I’ve decided I need a theme for what’s left of June and July. Inspired by the Pride Month Storybundle and the recent publication of the latest Astreiant novel, that theme is going to be Melissa Scott.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to be reading several of Melissa Scott’s novels for the first time, and writing about them here. Starting with The Kindly Ones, originally published by Baen Books in the late 1980s and recently reissued by the author as an ebook.

In Greek mythology, the Kindly Ones—the Εὐμενίδες—is a euphemism for the Furies, the goddesses who “take vengeance on anyone who would swear a false oath” (Hom. Il. 19.260), or those who commit gross impiety like a child who murders their parent, or a host who injures their guest. And often, they’re invisible to all but their target, who is driven mad. The Kindly Ones is the title of the third play of Aeschylus’ “Oresteia” trilogy (originally performed in 458 BCE), and these furious goddesses form a part of the action in a different ancient Athenian playwright’s take on the tragedy of the children of Atreus, Euripides’ Orestes. (And likely many more, but only a tiny fraction of ancient Greek drama has come down to us.)

Buy it Now

The title of Melissa Scott’s 1987 science fiction novel The Kindly Ones forbodes a reckoning, especially as it sets itself on two inhabited moons of the uninhabitable planet Agamemnon. Those moons are called Orestes and Electra, cold, harsh, and inhospitable. They were settled from a crash landing, and these unwilling colonists survived through the imposition of a strict social code. Life has grown a little easier: while at one point all violations of the code were punished with death, now in most cases only “social death” is required. Every Orestian city has a community of these “ghosts,” ostracised from family and community of origin, and none of the “living” may speak to them or acknowledge them in any way save through the office of an official “medium.” Alongside the ghosts are an intermediate class of people, self-selected outcasts to whom the Orestian social code doesn’t apply, who may speak to both the living and the ghosts, but who no longer have the protection of their original families, and who are looked down on by the rest of Orestian society.

Orestes and its smaller sister moon have been isolated from the galactic mainstream for a long time, but recently there’s been a lot more contact with the outside. Economic disruption plays into existing tensions in Orestian society, leading to feud and outright war—but when the highest families in Orestian society bend the code to their own purposes, an army of ghosts may use the code themselves.

The Kindly Ones follows three characters, all in some way outsides: Captain Leith Moraghan, retired from Peacekeeper Command and now flying a mailship that regularly calls at Orestes; Guil ex-Tamne, an Orestian outcast and pilot, and Moraghan’s friend; and Trey Maturin, a mediator, originally from off-planet, now working as a medium for one of Orestes’ most powerful families. Trey is, perhaps, the main character: we spend the most amount of time with him as he becomes more and more entangled and emotionally involved in Orestian politics—when a feud erupts, he becomes central to an Orestian war and its resolution.

His relationship with a male actor is well done, and their interactions highlight—as the novel’s title does, by reference to Aeschylus—the way in which narratives can be used and re-used. (The Kindly Ones doesn’t strongly emphasise this metacommentary, but it’s both interesting and there.) And to my delight, this is a very queer book: in addition to Trey, Moraghan and Guil are obviously lovers, though the novel never says so in as many words.

(Melissa Scott’s work really makes me wonder how I managed to go through the late nineties and early 2000s before I read a SFF novel that had an explicitly queer protagonist. Was there a backlash? Did no one publicise anything that had queerness in it? As far as I can tell, by the late 1990s, The Kindly Ones was already long out of print.)

With compelling characters, an atmospheric setting, and excellent pacing, The Kindly Ones is a fantastic novel. I really enjoyed it, and I thoroughly recommend it.

Liz Bourke is a cranky queer person who reads books. She holds a Ph.D in Classics from Trinity College, Dublin. Her first book, Sleeping With Monsters, a collection of reviews and criticism, was published in 2017 by Aqueduct Press. It was a finalist for the 2018 Locus Awards and is nominated for a Hugo Award in Best Related Work. Find her at her blog, where she’s been known to talk about even more books thanks to her Patreon supporters. Or find her at her Twitter. She supports the work of the Irish Refugee Council and the Abortion Rights Campaign.

Tor Books is very excited to reveal the first two chapters of The Ruin of Kings, the start of a new epic fantasy series by debut author Jenn Lyons, coming February 5th, 2019. To see the full cover, visit the B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog.

The author’s journey to seeing her fantasy novel on shelves has already been remarkably unique. In her words:

Let me tell you a secret. When I was a teenager, after my mother discovered she had terminal breast cancer, she sat me down and told me an uncomfortable truth: she had lied to me my entire life. I wasn’t an only child. I was in fact the youngest of many, the only one she’d been able to rescue when she had fled my father, who had been abusive and alcoholic, and also, as it happens, worked for the CIA. To this day, I don’t know if she was awarded custody of me in the divorce, or if I was stolen.

What I’m trying to say is that when I decided to write The Ruin of Kings, a story about an orphan whose dream of being a lost prince turns into a nightmare when he discovers his real family is vile, I was following that age-old advice to ‘write what you know.’

In a way, it was an inevitable that I would write this book as it is that its hero will discover that it’s his destiny to destroy the world he thought he was saving. I’ve been planning it my whole life, filling it with all of my love of fantasy and magic, wizards and dragons, gods, demons, and secrets.

So many secrets.

I grew up in the harbor of bookstores, and let the pages of Tolkien, Herbert, Le Guin and so many other masters shelter me. I aimed for the stars and looked to Patrick Rothfuss, Robert Jordan, and Brandon Sanderson for inspiration. Under the guidance of these heroes, I have built a world of my own and blessed it with my hopes and dreams. It’s not always a pretty world, but then worlds which feel true seldom are.

THE RUIN OF KINGS

Your Majesty,

Enclosed within is a full accounting of the events that led up to the Burning of the Capital. Much of the first section is based on transcripts derived from a conversation between two of the most pivotal individuals to the events; other sections consist of my own reconstruction. I used eyewitness accounts whenever possible, and tried to remain true to the essential spirit of events when I was forced to go afield. I’ve annotated the text with observations and analysis I hope you may find helpful.

I pray your forbearance for when I lecture you on subjects on which you are the greater expert, but ultimately, I decided it safest to assume on your ignorance rather than the reverse.

It is my hope that by possessing as complete a picture as possible of these events that led up to these matters, you will show leniency regarding the Lord Heir; the Council members who are recommending charges of treason and a death sentence surely do not have the whole story.

Your servant,
Thurvishar D’Lorus

Part I

Prologue: A Dialog Between a Jailer and Her Prisoner

“Tell me a story.”

The monster slouched down by the iron bars of Kihrin’s jail cell. She set a small, plain stone down on the ground between them and pushed it forward.

She didn’t look like a monster. Talon looked like a girl in her twenties, with wheat-gold skin and soft brown hair. Most men would give their eye-teeth to spend an evening with someone so beautiful. Most men didn’t know of her talent for shaping her body into forms crafted from pure terror. She mocked her victims with the forms of murdered loved ones, before they too became her next meal. That she was Kihrin’s jailer was like leaving a shark to guard a fish tank.

“You must be joking.” Kihrin raised his head and stared at her.

Talon picked at the mortar of the wall behind her with a wicked black nail. “I’m bored.”

“Knit something.” The young man stood up and walked over to the line of iron bars. “Or why don’t you make yourself useful and help me escape?”

Talon leaned forward. “Ah, my love, you know I can’t do that. But come now, it’s been so long since we’ve talked. We have all this catching up to do and ages before they’re ready for us. Tell me everything that’s happened to you. We’ll use it to pass the time—until your brother comes back to murder you.”

“No.”

He searched for somewhere to rest his gaze, but the walls were blank, with no windows, no distractions. The room’s only illumination shone from a mage-light lamp hanging outside the cell. Kihrin couldn’t use it to start a fire. He would have loved to set the straw bedding ablaze—if they’d given him any.

“Aren’t you bored too?” Talon asked.

Kihrin paused in his search for a hidden escape tunnel. “When they return, they’re going to sacrifice me to a demon. So, no. I’m not bored.” His gaze wandered once more around the room.

He could use magic to escape. He could change the tenyé of the bars and rocks to soften iron or make stone fragile as dried grass. He could do that—if Talon wasn’t watching his every movement. Worse, if she wasn’t capable of plucking thoughts of escape from his mind the moment they entered.

And she never slept.

“But I do eat,” she said, answering his thoughts with a gleam in her eye, “especially when I’m bored.”

He rolled his eyes. “You’re not going to kill me. Someone else has that honor.”

“I don’t consider it murder. I’d be saving you. Your personality would be with me forever, along with—”

“Stop.”

Talon pouted and made a show of examining the clawed tips of her fingers.

“Anyway, if you can read my mind, you don’t need me to tell you what happened. Take my memories—the same as you’ve taken everything else.”

She stood up again. “Boring. Anyway, I haven’t taken everything from you. I haven’t taken all your friends. I haven’t taken your parents.” Talon paused, “Well, not your real parents.”

Kihrin stared at her.

She laughed and leaned back. “Should I leave then? If you don’t tell me a story, I’ll go pay your mother and father a visit. ­They’d entertain me. Though the visit might not be so much fun for them.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Who would stop me? They don’t care about your parents. All they care about is their little scheme, and they don’t need your mother and father for that.”

“You wouldn’t—”

“I would,” Talon growled, her voice inhuman and shrieking. “Play my game, Bright-Eyes, or I’ll come back here wearing your mother’s skin cinched by a belt of your father’s intestines. I’ll reenact the moments of their deaths for you, over and over, until your brother returns.”

Kihrin turned away, shuddering, and paced the length of his cell. He examined the empty bucket and the thin blanket tucked into a corner. He searched the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. He studied the iron bars and the lock. He even checked himself over, in case his captors had missed something, anything, when they’d taken his weapons, his lock picks, the intaglio ring, and his talismans. They’d only left the necklace they didn’t care about, the one worth a fortune.

“Well. When you put it that way…” Kihrin said. “How can I refuse?” Talon brought her hands together in front of her face and made a tiny clap of delight. “Wonderful.” Then she tossed him the small rock she’d put between them earlier.

Kihrin caught it, but looked confused. “What’s this?”

“A rock.”

“Talon—”

“It’s a magic rock,” she said. “Don’t tell me a man in your position doesn’t believe in magic rocks?”

He studied the stone again, frowning. “Someone’s changed this stone’s tenyé.”

“Magic. Rock.”

“And what does it do again?”

“It listens. Since you’re telling the story, you hold the stone. Those are the rules.” She grinned. “Start at the beginning.”

1: The Slave Auction
(Kihrin’s story)

When they brought me up to the auction block, I looked out over the crowd and thought: I would kill you all if I had a knife.

And if I wasn’t naked, I amended.

And shackled. I had never felt so helpless, and—

What?­ You ­­don’t­ think ­this ­is ­the ­beginning,­ Talon? ¹

What ­do ­you­ mean ­by­ “beginning”­ anyway?­ Whose ­beginning?­ Mine? ­I­­ don’t­ remember­ it ­that ­well.­ Yours?­ Talon,­­ you’re­ thousands­ of ­years­ old ­and­ have ­stored­ the­ memories­ of ­as ­many people.­­ You’re ­the­ one ­who­ wanted ­to ­hear­ this.­ And ­you ­will,­ but­­ under ­my ­terms,­ not­ yours.

Let’s­ start­ over.

