Saturday, August 31, 2013

Wanted Dispatch Aug 31 And a look back in shame....

First will come a reprise of what should have been posted last week ... No technical problems just honest me problems and it was a pretty great week of books to get overlooked so here is my look back in shame...

 

The Exodus Towers by Jason M. Hough

This is the second book is the pretty marvelous Dire Earth Cycle. Jason writes with all the vigor and hunger as a Old Man's War era Scalzi in this story about a decimated earth where an mysterious alien artifact arrives in out near future giving us both apparently an elevator to the stars and soon there after a potently virulent 28days later for lack of a better word zombie like plague that gets called SUBS. The first book in this series, The Darwin Elevator came out in July and the third, The Plague Forge, is due out in September and if the first third of this novel is any indication things have gone way beyond the fire for the characters that thought they have gotten out of the frying pan only mostly scorched. These stories are so well told I really want to go back and read sci fi that does not fall into a sub genre category again because Mr. Hough has mixed and matched things so well that I can compare this to so much, the heroes are akin to those hard puckers written about by Joss Whedon you know the ones on that firefly class ship, the setting has both a corrupt corporate cyberpunk feel and a what is really going on here mystery akin to Alastair Reynolds, Asimov and Bradbury. I may be giving this too hard a sell but I am enjoying these books too much to not.

Here is a short story set in this univers to give you a taste... The story has action adventure to spare but his characters at the heart of it are relateable ... even the ones you hate... And here is a link to an excerpt of The Darwin Elevator... Enjoy

 

Crux by Ramez Naam

This is another sequel to a previously well recieved book; I do not recall who on the SF Squeecast talked about Nexus last year but my handy look up skills (yeah right google did all the work) tell me it was none other then one of my favorite writers Elizabeth Bear. Having yet to read the first one from my recollection this was a near future thriller that is what cyberpunk may have become if it had not disappeared in the early nineties. This is a novel written by a computer scientist who has written on the reality of biological enhancement and has recieved awards for his exploration of real Transhumanism. His fictional work has been praised by Elizabeth Bear who I think has written the definitive modern Bionic Woman story ( Hammered), by Cory Doctorow, Hannu Rajaniemi, and Scientific American. To me this looks like again a return to a fiction style abandoned before its time and updated... I have to read Nexus first but Crux is high on my list of to reads..... Here is a link to the Angry Robot Books site so you can check it out too... And here is a link to the amazing SF Squeecast where you can check out the books they Squeed about including Nexus... Hopefully Crux will be among the cast choices next year....

Sherlock Holmes The Stuff of Nightmares by James Lovegrove

James Lovegrove has been on my reading radar since before his highly popular Godpunk series of novels from Solaris books; I still have my yet to be cracked copy of Escardy Gap by James Lovegrove and Peter Crowther from back in 1996... um maybe that is not such a good thing to reveal about me but James has been a successful author for a good while. The Godpunk books his is recently gained notoriety for have drowned my attention but as a fan of interpretations of the redoubtable Holmes this book has my full attention. The really sad thing is or the really happy thing is depending on how you look at it is that I read Chuck Wendig's blog like an addict and this showed up this week... Titan publishing is below "some people's" radar (read my usual source) but thankfully not below Chuck. Here is a link for you to check out the interview with James and hopefully it hooks you as it does me.

For those of you wanting a synopsis here it is from Titan books...

It’s the autumn of 1890, and a spate of bombings has hit London. The newspapers are full of fevered speculation about anarchists, anti-monarchists and Fenians. But one man suspects an even more sinister hand behind the violence. Sherlock Holmes believes Professor Moriarty is orchestrating a nationwide campaign of terror, but to what end? At the same time, a bizarrely garbed figure has been spotted on the rooftops and in the grimy back alleys of the capital. He moves with the extraordinary agility of a latter-day Spring-heeled Jack. He possesses weaponry and armour of unprecedented sophistication. He is known only by the name Baron Cauchemar, and he appears to be a scourge of crime and villainy. But is this masked man truly the force for good that he seems? Is he connected somehow to the bombings? Holmes and his faithful companion Dr Watson are about to embark on one of their strangest and most exhilarating adventures yet.

 

Time of Contempt

Time of Contempt by AndrzejSapkowsk

Ok, wow I wish I had tied to find all the promotional work for this last week when it was about to come out. People were at least talking about the first two I was spotlighting but this one is kind of hard to find. It is a sword and sorcery series from Eastern Europe that has spawned several game franchises and has several novels that can be found in multiple languages around the globe. Ok yes it fits the white haired amoral swordsman archetype to a tee but based on my reading of the books I picked up in the Netherlands a couple years ago its pretty good Sword and Sorcery all gaming hype aside. I would hope that grim dark fantasy fans might give this series a go because its a good deal of fun and its well told.

 

 

 

On to the week of the 3rd of September ...

 

The Grim Company by Luke Scull

This is a book that has been getting a bit of buzz and having read the prologue and a bit more I can understand it. The feel of the bits I have gotten through remind me of my first excursions into the world of Erikson's Malazan; this is a world where there is great magical potential but it has come at a great price. Some reviewers have been critical of this work because of its grim tone but others have said that if its the last hurrah of the Joe Abercrombie's its a worthy read so I'm totally onboard and Penguin were nice enought to gift me a copy so you all can expect a review shortly. Its written by a video game plotter and that is what it may be but taking the prologue as a guide I think this looks like a very good first novel... I have hopes...

Here is the book synopsis...

The Gods are dead. The Magelord Salazar and his magically enhanced troops, the Augmentors, crush any dissent they find in the minds of the populace. On the other side of the Broken Sea, the White Lady plots the liberation of Dorminia, with her spymistresses, the Pale Women. Demons and abominations plague the Highlands.

