Rising Steam by Terry Pratchett
To those who know Mr. Pratchett I think this needs little prompting but even though I am a fan I did not know it was coming out till last month so ... here's a warning there's a new Diskworld book about to be out. Sir Terry is one of the best satirists writing today and knowing there is more of his work out the brings joy to me in that I know it will bring mirth to my days while reading it. This is one of the stories that follows the industrialization of the magic and pun rich world of his and uses the con man protagonist from Going Postal and Making Money. Though tongue in cheek and punnish these fantasy stories are no less epic then some of the doorstops filling the shelves. Everyone needs a good laugh now and again.
A brash new invention brings social upheaval, deadly intrigues, and plenty of wry humor to the 40th installment of Pratchett's best-selling Discworld fantasy series. When intrepid inventor Dick Simnel comes to Ankh-Morpork looking for a backer for his revolutionary steam engine, the Iron Girder, entrepreneur Sir Harry King is quick to grasp the possibilities. So is Ankh-Morpork's ruler, Lord Vetinari, who immediately puts master facilitator (and former con artist) Moist von Lipwig in charge of the Discworld's first railway. But while the would-be railway tycoons are busy cutting deals for right-of-ways, supplies, and second class coach service, a group of radically conservative dwarf extremists are determined to stop the railroad, along with anything else that threatens "the truth of pure dwarfishness." In a realm where "even the factions had factions," Moist finds himself cast as Vetinari's agent to help defeat a political coup that could re-ignite ancient hostilities between dwarves and trolls. As always, Pratchett's unforgettable characters and lively story mirror the best, the worst, and the oddest bits of our own world, entertaining readers while skewering social and political foibles in a melting pot of humanity, dwarfs, trolls, goblins, vampires, and a werewolf or two. (Mar.)
Fearful Symmetries edited by Ellen Datlow
Ok I'm kinda an anthology fan and Ellen Datlow is the queen of the horror anthology so I'm pretty much required to signal boost this but in addition it happens to be the product of a kickstarter I put my money where my blogging mouth is. ChiZine happens to be the publisher of this one so that also places it pretty high on my must recommend list of books. Quite a few of my favorite authors are part of the anthology and though I missed the deadline there was an open call for short stories for the collection so hopefully there will be some great new voices here too.... Here is the table of contents....
Table of Contents
Introduction by Ellen Datlow
A Wish From a Bone by Gemma Files
The Atlas of Hell by Nathan Ballingrud
The Witch Moth by Bruce McAllister
Kaiju by Gary McMahon
Will The Real Psycho In This Story Please Stand Up? by Pat Cadigan
In the Year of Omens by Helen Marshall
The Four Darks by Terry Dowling
The Spindly Man by Stephen Graham Jones
The Window by Brian Evenson
Mount Chary Galore by Jeffrey Ford
Ballad of An Echo Whisperer by Caitlín R. Kiernan
Suffer Little Children by Robert Shearman
Power by Michael Marshall Smith
Bridge of Sighs by Kaaron Warren
the worms crawl in, by Laird Barron
The Attic by Catherine MacLeod
Wendigo Nights by Siobhan Carroll
Episode Three: On the Great Plains, In the Snow by John Langan
Catching Flies by Carole Johnstone
Shay Corsham Worsted by Garth Nix
The Time Traveler's Almanac edited by Ann and Jeff Vandermeer
Did I say that Ellen was the queen of the anthology well this couple is right up there with her and the breadth and quality of the stories they choose for their anthologies wether it be Weird fiction, Steampunk or ailments, kosher animals and curiosities. This time out they pull time travel stories for the past and present that cover the staggering genre that is time travel. Coming in at eight hundred pages I'm including the table of contents for those interested but its bound to be worth the price of admission ... It even boasts nonfiction that is a common staple of their collections.....
In addition to collecting some of the best time travel fiction from over the past 100 years, the VanderMeers have commissioned original non-fiction, including an introduction by Rian Johnson, the writer and director of the recent Bruce Willis time travel movie Looper as well as an essay on the science of time travel by Stan Love, an astronaut from NASA. Other contributors are Charles Yu, Genevieve Valentine and Jason Heller.
Here’s the HUGE (alphabetical) table of contents:
FICTION
“Young Zaphod Plays It Safe” by Douglas Adams
“Terminós” by Dean Francis Alfar
“What If?” by Issac Asimov
“Noble Mold” by Kage Baker
“A Night on the Barbary Coast” by Kage Baker
“Life Trap” by Barrington J Bayley
“This Tragic Glass” by Elizabeth Bear
“Enoch Soames” by Max Beerbohn
“The Most Important Thing in the World” by Steve Bein
“In The Tube” by E.F. Benson
“The Mask of the Rex” by Richard Bowes
“A Sound of Thunder” by Ray Bradbury
“Bad Timing” by Molly Brown
“The Gulf of the Years” by George-Olivier Châteaureynaud
“The Threads of Time” by C.J. Cherryh
“Thirty Seconds From Now” by John Chu
“Palindromic” by Peter Crowther
“Domine” by Rjurik Davidson
“The Lost Continent” by Greg Egan
“The Gernsback Continuum” by William Gibson
“3 RMS, Good View” by Karen Haber
“Message in a Bottle” by Nalo Hopkinson
“The Great Clock” by Langdon Jones
“Hwang’s Billion Brilliant Daughters” by Alice Sola Kim
“On the Watchtower at Plataea” by Garry Kilworth
“Time Gypsies” by Ellen Klages
“Vintage Seasons” by Henry & C.L. Moore Kuttner
“At Dorado” by Geoffrey Landis
“Ripples in the Dirac Sea” by Geoffrey Landis
“The Final Days” by David Langford
“Fish Night” by Joe Lansdale
“As Time Goes By” by Tanith Lee
“Another Story” by Ursula K. LeGuin
“Loob” by Bob Leman
“Alexia and Graham Bell” by Rosaleen Love
“Traveller’s Rest” by David Masson
“Death Ship” by Richard Matheson
“Under Siege” by George R.R. Martin
“The Clock That Went Backwards” by Edward Page Mitchell
“Pale Rose” by Michael Moorcock
“The House that Made the Sixteen Loops of Time” by Tamsyn Muir
“Is There Anybody There?” by Kim Newman
“Come-From-Aways” by Tony Pi
“The Time Telephone” by Adam Roberts
“Red Letter Day” by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
“The Waitabits” by Eric Frank Russell
“If Ever I Should Leave You” by Pamela Sargent
“How the Future Got Better” by Eric Schaller
“Needle in a Timestack” by Robert Silverberg
“Delhi” by Vandana Singh
“Himself in Anachron” by Cordwainer Smith
“The Weed of Time” by Norman Spinrad
“Palimpsest” by Charlie Stross
“Yesterday Was Monday” by Theodore Sturgeon
“Triceratops Summer” by Michael Swanwick
“The Mouse Ran Down” by Adrian Tchaikovsky
“Augusta Prima” by Karin Tidbeck
“Twenty-One and Counting Up” by Harry Turtledove
“Forty, Counting Down” by Harry Turtledove
“Where or When” by Steve Utley
“Swing Time” by Carrie Vaughn
“(excerpt from) The Time Machine” by H.G. Wells
“Fire Watch” by Connie Willis
“Against the Lafayette Escadrille” by Gene Wolfe
“The Lost Pilgrim” by Gene Wolfe
NON-FICTION
Introduction by Rian Johnson
Music for Time Travelers by Jason Heller
The Science of Time Travel by Stan Love
Trousseau, Fashion for Time Travelers by Genevieve Valentine
Top Ten Tips for Time Travelers by Charles Yu
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