Here’s a sf/f/h book-related meme for a lazy Saturday…

For EACH of the following questions, name 1 or more science fiction, fantasy or horror book titles…

1. The last sf/f/h book I read and enjoyed was:
2. The last sf/f/h book I read and did not enjoy was:
3. A sf/f/h book that I would recommend to new sf/f/h readers is:
4. A sf/f/h book that I would recommend to seasoned sf/f/h readers is:
5. The sf/f/h book I most want to read next is:
6. My favorite sf/f/h book series includes:
7. I will read anything by this sf/f/h author:
8. The first sf/f/h book I read was:
9. The sf/f/h book I’m most surprised that more people don’t like is:
10. The sf/f/h book I’m surprised so many people do like is:
11. The most expensive sf/f/h book I own is:
12. The number of sf/f/h books I own and have yet to read is:

And so ends another week of Free Fiction. I’ll be spending today at Keycon 30 in surprisingly-not-frozen Winnipeg, Canada. But as a special treat that’s somewhat akin to having porridge for five days in a row, I’ll leave you with Part 5 of my five part serialization of The Raven’s Head Dagger and the Custom of the Seas.

What’s special about today’s free fiction?

1. Daily Science Fiction has a story from Mari Ness
2. Books One and Two of the Skye Morrison Vampire Series by J.L. McCoy are free on Amazon
3. Freda Warrington‘s Little Goose has five different extracts at five different places as part of her “Gorgeous Grave-throbber” Tour

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REVIEW SUMMARY: The May issue of Lightspeed features two new and two reprint stories in both the science fiction and fantasy categories. This review covers the four stories being published for the first time in this issue. In addition to the short fiction, Issue 36 includes feature interviews with authors Karen Russell and Gregory Maguire and cover artist Giuliano Brocani.

MY RATING:

BRIEF SYNOPSIS: The fantastic original fiction offerings in this issue of Lightspeed emphasize relationships set against the backdrop of mythology, end of the world, and parallel universe scenarios.

MY REVIEW:
PROS: Unexpected outcomes; familiar story ideas examined through a new lens; satisfying endings; imaginative world-building.
CONS: The focus on relationships over science fictional or fantastical concepts may not be to every reader’s liking. One of the original works has some potentially disturbing imagery.
BOTTOM LINE: The May 2013 issue of Lightspeed, from an original fiction standpoint, is quite good and comes highly recommended from this reviewer. The authors do not shy away from weighty issues while offering up interesting backgrounds against which they allow their dramas to unfold. As these stories become available on the website it would be a shame to pass them up.

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And so it continues… Part 4 of The Raven’s Head Dagger and the Custom of the Seas.

What’s special about today’s free fiction?

1. Beneath Ceaseless Skies #121 – May 16, 2013
2. Electric Velocipede has a story from Val Nolan
3. Nature has some flash from Ken Liu

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Titan has posted the cover art and synopsis of the upcoming novel Ecko Burning by Danie Ware, sequel to Ecko Rising.

Here’s the synopsis:
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It’s almost a given these days, especially with fantasy books–you open up the front cover and an enormous map sprawls out before you, denoting various continents, kingdoms, murky forests, coastal ports, and all the other bits and jots composing the world. Sometimes these locales have colorful names, such as Shadowlands of the Dark Lord, Bottomless Pit of Apathy, and Do-Not-Go-Here-istan. Other times, they’re a gibberish of glottal coughs and apostrophes.

However they’re named, though, so often these maps and representative lands are simply indicative of where the story happens rather than what the story is about. They’re just a reference point for those readers who dearly want to know if the heroine’s quest to save a hapless prince from a dragon took her through the pleasant town of Orcsg’utyo’u or not.

What if we tried a different perspective? Let’s strap on our Boots of Anti-Blistering, grab a wizard’s walking stick, and head off across worlds where the geography is as integral to the plot as the main characters themselves.

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Over on the Kirkus Reviews Blog today, I take a look at an adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s At The Mountains of Madness.

From the article:

Published by Sterling, this volume adapts Lovecraft’s At The Mountains of Madness in a classic style reminiscent of Hergé’s Tintin.  In the story, Professor Dyer leads an expedition to Antarctica in September of 1930.  With a biologist, engineer, physicist and meteorologist, and a geologist on board, their mission is to take core soil and rock samples from areas of unexplored Antarctica, run tests, and report their findings back home.  By November, they enter McMurdo Sound, and the adventure begins.

Click over and check out the rest of the review.

Something’s very rotten on a sailboat in the middle of the North Pacific. I’ve got Part 3 of my contemporary fantasy novelette, The Raven’s Head Dagger and the Custom of the Seas. For those of you who like coming late to things, there’s a Part 1 and a Part 2 as well.

What’s special about today’s free fiction?

1. Tor has a story from George RR Martin’s Wild Cards shared world: “The Button Man and the Murder Tree” by Cherie Priest
2. Books One and Two from Christopher Buecheler‘s The II AM Trilogy
3. Books One and Two from Jay Swanson‘s The Vitalis Chronicles
4. Silvia Moreno-Garcia has posted the first chapter of her upcoming contemporary fantasy novel, Young Blood. Read it and then give her all your money (it’s crowdfunding, so that’s what you’re supposed to do)

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Mighty Mur Lafferty has a new book coming out called The Shambling Guide to New York City. It’s a fun and funny look at being human in the increasingly supernatural city of New York.