The world is desperately in need of heroes. But what they get instead are a ragtag band of old warriors, a crippled Halfmage, two orphans and an oddly capable manservant: the Grim Company.

23 Years on Fire by Joel Shepherd

This is another series of novels that take up the mantle of cyberpunk nd run with it in the same vein as Elizabeth Bear's Hammered series. Joel has written three previous novels in this series that are all available from the great PYR books and I am so glad that he has written a fourth one. To me the novels have a bit of a Eastern European overtone but that may just be me... I love Cassandra Kresnova in the same way I love the Black Widow from Marvel comics... there is small comparison but where the characters is written well she is great...

Here is a link to the PYR page for it and a bit of the synopsis...

Cassandra Kresnov-a highly advanced hunter-killer android-returns to face down a rogue government's plot to eliminate free will.

Commander Cassandra Kresnov has her hands full. She must lead an assault against the Federation world of Pyeongwha, where a terrible sociological phenomenon has unleashed hell against the civilian population. Then she faces the threat from a portion of League space known as New Torah, in which a ruthless regime of surviving corporations are building new synthetic soldiers but taking the technology in alarming directions.

On the Torahn world of Pantala, Sandy encounters betrayal, crisis, and conspiracy on a scale previously unimaginable. Most challenging of all, she also meets three young street kids who stir emotions in her she didn't think she was capable of. Can the Federation's most lethal killer afford unexpected sentiment? What will be the cost if she is forced to choose between them and her mission, not only to her cause, but to her soul?

Chimes at Midnight by Seanan McGuire

For fans of Urban Fantasy I would hope that mentioning Seanan McGuire and her new novel but as a fan myself of her, her fiction and her podcast I have to gush and squee a bit. I have been a fan of her Toby stories for a couple of years and think she is one of the most entertaining writers in the genre right now, no offence to Chuck Wendig and Stephen Blackmoore whom I consider Noir fantasy and well there is always Brn Aaronovitch too but really I do really enjoy the fae worlds of Seanan McGuire. To be honest I'm a couple books behind but Chimes at Kidnight is on my buy the week of release list. Seanan is one of the creators of the SF Squeecast and a super sweet woman who talks a lot about ending the world...

Here is the book synopsis for this volume

Things are starting to look up for October "Toby" Daye. She's training her squire, doing her job, and has finally allowed herself to grow closer to the local King of Cats. It seems like her life may finally be settling down...at least until dead changelings start appearing in the alleys of San Francisco, killed by an overdose of goblin fruit.

Toby's efforts to take the problem to the Queen of the Mists are met with harsh reprisals, leaving her under sentence of exile from her home and everyone she loves. Now Toby must find a way to reverse the Queens decree, get the goblin fruit off the streets--and, oh, yes, save her own life, since more than a few of her problems have once again followed her home. And then there's the question of the Queen herself, who seems increasingly unlikely to have a valid claim to the throne....

To find the answers, October and her friends will have to travel from the legendary Library of Stars into the hidden depths of the Kingdom of the Mists--and they'll have to do it fast, because time is running out. In faerie, some fates are worse than death.

Seanan is up for the Hugo this year for her novel Blackout written under the pen name Mira Grant.... Go Sea... Um Mira.... Ok so yes I want Saladin to win I Loved Throne of the Crescent Moon forgive me... Or at least kill me fast....

 

Happy Hour in Hell by Tad Williams

I'm so exited about this book for all the wrong freaking reasons... I have yet to read the first book Dirty Streets of Heaven and am stupidly basing much of my excitement on this on my love of the Castiel character on Supernatural but in all my reading of synopsis and reviews this is the book out there for those of us who like him. Ok yes it silly and such but I really want this to be the print version of the dark angel story without all the gods assassin thing I liked so much in Hellblazer. Anyhow all my silly thoughts aside the people who have written about the Bobby Dollar series have said great things and I will be reading it as soon as I can get time... With all the other great things out there these days...

Here is a bit of add copy to egg you on too... Till the next season of Supernatural... I hope Meg made it somehow....

I’ve been told to go to Hell more times than I can count. But this time I’m actually going.

My name’s Bobby Dollar, sometimes known as Doloriel, and of course, Hell isn’t a great place for someone like me — I’m an angel. They don’t like my kind down there, not even the slightly fallen variety. But they have my girlfriend, who happens to be a beautiful demon named Casimira, Countess of Cold Hands. Why does an angel have a demon girlfriend? Well, certainly not because it helps my career.

She’s being held hostage by one of the nastiest, most powerful demons in all of the netherworld — Eligor, Grand Duke of Hell. He already hates me, and he’d like nothing better than to get his hands on me and rip my immortal soul right out of my borrowed but oh-so-mortal body.

But wait, it gets better! Not only do I have to sneak into Hell, make my way across thousands of miles of terror and suffering to reach Pandemonium, capital of the fiery depths, but then I have to steal Caz right out from under Eligor’s burning eyes and smuggle her out again, past demon soldiers, hellhounds, and all the murderous creatures imprisoned there for eternity. And even if I somehow manage to escape Hell, I’m also being stalked by an undead psychopath named Smyler who’s been following me for weeks. Oh, and did I mention that he can’t be killed?

So if I somehow survive Hell, elude the Grand Duke and all his hideous minions and make it back to the real world, I’ll still be the most hunted soul in Creation. But at least I’ll have Caz. Gotta have something to look forward to, right?

So just pour me that damn drink, will you? I’ve got somewhere to go.

