sam

Sick of all these good reviews for Ian McDonald’s River of Gods yet? Me, I never tire of reading them. Here, Mark Teppo has a very insightful analysis on Strange Horizons:

“While the Indian intermingling of reality and mythology is an important part of the resolution of the novel (as well as being responsible for a great deal of the rich texture of the book), in River of Gods McDonald is also building at true 21st century novel, recognizing the growing influence of cultures other than the US in the global Weltanschauung…a dense, sprawling microcosm of a novel…it is the first book in a long time that I’m looking forward to reading again.”

Teppo’s review touches on similar points to those raised by Cheryl Morgan in the April issue of Emerald City when discussing 21st Century science fiction:

“21st Century SF … will concentrate on the future after the fall of the American economic empire. It will often be set in former Communist countries, and in countries now regarded as ‘Third World’ such as India and Brazil. The prevailing technology will be biological. Early examples of the sub-genre might be M. John Harrison’s Signs of Life, Geoff Ryman’s Air, and Ian McDonald’s River of Gods (not to mention the eagerly awaited Brasyl).”

And Jonathan Cowie has a word or two of praise for Michael Blumlein’s The Healer over on the Science Fiction and Fact Concatenation:

“While a work of art and fiction, it does speak of a whole profession, and a key one at that to our society both local and global. Few books do that.”

Update: Blogger William Lexner, on his speculative fiction reviews blog, I Hope I Didn’t Just Give Away the Ending, compares Ian McDonald to such “visionaries” as Samuel Delaney, J.G. Ballard, William Gibson, Vernor Vinge, Roger Zelazny, and Salman Rushdie. He writes that River of Gods is:

“…as complex as it is lush, as forbidding as it is human. …what awaits is the best science fiction novel of this newborn century; the most important SF novel that has been released in my 18 years of fandom.”

And thanks to William for the kind words about Pyr, which he describes as “a newcomer to science fiction publishing, but with River of Gods they gain instant credibility as a powerhouse in genre fiction.” You are making us all blush.

Mike Resnick is interviewed by Lee Barnathan over at SciFi Wire where he describes his recent short story collection, New Dreams for Old, as “probably the best of the eight books” he has slated for release this year. New Dreams contains 20 short stories, most of them recent work and many of them award nominees and winners. You can read the full interview here.

From J-W Staff Reports:

Thursday, June 15, 2006

Kansas University’s Oread Books plans a book signing featuring 10 noted authors of science fiction and fantasy on July 8.

The authors attending the book signing will include Lou Anders, Robin Wayne Bailey, Bradley Denton, James Gunn, Kij Johnson, Frederik Pohl, Pamela Sargent and George Zebrowski. They will be joined by two additional authors, the to-be-announced recipients of the 2006 John W. Campbell and Theodore Sturgeon Awards.

The book signing takes place in conjunction with the annual Campbell Conference and its John W. Campbell and Theodore Sturgeon Awards. The Campbell Conference is the concluding event of the yearly Writer’s Workshop and the beginning of the Intensive English Institute on the Teaching of Science Fiction, through the Center for the Study of Science Fiction at KU.

The event begins at 12:45 p.m. in the Oread Books lounge in the Kansas Union. It is free and open to the public.

Rich Horton has some nice things to say about Chris Roberson’s Paragaea over on SFSite:

“This new novel is old again. That is, it’s quite explicitly, indeed exuberantly, in the mold of planetary romances such as Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Mars books, Alex Raymond’s Flash Gordon serials, and Leigh Brackett’s work. And, as the author reminds us, the television series Land of the Lost. Chris Roberson also includes buried references to many other SF books, and he grounds his story in at least vaguely (if not very) plausible speculative science. The end result is quite a lot of fun… I enjoyed myself, and I enjoyed and cared for the characters. Roberson has produced some excellent short fiction in the past few years, and this book (his second novel) suggests he will be producing engaging longer works as well. “

Rob Benford does as well over on SFFWorld:

“Chris Roberson thrusts readers into a fantastic world, both familiar and original in its sense of wonder. Very often throughout the story, he hits the reader across the face with scenes eliciting a feeling of, ‘Wow, look what he did here! No, wait, don’t miss this either!’ I found myself thinking this throughout most of the book, enjoying each tidbit of SFnal goodness Roberson put into the story… While Roberson definitely echoes many of his genre predecessors, the sense of lost/forgotten technologies coupled with the blurred line of technology and magic also reminded me of a couple of recent novels, Tobias Buckell’s Crystal Rain and Keith Brooke’s Genetopia. Roberson manages to pay homage to his literary predecessors while maintaining a strong sense of modern sensibility and keeping pace (and often outpacing) his contemporaries… I want to read more about this strange, fascinating, and slightly recognizable world. Much of his fiction is linked and part of a cohesive universe, not unlike Moorcock’s Multiverse. This is good news indeed, because I would love to hitch a ride on a return trip to Paragaea.”

