First review is of Aliette de Bodard’s magical Aztec murder mystery Servant of the Underworld:

Part murder mystery, part well-researched historical novel and part fantasy… The fantasy element blends neatly with the other parts.
4****

Next up is Lavie Tidhar’s steampunk romp, The Bookman:

The juicy backstory is unfolded by Tidhar, making it a key part of what makes the narrative so compelling… skilful, clever and highly enjoyable.
4****

Temple Library Reviews

When Marc Gascoigne was asked to set up a new imprint of Harper Collins, he knew he wanted to seek far and wide for authors. He wanted an international cast of characters. So he asked writers he’d worked with when he was with The Black Library to give him the names of writers they respected in their own countries.

Matthew Farrer, a Warhammer 40,000 novelist, included me on his list.

From there, I nervously emailed Marc to tell him I had three novels and he asked me to send him proposals for all three. His response to the proposals was to ask for sample chapters and his response to the sample chapters was to ask for full manuscripts.

That was a nervous time, waiting for his final response.

Then I got an email, telling me that Angry Robot would buy all three novels. I had to get my husband to read the email for me, to check I wasn’t dreaming!

Read the full interview here.

Today they followed up with a review of Kaaron’s first book, Slights:

Perhaps one of the most disturbing psychological horror stories imbued with withering decadence and written as a memoir. This story haunted me and froze my blood in a manner I have yet to encounter.

Talking of Slights, Bookish Ardour tells us:

Sometimes I finish reading a book and I swear it’s like I’m shell shocked. I’m dazed, I don’t want to talk to anyone, I don’t really want to listen to anyone. I feel like I’m stuck in some sort of limbo that only happens after certain stories. The thing is, it’s not always the story that leaves me shell shocked, but that the story is over…

The story actually deals with a lot of death, and hints at some pretty obscene and horrific acts, and yet in all that darkness I found quite a sense of humour. I don’t usually laugh when I’m reading. I’ll smile, maybe, but not laugh and I did with this one. I think the character Stevie is great and hilarious even though she is so crude. I even had to write down some of the lines because they entertained me so much.

Over at Fantasy Book Critic Ian Whates’ fabulous fantastical adventure (and brilliant debut) City of Dreams and Nightmare is reviewed:

“City of Dreams & Nightmare” grabs you pretty much from the first page and then you really do not want to put it down since it just twists and turns and the threads following the main characters above are all deftly handled with very smooth jumps and several crucial interludes following the “true movers and shakers” of the novel…

Highly recommended as a strong A and a fun, page turning sff adventure that will enchant all fans of such.

Falcata Times has just reviewed Lavie Tidhar’s The Bookman:

Angry Robot is fast building a reputation for bringing new talent alongside the less explored area’s of fiction to the fore. With this offering, they not only give the reader a new area to explore but a unique and novel storyteller to the masses…

Not only an interesting read but also one that leads the reader to ask more questions than is answered within the text supplied… A promising start and I hope that the follow-ups are just as interesting.

Slights - the fabulously dark and disturbing debut from Kaaron Warren – has been nominated (and shortlisted) for yet another award!

Congratulations, Kaaron! 

This time it’s a finalist in the Best Long Fiction category in the 2009 Australian Shadows Awards – given annually by the Australian Horror Writers’ Association. 

The winner will be announced on April 5th.

It’s a fascinating interview, and well worth 10 minutes of your time.

Amazon.com: Are there forms of fantastical or horror fiction that lend themselves more readily than others to religious issues?

Maurice Broaddus: I think horror naturally lends itself to religious issues. The first question I get asked is how I can be a Christian and write horror. The total depravity of man (if you want a Calvinistic loaded phrase), the nature of good and evil, the mystery of the afterlife, unseen spiritual forces (like angels or demons), or the meditation on mortality/our fear of death. So it was not hard to get thoughtful works of horror from the likes of Brian Keene or Kelli Dunlap.

Fantasy works just as well. It’s the world of Tolkien, Lewis, L’Engle, and MacDonald. Though, it seemingly is the form that more readily lends itself to allegory, which, when not done well, is little more than thinly veiled propaganda. That being said, we used a lot of contemporary and urban fantasy in the anthology, from Mary Robinette Kowal and Ekaterina Sedia to Jay Lake and Jennifer Pelland.

