1) John W. Campbell Memorial Award Finalists: The John W. Campbell Memorial Award nominations have been announced. To be well read in the best SF and fantasy of 2011, pretty much all you need to do is read these 11 novels.

2) British Fantasy Awards: The short list for the British Fantasy Awards has been announced. Some of the nominees are familiar to American audiences, but some works haven’t been published here yet.

3) A Wool Movie?: Fox has acquired the movie rights to Hugh Howey’s breakout indie publisher sensation Wool. Ridley Scott is currently attached to the project, which should make any sci-fi fan sit up and take note.

4) Cthulhu for Everyone!: If you’re a Lovecraft fan, this is especially for you: an exhaustive listing of books that pay homage to the founder of American eldritch literature. Frightening or funny, it’s all on this list.

5) Spooky or Jokey? 10 Favorite YA Fantasies: Here’s a great reading list for teens’ summer reading.

6) Nightmare Magazine Kickstarter: John Joseph Adams and Creeping Hemlock Press team up to kickstart a new Horror magazine.

Gene of Isis

Traci Harding’s Gene of Isis, the first book in her MYSTIQUE trilogy, is about three related women in three different time periods who have descended from the Grail kings: Ashlee Granville, an independent young woman who is unhappy about being on the “marriage market” in 19^th century England; Dr. Mia Montrose, Ashlee’s 21^st century descendent who is an expert in ancient languages; and Lillet du Lac, a 13^th century priestess who is fighting the Catholic Church. Each woman has clairvoyant talents and is drawn to a mountain that contains ancient mysteries and is the source of these women’s psychic gifts.

The first part of the book reads like one of those Regency romances where the enlightened (and in this case pagan) heroine wishes she was a man so she could pursue her real interests, but is instead stuck in a hell of petticoats, needlepoint, proper etiquette, and silly banter with shallow eligible bachelors. Yuck.

I stuck it out, though I was bored out of my mind, hoping that Gene of Isis would get better when we got to Mia’s story. But after Mia translates a cryptic message on an ancient tomb, the story quickly devolves into an alternative Christian history very similar to The Da Vinci Code — there’s a murder mystery, Mary Magdalene and Jesus were clandestinely married and had children, Jesus wasn’t actually crucified, there’s a secret order and an unknown Gospel of Mark, the communion bread and wine are really… well, never mind. I won’t give it all away, but when the heavily-foreshadowed vampire showed up, I’d had enough. I’ve seen this before, I didn’t enjoy it then, and since I was already bored with Gene of Isis and didn’t care what happened to any of the characters, I realized I was torturing myself for no reason. I quit after reading 35% of the book.

Gene of Isis is written well enough, and I’m sure there’s a willing audience for this story. It’s just not me. The reader of the audio version I listened to didn’t help. Edwina Wren has a pleasant voice, but when she read Ashlee’s POV (which was most of what I listened to), she sounded as bored and cynical as I felt. It wasn’t at all a bad performance, and was likely exactly what Traci Harding intended for the character. However, it just served to remind me that I was bored with Gene of Isis.

Dust

If Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes met Philip Pullman’s The Golden Compass in the world of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, you might end up with something like Arthur Slade’s YA novel Dust. Or at least, you might end up with the basic premise, setting, and tone and style. Falling short of these classics is no great fault, but unfortunately I’d say Dust falls a bit short even in less rarefied company. It isn’t a bad book by any stretch — it is in fact quite solid and has some lovely moments — but overall it fell a bit flat for me… Dust has a likable main character and a very intriguing setting, and though the style and plot are a bit mixed, it leans more to the positive side than the negative. It is, however, one of those YA books that is really best read and enjoyed by that YA audience, as opposed to one with more crossover adult appeal. Read the rest.

Rachel Aaron: 2012 has been a really exciting year for me! In February, Orbit released an omnibus edition of my first three books with some really fantastic new cover art, and in June, the long awaited fourth ELI MOONPRESS book, The Spirit War comes out! The series will end with the fifth and final book, Spirit’s End, which comes out in November 2012 (and has an amazing cover).

