!
Review: The Passage by Justin Cronin
We all know how it’s supposed to go, thanks to warehouses full of movies and libraries full of novels – when civilization ends, those who remain are left to scrounge together a living among the discarded relics of lives that were led, and proved to mean absolutely nothing. How the world ends – and this is actually what it’s about, isn’t it? We are selfish and have no real conception of ‘civilization’; when civilization falls, it is our own personal worlds that crumble into dust – is not really important; sure, the reasons are interesting, from a dramatic or scientific or mystical point of view (that’s aimed at you, 2012′vers), but what actually matters is what will happen after it ends. How will the people that survive the end of everything they know and have come to take for granted react, live, carry on?
This is, at its deepest heart, what I think The Passage is about; that journey from ‘this’ into ‘that which waits’, and how those who had the good fortune to survive make the journey.
First off – Justin Cronin is a man who will -hopefully, if he can stay away from natural or un-natural disasters, etc- probably become a legendary writer and storyteller. I’m not saying this lightly at all, believe me; I’ve read literally thousands of books since I started reading, from different genres, for different reasons, and sometimes, I’ll admit it, I’ve listened to the hype surrounding a particular novel and thought, “You know what? I’d be an idiot not to read that.” Not because I’m prone to hype, exactly, but because I’m, prone to being infected with excitement. Hearing about The Passage way back definitely piqued my interest, but not so much that I was waiting on tenterhooks for the book to hit the shelves – movies like The Road and I Am Legend were still fresh in my mind (no. I haven’t read either novel, but I will, one day) and with the whole population of the world (or very nearly so) having some knowledge about the Mayan take on 2012, the ‘end of the world’ or ‘the fall of civilization’ really wasn’t as exciting or interesting anymore. Sure, the movies I’ve seen about the End were all exciting and awesome for their own reasons, and there’s something strangely thrilling about watching the planet become a wasteland, or completely explode; but the fact of the matter is it had been done to death. From every conceivable angle. But there’s just so much more to this novel than what anyone expects – I’ve sold the book (I’m a bookseller, for those who don’t know) as a literary horror novel, but that, also, is just a fraction of what The Passage is.
But forget about the hype. The hype will have you thinking and expecting many things about The Passage, and it’s akin to being able to perfectly describe the beauty of a ray of sunlight entering a darkened room – you just can’t, or not as well as you’d like. The novel is stuffed, absolutely stuffed, with so much that concentrating on any one aspect of it is like looking at a pebble on a mountainside and believing it to be more interesting and beautiful than the mountain itself. It’s the same reason why I’m not going to give you my thoughts on the plot or the characters or the myriad rhythms and emotions and scents that fill the book – I’d be focusing your attention on that pebble, attractive though it may be.
All I will say is that I cried after reading the first chapter – not torrents of tears, but I was captured in an incredible moment. The last time that happened was with Ned Stark in A Game of Thrones, and before that, with Whiskeyjack in Memories of Ice. Yes, I am a guy who is not afraid of crying, but that’s beside the point. There are just scenes in novels that really affect you, and after 5 minutes of reading, in the first chapter of The Passage, I was crying. Am I saying that this novel is sad? For sure. But it is so much more, and to really give yourself a chance of catching even a glimpse of what The Passage has to offer, you need to allow yourself to cry when you read something sad or cheer when you read something awesome. I want to say that The Passage isn’t suited to readers who enjoy light reading material, but I hope that you, too, will give this book a try. It probably won’t be for everyone -no novel can claim that, or ever will- but a helluva lot of people will probably be swept away by The Passage – I was, and I’ll gladly admit it.
Justin Cronin is an absolutely incredible writer and storyteller. Fact.
10 / 10
For more info about the book and Justin, follow this link; to order your copies, click here for Amazon US and here for Amazon UK.
The Random House Struik Get Smarter Short Course in Creative Writing
Hey Guys and Girls, I thought that I would let you know about the excellent course again, considering that I took the course earlier this year and was very, very impressed and happy that I took part.