And Julie Haves over at the Science Fact and Science Fiction Concatenation e-magazine seems to like our first season novel, Fiona Avery’s The Crown Rose:

“A charming and believable, though fantastic, novel encompassing love, romance, war, political intrigue and the legendary order of the Knights Templar…a wonderful, magical, entertaining, heart-warming and tragic novel. It is a breath of fresh air, a truly original work which is a great pleasure to read.”

And, at the same e-mag, so does Sue Griffiths:

“What sets the book apart from many a historical work of fiction is the balance of intrigue, mysticism and romance. Another interesting addition to the book is the author’s notes at the end, explaining where she received the inspiration for her characters, who the real historical figures were and how the author researched events of the period of history her book is set in. The author’s interpretation of what life was like in that era is well pieced together, and while the mysticism in the book is a welcome change from a straightforward historical drama, it is also to the writer’s credit that it is not something that is overplayed, and therefore does not detract from other characters or the events in the story.”

David Louis Edelman, author of the upcoming novel Infoquake (available for pre-orders on Amazon.com, Booksense, and Barnes & Noble) is one of the founding members of a new group blog called DeepGenre. Edelman is joined by fantasy novelists Kate Elliott (Crown of Stars and the Novels of the Jaran), Katharine Kerr (Dragonspell, the Deverry novels), and several others. The blog debuts today.

Meanwhile, Chapter 5 of Infoquake has been posted online, with two new original illustrations by Josef K. Foley. Also new online is the background article on orbital colonies, including a list of major settlements and a brief history of offworld colonization.

Edelman will be appearing at next month’s Readercon SFF convention in Burlington, Massachusetts from July 7-9, and the 64th annual WorldCon SF Convention in Anaheim, California from August 23-27. More Infoquake news available at www.infoquake.net

The June 12, 2006 issue of Publishers Weekly has some very nice things to say about Joel Shepherd’s upcoming novel, Crossover: A Cassandra Kresnov Novel:

“Set in the far future, Australian author Shepherd’s energetic debut introduces Cassandra Kresnov, an experimental killer android-with-a-heart who has defected from her League Dark Star special ops assignment. Graced with a yen for human art almost as insatiable as her libido, Kresnov first tries to melt anonymously into Tanusha, the sybaritic capital of Callay, a planet of the League’s galactic archenemy, the Federation. But Cassandra can’t leave her martial past behind when she’s caught up in a heroic struggle to protect the Callayan president from assassination by Federal forces. Shepherd’s intriguing heroine and strong female characters bode well for this projected series. Lacing Cassandra’s search for identity and acceptance with plenty of hand-to-hand combat and racy sexual exploits, Shepherd also convincingly presents vividly realized ethical dilemmas: what happens to soldiers when the war is over? can a culture that opposes the artificial manufacture of life accept its creations? Shephard grapples with some genuinely thought-provoking questions on the nature of humanity.”

Just a quick note to say that we’ve added PayPal buttons to all the individual Pyr book pages in our current catalog. Now purchases can be made direct from parent company Prometheus Books, who are offering a 20% discount off the cover price to customers who order via PayPal. As always, the usual suspects of online merchant options are also offered: Amazon, B&N, Books-a-Million, and Booksense.

Over at the Agony Column, Rick Kleffel has just posted his thoughts on David Louis Edelman’s Infoquake, forthcoming from Pyr this July. Kleffel sees Infoquake as fitting into the tradition of Frederick Pohl and C. M. Kornbluth’s classic The Space Merchants, and being in the company of Cory Doctorow’s Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom and Charles Stross’ The Family Trade:

“Edelman, Doctorow and Stross are, like all great science fiction writers, not really writing about the future. They’re responding to the present, and in the present, economic science is driving societal decisions every bit as much as any hard-science technology. In fact, economics drives the hard science, in that we only get the technologies that look profitable. Edelman’s vision in this regard is particularly sharp and particularly on-point. There’s a certain amount of satire going on here, but Edelman is quite serious about his world, which makes it all the easier to invest in his characters and settings. “

Kleffel has already opinioned elsewhere that Infoquake “will be one of the most praised first novels this year.” Meanwhile, Edleman continues to podcast chapters from his novel, post excerpts, and grow his fascinating background articles about the Infoquake world. (Oh, and completely unrelated, he blogs about his recent trip to France.)

Here is the final cover design for Joel Shepherd’s Crossover, coming out this August. The artwork is by Stephan Martiniere with design by Jacqueline Cooke. (When clicking to enlarge the image, right click and open the image in a new window to avoid the frames here.)

Crossover is the story of Cassandra Kresnov, an artificial person struggling to find a new life away from the war with which she has grown disillusioned. Tobias S. Buckell (Crystal Rain) recently described it as “an awesomely zesty adventure set amongst a nicely realized multiethnic future. A blast to read.”

Update: You can see the original illustration, sans text, here on Stephan’s website.