Danielle Ackley-McPhail: I’m happy to announce that after over a decade since the original publication of Yesterday’s Dreams (Book 1 in the ETERNAL CYCLE Series) Dark Quest Books is re-releasing Yesterday’s Dreams and Tomorrow’s Memories (Book 2) leading up to the release of the never-before-published Today’s Promise, the final book in the trilogy. The ETERNAL CYCLE series follows Kara O’Keefe. Twenty-three years old, first-generation Irish-American, and a young prodigy on the violin, Kara has had to set aside her dreams of a musical career to help provide for her family as her father battles cancer for a second time. When she pawns her heirloom violin she discovers her magical heritage as forces both good and evil are drawn to her magical nature. As she struggles with a personal journey of self-discovery events draw her into a battle older than time. Today’s Promise and the entire series will be launching Memorial Day Weekend in Baltimore, at Balticon.

Alma Alexander: Lots of news! Newest novel out, Midnight at Spanish Gardens — I will be doing readings and signings for those at the Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park in Seattle on May 19 and at Village Books in Bellingham WA on June 12 so come along to those if you’re nearby. The anthology I edited and am very proud of, with a “map of contents” and not a common or garden table of contents, is out from Dark Quest Books, and is a great collection of stories — check it out. New ebook — now released in the USA for the first time, Embers of Heaven, the follow-up to my Secrets of Jin Shei, with a paperback edition to come soon. And to be re-released as ebooks first and then paperback editions, my YA WORLDWEAVERS trilogy… with a book 4 and 5 to follow VERY SOON (book four is now in the final stages of polishing up…) Also, I have stories in anthologies Absolute Visions and Scheherezade’s Facade, and also in Beyond Grimm, an ebook anthology by Book View Cafe, where my contribution has garnered special mention. ALSO, if you have an e-reader, check out my “Triads” collections — mini-anthologies of three themed short stories per “book” — five currently available in the Amazon Kindle store and at Smashwords (for all other ereader platforms).

Alex Bledsoe: The fourth EDDIE LACROSSE novel, Wake of the Bloody Angel, comes out in July. The second in the series, Burn Me Deadly, just came out in mass market paperback, and the third, Dark Jenny, will be out soon. Both include preview chapters of the new novel. I’ll also be attending (and paneling) at WisCon later this month in Madison, WI.

Blake Charlton: I’m in the final stretch of medical school! Only 4.56 months left to go. (Not that I’m counting… or anything.) Then I’ll have time to finish Spellbreaker, which will be the third and last book of the SPELLWRIGHT trilogy. Because of my unusual schedule through school, I’ll get from September to July completely free of the hospital to write. I’ve also had enough time to start putting the framework together on my fourth novel. But more about that later… possibly much later…

Stephen Deas: The Warlock’s Shadow (sequel to The Thief-Taker’s Apprentice) is coming out in mass-market paperback a month from now. Right now I’m also giving away a lot of books on my website with a new book up for grabs every two or three days. These are some of my own titles and some others off the Gollancz list.

Chris Evans: I’ll be at Balticon in Baltimore, MD on May 25 through 28 doing panels, a signing, and otherwise enjoying the convention. The mass market edition of the third and final book in the IRON ELVES series, Ashes of a Black Frost, comes out in September in North America. The Russian edition of A Darkness Forged in Fire just came out as did the German edition of Ashes.

Justin Gustainis: My novel Evil Dark, the second in the OCCULT CRIME UNIT INVESTIGATIONS series (although I like to call them the HAUNTED SCRANTON books), was released on April 24th, in both paper and digital versions. Stan Markowski, detective on the Scranton Police Department’s Occult Crimes Unit has a lot to worry about these days. Someone has been making “snuff” films in which a demon-possessed person is forced to torture and slaughter an innocent victim. Furthermore, someone in Scranton has been abducting witches and burning them alive. The two cases can’t possibly be connected — or can they?