 

Sunday, August 25, 2013

Wanted dispatch...d

As I worked a full day on Saturday and I need a day to pull the cool that is next tuesday together I will post my dispatch Monday... I will apologize for the delay... There is good stuff a coming and I would ask forgiveness for my lateness.. Its a good week a coming...

 

Sunday Comics Aug 25 2013...

This week's Sunday comics choices are both written by Cullen Bunn and one sadly is on the soon to be gone list.

Venom which stars one time bully and long time Spiderman fan Flash Thompson as the symbiot host and darker edged hero trying to do the right thing, fighting his deep personal demons and the influence of Venom. The book goes from self seraching personal drama to frenetic action featuring webs, guns and bombs with repercussions for both the personal and superhero conflicts in Flash's life. The recent storyline has him setting up himself in the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia, where heroes are scarce and a villain named Lord Ogre has free reign. Starting a new life after his failures in the big apple Flash takes up residence and to the streets as a hero for the people who have no spandex wearing defender.

Flash was crippled in the war on terror and lives life in a wheel chair when not sharing his body with the alien symbiot, he's a coach for a local highschool and seems a man trying to make up for a past he regrets. He's the kind of character I particularly love, much like Jamie Lannister of Game of Thrones he is a man though we know has done bad things he has a code of morals when seen from his point of view as readers we can get. Like so many of the heroes in Marvel that I love he is not a first stringer, he is a character who's past informs his present and will shape his future; he is not Peter Parker who carries the weight of being an icon, Flash gets to be a person beyond the brand of being a brand like Spider-Man or X-men.

The the most recent run of issues have culminated in paranoia on Flash's part, superpowered mercenaries and assassins running roughshod over Phliiy looking for the bounty on Agent Venom's head and his contactes in Philly as Venom are seeking information on the new hero. In his many attempts to be the hero he idolizes Flash inadvertently has created another spawn of the Venom symbiot and gained a "sidekick" in the teen girl now called Mania. The art by Declan Shalvey is unique, dynamic and characterful and may not be to everyone's tastes but I personally love the fresh approach to action. His strengths lie in the expressiveness of the characters faces and when the symbiots are out and in action its a whole new SFX ball game much like Cameron's The Thing for the eighties. Vemon is a book that has action adventure and drama in spades and I'm sad that it will be a memory come November... Both Rick Remender's and Cullen Bunn's runs on this unappreciated book are available to Marvel Ultimate subscribers but if you do check it out get it from a local friendly comic shop.

 

I've mentioned Fearless Defeneders before but since I want this all "life on the d list" marvel women title to survive the current cull that seems to be going on in the second stringer title family at the new excellent house of ideas. This is a superhero comic that is part Big Trouble in Little China with its crazy Hong Kong cinema approach to action and fast forward adventure and part Farscape with its modern media reference points and snappy sarcastic dialogue. Cullen pulls on the whole catalogue of Marvel heroines with this bringing back long sadly ignored characters like the onetime apprentice of Dr Strange Clea and the one time Nextwave monster hunter Elisa Bloodstone. Issue seven was a Valkerie centric episode that used a trip to the Viking afterlife to bring home the perils of the afterlife and reintroduce Clea who I forgot I totally missed and issue eight was a Big Trouble in Marvel little China with a Brood influenced twist.

Fearless defenders spotlights characters that need more so called screen time. Misty Knight has been knocking around the Marvel universe for so long as their version of the bionic woman its great to see her shining as well as seeing Danille Moonstar being more then just another mutant and Brunhild just as a female Thor replacement. These issues are at their best when Cullen is giving us their everyday non-fighting lives. With Journey into Mystery ending next month I need a title like this to get a bit more fan love.

I love these kinds of titles; the Hero's for Hire, the Defenders, the thrid stringers, the d listers; their stories usually involve change that remains with them. Marvel carries stories forward... I say this because of the so called new 52. DC has long been known to push the reset button on stories for the time of the end of the first Crisis in 1985. I loved Crisis and what came after bit as time has gone on their predilection to push the rest button has become a crutch for DC editorial see the recent posts about the new Lobo ideas. Marvel has committed lots of bad summer and yearly events and summer crossovers and the debacle of the clone saga... What I will commend Marvel for the their embracing the past stories and create lemon aid from lemons. I would love the opportunity to read stories I could not afford to own and these days with Marvel Unlimited I can read them... History matters to Marvel so far and this I respect. I know someday Cyclopse will be the golden boy of Xavier and Magneto will be the enemy but there will hopefully be someone who recalles when he was the bad guy... Checkout Venom and Fearless Defenders... They are in sore need of fans... And Marvel loves telling stories these days....

 

Sunday Comics Aug 25 2013...

This week's Sunday comics choices are both written by Cullen Bunn and one sadly is on the soon to be gone list.

Venom which stars one time bully and long time Spiderman fan Flash Thompson as the symbiot host and darker edged hero trying to do the right thing, fighting his deep personal demons and the influence of Venom. The book goes from self seraching personal drama to frenetic action featuring webs, guns and bombs with repercussions for both the personal and superhero conflicts in Flash's life. The recent storyline has him setting up himself in the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia, where heroes are scarce and a villain named Lord Ogre has free reign. Starting a new life after his failures in the big apple Flash takes up residence and to the streets as a hero for the people who have no spandex wearing defender.

Flash was crippled in the war on terror and lives life in a wheel chair when not sharing his body with the alien symbiot, he's a coach for a local highschool and seems a man trying to make up for a past he regrets. He's the kind of character I particularly love, much like Jamie Lannister of Game of Thrones he is a man though we know has done bad things he has a code of morals when seen from his point of view as readers we can get. Like so many of the heroes in Marvel that I love he is not a first stringer, he is a character who's past informs his present and will shape his future; he is not Peter Parker who carries the weight of being an icon, Flash gets to be a person beyond the brand of being a brand like Spider-Man or X-men.