The auctioneer’s voice boomed out over the amphitheater: “Lot six this morning is a fine specimen. What will I hear for this human Doltari male?² He’s a trained musician with an excellent singing voice. Just sixteen years old. Look at that golden hair, those blue eyes, those handsome features. Why, this one might even have vané blood in him! He’ll make a welcome addition to any household, but he’s not gelded, so don’t buy him to guard your harem, ladies and gentlemen!” The auctioneer waved his finger with a sly grin, and was answered with a few disinterested chuckles. “Opening bid is ten thousand ords.”

Several members of the audience sniggered at the price. It was too much.

I didn’t look any prize that day. The Kishna-Farriga slave masters had bathed me but the scrubbing only made the raw whip wounds on my back stand out in angry red stripes. Copper bangles on my wrists did a poor job of camouflaging sores from long months spent in chains. The friction blisters on my left ankle were swollen, infected, and oozing. Bruises and welts covered me: all the marks of a defiant slave. My body shook from hunger and a growing fever. I wasn’t worth ten thousand ords. I wasn’t worth one hundred ords.

Honestly, I wouldn’t have bought me.

“Ah, now don’t be like that, my fine people! I know what he looks like, but I promise you, he’s a rough diamond who only needs polish to shine. He’ll be no trouble either—see, I hold his gaesh in my hand! Won’t someone here pay ten thousand ords for the gaesh of this handsome young slave?” The auctioneer held out his arm and revealed a tarnished silver chain, from which dangled something that glittered and caught in the sun.

The crowd couldn’t see the details, but I knew what he held: a silver hawk, stained black from salt air. A part of my soul, trapped in metal: my gaesh.

He was right: I would cause no more trouble. Never again. Controlling a slave via a gaesh was as effective as it was terrible. A witch had summoned a demon, and that demon had ripped part of my soul away, transferring that essence to the cheap tourist bauble the auctioneer now held in his hand. Anyone who carried that damn gaesh charm could command me to do anything they desired. Anything. If I ignored those orders, my reward would be my agonizing death. I would do anything that the holder of my gaesh asked of me, no matter how objectionable, no matter how repugnant.

Obey or die. There was no choice.

No, my body may not have been worth much, but in Kishna-Farriga the going price for a man’s soul is ten thousand ords.

The crowd stirred and looked at me with new eyes. A troublemaking teenage boy was one thing. A teenage boy who could be healed and perfumed, forced to obey every whim his owner might command, was quite another. I shivered, and it had nothing to do with the warm breeze that prickled the hairs on my skin.

It was a fine day for a slave auction, if you’re into that sort of thing. The weather was hot, sunny, and the air tinged with the stink of gutted harbor fish. Paper umbrellas or canvas awnings obscured the bidders as they lounged on cushioned seats.

Kishna-Farriga was one of the Free States, border city-states that owed no fealty to their neighbors, but relied on shifting political tensions³ to keep themselves off anyone’s leash. Countries who didn’t want to deal with each other used Kishna-Farriga as a halfway entrepôt for trade goods and commodities—commodities which included slaves such as myself.

Personally, I was used to the slave markets of the Quuran Octagon, with its endless mazes of private chambers and auction theaters. The slave pits in Kishna-Farriga weren’t so elaborate. They used just one openair stone amphitheater, built next to the famous harbor. At maximum capacity, the rising stone steps seated three thousand people. A slave might arrive by ship, visit the holding cells underneath the amphitheater, and leave with a new owner the same day—all without clearing the smell of dead fish from their nose.

It was all quite charming.

The auctioneer continued to speak, “Do I hear ten thousand?” Reassured that I was tame, a velvet-clad woman of obvious “professional” talent raised her hand. I winced. I had no desire to go back to a brothel. A part of me feared it would go this way. I was by no means homely, and few are those who can afford the price of a gaeshed slave, without means of recouping their cost.

“Ten thousand. Very good. Do I hear fifteen thousand?”

A rich, fat merchant leered at me from the second row and raised a little red flag to signal his interest. Truth be told, he raised all kinds of red flags. His ownership would be no better than the whorehouse madam’s, and possibly quite worse, no matter what my value.

“Fifteen thousand? Do I hear twenty thousand?”

A man in the front row raised his hand.

“Twenty thousand. Very good, Lord Var.” ⁴

Lord Var? Where had I heard that name?

My gaze lingered on the man. He appeared ordinary: of medium height and weight, nondescript but pleasant, his dress stylish but not extravagant. He had black hair and olive brown skin—typical of Quurans from west of the Dragonspires—but his boots were the high, hard style favored by Easterners. Jorat, perhaps, or Yor. In addition, he wore a shirt of the Marakor style rather than an Eamithon misha or usigi wrap.

No sword.

No obvious weapon of any kind.

The only remarkable qualities about Lord Var were his confidence, his poise, and the fact the auctioneer recognized him. Var didn’t seem interested in me. His attention focused on the auctioneer; he barely glanced at me. He might as well have been bidding on a set of tin plates.

I looked closer. No protection, hidden or otherwise, and not even a dagger in one of those unpolished leather boots. Yet he sat in the front. No one crowded him, though I’d spotted plenty of pickpockets working the crowd.

I’d never been to Kishna-Farriga before, but I didn’t have to be a native to know only a fool came to this auction house without bodyguards.

I shook my head. It was hard to concentrate. Everything was noise, flashing light, and waves of cold—which I suspected were from a fever. One of my cuts had become infected. Something would need to be done about that soon, or I would be the most expensive paperweight some poor gull had ever purchased.

Focus. I ignored the crowds, the bidding, and the reality of my situation as I slipped the First Veil from my eyes and looked at him again.

I’ve always been skilled at seeing past the First Veil. I had once thought this talent would be my redemption from the Capital City’s slums, back when I was naïve enough to think there was no fate worse than poverty.

There are three overlapping worlds, of course, each ruled by one of the Sisters: the world of the living, the world of magic, and the world of the dead.⁵ We live in Taja’s realm, as do all mortals. But I’d learned from a young age that my talent for seeing past the First Veil, into Tya’s magical domain, was a terrific advantage.

Only the gods can see past the Second Veil, although I suppose we all do when we finally travel to what lies beyond, to Thaena’s realm— Death.

The point is that wizards always wear talismans. They stamp such trinkets with their own auras to guard against the hostile sorceries of other mages. Talismans can take any shape. A smart wizard conceals their talismans from casual observation by disguising them as jewelry, sewing them into the lining of their clothes, or wearing them under robes. You might never know if someone is a wizard…

…unless you can see past the First Veil yourself, in which case that talisman-enhanced aura always betrays a wizard’s profession.

That’s how I knew Relos Var was a wizard. He wasn’t wearing any obvious talisman, but that aura was terrifying. I’d never seen an imprint so strong before, nor an aura stamped so hard, sharp, and crisp.⁶

Not with Dead Man, not with Tyentso…

And­ no,­ lovely­ Talon,­ not­ even­ with­ you.

I couldn’t remember why Lord Var’s name was familiar, but I could sum the man up in a single word: dangerous. But if I was lucky…

Who was I kidding? There was no luck left for me. I had angered my goddess, lady of luck both good and bad; her favor was gone. I did not even dare to hope that Lord Var would treat me better than the others. No matter who won me this day, it didn’t change that I was a slave, and would be so until the moment of my death. A normal slave might hold out some faint hope of escape or buying his or her freedom, but a gaeshed slave can’t run, and no one would ever free them. They are worth too much.

“The bid is twenty thousand. Do I hear twenty-five thousand?” The auctioneer wasn’t paying attention anymore: he thought the sale all but over. He’d done well to fetch twenty thousand. That price exceeded his expectations.

“Twenty thousand, going once, going twice. Fair warning—”

“Fifty thousand,” a clear voice said from the top of the seats.

Murmurs spread through the crowd. I strained to see who’d placed the bid. It was a large stadium. I couldn’t see the speaker at first, but then I noticed who the rest of the crowd had turned to watch: three seated figures in black hooded robes.

The auctioneer paused, surprised. “The Black Brotherhood bids fifty thousand. Do I hear fifty-five thousand?”

The man they called Lord Var looked annoyed. He nodded at the auctioneer.

“Fifty-five thousand. Do I hear sixty thousand?” The auctioneer was awake now that there was a bidding war.

One of the three black-clad figures raised its red flag.

“Sixty thousand.” The auctioneer nodded at them.

Half the crowd looked at Lord Var, the other half stared at the robed figures. The auction had just become an entertainment sport.

“Do I hear seventy-five thousand?”

Var nodded again.

“I have seventy-five. Do I hear one hundred?” The auctioneer saw the black-clad figures’ flag raise again. “I have one hundred from the Brotherhood. Do I hear one-fifty?”

Var nodded.

“One-fifty. Do I hear two hundred?” The red flag raised. “I have two hundred. Do I hear two-fifty?” Var frowned, but made a quick wave of his fingers. “I have two-fifty from Lord Var. Do I have five hundred from the Black Brotherhood?”

He did.

The desire to vomit hit me hard, and not just because of sickness. Had a slave ever sold for so much? There was no use that justified such a price; not as musician, not as catamite. Unless—

My eyes narrowed.

I wondered if, against all reason, they somehow knew who I was, knew what I carried. I almost reached for the gem around my throat. The Stone of Shackles was worth such a price, worth any price, but I had used the only spell I knew to hide what I wore.

I might be gaeshed, but I couldn’t be ordered to hand over what no one knew I possessed.

“The Black Brotherhood bids a half-million. Do I hear 750,000?” The auctioneer’s voice broke. Even he seemed stunned by the price rising from his throat.

Lord Var hesitated.

“Lord Var?” the auctioneer asked.

Var grimaced and turned to glare over his shoulder at the three figures. “Yes,” he said.

“I have 750,000 ords from Lord Var. Do I hear one million?” The figures in black didn’t hesitate.

Lord Var cursed aloud.

“I have one million ords. Final warning.” The auctioneer paused for the required time. “Sold to the Black Brotherhood for one million ords. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new record!” The end of the staff pounded down on the floor.

I fought the urge to join it.

* * *

1: It seems Talon was serious about that “magic rock,” for it records the words spoken by its holder. I could have fabricated the other side of the conversation, but the gist seems clear enough through context and so I have let the words fall where they may.

2: Having known Doltari slaves, I can only assume the auctioneer was blind. Then again, perhaps the good citizens of Kishna-Farriga have become expert at accepting the labels given to slaves without question.

3: I have heard a great many theories to the effect that the Free States are a vassal of some other nation. So Doltar believes the Free States are in league with the Manol and the Manol believes the Free States are in league with Zherias, and of course Quur thinks the Free States are Doltari and thus must be protected by the Manol. If large scale war ever breaks out, I fear it will go poorly for these Free States people trapped in the middle.

4: There is no record to indicate that Relos Var has claim to a noble title or order of merit. On the other hand, there’s scarcely any record of Relos Var at all. The earliest mention of that name I have been able to locate is from the book History­ of­ the­ Raevana­ Conquest by Cilmar Shallrin, which mentions the name once. Since that book was published five hundred years ago, the idea that this might be the same person is troubling.

5: This is… so wrong. So wrong. The odd number alone should have been the giveaway. This is what happens when you neglect to have a proper education. Two worlds. Just two. Magic is not a “realm,” it is a metaphysical river separating two parallel shores.

6: Having personally met Relos Var on several occasions, including at public baths, I have to say that I have never been able to figure out where the man keeps his talismans either—or if he even wears any. Relos Var has the power and aura of someone who wears a great many talismans without seeming to wear any at all.

Excerpted from The Ruin of Kings, copyright © 2018 by Jenn Lyons.