Kevin Hearne: I’m very grateful that readers have embraced the IRON DRUID series with such enthusiasm. Tricked, my latest book, debuted at #11 on the NY Times Best Seller list.

Jim C. Hines: The goblin books will be coming out in omnibus form in July as The Legend of Jig Dragonslayer, which should be fun. Then in August, my book Libriomancer launches a new series, which follows a librarian from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula who can pull things from books. (Including a certain fire-spider from the goblin series.) Also, we’re getting a new kitten named Taz.

Matthew Hughes: I’ve had two books out lately: Costume Not Included, the second in the TO HELL AND BACK urban fantasy series about an autistic actuary who fights crime with the aid of a rum-swilling demon who used to work with Al Capone; and (under my pen name Hugh Matthews) Song of the Serpent, a media tie-in novel set in the Pathfinder Role Playing Game world of Golarion, about a rogue named Krunzle the Quick who is sent on a quest to bring back a tycoon’s runaway daughter. I’ll also have a Dying Earthesque story in the July-August issue of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, “Wearaway and Flambeau,” about a thief who gets mixed up in a duel between two wizards. I’ll be at VCon in Vancouver in September, where one of my stories — maybe even “Wearaway and Flambeau” — will be transposed into a radio-style script and performed by the Pallahaxi Players Readers Theatre.

L.E. Modesitt Jr: Princeps  –  the fifth book of THE IMAGER PORTFOLIO — will be released on May 22nd, and I’ll be appearing at the Gaithersburg Book Festival [Gaithersburg, MD] on Saturday, May 19th, and then I’ll be the writer Guest of Honor at OASIS in Orlando, FL, May 25-27th.

Janny Wurts: Here’s a new interview with me on The Author’s Connection. I will be a guest at three upcoming conventions this summer: OASIS (Orlando Florida, May 25-27), LibertyCon (Chattanooga TN,  July20-22), DragonCon (Atlanta GA, laborday weekend). I have Contracts just in for: Italian translation of Curse of the Mistwraith, Daughter of the Empire (collaborated with Ray Feist) is going to be translated into Chinese, which makes a total fourteen languages, worldwide. I have signed up for Audible’s program for authors, which means any sale of any one of my audio books (Stormwarden, Keeper of the Keys, Shadowfane) from now till year’s end gives me an author’s bonus of a dollar — this is available to all Audible authors, many have already signed up. Any with Audible titles who have not, check it out!

We’ll be back with more news next week!

The Arm of the Stone

… Originally published in 1998, The Arm of the Stone by Victoria Strauss was re-released in 2011. I was not familiar with her work before but was greatly impressed by this book. Strauss takes a standard heroic quest fantasy but embeds it in a deeply detailed world that is fascinating in its complexity. Strauss manages to write a book that can be read at two levels simultaneously. First, you have an excellent fantasy quest novel… Secondly, this book is a great discussion on the nature of power and its corruptive forces… I highly recommend this book as an example of epic quest fantasy that goes beyond sword slinging and mind magic. Strauss masterfully accomplishes a detailed, thought-provoking work of epic fantasy that has something to offer for everyone. I will be seeking out the second book in this duology to finish the story of Bron, Liliane and Goldwine to see what will happen next in this expertly crafted world. Read the rest.

The World Inside

… The World Inside (1971) is a thoughtful look at what life on Earth might be like if our population ever reaches the level where we need to grow vertically instead of horizontally. I was fascinated by Silverberg’s Urban Monads where everything that’s necessary for life is in one building, and where blocks of floors represent different classes and cultures. But what I liked best about The World Inside was the idea that, because dissidents are sent down the chute, possessiveness, rebellion, jealousy, and other forms of social strife have been selectively bred out of the human population. Perhaps it would be possible for future humans to be happy in an Urban Monad, but 21^st century readers will be horrified by Silverberg’s setting… In the end, the plot didn’t hold together, but I still enjoyed the setting and many of the ideas in The World Inside, so I didn’t feel like it was a waste of my time. The World Inside was nominated for, but didn’t win, the Hugo Award in 1972. I listened to Audible Frontier’s version which is almost eight hours long and is read by Paul Boehmer, who did a great job with the narration. If you’re going to read The World Inside, I recommend the audiobook. Read the rest.