One might think that science fiction would seem to be the one least likely to lend itself to religious themes, with the (false) opposition between science and religion. Yet Mary Doria Russell’s The Sparrow was an amazing book. And Gary Braunbeck goes dark science fiction in his tale for the anthology.

Maurice’s King Maker is out now in the UK, and his Dark Faith anthology (co-edited with Jerry Gordon) is available from Apex Publications in May.

First up, another great review of The Bookman – this time, from The Mad Hatter’s Bookshelf and Book Review:

One of the fascinating aspects of Steampunk is how authors alter the timeline and introduce historical characters, which The Bookman has in spades. The story starts off a bit sedately, but quickly moves into something all action oriented with nary a slow spot. The world building is immense as Tidhar has warped history into something altogether wonderful and exciting, which also shows the authors great love for the written word and the power it can convey.

While over at Dark Wolf’s Fantasy Reviews, author Lavie Tidhar is grilled (in the questioning sense, not culinary):

M(DW): I read that you define your writings as weird fiction. Why an attraction towards the weird? Why do you define your works as weird fiction?

LT: I can’t really answer the why of it. I just tend to have this skewered way of viewing the world, I guess. The thing is, I like writing different things, mixing different genres, trying different approaches, and the only common denominator for them is the “weird”, is that they’re all kind of skewered. But I’d hate to be stuck in one single genre or sub-genre or whatever. I still want to write a cookbook! And I have this dream of one day writing a Mills & Boon romance…

And the first review of Matt Forbeck’s hi-octane scifi adventure, Amortals is already in, courtesy of the Writing and Reading blog:

It’s gripping, exciting, imaginative… It would could make a great film, but it’s a great book anyway so read it, whether you like scifi or not!

Amortals is out next month in the UK and Australia, and June in the US and Canada.

Have a great Friday.

Once during a week-long writers’ conference where I was one of the instructors, the faculty gave a reading and afterward did Q&A with the audience. One person asked me when I write, and I truthfully answered that I was working on a scene for my novel right then. Everyone in the audience laughed, but I was serious. I’d only been half paying attention to what my fellow faculty had been saying. The rest of my mind was busy working on story stuff, as usual.

Don’t forget, Dead Streets is out today in the UK, and will hit the streets in Oz as soon as the plane touches down.

Also out today, Ian Whates’ superb fantasy City of Dreams and Nightmare and Maurice Broaddus’ fantastic urban fantasy, King Maker.

King Maker is gathering momentum, and is already being touted as potentially some people’s book of the year. Author Adam Christopher has this to say:

probably the first true urban fantasy… 

Broaddus’s story is grim and gritty, a world of gang crime, guns and drugs. The characters of the King Arthur legends are wonderfully and originally transposed to this setting… King Maker is a fascinating novel, a true urban fantasy in the literal definition of the term, and with assured prose and strong characters, should be on every SF fan’s shelf.

For Guy Adams’ wonderful, “insane and exciting” The World House:

Another pearl within this brilliant narrative is Sophie. Whenever the story is told from her perspective, it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. She has a special way to see and think about the world, you’ll see…

if you enjoy strange and bizarre tales and especially if you love Neil Gaiman’s work and wonder what his tales would be like on a bad trip, get yourself a copy of The World House

from DailySteampunk.com (although the book isn’t Steampunk, of course).

Moving across to Tim Waggoner’s Nekropolis:

this is still a blood [sic] good book, and you’re unlikely to read anything else like it. It will make you grin with delight and make you want to visit the strange world of Nekropolis. It’s the perfect travel-guide

(from Stanley Riiks). Remember: the sequel – Dead Streets – is published in the UK tomorrow!)

Lateral Books seems to like Lavie Tidhar’s steampunk romp, The Bookman:

His writing is easy on the mind, and deceptively smooth. His vision is surprising, and intricate within a simplistic frame. There’s a lot of nods to popular steampunk inspirations, and plenty of opportunities for you to chuckle at his references and the marvellous way he weaves his references into his novel. And it even has pirates, too. I mean, it has it all. Except ninjas. For now.

Angry Robot keep pushing the boundaries of fantasy and scifi. They have an incredible eye for what works and what doesn’t, and… they work to surprise you with a depth and creativity you know has been slowly dwindling from fantasy and scifi.

Aww, shucks… Now you got us all a-blushing.