Welcome back to Reading V.E. Schwab’s Shades of Magic! We are on track with our stamp card (when we reach ten parts we get a free latte? I really wish the world worked like this).

This week we’re diving further into the worldbuilding and learning some very interesting stuff about the difference between the colors red and black. As they pertain to magic, that is—the difference between the colors themselves should be pretty easy to divine. Unless you’re colorblind. Anywho…

Here is a link to the series index, for your convenience. Go there for previous entries!

Two: Red Royal

I

Summary

Two guards, Gen and Parrish, are playing a card game that Gen wins. (They both might have been cheating the whole time.) They are Prince Rhy’s private guard, and Parrish likes the prince because he’s lenient with them and sometimes even speaks to them in common tongue instead of Royal. He also sometimes allows the guard to accompany him at a safe distance when he goes out at night with Kell, who everyone knows can protect him better than any guard could. Parrish goes to pee, and when he comes back Gen is not there, and he can hear a male voice in Rhy’s room—Holland, the foreign Antari. Holland unsettles most people and some of the guard call him “Hollow” behind his back.

Parrish ends up listening at the door. Holland speaks in a seductive tone of voice and tells the prince that he has come to offer a gift from his own king and queen for Rhy’s birthday. Rhy protests that there are laws against this, but Holland tells him that the gift comes from his own city, as his master’s instructed, so Rhy accepts. He opens the gift and asks what it’s for. Holland says it’s for strength, and the palace clocks chime and drown out the rest of their conversation. Holland exits the prince’s room and comes upon Parrish with a sigh—it is clear that he is the one who sent Gen away and he’s aggravated to find another guard there. He flips a coin to Parrish, saying that he was never there, and by the time Parrish catches it, he has forgotten that Holland came to visit the prince at all.

Commentary

Aw, guards playing cards. I love that trope, especially when said guards actually get to be people instead of cardboard cutouts used to get in the protagonist’s way. It also rhymes, which I never noticed. I expect this to be the new cosplay trend, by the by, just groups of guards playing cards.

So Red London has two different languages, Royal and Arnesian (which is clearly named for the royal house Arnes). Arnesian is the common language, while Royal (English) is a special upper class language. While our London doesn’t have two distinct languages that way, this seems like a cool twist on the “received pronunciation” version of English, a specific accent which usually denoted higher classes and royalty. (There’s a lot iffiness about whether it should still be called RP, or if terms like “BBC Pronunciation” are better? But I’m not from the UK, so I suppose I have the luxury of not having a horse in that race.) We also get the term “lin” for money. The royal emblem has a chalice and a sun on it, both common symbols for regal and religious imagery, though the symbols themselves have had many meanings throughout history; chalices often stand in for the Holy Grail, but also feminine power. The sun is… you know, it’s the sun, it’s kind of everything. I wonder if we’ll get more info on that later.

Prince Rhy has “varied tastes,” which sounds bisexual (or pan) to me. It looks as though he doesn’t make much of a secret of it around the guards, but it’s also worthy of commentary, which means that there’s something about it that isn’t altogether kosher. It’s so-far unclear if this is an issue because this world has homophobia or other taboos associated, or the Red London royal family merely wants their prince to have fewer affairs and be more discrete. Rhy responds to Holland’s seductive tone by flirting in kind, which might just be a personality quirk of the prince, but also could indicate some interest there…

The reveal that Holland is “foreign” begs the question of whether he is from a different world? There are laws against these two kingdoms exchanging gifts, so it sounds like. (This also makes me wonder if Red London is under the rule of this one magical family, or if this world also has countries outside it…) He’s not from Gray London, obviously, since there’s no magic left, so… White London? 

And Holland is erasing people’s memories of his visit and sending guards away after giving the prince a gift “for strength.” That doesn’t sound like trouble at all.

II

Summary

Kell steps into the bank of Red London. The river that runs through that magic kingdom is called the Isle, and it shines red, even at night. While people have different theories as to why, Kell knows it’s from blood. Red blood indicates magic in balance, but if the blood turns black, that is indicative of unbalanced chaotic magic. Kell has both as an Antari, hence his red blood and the black of his eye.

There is a bridge that runs over the river and to the palace called Soner Rast, made of glass, stone, and bronze. It is known that the “Beating Heart” of the city. People come from all over to study the river or lay flowers there and look on the palace. Currently, the Night Market is going. A little boy falls into Kell’s path, and he catches him by the sleeve so he doesn’t hit the ground. His mother scolds him and goes to apologize, but she sees Kell’s eye and knows instantly who he is, clearly awed and frightened. The whole crowd realizes who is among them and they go quiet and part for him. Chance at enjoying the market now disrupted, Kell heads to the palace. He shrugs off his coat, and turns it to the side that is red like the Isle and fastened with gold buttons. He steps inside.

Commentary

So we’ve got the Isle, a deliberate juxtaposition to the Thames (which is famously filthy, and was even moreso at this point in time), and some worldbuilding color theory. Red is the color of magic, the color of blood, a signifier of balanced magic. Black is unbalanced magic, which is represented in the one black eye of every Antari. If Kell’s blood were to run black, it would be an indication that he’s gone… okay, I’m just going to say “dark side” for our shorthand because everyone always knows what that means. Setting us up with that knowledge means that someone’s blood is practically guaranteed to run black at some point in these books, which is obviously not unnerving in any way. Nope.

I like this Night Market, and I would like to go there and buy a bunch of masks. This was a thing I did when I was in Venice, I bought like three Venetian masks and had to stop myself from buying every mask I looked at for more than five seconds. I don’t even wear the darn things. I just like to stare at them. Also, the idea of them selling vials of Isle water reminds me of every beach gift shop ever, and how they all wanna sell you little bottles of sand. The worst kind of tourist trinket.

The big set up of this chapter is learning how the average denizen of Red London thinks of Kell, which is that he’s pretty darned special, and they’re all kind of amazed by and afraid of him. So much for trying to enjoy the local nightlife in peace.

III

Summary

Kell finds the royal family bickering in the courtyard over Rhy’s insistence on having a week’s worth of celebrations for his 20th birthday. Rhy points out that it makes sense since is mother is adamant on finding him a match. Rhy asks Kell to come to his aid, but Kell admits that he also thinks it’s a terrible idea—but that they should throw that party at the palace so that they can all work to keep him out of trouble. The queen and king fuss over Kell, who they worry looks unwell after his journey. Kell tells them he’s fine, and corrects himself from calling the Queen “Your Majesty” to “Mother.”

Kell sits among the royal family until he can’t keep his eyes open, then gets up to leave. Rhy follows him, and tells him that Holland left recently, which surprises Kell, as that’s different from their usual schedules. Rhy asks Kell what he’s brought back from the other world, but Kell insists nothing, so Rhy pins Kell to the wall and demands that he tells the truth; Rhy has known about Kell’s side activities for two years, when Kell admitted it to him while drinking. Rhy had asked him why he did it, if his family had not provided enough to him in their arrangement—Kell is essentially adopted by the royal family. Kell admitted to Rhy that he didn’t feel like a true member of the family, more like a possession. This resulted in Rhy punching him in the face. Rhy remembered the conversation and every time Kell comes back, he questions him about it.

This time, Rhy tells Kell that he needs to stop trading for his trinkets, reminding him that transference is treason. Kell asks if he’d tell the king and queen, and Rhy seems to answer in the negative, but still demands that Kell give up these pursuits before he has to do something about. He wants Kell to be ready to aid him when he’s the king one day and Kell wants the same. Kell heads to his rooms and bypasses his bed for his library of magic books (most of the books on magic were destroyed after the Black London purge out of fear, so his collection is rare and limited). The door to that room has markings on it that lead to different places in Red London. Kell takes more blood from the cut on his arm and traces one to a tavern called Kir Ayes—meaning the Ruby Fields—run by an old woman named Fauna. They struck a deal years back so that the room at the top of the tavern stairs was his.

This room is the one thing that is truly Kell’s and it is marked with spells so that no one can perceive it. There he keeps all of his items from the other Londons, including a book of Blake’s poetry and a special glass ball that shows a person their dreams. The only decorations on the wall are three maps, one of each standing London. Grey London is Great Britain. White London is called Makt, and the capital city is run by the Dane twins while the rest of the territory is in flux for control. Red London is called Arnes, and London was only the start of their empire. Kell marvels at the fact that he has seen each London, but knows nothing of the worlds beyond any of them, as he’s bound to his service of the crown. Kell takes out his parcel, then tends to his cuts with water and salves; the Antari magic for healing would take more out of him than it would benefit him, so he uses more traditional means. Antari also heal faster, so the cuts will heal by the next day.

There is a scar on Kell’s arm, a rune for memory, something to make him forget his life from before. He has lived in the palace since he was five, and the scar is the mark of a type of spell that Red London views as a capital offense, as it’s magic that binds a person’s body or mind. Kell thinks that the king and queen themselves might have sanctioned the spell’s use on him, however. The initials on Kell’s knife (K.L.) don’t help him to remember and are largely a mystery; the letters can be found in both English and Arnesian alphabets, and the letters were used to create the name he now goes by. He doesn’t know how he got the knife, or if he’s always had it. He only knows that his parents could not have been Antari—magic doesn’t get passed down through generations or Antari would essentially be bred for their power. No one knows what causes the birth of an Antari, but most people believe they are sacred or chosen.

Because of this, Antari are now something to be kept, and Kell fancies that he is part of the royal family’s own collection. He sets the music box playing and wonders about his past, whether his magic manifested or he always had it. Whether his family had been sad to give him up and who they were. The king and queen won’t tell him, so he has stopped asking. Whoever that child was, he doesn’t exist anymore anyway.

Commentary

Okay. So this chapter is worldbuild-y and full of information, and we get a better idea of the structure of Arnes and how Kell fits into it. This quickly gets all squiffy with the queen being adamant that Kell call her “Mother”—that’s an automatic red flag for me, because someone insisting that you call them by a familiar name when it’s not your first instinct is never a good sign of love and trust and equal footing. They seem nice enough on the outside, but that part just made me eight kinds of uncomfortable.

The discussion with Rhy fills us in even more, letting us know that Kell is technically adopted by the royal family, but he does not feel like family in any sense of the word. And then I think about my vibe from earlier about Kell and Rhy having a thing going on between them, and suddenly my brain is like—

—OMG IT’S THOR AND LOKI.

I mean, I do love Thor/Loki in the MCU (the Marvel movies), and this is a direct parallel; one son is adopted but pointedly doesn’t feel like part of the family at all, and he happens to be the skinnier super-magic one. The biological son is strong and charismatic and doesn’t get why his brother feels like he doesn’t belong to the family (even though it should be really obvious). There is an expectation that the magic-son will help his less-magic brother with ruling once he ascends to the throne. There’s some chemistry going on here, on a few different levels. This is Thor and Loki. Oh no, this is going to cause problems for me, I cannot unsee it, I have feelings. Help.

We learn that Rhy doesn’t have much of a knack for magic, which Kell counts as a good thing because the rulers of White London do, and it’s apparently made them awful. We also find out that while Rhy isn’t happy with Kell’s side job, he’s pretty much a sucker for letting Kell do what he wants. At least for now. Kell is extremely forgiving of Rhy in this case, though the prince has all the power in this exchange. Kell thinks on how beloved Rhy is and why everyone adores him so much and he pretty much agrees, and that’s great and all. But Rhy doesn’t really understand why Kell feels so separate from his family and doesn’t appear to have made any effort to on that front. Hope he does in the future.