The course is for anyone and everyone who has thought about being a writer, or anyone who has tried their hand at writing. I’ve been writing for about 8 years now, and when I began all I wanted to do was write the stuff that was in my head; I tried my hand at writing fan-fiction for Tomb Raider, Highlander, even Star Wars. About 6 years ago I started writing a South African-set Urban Fantasy and stopped after about 40000 words because I had no idea how the tale continued. lately I’ve been busy with an Epic Fantasy project that has gone through many iterations over the years. I finished a couple of short stories, but not much else.
And then early this year I heard about the Random House course, from a good friend (and now fellow writer). I was impressed that the course was being presented by Random House Struik and Ron Irwin (Ron got in touch with me after I reviewed Lauren Beukes’ Moxyland, and I’d also read House of War by Hamilton Wende, one of Ron’s clients), and to be honest, if anyone other than Ron was attached to the course I probably wouldn’t have taken it.
But I did (after taking out a loan from the bank – I just didn’t have the money), and after 10 weeks I not only learned an absolute shitload about writing but I became more focused on my writing. Now I’m sitting at 51400 words (almost half-way) and I know for a fact that I really do want to write for the rest of my life.
You see, the course is excellent for the following the reasons:
1) Ron knows what he’s doing: he studied under an absolute giant of South African fiction, J.M. Coetzee; he’s been working in the publishing industry long enough to know everyone, everywhere (he’s good mates with the guys behind Angry Robot, too) and he’s in the game to help writers become the best bloody writers they can be.
2) During this course you’ll learn about POV, introducing and handling conflict, what you need to keep in mind to create awesome characters, how to keep the pacing of your story up, the fact that you’re telling a story and not reporting a story, etc
3) Your work is also critiqued by fellow students and Ron himself (one of the most awesome aspects of the course, since learning how to take critique is too important to ever overlook);
4) Get Smarter has an incredible team of people ready to help you with anything – you see, this is an online course, so there’s no catching taxis or getting stuck in traffic or paying for a hotel, etc.
This course is probably the best thing I’ve done, and has laid the foundation for all the bestsellers I’ll ever write. If you’re serious about writing, or even if you’re only dabbling, you could do much, much worse than take this course.
Head on over to the Get Smarter website for more detailed info.
Be EPIC!
Another Message from John Jarrold
Hey Guys and Girls, hope your Friday has been better than mine! Ah, it wasn’t so bad, I s’pose, but hell, worked my ass off (as did everyone else), so we’re all a bit stuffed-tired.
Anyway, John’s problems regarding how to get hold of him through his website have been sorted, but he wants everyone to know the following:
I have now added my e-mail address to the home page and contacts page, and removed the contacts form, which should make everything simpler. But I shudder at the number of queries and submissions I must have missed between the date the revised website was launched, June 7, and August 16 when the problem was resolved. All those submissions and queries on the agency or editorial services still need to be re-sent by e-mail to: j(dot)jarrold(at)btinternet(dot)com
So there we have it: if you have sent anything to John via his website in the period specified, please re-send it! One of you may have an awesome novel that may just be nuts about!
Until Monday, hope you all have an AWESOME and KICK ASS weekend!
Be EPIC!
Want to have a chance of attending the ‘I Am Number Four’ Movie Premiere?
Chances to attend the Premier of a movie that will probably be huge (if the highly enjoyable book is anything to go by), and probably rub shoulders with the attending celebs, don’t come along often, and here’s a chance to win just that – for the Premier of “I Am Number Four”, directed by DJ Caruso and produced by Stephen Speilberg.
Here are the details:
Now on Moviefone, enter for a chance to win a trip to the I AM NUMBER FOUR Movie Premiere!
One Grand Prize winner will receive a three-day / two-night trip to the ‘I Am Number Four’ movie premiere next year. The prize package will include two tickets to the premiere event, roundtrip airfare for two and hotel accommodations.
Check it out at: http://insidemovies.moviefone.com/2010/08/16/i-am-number-four-movie-premiere-sweepstakes/
The book is the thrilling launch of a series about an exceptional group of teens as they struggle to outrun their past, discover their future—and live a normal life on Earth. It is currently #7 on the New York Times Best Sellers List.
Don’t forget to check out the I Am Number Four website. And good luck to you!
Be EPIC!