The the most recent run of issues have culminated in paranoia on Flash's part, superpowered mercenaries and assassins running roughshod over Phliiy looking for the bounty on Agent Venom's head and his contactes in Philly as Venom are seeking information on the new hero. In his many attempts to be the hero he idolizes Flash inadvertently has created another spawn of the Venom symbiot and gained a "sidekick" in the teen girl now called Mahem. The art by Declan Shalvey is unique, dynamic and characterful and may not be to everyone's tastes but I personally love the fresh approach to action. His strengths lie in the expressiveness of the characters faces and when the symbiots are out and in action its a whole new SFX ball game much like Cameron's The Thing for the eighties. Vemon is a book that has action adventure and drama in spades and I'm sad that it will be a memory come November... Both Rick Remender's and Cullen Bunn's runs on this unappreciated book are available to Marvel Ultimate subscribers but if you do check it out get it from a local friendly comic shop.

 

I've mentioned Fearless Defeneders before but since I want this all "life on the d list" marvel women title to survive the current cull that seems to be going on in the second stringer title family at the new excellent house of ideas. This is a superhero comic that is part Big Trouble in Little China with its crazy Hong Kong cinema approach to action and fast forward adventure and part Farscape with its modern media reference points and snappy sarcastic dialogue. Cullen pulls on the whole catalogue of Marvel heroines with this bringing back long sadly ignored characters like the onetime apprentice of Dr Strange Clea and the one time Nextwave monster hunter Elisa Bloodstone. Issue seven was a Valkerie centric episode that used a trip to the Viking afterlife to bring home the perils of the afterlife and reintroduce Clea who I forgot I totally missed and issue eight was a Big Trouble in Marvel little China with a Brood influenced twist.

Fearless defenders spotlights characters that need more so called screen time. Misty Knight has been knocking around the Marvel universe for so long as their version of the bionic woman its great to see her shining as well as seeing Danille Moonstar being more then just another mutant and Brunhild just as a female Thor replacement. These issues are at their best when Cullen is giving us their everyday non-fighting lives. With Journey into Mystery ending next month I need a title like this to get a bit more fan love.

I love these kinds of titles; the Hero's for Hire, the Defenders, the thrid stringers, the d listers; their stories usually involve change that remains with them. Marvel carries stories forward... I say this because of the so called new 52. DC has long been known to push the reset button on stories for the time of the end of the first Crisis in 1985. I loved Crisis and what came after bit as time has gone on their predilection to push the rest button has become a crutch for DC editorial see the recent posts about the new Lobo ideas. Marvel has committed lots of bad summer and yearly events and summer crossovers and the debacle of the clone saga... What I will commend Marvel for the their embracing the past stories and create lemon aid from lemons. I would love the opportunity to read stories I could not afford to own and these days with Marvel Unlimited I can read them... History matters to Marvel so far and this I respect. I know someday Cyclopse will be the golden boy of Xavier and Magneto will be the enemy but there will hopefully be someone who recalles when he was the bad guy... Checkout Venom and Fearless Defenders... They are in sore need of fans... And Marvel loves telling stories these days....

 

Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Mind fcuk

Mind Mgmt is a subversive comic, it is a comic that plays with the idea that people can manipulate one another at a subconscious level to frightening levels. Matt Kindt has written and drawn a comic that plays on the same weaknesses and fears that the novel Lexicon by Max Barry and the movie In the Mouth of Madness plays upon; the basic question of if you can not trust your sences, if at the subconscious level you can be lies to what can you trust. As a reader and a watcher I love this kind of existential horror and with a book like Mind MGNT and John Carpetner's Mouth of Madness I'm totally onboard because the characters are relateable and compelling. Don't get me wrong I loved Lexicon by Max Barry but it's best elements were the ideas, the concepts that drove the tale and here it is the neat Xmen like characters that are the force that gives power to the ideas. If the mind is mailable and can kill with concepts Mind MGMT imagines a world where it happens and where few people use this power to its most powerful aspect, among the privileged few who know of its existence.

Ming MGNT is a world of psionic powers and conspiracy gone corporate, gone viral, and been broken up before a catastrophe. It is a place where subtle powers like telepathy predicts the near future, where ad copy can influence the actions of others more then is the real world and. A select few can erase memory with a whim and kill just by sending a letter with a silly haiku or by pointing their fingers and saying bang. This is a would a mystery crime writer named Meru finds herself living in in Mind MGMT vol 2 and the one I fell into reading it. She is a thriller writer who is failing to writer her promised new novel because of reoccurring thoughts about stories and conspiracies that involve her mailman and letters and such. These worrying thoughts lead her down a rabbit hole that lead to murder, danger and a man named Lyme, people who played with others minds and killed because they could till the Eraser came along.

This is a book highly reminiscent of the eighties comic and RPG Espers written by Mage writer Matt Wagner when he posited a story about characters with ESP powers in the modern paranoia spy driven world of the paranoid eighties. These days its not the red menace that is the fear element but fear is a big element in modern post 2000 lifeline and Matt Kindt taps into that in this comic with its water color highlighted primative lined art and its look over your shoulder storytelling. Given its somewhat amnesiac protagonist and the deceptive nature of the heroes I am still guessing as to the nature of the real story. Yes I came in at the opening of the second act and myself may be Rosenstern but I can hardly tell hero from villain. This is a caper tale where as readers we are forced to be astute and pay attention to the whole picture if we hope to understand the story.