Kell has a small magic library and a magic door to a special room above a tavern that he’s hidden away from everyone. I have a question about the magic here; I know that Antari are the only people who can make these portals to other places because of their special blood, but are the marks universal? What I mean is, if another Antari makes the same mark, will they end up in Kell’s special room, or do the Antari themselves assign their own marks to things that only work for them personally? Because if it’s the former, that could cause serious trouble for Kell if, say, Holland ever found this mark. Was this answered before and I missed it?

There’s a helpful note here about how Kell hasn’t seen that far beyond the various Londons because he’s bound to the crown, and that is a super useful way to narrow the narrative scope of these stories. Because I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious about how the other Londons had developed differently alongside the rest of their worlds, but this way we can stick to a smaller scale and not get lost in an encyclopedia of background. It also gives you more room to theorize about that sort of thing, or I assume it will as time goes on.

And another helpful qualification on magic limitations in the knowledge that Kell cannot use healing magic on himself effectively because it takes more than it gives, and also that being Antari makes him kinda like Wolverine and he heals super quickly. Cool cool.

We come back to Kell’s knife and his past and the things he doesn’t know, and we learn something pretty terrifying: a spell stripped him of his memories from before he arrived at the palace, and he’s pretty sure that was the king and queen’s choice. Normally, doing this kind of magic is a huge offense that can get a person “stripped of their power,” which is a pretty freaky thing to be able to do in the first place. And obviously this begs a lot of very upsetting questions, such as: Did the royal family steal Kell from his family? Was he sold to them? Where is Kell actually from, and is it a different London?

Oh god, Kell’s not from Black London, is he?

That would suck for him.

Emily Asher-Perrin is ready to create the Guards Playing Cards cosplay troupe, y’all. You can bug her on Twitter and Tumblr, and read more of her work here and elsewhere.

When the sea levels rose and the world was flooded, the Diné built a wall around what once was the Navajo reservation, now called Dinétah. As the Fifth World was drowned by the Big Water and the Sixth World rose up, so too did creatures from Diné legend. That wall keeps enemies out, but monsters in. Which is where Maggie Hoskie comes in. She takes on the monsters terrorizing her people using her clan powers, the speed of Honágháahnii (“one walks around”) and the killing prowess of K’aahanáanii (“living arrow”). When we first meet Maggie, she’s stuck in stasis. Abandoned by the man she loved and her only family dead, she’s alone and pretending not to be lonely. She’s hired to rescue a young girl and finds instead a whole new breed of monster.

Maggie cautiously accepts the help of Kai Arviso, the grandson of Tah, the only person in the whole of Dinétah who cares for her, and the two head off to investigate. Kai is a healer and medicine man, but something else, something Maggie can’t quite put her finger on. Soon, enemies, mortal and immortal alike, are hemming in on all sides, and Maggie and Kai are dragged in over their heads. Maggie’s survival depends on great sacrifice. She must fight for her life, literally, to save a world that has shunned her.

Rebecca Roanhorse is an author to watch. She knows her stuff, how to twist the knife to make it hurt so good and how to turn the screw to make it almost too stressful to handle. I got hooked on her through her Nebula-winning, Hugo-nominated short story “Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience,” which is so good I can’t even. So of course I was dying to get my greedy little hands on Trail of Lightning.

Buy it Now

First off, we have to talk about Maggie. I’ve read a lot of urban/rural fantasy over the years, and she has to be one of my all-time favorite leads, both in that sub-genre and out. She’s tougher than Buffy Summers, more emotionally damaged than Harry Dresden, and more stubborn than Sierra Santiago. Wherever Maggie goes, trouble follows. She is as physically fierce as she is emotionally fragile. That fragility is one of the things that sets her apart from most urban/rural fantasy heroes. Rebecca Roanhorse takes the time to show the repercussions of Maggie’s experiences. What grounds her, what makes her a relatable character isn’t just what she goes through, but how she faces it and how it haunts her anyway. In the real world we can’t wave a magic wand over our pain, and neither can Maggie.

In Maggie we see the vast extent of damage trauma inflicts on survivors. She experienced a horrifying near-death experience as a child and witnessed the brutal murder of her grandmother by a sadistic witch and his posse. As a young adult, she was trapped in an abusive relationship with a partner who caused as much pain leaving her life as he did when he entered it. And as an adult she’s constantly harassed by a man who thinks police brutality and toxic masculinity are compliments. That isn’t just some tragic backstory. Subtract the magical elements and there are real issues here. Domestic abuse, sexual/verbal/physical assault, PTSD, the patriarchy, and state-sanctioned violence all make appearances but are thankfully never sugar coated or swept under the rug.

Kai isn’t quite as nuanced as Maggie, although there are plot-related reasons for that. It’s not so much that he isn’t as interesting or developed, but that withholding seems to be his dominant personality trait. Even his secrets have secrets. Getting to know someone like that can be a challenge, but by the end of the book he proves himself well worth the work. He also makes for a striking contrast to both Neizghání, the monster slayer god who trained Maggie, and Ma’ii (aka Coyote) who plays with Maggie like a cat with a mouse. They each take what they want from her regardless of whether or not she wants to give it, but only one offers her something in return. Doesn’t make his actions right or fair, but it does complicate him even further.

Trail of Lightning reminds me a bit of two other recent fantasy stories: Dread Nation by Justina Ireland and Witchmark by C.L. Polk. The three stories aren’t similar in tone or style, but each take an old trope and filter it through a diversity lens to make it shiny and new. It’s not just that Maggie is Diné, but that she lives in Dinétah with creatures from Diné legend. Her mannerisms, language, habits, interactions, relationships, and expectations are informed by her heritage as much as the novel itself is tied to Roanhorse’s. You couldn’t drop Dresden into her world and make it work. He would forever be interpreting Dinétah through a white male perspective. This book is a lot of things, but what it’s not is a colonizer’s narrative. Non-Natives are present, but this isn’t their story or their framework. Refreshingly, everything about Trail of Lightning is Diné.

I went into Trail of Lightning knowing little about Diné culture or spiritual beliefs. While Roanhorse doesn’t hold your hand through the culturally-specific bits, she does offer the reader enough context to figure it out on their own. After I finished, I spent some time researching and got even more out of the story. Not in the sense that I didn’t get stuff before, but that I understood it more after some digging. Now I’m all hyped up for the hope for an appearance by Neizghání’s twin brother Tóbájíshchíní (“child of water”). Will he turn up in future installments? Here’s hoping. Given how Trail of Lightning ends, there’s a lot of room for the twins to make Maggie’s life even worse.

What’s not to love about Trail of Lightning? It’s rural fantasy at its finest. Because I’m not Diné I’m sure there’s plenty of sociocultural context I missed. But even on a cursory level, it’s a frakking awesome novel and a fantastic prelude to what is sure to be a thrilling series.

Trail of Lightning is available from Saga Press.

Alex Brown is a YA librarian by day, local historian by night, pop culture critic/reviewer by passion, and an ace/aro Black woman all the time. Keep up with her every move on Twitter, check out her endless barrage of cute rat pics on Instagram, or follow along with her reading adventures on her blog.

My favourite opening of any book ever is the first paragraph of Richard Rhodes’s masterful nonfiction giant, The Making of the Atomic Bomb. Whenever I am asked about my favourite books, I read it aloud. You should do the same. Go on. I’ll wait.

In London, where Southampton Row passes Russell Square, across from the British Museum in Bloomsbury, Leó Szilárd waited irritably one gray Depression morning for the stoplight to change. A trace of rain had fallen during the night; Tuesday, September 12, 1933, dawned cool, humid and dull. Drizzling rain would begin again in early afternoon. When Szilárd told the story later he never mentioned his destination that morning. He may have had none; he often walked to think. In any case another destination intervened. The stoplight changed to green. Szilárd stepped off the curb. As he crossed the street time cracked open before him and he saw a way to the future, death into the world and all our woe, the shape of things to come.

Szilárd, a Hungarian physicist, has just invented the chain reaction that makes liberation of atomic energy possible—it takes Rhodes a while to get to that. But that paragraph has already set off ideas colliding and splitting and exploding in our brains. I love everything about it: the perfect cadence, the confident sketch of grey rainy London, the hint of Szilárd’s inner turmoil—and most of all, the sudden transformation of the mundane into the wondrous. Rhodes may be writing what he calls verity, applying the craft of fiction to real events, but that moment captures the very heart of science fiction.

Buy it Now

It is fitting that science fiction was also the stray neutron that triggered Szilárd’s explosive revelation. In 1932, he was at a turning point in his career, crippled with self-doubt. A new refrigerator design he had invented with Einstein himself was a commercial failure, and he considered abandoning physics altogether. (Yes, Albert Einstein dabbled in refrigerators, but that’s another story…) Then a friend gave Szilárd a book by H.G. Wells: The World Set Free, written in 1913. It features an explosive device based on radioactive materials, small enough to be dropped from an aircraft, and capable of destroying an entire city… called the atomic bomb. In an uncanny prophetic twist, Holsten, the fictional scientist who figures out how to liberate atomic energy in the novel, does his work in London’s Bloomsbury, in the distant future of 1933!

After finishing the book, Szilárd immediately decided to devote his life to nuclear physics—to save humankind from destruction, and to develop the means “that would enable man not only to leave the earth but the solar system”, as he said in an interview. At the time, most mainstream physicists like Ernest Rutherford didn’t believe that atomic energy would ever be practical. But Wells’s vision convinced Szilárd otherwise. Later, he even credited Wells as the true father of the atomic bomb.

In Wells’s novel, the threat of atomic weapons leads to the formation of an Utopian world government. (Incidentally, Wells himself was involved in setting up the ill-fated League of Nations—which made him an irresistible model for Prime Minister West in my novel Summerland.) Szilárd wanted to make Wells’s vision a reality. But the Second World War intervened. Szilárd and Einstein wrote their famous letter to Roosevelt, kicking off the Manhattan Project. In 1945, in spite of Szilárd’s petition for a bloodless demonstration, atomic bombs fell on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Rhodes covers their horrors in detail, unflinchingly showing the dark side of Szilard’s transcendent vision.

Eighty-five years later, we still haven’t made our way past that crack in time, and our ultimate destination remains unknown. But through the power of Rhodes’s words, we can imagine how Szilárd felt that fateful morning; and, like him, turn to science fiction to dream of brighter things to come.

Hannu Rajaniemi is a mathematical physicist, science innovator, and author of the Jean Le Flambeur trilogy, from Finland. His new novel Summerland is available June 26th from Tor Books. He currently resides in California.

There’s a lot of space-faring fiction this month—astronauts, soldiers, adventurers, you name it. Mary Robinette Kowal expands on the world of her story “The Lady Astronaut” with The Calculating Stars; Becky Chambers continues her Wayfarers series with a tale about the folk living on the remnants of the Exodus Fleet; Emily Skrutskie’s Hullmetal Girls turn into enhanced soldiers for different (or mysterious) reasons; and we’ve got some creepy space beings and space romance, for good measure! If you just can’t choose, you might pick up one of two new anthologies of SF stories, including the 35th annual Year’s Best Science Fiction. Something for everyone!

Keep track of all the new releases here. Note: All title summaries are taken and/or summarized from copy provided by the publisher.