Booksquawk, reviewing Aliette de Bodard’s Servant of the Underworld tells us that

de Bodard weaves a substantial air of magic and wonder into her narrative.

And genre powerhouse, Elizabeth Bear says of it:

Her characters are engaging, and (based on my limited knowledge) her worldbuilding and research seem absolutely impeccable… a fascinating look at a culture and setting rarely used in modern fantasy.

Dan Abnett’s swashbuckling yarn, Triumff: Her Majesty’s Hero gets a once-over at WarpCore SF:

Abnett’s verbal fencing is a delight. He’s one of the few writers who can go on for five pages about rain, and still have you hooked like a salmon on a crack-dosed worm.

Triumff invites inevitable comparisons with Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books, thanks to its Britishness and highbrow humour… Although the gags are often cheesier, the slapstick dafter and the puns more outrageous, this novel is easily in the same league as Pratchett, or indeed of any other comic fantasy author.

Writer Gareth L Powell has just enjoyed Lauren Beukes’ Moxyland:

Lean, sharp, and tightly written, Moxyland keeps raising the stakes, from the opening chapter to the uncompromising finale. And with its electronic panopticon, it gives us a dystopia to rival 1984 or Stand On Zanzibar – a future horrifying for its very plausibility.

That’s all for now!

The premise of King Maker is simply awesome

Maurice Broaddus’ writing creates a dangerous and authentic mood. The language is fierce and evokes the gritty realism of life on the streets. When the supernatural elements are introduced, they drift through the novel like smoke, leaving the reader gradually horrified as the end game is reached.

the dialogue is very effectively written

all of [the characters] are written in shades of grey

For some, King Maker is going to be the best read of 2010.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that the reviewer adores this book as much as we do, but she doesn’t. As she is someone as far removed from Indianapolis gangland life as you can possibly get, she found the dialogue difficult to get through at times, and there are a few “extremely gruesome scenes” that she had difficulty in reading, but the interesting thing about this review is that, although the reviewer didn’t particularly enjoy the read, she acknowledged that “sometimes you just don’t ‘fit’ with a book” and that she has “the sneaking suspicion that other readers will love this book.”

She’s right. As a former book reviewer for several magazines, I know how important it is for the right person to read a book for review – no point, for instance,  in giving a visceral horror to a paranormal romance aficionado, no matter how great the title, they won’t enjoy the ride.

So, it’s refreshing to find a review from someone who didn’t particuarly gel with a title, and find that they don’t blame the book, nor themselves, but the synergy between the two.

And for what it’s worth, we’ll take a negative – but well-rounded –  review such as the one above, over an overtly positive but nothing-to-say review, all the time.

Oh, and King Maker is in the shops this Thursday – but before you go buy a copy, just re-read the comments quoted above, from a reviewer who didn’t fit with the book. Yeah, you want a copy…

EP: You’ve said previously that the human form of dark fiction is your favourite. What is it about this that fascinates you?

KW: I’ve never really been able to answer this question. My fascination is almost instinctive, it really is. I prefer a bad ending in a story to a happy one, perhaps because there is more surprise that way.

I’ve spoken before about a story which resonated with me when I was a child, about a young man murdering his sister. I can still remember the way it was described; her skull cracked open. These are the stories I remember and want to write about.

And for those of you (and there are many) looking forward to Andy Remic’s next installment in the Clockwork Vampire Chronicles, we’ll have a promotional video to show you very soon, but for now, enjoy this teaser poster for Soul Stealers.

SF Crowsnest have just reviewed Moxyland:

…a chilling, effectively written novel.

Actions have repercussions, good guys don’t always win and there are no easy answers. This uncertainty builds real tension as the novel progresses towards its climax, as the various strands of reality weave around each other and the relentless minimalism of Beukes’ style evokes an oppressive atmosphere to match that hanging over the city. A tension leading to an utterly terrifying scene in which the police deploy biological weapons as a crowd-control measure.

The uncomfortable question ‘Moxyland’ raises is whether it’s truly terrorist to oppose a system which no longer recognises the rights of its individual citizens. There is a line between terrorist and freedom fighter, that much is clear but when does it get drawn and who gets to do the drawing?

Read the full review here.

Then go buy Moxyland (currently on special offer (£3.99) at Play.com) – you’ll thank yourself.