Along the course of this story our reporter heroine Meru encounters many potential allies in her quest to tell the story; her savior Lyle, a man who may not be worthy of her full trust bet is fighting for a bigger goal and seems to be getting the sharp end of the stick, Duncan who seems a sociopath but may just be the tales hero, Perrier who is the most used by the old power who has the most to gain by taking Meru's side and is the most worthy of vengeance and Dusty who well has a lot lose and the most to protect. In the end Matt leaves you with a heroine you still want to follow heroes to root for and villains to despise but your not really sure of things. This is a great overall caper tale like that of Inception the movie in that he end though clear may not be so clear and the story has angles yet to persue. The villain the Eraser is still out there and if we get her/his tale next who knows where the story will go. I like this kind of thing that plays havoc with expectations and makes you wonder though you think you know the story... I'm laughing in the cinema seats with the doomed hero in this one like at the end of Mouth of Madness... At least that is the end I hope for... Its dark but well truth is a darkness sometimes...

If you like mind f7cking stories Mind MGMT may be for you its a great caper bringing the band back together tale.... Excelsior

Mind MGMT by Matt Kindt is a densely packed caper story that has much in common with the thriller Lexicon by Matt Barry I can't help but wonder, but that is the human mind looking for connections (cause and effect) where no conspiracy or link exists. Dropping into this complex mind and memory manipulation tale blind in volume two was no hindrance to understanding the story and getting the characters. It is really more a mix of Xmen and Lexicon since each of the characters has a special ability like being able to read others thoughts, seeing and feeling through their twin or knowing how to twist someone unseen through words an images an addition o being trained today with people's minds on a subconscious level.

Here is the link to the compilation of the issues that make up this compelling and engaging volume. I connected with the characters in this volume wether their motivation was telling a tale, survival or revenge. I liked so much of this story and think its a better verion of the Xmen then the Xmen, the players have extraordinary powers but it is delt with so realistically. This is a book a hope has a great conclusion.

 

Sunday, August 18, 2013

Sunday Comics

Wolverine by Paul Cornell is one of those titles... you know the ones it is one you want to love and you like and tickles the right spot just enough that you can't give it up. Last issue I did like but at almost 4 dollars I should love it to continue but because of something I just can't say indeed to stop NOW. Paul is pulling from Marvel history in a way I love; he is tapping into the old Mike Golden Micronauts,the old Frankenstein titles and delves into Logan as a character and not Wolverine as an ICON. It is totally a book I would not balk at 2.99 but at 3.99 I think it always has to prove itself and this issue does it in spades.

Alan Davis is back on the art so it is a feast for the eyes and the emotion in the issue comes out of the corners to hit you as a reader. Wolverine 8 is a winner in terms of story and art renewing my trust in the title... I want so much to love this title that I may be clouding my own opinion but I think its totally up to the task of living up to its price. Black Panther has not looked better in a long time and Logan has not been as sympathetic; he has been for so long a man who's pain has come with little consequence and this issue points our the realities of being Wolverine from several angles because of all the various players in the story including Black Panther, Victoria Frankenstein and several others. I love the fact Paul is thinking about the real emergent behavior of being the Wolverine or having access to resurrection or rebirth or super science... Its a smart book a dim so sad people may have checked out before this happened. I am still on the hook for this one. Thanks Paul for the thinking mans Marvel Comic.... Of yeah could we please have a Victoria Frankenstein mini series written by Deconnick and Cornell.....

Excelsior....

 

Saturday, August 17, 2013

The Dispatch skipped a week so.....

Assault on Sunrise by Michael Shea

Michael Shea has been known for his sword and sorcery and horror influenced speculative fiction tales since the eighties and though his published work can be hand to find it is well respected and award winning. Assault on Sunrise is the sequel to his novel Extras that posited a California where petroleum signed on to deadly dangerous reality shows that was by all reports delightfully dark and cynical in its treatment of a dystopic future Hollywood. This novel promises to pick up with the survivors of Extras and pitch them into more deadly mayhem. Tor.com has an excerpt here and its is something worth a read if B movie grindhouse is your kind of thing. I'll be waiting for a softcover of this but its one one of the titles I missed when I skipped the second week of releases for August last time around...

Elysian Fields by Suzanne Johnson

Not I will be honest here I have this one awaiting me as an electronic file from net galley and I missed getting to it before it hit the shelves last week. It is urban fantasy set in New Orleans and promises historical serial killers, an undead Pirate and necromancy in the pitch black perfect setting for UF to be a good time. I have yet to get to reading it but the pitch alone has my interest...

The mer feud has been settled, but life in South Louisiana still has more twists and turns than the muddy Mississippi.

New Orleanians are under attack from a copycat killer mimicking the crimes of a 1918 serial murderer known as the Axeman of New Orleans. Thanks to a tip from the undead pirate Jean Lafitte, DJ Jaco knows the attacks aren’t random—an unknown necromancer has resurrected the original Axeman of New Orleans, and his ultimate target is a certain blonde wizard. Namely, DJ.

Combating an undead serial killer as troubles pile up around her isn’t easy. Jake Warin’s loup-garou nature is spiraling downward, enigmatic neighbor Quince Randolph is acting weirder than ever, the Elders are insisting on lessons in elven magic from the world’s most annoying wizard, and former partner Alex Warin just turned up on DJ’s to-do list. Not to mention big maneuvers are afoot in the halls of preternatural power.

Suddenly, moving to the Beyond as Jean Lafitte’s pirate wench could be DJ’s best option.

So whole I am waiting for the next Delilah S Dawson and Chuck Wendig novels the above may just have to keep me company...

And speaking of those her are some great covers for your approval....