WEEK ONE

Alpha (Infinity Division #3)—Jus Accardo (July 3, Entangled Teen)
Young adult. Sera has no memory of her life before. Before captivity, before experiments, before the only lifeline she had was the voice of a boy in the cell next to hers. Before G. G wishes he could forget everything before Sera brought him back to life. Forget his memories as a ruthless mercenary on an alternate version of Earth. Forget that he was part of an experiment simply known as Alpha. Now on the run from their captors and in need of an antidote to save his life, G and Sera’s clock is ticking. And they’ll have to gamble everything on the bond they forged in captivity if they want to survive.

Space Unicorn Blues—T.J. Berry (July 3, Angry Robot)
Having magical powers makes you less than human, a resource to be exploited. Half-unicorn Gary Cobalt is sick of slavery, captivity, and his horn being ground down to power faster-than-light travel. When he’s finally free, all he wants is to run away in his ancestors’ stone ship. Instead, Captain Jenny Perata steals the ship out from under him, so she can make an urgent delivery. But Jenny held him captive for a decade, and then Gary murdered her best friend… who was also the wife of her co-pilot, Cowboy Jim. What could possibly go right?

The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Thirty-Fifth Annual Collection—Gardner Dozois, editor (July 3, St. Martin’s Griffin)
In the new millennium, what secrets lay beyond the far reaches of the universe? What mysteries belie the truths we once held to be self-evident? The world of science fiction has long been a porthole into the realities of tomorrow, blurring the line between life and art. Now, in The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Thirty-Fifth Annual Collection, the very best SF authors explore ideas of a new world. This venerable collection brings together award-winning authors and masters of the field. With an extensive recommended reading guide and a summation of the year in science fiction, this annual compilation has become the definitive must-read anthology for all science fiction fans and readers interested in breaking into the genre.

The Loneliest Girl in the Universe—Lauren James (July 3, HarperTeen)
Young adult. The daughter of two astronauts, Romy Silvers is no stranger to life in space. But she never knew how isolating the universe could be until her parents’ tragic deaths left her alone on the Infinity, a spaceship speeding away from Earth. Romy tries to make the best of her lonely situation, but with only brief messages from her therapist on Earth to keep her company, she can’t help but feel like something is missing. It seems like a dream come true when NASA alerts her that another ship, the Eternity, will be joining the Infinity. Romy begins exchanging messages with J, the captain of the Eternity, and their friendship breathes new life into her world. But as the Eternity gets closer, Romy learns there’s more to J’s mission than she could have imagined. And suddenly, there are worse things than being alone…

The Calculating Stars (Lady Astronaut #1)—Mary Robinette Kowal (July 3, Tor Books)
On a cold spring night in 1952, a huge meteorite fell to earth and obliterated much of the east coast of the U.S. The ensuing climate cataclysm will soon render the earth inhospitable for humanity. This looming threat calls for a radically accelerated effort to colonize space, and requires a much larger share of humanity to take part in the process. Elma York’s experience as a WASP pilot and mathematician earns her a place in the International Aerospace Coalition’s attempts to put man on the moon, as a calculator. But with so many skilled and experienced women pilots and scientists involved with the program, it doesn’t take long before Elma begins to wonder why they can’t go into space, too. Elma’s drive to become the first Lady Astronaut is so strong that even the most dearly held conventions of society may not stand a chance against her.

Empire of Silence (Sun Eater #1)—Christopher Ruocchio (July 3, DAW)
It was not his war. The galaxy remembers him as a hero: the man who burned every last alien Cielcin from the sky. They remember him as a monster: the devil who destroyed a sun, casually annihilating four billion human lives—even the Emperor himself—against Imperial orders. But Hadrian was not a hero. He was not a monster. He was not even a soldier. On the wrong planet, at the right time, for the best reasons, Hadrian Marlowe starts down a path that can only end in fire. He flees his father and a future as a torturer only to be left stranded on a strange, backwater world. Forced to fight as a gladiator and navigate the intrigues of a foreign planetary court, Hadrian must fight a war he did not start, for an Empire he does not love, against an enemy he will never understand.

WEEK TWO

River of Bones (Destroyermen #13)—Taylor Anderson (July 10, Ace)
Commander Matt Reddy and his crew are afraid it may finally be the end of the USS Walker. Ever since their ship was transported to another world, and they became embroiled in a deadly conflict between the Lemurians and the vicious Grik, the Walker has been taking a pounding. With Walker out of commission for repairs, Reddy takes command of a different ship and joins a desperate battle to block the Grik swarm. Meanwhile, the humans and their allies face a deadly second front in the Republic to the south. All of Reddy’s forces are committed, and there’s no turning back. Either they’ll win—or lose—everything…

I Only Killed Him Once (Ray Electromatic)—Adam Christopher (July 10, Tor Books)
Another Hollywood night, another job for electric-detective-turned-robotic-hitman Raymond Electromatic. The target is a tall man in a black hat, and while Ray completes his mission successfully, he makes a startling discovery—one he soon forgets when his 24-hour memory tape loops to the end and is replaced with a fresh reel. When a tall man in a black hat arrives in the offices of the Electromatic Detective Agency the next day, Ray has a suspicion he has met this stranger before, although Ray’s computerized boss, Ada, is not saying a thing. But their visitor isn’t here to hire Ray for a job—he’s here to deliver a stark warning. Because time is running out and if Ray and Ada want to survive, they need to do exactly what the man in the black hat says. A man that Raymond Electromatic has already killed.

The Final Frontier: Stories of Exploring Space, Colonizing the Universe, and First Contact—Neil Clarke, editor (July 10, Night Shade Books)
The urge to explore and discover is a natural and universal one, and the edge of the unknown is expanded with each passing year as scientific advancements inch us closer and closer to the outer reaches of our solar system and the galaxies beyond them. Generations of writers have explored these new frontiers and the endless possibilities they present in great detail. With galaxy-spanning adventures of discovery and adventure, from generations ships to warp drives, exploring new worlds to first contacts, science fiction writers have given readers increasingly new and alien ways to look out into our broad and sprawling universe. The Final Frontier delivers stories from across this literary spectrum, a reminder that the universe is far large and brimming with possibilities than we could ever imagine, as hard as we may try.

Suicide Club: A Novel About Living—Rachel Heng (July 10, Henry Holt)
Lea Kirino is a “Lifer,” which means that a roll of the genetic dice has given her the potential to live forever—if she does everything right. And Lea is an overachiever. She’s a successful trader on the New York exchange—where instead of stocks, human organs are now bought and sold—she has a beautiful apartment, and a fiancé who rivals her in genetic perfection. And with the right balance of HealthTech, rigorous juicing, and low-impact exercise, she might never die. But Lea’s perfect life is turned upside down when she spots her estranged father on a crowded sidewalk. His return marks the beginning of her downfall as she is drawn into his mysterious world of the Suicide Club, a network of powerful individuals and rebels who reject society’s pursuit of immortality, and instead choose to live—and die—on their own terms. In this future world, death is not only taboo; it’s also highly illegal. Soon Lea is forced to choose between a sanitized immortal existence and a short, bittersweet time with a man she has never really known, but who is the only family she has left in the world.

The Furnace—Prentis Rollins (July 10, Tor Books)
Graphic novel. One decision. Thousands of lives ruined. Can someone ever repent for the sins of their past? When Professor Walton Honderich was a young grad student, he participated in a government prison program and committed an act that led to the death of his friend, the brilliant physicist Marc Lepore, and resulted in unimaginable torment for an entire class of people across the United States. Twenty years later, now an insecure father slipping into alcoholism, Walton struggles against the ghosts that haunt him in a futuristic New York City.

WEEK THREE

Maze Master—Kathleen O’Neal Gear (July 17, St. Martin’s Press)
LucentB is a retrovirus that’s inevitable, unstoppable, and utterly catastrophic for humanity. The US government believes the only person who can find the cure is the geneticist who tried to warn them about it and then disappeared: James Hakari. They assign the task of finding him to his former student Anna Asher, who in turn recruits paleographer and religious studies scholar Dr. Martin Nadai. The brilliant but insane geneticist is leaving clues for Anna and Martin to follow, showing he’s truly earned his students’ nickname for him: the Maze Master. The search takes Anna and Martin around the world and into a warzone they never imagined.

Nyxia Unleashed (Nyxia Triad #2)—Scott Reintgen (July 17, Crown Books for Young Readers)
Young adult. Emmett Atwater thought Babel’s game sounded easy. Get points. Get paid. Go home. But it didn’t take long for him to learn that Babel’s competition was full of broken promises, none darker or more damaging than the last one. Now Emmett and the rest of the Genesis spaceship survivors must rally and forge their own path through a new world. Their mission from Babel is simple: extract nyxia, the most valuable material in the universe, and play nice with the indigenous Adamite population. But Emmett and the others quickly realize they are caught between two powerful forces-Babel and the Adamites-with clashing desires. Will the Genesis team make it out alive before it’s too late?

Hullmetal Girls—Emily Skrutskie (July 17, Delacorte Press)
When Aisha Un-Haad’s brother contracts a plague, she knows her janitor’s salary isn’t enough to fund his treatment. So she volunteers to become a Scela, a mechanically enhanced soldier sworn to serve the governing body of the Fleet. If Aisha can survive the harrowing modifications and earn an elite place in the Scela ranks, she may be able to save her brother. Key Tanaka awakens in a Scela body with only hazy memories of her life before. She knows she’s from the privileged end of the Fleet, but she has no recollection of why she chose to give up a life of luxury to become a hulking cyborg soldier. If she can make it through the training, she might have a shot at recovering her missing past. In a unit of new recruits vying for top placement, Aisha’s and Key’s paths collide, and the two must learn to work together—a tall order for girls from opposite ends of the Fleet. But a rebellion is stirring, pitting those who yearn for independence from the Fleet against a government struggling to maintain unity. With violence brewing and dark secrets surfacing, Aisha and Key find themselves questioning their loyalties.

The Hidden World (Imperials #3) – Melinda Snodgrass (July 17, Titan Books)
Disgraced military officer Thracius “Tracy” Belmanor has built a new life for himself, living under an assumed name as the captain of a small trading vessel crewed by aliens. At the other end of the social hierarchy, Mercedes’ faces rumors of a coup, and she makes the desperate decision to undertake a military campaign and gain her people’s loyalty through a victory. But when things go badly wrong, her future lies in the hands of the man she betrayed…

The Wild Dead (Bannerless #2)—Carrie Vaughn (July 17, John Joseph Adams Books)
A century after environmental and economic collapse, the people of the Coast Road have rebuilt their own sort of civilization. They strictly ration and manage resources, including the ability to have children. Enid of Haven is an investigator, who with her new partner, Teeg, is called on to mediate a dispute over an old building in a far-flung settlement at the edge of Coast Road territory. The investigators’ decision seems straightforward—and then the body of a young woman turns up in the nearby marshland. Almost more shocking than that, she’s not from the Coast Road, but from one of the outsider camps belonging to the nomads and wild folk. Now one of them is dead, and Enid wants to find out who killed her, even as Teeg argues that the murder isn’t their problem. In a dystopian future of isolated communities, can our moral sense survive the worst hard times?

WEEK FOUR

Contagion—Erin Bowman (July 24, HarperTeen)
Young adult. After receiving a distress call from a drill team on a distant planet, a skeleton crew is sent into deep space to perform a standard search-and-rescue mission. When they arrive, they find the planet littered with the remains of the project—including its members’ dead bodies. As they try to piece together what could have possibly decimated an entire project, they discover that some things are best left buried—and some monsters are only too ready to awaken.