Here’s the official description:

A travel writer takes a job with a shady publishing company in New York, only to find that she must write a guide to the city – for the undead!

Because of the disaster that was her last job, Zoe is searching for a fresh start as a travel book editor in the tourist-centric New York City. After stumbling across a seemingly perfect position though, Zoe is blocked at every turn because of the one thing she can’t take off her resume — human.

Not to be put off by anything — especially not her blood drinking boss or death goddess coworker — Zoe delves deep into the monster world. But her job turns deadly when the careful balance between human and monsters starts to crumble — with Zoe right in the middle.

And here’s the trailer (and more goodies!)…
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Note: this review originally appeared on the blog of Starship Reckless, as part of a series in which Athena Andreadis discusses works of the contributors to The Other Half of the Sky.

by Athena Andreadis

Cat Rambo’s recent collection, Near + Far (Hydra House, $16.95 print, $6.99 digital), is a tête-bêche book containing 2×12 stories of wildly different lengths that previously appeared in such venues as Abyss & Apex, Clarkesworld, Clockwork Phoenix, Crossed Genres, Daily SF and Lightspeed.

Before I discuss the stories themselves, I’ll mention two secondary but important aspects of the book. One is the attention paid to the presentation; as one example, the text ornaments are almost distracting in their beauty. The other is that each story has an afterword in which Rambo gives its backstory and worldpath. Personally, I greatly enjoy such fore/afterwords (I still fondly recall Harlan Ellison’s needle-sharp, needling introductions) and find that they invariably deepen my understanding and appreciation of the tale – provided that the writer knows their craft. Which brings us to the content of the collection.
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Did you ever notice that some novels are extensions of (or based off of) shorter works of fiction? This week at the Kirkust Reviews Blog, I take at look at that very thing. I used this as an opportunity to interview Ted Kosmatka, Catherine Lundoff, Will McInrosh, Linda Nagata and Robert J. Sawyer — all of whom have novels that began life as short fiction.

See some of the challenges they faced over at the Kirkus Reviews Blog in When Short Fiction Grows Into a Novel.

You should all be grateful that I have a serialized story. That way I don’t keep mentioning my novel. Uh… oops.

What’s special about today’s free fiction?

1. Crossed Genres #5 – May 2013 – Escape
2. Tor has a story from Alex Bledsoe
3. Weird Fiction Review has a story from Kit Reed

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Another round of book cover smackdownery today…this time with a selection of blue-tinted space scenes.

Which is your favorite?

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In this video, promoting Robert Silverberg’s new eBook Releases, the author talks briefly about how the ancient myths helped him envision future worlds.
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Susie Hufford is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College & a freelance writer.

Lauren Beukes’ new novel The Shining Girls is a repulsive, and yet strangely addicting, read. It can’t be denied that Beukes has talent, and her talent shines brightest in moments when she engages the psyche of serial killer, Harper Curtis, as he grotesquely pulls the wings off a bee or contemplates stabbing out a child’s eyes. Shining Girls is pitched by the publisher as a combination of The Time Traveler’s Wife and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, but it’s not clear if those two excellent books ever should have combined forces.
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George R.R. Martin has posted the table of contents for his the upcoming anthology he co-edited with Gardner Dozois. It’s called Rogues and is their latest of “big cross-genre anthologies”:

Says Martin:

This one was an enormous amount of fun. We’re got something for everyone in ROGUES — SF, mystery, historical fiction, epic fantasy, sword and sorcery, comedy, tragedy, crime stories, mainstream. And rogues, cads, scalawags, con men, thieves, and scoundrels of all descriptions. If you love Harry Flashman and Cugel the Clever, as I do, this is the book for you.

If there’s any bloody justice, some of these stories will contend for awards.

Check out the star-studded table of contents:
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I’ve fallen on normal times and taken to serializing: The Raven’s Head Dagger and the Custom of the Seas.

What’s special about today’s free fiction?

1. Black Gate has a story from Vera Nazarian
2. Electric Velocipede has a story from Julie C. Day
3. International SF #4 – May 2013 available for download as an ebook

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Risingshadow has posted the cover and synopsis of The Whispering Swarm by Michael Moorcock, the first book in a new trilogy: The Sanctuary of the White Friars, coming soon (-ish) to a bookstore near you.

Here’s the synopsis:
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Adrian Barnes is the author of the novel Nod, published by Bluemoose Books and shortlisted for the 2013 Arthur C. Clarke Award. His next novel, Neverhasbeen, will be published in the spring of 2014.

You can learn everything you need to know about a society from its nightmares. Vampires, serial killers, werewolves, corporate bankers, demons, and zombies–the list of bogeymen is long and terrifying. Today, apocalypse is all the rage as writers of all stripes envision the ultimate end of…well, of everything. From The Walking Dead to Cormac McCarthy’s The Road to the upcoming World War Z, to my own recent novel, Nod, in which the end of the world as we know it arrives courtesy of an insomnia epidemic–apocalypses are everywhere you look.

And why not? Doomsday scenarios make for great entertainment. Death on speed dial, toppling skyscrapers, unfettered revenge, doomed love–at the end of the world every dramatic possibility is cranked up to the proverbial Eleven. It’s opera staged in a field of corpses.

A superficial analysis might lead one to diagnose either morbid fascination or self-hatred as the motivator for both the creation and consumption of such entertainments. But I disagree. In fact, I believe the driving force behind our lust for disaster is…hope.
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Analog has posted the table of contents for the July/August 2013 double issue:
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