 

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Wanted and World Fantasy

Well, I made a bit of a mistake and jumped a week of book releases this last Saturday with my Wanted Dispatch.... I'll hit up the books that came out today soon but the World Fantasy award list is up and its got a few of my favorites including The Drowning Girl by Caitlìn R Kiernan, The Killing Moon by N K Jemisin, Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson and the collection Jagannath Stories by Karen Tidbek to name a few...

 

Novel

  • The Killing Moon, N.K. Jemisin (Orbit US; Orbit UK)
  • Some Kind of Fairy Tale, Graham Joyce (Gollancz; Doubleday)
  • The Drowning Girl, CaitlĂƒn R. Kiernan (Roc)
  • Crandolin, Anna Tambour (ChĂƒ´mu)
  • Alif the Unseen, G. Willow Wilson (Grove; Corvus)

Novella

  • “Hand of Glory,” Laird Barron (The Book of Cthulhu II)
  • “Let Maps to Others,” K.J. Parker (Subterranean Summer ’12)
  • The Emperor’s Soul, Brandon Sanderson (Tachyon)
  • “The Skull,” Lucius Shepard (The Dragon Griaule)
  • “Sky,” Kaaron Warren (Through Splintered Walls)

Short Story

  • “The Telling,” Gregory Norman Bossert (Beneath Ceaseless Skies 11/29/12)
  • “A Natural History of Autumn,” Jeffrey Ford (F&SF 7-8/12)
  • “The Castle That Jack Built,” Emily Gilman (Beneath Ceaseless Skies 1/26/12)
  • “Breaking the Frame,” Kat Howard (Lightspeed 8/12)
  • Swift, Brutal Retaliation,” Meghan McCarron (Tor.com 1/4/12)

Anthology

  • Epic: Legends of Fantasy, John Joseph Adams, ed. (Tachyon)
  • Three Messages and a Warning: Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic, Eduardo JimĂƒ©nez Mayo & Chris N. Brown, eds. (Small Beer)
  • Magic: An Anthology of the Esoteric and Arcane, Jonathan Oliver, ed. (Solaris)
  • Postscripts #28/#29: Exotic Gothic 4, Danel Olson, ed. (PS Publishing)
  • Under My Hat: Tales from the Cauldron, Jonathan Strahan, ed. (Random House)

Collection

  • At the Mouth of the River of Bees, Kij Johnson (Small Beer)
  • Where Furnaces Burn, Joel Lane (PS Publishing)
  • The Unreal and the Real: Selected Stories Volume One: Where on Earth and Volume Two: Outer Space, Inner Lands, Ursula K. Le Guin (Small Beer)
  • Remember Why You Fear Me, Robert Shearman (ChiZine)
  • Jagannath, Karin Tidbeck (Cheeky Frawg)

Artist

  • Vincent Chong
  • Didier Graffet and Dave Senior
  • Kathleen Jennings
  • J.K. Potter
  • Chris Roberts


Special Award—Professional

  • Peter Crowther & Nicky Crowther for PS Publishing
  • Lucia Graves for the translation of The Prisoner of Heaven (Weidenfeld & Nicholson; Harper) by Carlos Ruiz ZafĂƒ³n
  • Adam Mills, Ann VanderMeer, & Jeff VanderMeer for the Weird Fiction Review website
  • Brett Alexander Savory & Sandra Kasturi for ChiZine Publications
  • William K. Schafer for Subterranean Press

Special Award—Non-professional

  • Scott H. Andrews for Beneath Ceaseless Skies
  • L. Timmel Duchamp for Aqueduct Press
  • S.T. Joshi for Unutterable Horror: A History of Supernatural Fiction, Volumes 1 & 2 (PS Publishing)
  • Charles A. Tan for Bibliophile Stalker blog
  • Jerad Walters for Centipede Press
  • Joseph Wrzos for Hannes Bok: A Life in Illustration (Centipede Press)

The Life Time Achievement Award will go to Susan Cooper and Tanith Lee

Saturday, August 10, 2013

Wanted Dispatch Aug 10...

This next week is pretty spare but has a couple things that are on my list... and little surprise here they are mostly short story collections....

The Year's Best Dark Fantasy and Horror edited by Paula Guran

For me the lineup of amazing short story authors is enough to see me on the collection. Laird Barron and Jeffrey Ford both write excellent and chilling weird fiction, Caitlìn R Kiernan has become one of my favorite one of my go to authors for modern dark fantasy after reading The Drowning Girl, adding in the queen of steampunk in my opinion,Genevieve Valentine, and the ever excellent Ekaterina Sedia, Joe Lansdale and... And .... And. Ok, run on and on sentence aside just reiterating the name s there with my insufficient adjectives to describe them is not a great endorsement for this collection so I will leave it at this, if you like darker moodier weirder folklore influenced fiction this is most likely the collection you should be getting this summer. Here is a link to Prime Books where you can see the complete contents and the source where they came from...

 

 

Tell My Sorrows to the Stones by Christopher Golden

Christopher Golden has worked in many genres including being one of the writers known for horror invited to write stories about Hellboy by his creator Mike Mignola. He's an accomplished author of novels and short stories and has been part of collaborative books with some of the best writers around so its a wonder I have read so little of his work. The fine people at ChiZine are publishing something that sounds very cool... Here is the synopsis...

A circus clown willing to give anything to be funny. A spectral gunslinger who must teach a young boy to defend the ones he loves. A lonely widower making a farewell tour of the places that meant the world to his late wife. A faded Hollywood actress out to deprive her ex-husband of his prize possession. A grieving mother who will wait by the railroad tracks for a ghostly train that always has room for one more. A young West Virginia miner whose only hope of survival is a bedtime story. These are just some of the characters to be found in this story collection. Introduction by Cherie Priest.