Record of a Spaceborn Few (Wayfarers #3)—Becky Chambers (July 14, Harper Voyager)
Hundreds of years ago, the last humans on Earth boarded the Exodus Fleet in search of a new home among the stars. After centuries spent wandering empty space, their descendants were eventually accepted by the well-established species that govern the Milky Way. Today, the Exodus Fleet is a living relic, the birthplace of many, yet a place few outsiders have ever visited. While the Exodans take great pride in their original community and traditions, their culture has been influenced by others beyond their bulkheads. As many Exodans leave for alien cities or terrestrial colonies, those who remain are left to ponder their own lives and futures: What is the purpose of a ship that has reached its destination? Why remain in space when there are habitable worlds available? What is the price of sustaining their carefully balanced way of life—and is it worth saving at all? A young apprentice, a lifelong spacer with young children, a planet-raised traveler, an alien academic, a caretaker for the dead, and an Archivist whose mission is to ensure no one’s story is forgotten, wrestle with these profound universal questions. The answers may seem small on the galactic scale, but to these individuals, it could mean everything.

Between Frost and Fury (Xenith Trilogy #2)—Chani Lynn Feener (July 24, Swoon Reads)
Young adult. Delaney has been kidnapped by aliens. Again. After only a month back on Earth with her hot new alien boyfriend Ruckus, the deadly and devastatingly handsome prince Trystan has dragged her right back to his planet. While some girls may dream of winning a prince’s heart, Delaney just wishes this one would leave her alone. Instead, she finds herself at the center of both a tense political battle between two alien kingdoms and Trystan’s romantic attentions, both of which are absolutely ruining the life she’s built on Earth. Not to mention the fact that she’s about to be crowned queen of a planet she’s barely even visited. Just another day in the life of an ordinary human girl.

Annex—Rich Larson (July 24, Orbit)
At first it is a nightmare. When the invaders arrive, the world as they know it is destroyed. Their friends are kidnapped. Their families are changed. Then it is a dream. With no adults left to run things, Violet and the others who have escaped capture are truly free for the first time. They can do whatever they want to do. They can be whoever they want to be. But the invaders won’t leave them alone for long…

Sanctuary—Caryn Lix (July 24, Simon Pulse)
Young adult. Kenzie holds one truth above all: the company is everything. As a citizen of Omnistellar Concepts, Kenzie has trained her entire life for one goal: to become an elite guard on Sanctuary, Omnistellar’s space prison for superpowered teens. As a junior guard, she’s excited to prove herself to her company—but then a routine drill goes sideways and Kenzie is taken hostage by rioting prisoners. At first, she’s confident her commanding officer—who also happens to be her mother—will stop at nothing to secure her freedom. Yet it soon becomes clear that her mother is more concerned with sticking to Omnistellar protocol than she is with getting Kenzie out safely. As Kenzie forms her own plan to escape, she doesn’t realize there’s a more sinister threat looming. And Kenzie might have to team up with her captors to survive—all while beginning to suspect there’s a darker side to the Omnistellar she knows.

The Future Will Be BS Free—Will McIntosh (July 24, Delacorte Press)
Young adult. In a Putin-esque near-future America, the gifted and talented high school has just been eliminated, and Sam and his friends have been using their unexpected free time to work on a tiny, undetectable, utterly reliable lie detector. They’re all in it for the money—except Theo, their visionary. For Theo, it’s about creating a better world. A BS-free world, where no one can lie, and the honest will thrive. Just when they finish the prototype and turn down an offer to sell their brainchild to a huge corporation, Theo is found dead. Greedy companies, corrupt privatized police, and even the president herself will stop at nothing to steal the Truth App. Sam sets his sights on exposing all lies and holding everyone accountable. But he and his friends quickly realize the costs of a BS-free world: the lives of loved ones, and political and economic stability. They now face a difficult question: Is the world capable of operating without lies, or are lies what hold it together?

Binti—Nnedi Okorafor (July 24, Tor.com Publishing)
Hardcover reissue. Her name is Binti, and she is the first of the Himba people ever to be offered a place at Oomza University, the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy. But to accept the offer will mean giving up her place in her family to travel between the stars among strangers who do not share her ways or respect her customs. Knowledge comes at a cost, one that Binti is willing to pay, but her journey will not be easy. The world she seeks to enter has long warred with the Meduse, an alien race that has become the stuff of nightmares. Oomza University has wronged the Meduse, and Binti’s stellar travel will bring her within their deadly reach. If Binti hopes to survive the legacy of a war not of her making, she will need both the the gifts of her people and the wisdom enshrined within the University, itself — but first she has to make it there, alive.

Binti: Home—Nnedi Okorafor (July 24, Tor.com Publishing)
Hardcover reissue. It’s been a year since Binti and Okwu enrolled at Oomza University. A year since Binti was declared a hero for uniting two warring planets. A year since she found friendship in the unlikeliest of places. And now she must return home to her people, with her friend Okwu by her side, to face her family and face her elders. But Okwu will be the first of his race to set foot on Earth in over a hundred years, and the first ever to come in peace. After generations of conflict can human and Meduse ever learn to truly live in harmony?

Binti: The Night Masquerade—Nnedi Okorafor (July 24, Tor.com Publishing)
Hardcover reissue. Binti has returned to her home planet, believing that the violence of the Meduse has been left behind. Unfortunately, although her people are peaceful on the whole, the same cannot be said for the Khoush, who fan the flames of their ancient rivalry with the Meduse. Far from her village when the conflicts start, Binti hurries home, but anger and resentment has already claimed the lives of many close to her. Once again it is up to Binti, and her intriguing new friend Mwinyi, to intervene–though the elders of her people do not entirely trust her motives–and try to prevent a war that could wipe out her people, once and for all.

Star Wars: Thrawn: Alliances—Timothy Zahn (July 24, Del Rey)
The sequel to New York Times bestseller Thrawn, Thrawn: Alliances will continue to follow the rise of Grand Admiral Thrawn to the heights of Imperial power—and accompany him into the past, witnessing his first encounter with the man who will one day become Darth Vader.

WEEK FIVE

Keepers (Project Earth #2)—Brenda Cooper (July 31, Pyr)
In a future Earth that’s run by brilliant green cities separated by open land held in common for the good of wild things, two sisters must work together across and between the vastly different environments to root out dangers to both. They must protect the cities and the wild from the Returners, who prefer the toxic past to the difficult present. The older sister, Lou, her protector Shuska, and biologist friend Matchiko have reputations as successful rugged environmentalists. They must stay safe, listen, work, and sleuth out hidden nests of Returners. Oh, and save a few wolves along the way. In the meantime, Lou’s younger sister, Coryn, is learning that working for the most powerful woman behind the scenes in a megacity is far harder than it looks. When the Returners threaten the city, the sisters must find a way to preserve both their ways of life.

Arabella the Traitor of Mars (Adventures of Arabella Ashby #3)—David D. Levine (July 31, Tor Books)
At last husband and wife, Arabella and Captain Singh seem to have earned the attention of great men, ones who have new uses in mind for the Mars Company captain and his young wife. Both Company and Crown have decided that it is time to bring Mars into the folds of Empire, and they think Singh is the perfect man to do it. Now, Arabella must decide between staying loyal to the man she loves and the country of her father or betraying all that she has known to fight alongside the Martians in a hopeless resistance against the Galaxy’s last remaining superpower.

Planetside—Michael Mammay (July 31, Harper Voyager)
War heroes aren’t usually called out of semi-retirement and sent to the far reaches of the galaxy for a routine investigation. So when Colonel Carl Butler answers the call from an old and powerful friend, he knows it’s something big—and he’s not being told the whole story. A high councilor’s son has gone MIA out of Cappa Base, the space station orbiting a battle-ravaged planet. The young lieutenant had been wounded and evacuated—but there’s no record of him having ever arrived at hospital command. The colonel quickly finds Cappa Base to be a labyrinth of dead ends and sabotage: the hospital commander stonewalls him, the Special Ops leader won’t come off the planet, witnesses go missing, radar data disappears, and that’s before he encounters the alien enemy. Butler has no choice but to drop down onto a hostile planet—because someone is using the war zone as a cover. The answers are there—Butler just has to make it back alive…

June is audiobook month, and to celebrate, we’ve got a prize pack that’ll keep you listening for hours and hours!

One lucky reader listener will receive a copy of each of the following on CD from Macmillan Audio:

• Dune by Frank Herbert, read by Scott Brick, Orlagh Cassidy, Euan Morton, Simon Vance and cast!
• Death Doesn’t Bargain by Sherrilyn Kenyon, read by Holter Graham!
• Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson, read by Kate Reading and Michael Kramer!
• and The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan, read by Kate Reading and Michael Kramer!

(The Eye of the World is in a nifty, very vintage-looking giant package. Just sayin’. You probably want this.)

Comment in the post to enter!

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN. A purchase does not improve your chances of winning. Sweepstakes open to legal residents of 50 United States and D.C., and Canada (excluding Quebec). To enter, comment on this post beginning at 3:30 PM Eastern Time (ET) on June 26th. Sweepstakes ends at 12:00 PM ET on June 30th. Void outside the United States and Canada and where prohibited by law. Please see full details and official rules here. Sponsor: Tor.com, 175 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10010.

A mother. A son. A virtual world they both share where each could live forever and achieve their fullest potential. Until one of them decides that isn’t enough for life.

The noon sun was programmed to perfection—warming but not scorching—and the light breeze refreshed as it rearranged Lake’s hair. The black sand beach was soft to the feet, containing the right amount of exquisitely shaped shells planted in a manner that drew Jared down the beach, exploring. Lake had brought her son here because of the nature setting. He seemed to be enjoying himself, yet she watched with a wary eye, jaw and shoulders tight with anxiety. Her eyes darted restlessly to the endless scroll of must-haves to the right of her main view: spa getaways, mood boosters (completely safe!), and the latest fashions. At the upper right of her view were the icons for her own settings, as well as the parental access to her son’s space. Knowing she could always check his whereabouts should be reassuring, but it couldn’t warn her in advance, and that was the issue.

A small group had gathered a short distance away: two young men, three women in burkinis, and four children, all apparently older than Jared. Lake reached for her cover-up and slipped it over her head. She knew it wasn’t necessary, but still, the modesty wear made her self-conscious. Instantly, burkinis began scrolling through her feed, informing her brightly that they’re for anyone! She almost laughed.

One of the older girls, wearing a purple and black burkini, spotted Jared and ran up to him. They exchanged words, and then the girl threw back her head and laughed. Jared flung out his arms, theatrically, like his father used to when he was about to accomplish some minor feat like opening a stubborn jam jar. These small reminders always stabbed Lake with sweet daggers.

Having broadcast his intentions for greatness, Jared turned and did a cartwheel in the sand. His new friend clapped, and then did a handstand while Jared stared. The girl lowered expertly onto her feet again, and then gestured for Jared to try it. It took him a few tries to get his feet up high enough for her to catch them and help him balance.

Lake looked over at the rest of the group. Two of the women were watching the acrobatics, and one looked over at her and waved. Lake waved back. She dared to hope she could leave Jared with them while she went to her job. Even an hour in beta testing would earn her enough money to keep them both going for several more days. Only a small percentage of the fully instantiated opted for that type of work, and never the sequestered, until she’d come around. Most people didn’t want to be reminded of where they were. It was disorienting, but it paid well, and expenses here were minimal. Maybe Lake could sweeten the pot by offering the girl credits for babysitting.

All the children were at the shore now, playing. They’d made their way closer to where Lake sat. She waved at the girl who’d helped Jared with his handstand. The girl smiled and returned the gesture shyly. She had such a pretty smile.