Ajjiit: Dark Dreams of the Ancient Arctic

Note: This has been published in Canada, but not the USA.

Ajjiit: Dark Dreams of the Ancient Arctic, by Sean Tinsley and Rachel Qitsualik, is a collection of fantasy short stories based on Inuit myth and culture. It isn’t often I come across wholly unfamiliar fantasy backgrounds, creatures, or images and it really was a pleasure to wander through the utter strangeness of these stories. They took me places I didn’t expect to go: not to the snowy arctic landscape I imagined, but instead deep underground or even, in one story, to the moon for one of the weirder competitions I’ve seen.

And Tinsley and Qitsualik introduced characters I hadn’t expected to meet: not the polar bears and seals and fishermen I anticipated, but rather half-wolves, crystalline-like cavern dwellers and sword-carrying bee creatures. Though indeed, form is something many of the characters and creatures can don at will, becoming something other than what they began as, and that sense of formlessness, of constant lurking change adds to the sense of both wonder and eerie danger.

The stories are often deliciously dark and sorrowful. Some are true horror stories, but most are more complex and richly tapestried. Even those that end well have a bite to them, are more bittersweet than happy, and many deal with loss in some manner or shape. A few have a bit of a traditional twist to them at the end, but I can’t say I saw where most of them were going. Even the one story I thought was a bit predictable in its close was no less satisfying for its expected ending.

Part of that is due to the language, which I thought was a strength throughout and could probably be best characterized as an arch-formal sort of high fantasy prose, formal in style and word choice and serious in tone, as in this description of one of those form-changes mentioned above:

Now the Qallupiluq dreamt, and it dreamt of her form. Such dreams were not entirely of the Human, for these ran like roots into the veiled Land — that unseen Land which governs even the sea — where they drew upon timeless wells of Strength…  It seemed the Qallupiluq was very still for a time, perhaps even asleep, and when the chimera again moved, it stood upon Human feet.

Passages are also dotted liberally, as one can see, with wholly unfamiliar Inuit names and terms. Some of these were clear from context, but I confess at times I groped a bit toward meaning and while it didn’t hinder the reading, I wouldn’t have minded a glossary at the end to have a better sense of some of the vocabulary. And while the high tone works well through each individual story, the collection could have done perhaps with a bit more variety in style. I wouldn’t, for instance, have minded a bit more humor.

The stories in Ajjiit are also enhanced by Andrew Trabbold’s black and white drawings interspersed throughout, some simply evocative and others downright creepy. Which is, as mentioned, appropriate for many of the tales. They are, as stated, based at least loosely on fairy tales and folklore, but these are much more like the original folktales of the Brothers Grimm and not their lighter Disney-fied versions. There is death in numbers large and small, a little gore, and some real menace, as when an abusive Inuit husband tells his wife:

“You know what we say when we don’t like a hunter, Suqqivaa?” he asked her. “We say I should take him seal hunting. That’s what we say.”

Suqqivaa felt the gooseflesh arise on her skin at the murderous references… “Would you like that old wife? Would you like me to take you seal hunting?”

This threat is all the more frightening as it is so concretely realistic, based in the all-too human world of wife killing than the distanced fantasy realm.

As with any collection of stories, some of the nine are stronger or weaker than others, but I can’t say any were truly weak. There wasn’t one I didn’t enjoy, though I had a few favorites, such as the one set on the moon or that involving the strange crystalline underground dwellers. I have to imagine that the well of Inuit folklore is barely tapped with Ajjiit, and would happily pick up a second such collection in the future. Recommended.