In addition on of the great perks about buying direct from ChiZine on the day of release (Aug 15) if you send them a copy of your real or electonic receipt you get to choose two of their other ebooks to get for free.

 

Celestial Inventories by Steve Ransic Tem

This is yet another collection by ChiZine of dark fantasy short fiction. Steve's name is familiar to me, I know I have seen itin many magazines over recent years and I may well have read his work but based on the synopsis of this he is someone who I really should be aquatinted with. Here is a link to the ChiZine site and the synopsis for your reading pleasure....

Celestial Inventories features twenty- two stories collected from rare chapbooks, anthologies, and obscure magazines, along with a new story written specifically for this volume. All represent the slipstream segment of Steve Rasnic Tem’s large body of tales: imaginative, difficult-to-pigeonhole works of the fantastic crossing conventional boundaries between science fiction, fantasy, horror, literary fiction, bizarro, magic realism, and the new weird. Several of these stories have previously appeared in Best of the Year compilations and have been the recipients of major F & SF nominations and awards.

Ok seems this is the extent of the things I am hankering to purchase this next week... Never will I have the time to read all the great books I would have if I got them all...

Take care

 

Sunday, August 4, 2013

Sunday Comics...aug 4

Catalyst Comix... By Joe Casey and a cast artists....

Once upon a time Dark Horse Comics started a series of superhero comics refered to as Comics Greatest World; the world was populated by such characters as X,Ghost, Motörhead to name just the few that occur to me the fastest but there were many more. This was a setting hat survived a while and was cool in many ways but in the morass of the superhero glut it got lost and buried in the mass of the mediocre. Writers are returning to these concepts and characters today and I for one hope that with the new reality of comics they can gain an audience.

There are some great current writers and some writing stars of years past that are writing in this setting that traders should be looking farther afield from Marvel these days for good superhero stories. There are reasons I exclude DC and it has to do with my taste and my dissatisfaction with the new 52stable. I will say I loved Frankenstein and the agents of Shadow, Demon Knights, Dial H, Justice League Dark and the Simon Baz Green Lantern but on the whole the new DCU falls totally flat for me especially the big three they are worth nought these days and the new standard is the greatness is the old house of ideas.... Marvel.

Marvel currently has the writing of people who have ideas and artists nat are given the free reign to draw to their strength. Captain Marvel is about the best of the stable these days followed closely by Hawkeye and Daredevil. To me an OLD comics fan its like the early eighties when DC has a couple good books considered c level titles and Marvel and the Indys had the lead in storytelling. This is where I will talk about the cool that is Catalyst Comics #1

This issue introduces us to the heroes and stories of a world which has survived a cosmic apocalypse of Lovecraftian proportions. Among the three tales we get a superman like tale of the single superhero against the cosmic horror but with consequences and emotional baggage, we get the story of the possible cause and solution to the crisis in the first back up story and in the last we set a bringing the band back together story in a superhero vein. This book makes me wish I had picked up the Deconnick Ghost series because I love her writing on Captain Marvel and Hopeless's title for Dark Horse too. These are titles that may hall beneath the usual superhero collectors radar but these tales are just as good as the big two.... I was a long time fan of the Elementals and this stable have the feel of the old First comics.... Take a look they are not the big guys but they are no less for it.

Along the same line I have to point out the Zenith comics project from kickstarter that needs support. Its a comics fan that wants to bring the light back to the grim dark that has swallowed the comics world. Here is the link to the project. I read the script for the first issue and it looks to be as good as the feat of things on the shelf and worthy of sharing the space with them. It has a great pedigree and I hope to see it as a reality.. Take a look let me know what you think....

Take a look to at Catalyst, Ghost, X Captain Midnight from Dark Horse... If there are more super hero comics the ones put there will get better .... I dug the first issue of Catalyst and will be adding the second to my pull list....

 

Personal thanks...

Hey everyone I wanted to extend a personal thank you to people who read my comments weekly... Since i get few comments I don't know any of you but I totally appreciate anyone who visits... Thank you for your attention... I have more things in the works.... Take care all ... Excelsior....

Greg

Saturday, August 3, 2013

Wanted Dispatch Aug 3...

Wrath-Bearing Tree by James Enge

James Enge's stories of Morlock Ambrosius have pretty much renewed my love of sword and sorcery short fiction and remind me of my first encounters with the works of Moorcock and Leiber. Guile of Dragons, the first novel in this series, recounted a bit of the early life and the origins of Morlock his life among the Dwarves as a foster child and his early encounters with dragons that we almost his undoing. I have been anxiously awaiting this second volume and it will be at the top of my to read pile when I get a copy. You can go here to check out m review of the novel The Wolf Age here, its a novel I feel the need to re read anytime I think about it.

Here is the synopsis for this one

The masked powers of Fate and Chaos are killing gods in the land of Kaen, facing the Wardlands across the Narrow Sea. Vocates AloĂª Oaij and Morlock Ambrosius cross into the unguarded lands, seeking to uncover the reasons for the godslaying, and to avert any threat to the lands the Graith of Guardians has sworn to protect. After crash-landing on the hostile coast of Kaen, the two Guardians confront vengeful frightened gods, a calmly murderous dragon, a demon called Andhrakar, and a bitter old necromancer named Merlin Ambrosius. Amid these dangers they find that they can trust no one but themselves—and each other.