Jared tapped his new friend on her arm to regain her attention. “Hey, look, Aminah! Look what else I can do!” His form suddenly slumped.

No. Lake sprang to her feet in alarm, but it was too late. Jared deflated like a popped balloon and then he was gone.

The girl gasped, and then stared wide-eyed at Lake.

Lake’s face grew hot with embarrassment. “I’m so sorry,” she shouted, to be heard above the waves. “He’s only eight. He…thinks it’s funny.”

But Aminah had started to back away. “Oh. That’s okay. Bye!” She took off running, and the other children followed. Lake watched as Aminah spoke to one of the women, and then pointed at Lake. The other children kept running down the beach, increasing their distance.

So much for the idea of babysitting. Lake burst into tears, which she quickly quelled. She closed her eyes and concentrated. Clap your hands, she told herself. Clap.

She succeeded. The physical clapping brought her into awareness of her body. She sat up, fumbled with her hood and pulled it off. The bed ceased undulating. She blinked repeatedly as her eyes adjusted to the soft security lighting. There were no windows here, only undecorated cream-colored walls and the long rows of black-clad forms on their beds. The place reeked of body odors and cleaning fluid. She yanked the tubes out of her suit and swung her heavy legs over the side of the bed. It was becoming easier to do this, and that was a bad sign. She pounded the bed with her fist, and then, leaving her hood behind, rose and stumbled down the long rows of anonymous black-clad near-corpses. She should be like them, learning to forget their bodies, not feeling the slick coolness of the laminate floor through the thin soles of her suit as she chased down her wayward child.

The door at the end of the room swept open as she approached. She stepped into the softly lit hallway, and across to the children’s ward.

The door opened at the touch of her palm scan. Everything here was the same as the other room, but in miniature. Something tugged at her heart at the sight of all the small, still bodies. She’d been told they took better to the transition than adults. Their entire brief lives had led them to this.

She knew where to look, and saw the empty bed. “Jared?” She cleared her throat, and tried a little louder. “Jared!”

Flashing lights warned her she’d exceeded the policy’s decibel limits. “Sorry,” she murmured, and exited quickly, her heart pounding with mounting panic. She stood in the corridor looking up and down, not knowing which way to go. She tried taking deeper, slower breaths. She had to calm herself so she could think, and act.

She’d seen him disappear twice before, in the ten days they’d been here, but she’d always found him in the ward, wandering up and down the rows of kids. “I wanted a glass of water,” he’d said the first time. Honey, she’d reminded him, you can drink all the water you want if you put your hood back on. He hadn’t seemed to hear her. He’d stared at the rest of kids on their beds and whispered, “Everyone looks weird, don’t they? It’s kind of spooky.”

The second time, he’d complained his suit itched, and his face was hot under the hood. “Can I go outside for some air?” he’d asked innocently. “It stinks in here.”

Now he was gone. Honestly, why did the ward allow a child out to wander around? “Jared!” The lights flashed again. Really? She was out in the hall. If they’d wanted to, they could’ve provided some soundproofing, or stuffed everyone’s ears with plugs or something. They could’ve done that.

Somewhere down the corridor, she heard a door closing. She burst into a mad sprint, ignoring her tortured lungs gasping for air almost immediately. She was quickly getting out of shape, being here. But of course she wasn’t supposed to be here. And neither was Jared.

She spotted the soft green light of an exit, its white figure in mid-stride, dutifully following the pointing arrow. She yanked open the door. There were stairs going up, and none going down. They were being kept in a basement? She was so disgusted she felt sick to her stomach. “Jared!” she called up the stairwell.

The silence gnawed at her gut. She hadn’t seen one person, not one robot, either. Clearly, this place was understaffed. Those flashing lights were on automatic sensors.

Somewhere above, a heavy door slammed, followed by a whirring noise that grew closer. Then she heard quiet sobbing. “I just wanted some air!”

“Jared!”

“Jared is found,” a calm male voice announced.

They came into view, a robot in descent mode with gliders extended, cradling the limp form of her son in its outstretched arms. Jared’s suit was made to leave his artificial legs uncovered, and they gleamed as they dangled, the same dark metal as the robot’s.

“Jared!” Her voice was stuck on that one word, but this time she uttered it with relief.

His head lolled toward her. “Mom?” His eyes struggled to focus as they reached the bottom step.

She rushed forward, tried to take him from the robot’s hands. “What’s wrong with him?”

The robot either didn’t understand she wanted to take him, or refused her wishes. “Jared is fine. A mild sedative has been administered. It was understood you wanted him returned, Ms. Lake Lipsman. You are his legal guardian.”

“I’m his mother,” she retorted.

The robot did not reply. Its gliders retracted, and it skated swiftly past her and down the hall toward the children’s ward. Lake followed. She moved as fast as she could, but there was no keeping up with the thing.

The robot was already pulling Jared’s hood on when she arrived at the door to the children’s ward, out of breath. She wished she could’ve seen her son’s face one last time.

“Do you wish there to be a child lock on the hood?” the robot asked softly as it finished its ministrations.

Her mouth was suddenly dry. “Child lock? I thought that was for the younger kids. You know, the ones too little to understand.” She took several steps toward Jared’s still form. “Why don’t you just keep him in the ward if he comes out again?”

The robot finished hooking Jared’s tubes up, and turned toward her. “This is Sequester. It is not a prison.”

Lake sucked in her breath. At last she said, “No hood lock on my son. Understand? I’ll keep him inside. He’ll adjust.”

The robot glided to the door, gesturing for her to follow. “They nearly always do.”

The door to the children’s ward slid closed behind her. Nearly always?

The door to the adult ward whispered open. “Would you like assistance with your own bed?” asked the robot.

She stomped past. “No. Just give me my son’s coordinates.”

“Gladly. You’ll be surfacing at your dwelling. He’ll be waking up.”

She watched Jared’s eyes flutter open. “Hi, honey! Did you have a nice nap?”

He raised himself onto his elbows and looked around, frowning. “Mom. I’m not four years old. I know what went down.”

Lake dropped her forced smile. “Fine. So you don’t want to be treated like a baby? Then let me tell you something. I’ve worked very, very hard so I can give you this. Don’t you like having your own room? Getting to play on a black sand beach? Don’t you like having your own legs?”

Jared frowned and pushed himself upright and out of bed, jostling Lake’s shoulder. “That’s ableist talk, mom. I have legs.” He left the room.

Where had he heard that term? Surely not in his present school. School before, then. Or from his father. She heaved a sigh. She had sacrificed a lot, working overtime, so he could have those legs. They had to change them as he grew, too. He’d been on his third set when they’d come to Sequester.

Her feed scrolled through other apartments she could have, other beaches to visit. Or how about hiking in the mountains? She saw a breathtaking view from a high vantage point.

“Hey,” she called out. “How about we take a trip to the mountains? Do some hiking?”

His head popped into sight in the doorway. “Mom. Is that what your feed is showing now?”

She threw up her hands. “I’m just trying to make you happy. So what do you want to do? Tell me and we’ll do it.”

He slouched against the door frame and studied his shoes. “Well, we’ve been studying animals at school. Dogs and things. I guess I could go do that, and then hang out with some of the kids.”

Lake rose and went to him. She bent and kissed the top of his head and then ruffled his hair. “You’ve been making friends, then. That’s good.” Maybe that’ll keep him where he’s supposed to be. Age groups were more often separated here. It encouraged the children to become more autonomous, while providing a safe environment, reducing the need for constant parental monitoring. Lake had been enjoying her own greater freedom, until her son had started disappearing.

Having him in school also meant she could go to work. “Hey, so get out of here already. I’ll see you later.”

“Thanks, Mom.” Jared straightened and headed for the living room and the front door.

“And Jared?”

“Yes, Mom?”

“Behave yourself now.”

“Sure, Mom.” Then he was out the door.

Lake suspected that aside from being disorienting, people shied away from beta testing because it requires interaction with artificial intelligence. The A.I. were difficult to understand, even when they managed a complete sentence in human language. Usually they spoke in gibberish, which she’d been told was their own invented language, and signified their superior intelligence.

Cycle Lake I I I body circuit jaguar tree massive parallel processing, one said.

Another responded in a more feminine voice. MPP CIP I complete tree they. In cycle circuit abbastanza.

It didn’t seem important whether she understood or not. They seemed to listen politely to her verbal feedback after testing, but she suspected it was unnecessary. They’d probably already gathered what they’d needed based on observing her.

Sometimes what she beta tested was unpleasant, although afterward she felt invigorated by being stretched and challenged in this way. Today was no exception. She found herself in a different body, one with extra appendages she didn’t seem able to control. They flopped around as she walked, even slapping her in the face. She became aware she was on a very thin slice of sidewalk suspended high over a mountain valley. Even though she knew she was safe, she gasped, and her four arms flailed. The two arms she seemed unable to control slapped against her face again. It didn’t hurt—nothing here ever did—but it was annoying. She strained with the effort of trying to manipulate them, to no avail. They fumbled over her face till they found her eyes, and covered them. Evidently this was their function, because they stopped flopping around. What a relief.

Then the feed sprang to life around her. No longer was it a separate window to the side of her vision. It enveloped her. She had a new avatar here. It was younger, more vibrant, and thankfully had the correct number of arms and legs. Delighted, she grabbed at things. She tried on a flowing halter dress that shimmered with color when she moved. She selected a pair of gold stiletto heels she’d never been able to walk in with her other body, but was effortless here. She saw a section where she could modify this new avatar. She could select different eyes, give herself a nose job (she laughed ruefully at that one), or sculpt her body in new ways. Suddenly she had a tiny waist, and slimmer thighs. Her skin looked like she’d spent a week in the Bahamas.

She found she could focus outside this immersive feed experience. She experimented with her new appendages again, and found at last the trick to thinking about them, and with this thought muscle she uncovered her eyes. Looking down, she saw she did not have the new body or the new clothes. “Well, that sucks,” she said out loud. Back on the thin walkway above the abyss, she was suddenly overcome by a feeling of deep loss, and sank to her knees. Her whole life had been a series of disappointments. Jared’s father, David, had left her for a man. She’d understood, but she’d also lost her best friend. Then Jared was diagnosed—incompetent doctors for not catching that sooner!—and had his legs amputated when he was four years old.

She looked down into the abyss. It would be easy to throw herself off, but she knew she couldn’t die here. Instead, she tried covering her eyes with her hands again. Wrong pair. She tried again, with the other hands that she was still getting used to manipulating, and covered her eyes with those.

Instead of seeing the beautiful feed sprung to life, with the customizable body and all those clothes, she was out of the simulation altogether.

Thank you Lake cherry cherry lime, said the more feminine voice.

Was that a reference to a slot machine? Lake almost laughed. She started to report out, sharing her impressions and thoughts—especially about that new way to experience the feed!—but she was suddenly very tired. They probably knew everything they needed to, anyway. She punched out for home.

Lake paced the living room, frowning. She’d rather be at the Never-Ending Mixer, her favorite after-work hangout, but she’d told Jared she’d be here when he came home. But just when was that going to be? She replayed the memory of their conversation, and saw no time had been mentioned. He’d said he was going to hang out with the kids after classes, so even if she checked the school times, it wouldn’t tell her anything about Jared’s return.

She replayed the memory again. There was her son, leaning on the door jamb, studying his shoes. That was his father’s slouch, with the downward gaze. She pursed her lips. Jared’s intentions were plain as day, but she’d failed to see it because she’d been so relieved she could go to work. If you passed a statue in an art museum posed like this, its title would read Dishonest Boy with Secret Plans.