The Thinking Woman's Guide to Real Magic by Emily Croy Baker

Here we are again with the here is an author I know nothing about BUT I have interest in reading this; working in an Indybookshop I have two coworkers who read this as an ARC and are both exited that it was finally coming out that it is on my reading list. This is an author who's writing that is compared to Lev Grossman and Deobrah Harkness both of whom I now to be deft writers.... Its on my to read list whence I have a chance. Here is the synopsis...and a link to the publishers page.

Nora Fischer’s dissertation is stalled and her boyfriend is about to marry another woman. During a miserable weekend at a friend’s wedding, Nora wanders off and walks through a portal into a different world where she’s transformed from a drab grad student into a stunning beauty. Before long, she has a set of glamorous new friends and her romance with gorgeous, masterful Raclin is heating up. It’s almost too good to be true.

Then the elegant veneer shatters. Nora’s new fantasy world turns darker, a fairy tale gone incredibly wrong. Making it here will take skills Nora never learned in graduate school. Her only real ally—and a reluctant one at that—is the magician Aruendiel, a grim, reclusive figure with a biting tongue and a shrouded past. And it will take her becoming Aruendiel’s student—and learning magic herself—to survive. When a passage home finally opens, Nora must weigh her “real life” against the dangerous power of love and magic.

Walking in the Midst of Fire by Thomas E. Sniegoski

Why why why on earth would I be posting about an urban fantasy series I have yet to even read six volumes into the story. Well, the books about the angel Remy Chandler have been of the edge of my to read list for far too long; yes I will also say it I love Sancuary and Castiel is my favorite... Yes I'm a fanboy but I have faith in a series that gets so consistently good word of mouth... and its got a respect for the tropes of noir crime fiction too boot.

The synopsis is hard to capture so here is the link to Thomas' website for the series and I'd encourage fans of Sanctuary and noir fiction to check it out... It honestly looks like a good time and I for one like the whole angel goes against the wishes of god thing.... That probably says something about me but I also agree with the angels are gods hitmen that Garth Ennis's posited...

 

Codex Born by Jim C. Hines

Honestly anyone who exposes the ridiculous in urban fantasy cover poses with his own body for the enjoyment of others has my vote on a writer to give some support to. Jim has written hero tales with Goblins as the main heroes,he has told tales out of school about the other adventures of so called Disney princesses, and with this series he has a setting where things in books can be made real. There are a few American authors that put me in mind of Terry Pratchett and Jim is one of them and this is a series I do much want to spend some time with. Here is some teaser text from Jim and a link to his website...

Isaac Vainio’s life was almost perfect. He should have known it couldn’t last.

Living and working as a part-time librarian in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, Isaac had finally earned the magical research position he dreamed of with Die Zwelf Portenære, better known as the Porters. He was seeing a smart, fun, gorgeous dryad named Lena Greenwood. He had been cleared by Johannes Gutenberg to do libriomancy once again, to reach into books and create whatever he chose from their pages. Best of all, it had been more than two months since anything tried to kill him.

And then Isaac, Lena, and Porter psychiatrist Nidhi Shah are called to the small mining town of Tamarack, Michigan, where a pair of septuagenarian werewolves have discovered the brutally murdered body of a wendigo.

What begins as a simple monster-slaying leads to deeper mysteries and the discovery of an organization thought to have been wiped out more than five centuries ago by Gutenberg himself. Their magic rips through Isaac’s with ease, and their next target is Lena Greenwood.

They know Lena’s history, her strengths and her weaknesses. Born decades ago from the pages of a pulp fantasy novel, she was created to be the ultimate fantasy woman, shaped by the needs and desires of her companions. Her powers are unique, and Gutenberg’s enemies mean to use her to destroy everything he and the Porters have built. But their plan could unleash a far darker power, an army of entropy and chaos, bent on devouring all it touches.

The Upper Peninsula is about to become ground zero in a magical war like nothing the world has seen in more than five hundred years. But the more Isaac learns about Gutenberg and the Porters, the more he questions whether he’s fighting for the right cause.

One way or another, Isaac must find a way to stop a power he doesn’t fully understand. And even if he succeeds, the outcome will forever change him, the Porters, and the whole world.

 

Weight of Souls by Bryony Pearce

Strange Chemistry the YA imprint cousin of personal favorite Angry Robot Books has a great growing stable of writers and I have hopes for the author of The Weight of Souls. Net Galley and SC granted me access to the ARC and I have hopes to get to it before the release date but just in case I have to get some attention focused this way. Here is a link to the Strange Chemistry site and below I'm including the synopsis...

Sixteen year old Taylor Oh is cursed: if she is touched by the ghost of a murder victim then they pass a mark beneath her skin. She has three weeks to find their murderer and pass the mark to them – letting justice take place and sending them into the Darkness. And if she doesn’t make it in time? The Darkness will come for her…

She spends her life trying to avoid ghosts, make it through school where she’s bullied by popular Justin and his cronies, keep her one remaining friend, and persuade her father that this is real and that she’s not going crazy.

But then Justin is murdered and everything gets a whole lot worse. Justin doesn’t know who killed him, so there’s no obvious person for Taylor to go after. The clues she has lead her to the V Club, a vicious secret society at her school where no one is allowed to leave… and where Justin was dared to do the stunt which led to his death.

Can she find out who was responsible for his murder before the Darkness comes for her? Can she put aside her hatred for her former bully to truly help him?

The Best Horror of the Year Vol 5 edited by Ellen Datlow

I know I have mentioned Ellen before as an anthology editor and I still have nothing but respect for her impeccable choices. I have to admit a love of horror fiction and this is one right up that alley and just Look at that great cover. I am glad that this will be coming out even with the debacle that Night Shade Books went through and I hope that this anthology will continue into the future even without NightShade. Via the Darwolf website here is a link to the tale of contents... You can go there to check it out...