Oh, but she knew exactly where he was. She flung herself on the couch and closed her eyes. Clap, she shouted at herself. That wouldn’t do. She sighed out a lungful of anger and tried again. Clap. Clap your hands.

She sat up, pulling the hood from her head in one smooth motion, and then the lines connecting her suit with the bed. God, she was getting too good at coming out. She was steady on her feet as she rose and walked swiftly to the door of the ward.

There was a robot in the hallway, apparently waiting for her. For a moment, she took it for the one that had brought Jared back from wherever he’d roamed, but then again, all of them looked alike. Robot personality programming had been purged several updates ago.

“Where is he?” she demanded.

The robot tilted its head as if unsure what she’d said. “This is your formal warning that repeated surfacing behavior will result in ejection from Sequester.”

Lake sucked in her breath. “Just how many formal warnings do I get?”

“One,” the robot replied.

Lake blinked. “This one? This is it?”

“Correct.”

Lake’s hands clenched. “Then help me find my fucking son.”

She pushed past the robot and let herself into the children’s ward. All the bodies looked so similar in their black suits, but at least none of the beds were empty. She breathed a sigh of relief when she spotted Jared’s artificial legs, gleaming in the dim light. She approached, and stared down at his form, suddenly wanting to scream at him, he’s caused them both so much trouble. They’re on the brink of being evicted, of losing this golden opportunity to improve their lives for good.

But he was already on the other side, back where he should be in the virtual world. She’d have to save her fury for when she returned.

She felt rather than heard the robot’s presence at her side. There was a displacement of the air, a large mass in her peripheral vision. Her memory worked the old way here, but it was vivid enough.

“You mentioned you could put on a child lock,” she said. “On his hood. So he can’t take it off.”

“It requires the legal guardian of the child to authorize,” it said.

She chewed her lower lip briefly. “Then let’s do it.”

The robot reached down. Its arm made two clamping motions, one on each side of Jared’s neck.

“And take his legs,” she said, turning away.

“Repeat?”

“You heard me. Take his goddam legs off.” She exited, crossed the hall swiftly, and reentered her own ward.

It’s for his own good, she told herself as she fastened herself into the bed. He’ll be fine. He’ll adjust. Everyone does. And he’ll thank me. He’ll thank me for this.

She sat in her beach chair, toes grinding into the black sand, and watched her son—her only son—stare out to sea. He hadn’t spoken to her for three hours, not since he’d obviously tried to leave, to come out of it, to do his little visit back to his body. He’d come bursting out of his room screaming, “Mom! What’s going on?” She’d tried to soothe him, of course. She wasn’t a monster. She was doing this because she loved him.

“Honey,” she’d said as she held him close. “It’s because I care about you. I care about your future. You’ve got to believe me, this is better than out there. You’ll live forever, for one.”

Then, because he hadn’t stopped crying, she’d brought him here, to the beach. He liked the beach. Kids don’t understand about mortality, she thought. Jared probably never thought she’d die someday, let alone himself.

Jared was planted in the wet sand, letting gentle waves roll over his legs. His father, David, had liked the beach. He was always photographing the beach, and their seaside cottage, with that impossibly archaic camera with the bellows, and gargantuan negatives. He had to send for supplies halfway across the country, to make his blasted black-and-white photographs.

“Why do you bother?” she’d asked him many times.

“I like old things,” he’d responded. But there were some things he liked young, she’d discovered. He’d left her for a twenty-five-year-old man who’d majored in psychology at Sarah Lawrence. They got the beach cottage in the divorce. Lake had taken the two-bedroom apartment in Cambridge, near Jared’s school.

The morning she’d left him with Jared in tow, David had stood staring at the sea in the same way that Jared stared now.

She reached up and ran her fingers over her hair, as if the memories would shake out with the sand and float down the shore. This programmed place she’d secured for herself, for Jared, was her new world now, an exciting and seemingly limitless place that she was helping to create with A.I., through her beta testing job. Cherry cherry lime, they’d told her. They’d been pleased. When would she be able to leave Jared again and go back to work? She’d love to be enveloped by the feed again. The current sidebar of goodies suddenly seemed outdated. She watched the offerings scroll by: mood boosters, a memory excision tool. She paused to read about the latter.

“Mom? Mom!”

It was Jared, kneeling in front of her. Black sand stuck to his arms and thighs like so much pepper.

“Yes, I’m here,” she said. “You don’t have to shout.”

“Mom, I have to go back. Now.”

“Jared, you know you can’t. It’d mean—”

“I have to feed the dog, Mom. It’ll starve if I don’t.”

“Dog?” She couldn’t process this. “We can get you a dog, honey. Whatever you want.”

“Mom. This is a real dog. There’s a place outside Sequester where I go. Mom.” He started to cry.

“Go? What do you mean go?” But now guilt stabbed through the anger and made everything clear. She’d been so wrapped up in her new job, and being around A.I., and going to the Never-Ending Mixer, and worrying about what he was going to do, that she’d neglected to access her son’s space to look at his history of movements. She called it up now, even as he relentlessly stared at her with those serious eyes. And what she saw was unbelievable.

“You’ve hardly been sequestering at all,” she whispered. Every time she’d been at work, every time she’d gone to the Never-Ending Mixer, he’d been sneaking out. He’d hardly attended school at all, since they’d arrived.

“How can you still be here?” She meant how was he not expelled from Sequester, but instead it sounded like she didn’t want him around. Yet she didn’t have the words to correct herself. The silence between them was an almost measureable distance.

“They’ve been letting me go outside to get fresh air,” he said. “It’s only when you get involved that they care. Mom, please. I need to go.”

God, that place was so lax, that they wouldn’t even protect a child.

“I’ll buy you a pet.” God, she was shouting. She wasn’t angry at Jared, but the system. It was seriously messed up. There should be a warning light on that parental access icon, to let someone know they should be monitoring their child’s activities.

He leaped to his feet and glowered down at her. “I don’t want a fake dog!”

Lake made an effort to lower her voice. “Honey, I’m sorry. I’m not mad at you.”

But he was screaming now. “I can’t believe you put a lock on my hood!”

“Jared.” She was calm now. She had this. “They weren’t doing you any favors, letting you go outside. The whole point of Sequester is to weaken your attachment to your body. So you can adjust to being here permanently.”

His brows drew together. If he’d been older, he’d look menacing. “I don’t want to be here. I want to stay a breather.”

Lake stared up at him. “I’m not sure you understand what that means, honey. You’re too young to think long-term.”

His expression had gone blank. He was reading his feed. She hoped he was looking at the dogs he could have, but she doubted it.

“Mom?” His voice was a whisper. “Did you tell them to take…my legs?”

Again the guilt threatened to overwhelm her, just as it had with his father. Why hadn’t she seen that one coming, either? It had only been when her heart had broken that she’d seen the truth, could trace the history of the betrayal. She lifted her chin. “I did. For your own good. Honey, I love you. You need to let me provide for you.”

He was backing away from her across the sand. Then he exited the beach. Lake flipped on her parental access. She’d never neglect that again.

She saw at least he wasn’t trying to surface, to claw at his hood. But where he’d gone was puzzling. What was he doing at Human Affairs? Well, let him learn for himself that she was well within her rights to make decisions for him.

She rose, brushing sand from her thighs absentmindedly. While he was occupied, she could go to work.

She was special. She’d known that by the assignments they’d given her, but it was all confirmed at the Never-Ending Mixer. She arrived after work, when another invigorating round of what she’d begun to call feed immersion helped her recover from her argument with Jared. She dropped the term casually at the mixer—the first time she’d mentioned her job—and instantly found herself the center of a small crowd’s admiration.

You’re still in Sequester, and you’re beta testing?

Yes, she was, she said proudly.

But you’re so new to the virtual world. You can’t possibly have adjusted to standard functioning yet.

She was used to having a job. There happened to be openings for beta testing, she’d signed up, and was accepted. It pays well.

It carries a certain amount of risk. Adjustment problems, primarily, which places a strain on one’s mental health.

Actually, she found the work interesting.

Then came a barrage of questions about A.I. She could answer few of these, but it was obvious they were jealous of her interactions with artificial intelligence. The crowd was hungry for any tidbit of information. She got the distinct impression she was viewed as a courageous pioneer. Well, she’d had to be that, and resourceful as well, as a single parent. Providing for her son had made her tenacious. Bringing Jared here was part of her natural pioneering spirit. This was the wave of the future.

She was still having fun at the mixer, regaling the crowd with some of her testing experiences, when she received a message in her feed. She was being summoned to Human Affairs. She sighed. Undoubtedly she was being asked to retrieve Jared. She didn’t want to leave. Everyone was absolutely spellbound. Well, it was a sneak preview of their future, after all. But being a parent came first. She left right away, voicing sincere apologies to her admirers.

Jared’s shoulders were hunched, and his gaze was on his shoes as he stood next to the arbitrator, a tall woman with extremely short gray hair and wearing a blush pink blouse over gray trousers. The pink looked decidedly unjudicial. When the arbitrator spoke, she sounded too informal.

“Hi, Lake,” she said. “We’re here to talk about Jared’s request to be emancipated from you. If granted, your parental rights will be terminated.”

She did not have words for this…betrayal. Jared was just like his father. “There must be some mistake,” she told the arbitrator.

The woman’s eyes were not unkind. “Please answer this question, Lake. Did you order the robot to remove your son’s prosthetic legs?”

Something deep inside her ached, threatened to overwhelm. She was going to buy that memory excision tool she’d seen in her feed. “I did. The stakes were high. We were close to being expelled from Sequester.”

The arbitrator regarded her, inhaling slowly. “And you ordered this, aware that Jared’s prosthetics are fully integrated into his body? That they aren’t readily removable?”

“Of course,” Lake replied, irritated. Only the best for her son. This wasn’t the olden days, when people took their artificial limbs off to go to bed.

The arbitrator blinked once, quickly. “Are you aware your request in this matter was denied?”

Lake was taken off guard. “No. I mean…I was…” She didn’t want to admit she’d given the order out of anger. She’d only wanted to make sure Jared stayed put. For his own good.

The arbitrator cut into her thoughts. “Your order was denied because it was a reckless request. Sequester is not a prison.”

The robot had said the same thing. Lake was fuming inside. They let her son get up and leave Sequester multiple times, for hours. But one careless comment from her, uttered when she was justifiably angry and fearful of the consequences, and it was grounds for this? Well, she wasn’t about to blow up now. She stood, seething, facing the arbitrator and her son, and said nothing.

The arbitrator paused, and then nodded. “Because Human Affairs has jurisdiction over these matters, and they’ve given me authority to make a decision on this, I’m declaring Jared emancipated from your authority. Is there anything you’d like to say to Jared, or to me, at this time, Lake?”

Lake shook her head, not to mean no, but to express her disbelief. “Where is he going to go? Who’s going to take care of him?”

The arbitrator put a hand on Jared’s shoulder and he looked up, grudgingly, into his mother’s eyes. “I’ve talked to Dad.”

Lake’s shoulders stiffened.

The arbitrator spoke to Jared. “Your dad. You want to go live with your dad.”

Jared nodded. “He’ll come get me tomorrow. And Hope, too.”

“Hope?” Lake echoed. The word didn’t belong here. “Hope for what?”

Jared smiled sheepishly. “Hope is the name of my dog, Mom.”

Again that dog. She accessed her son’s space—she still had her authority to do that— and clicked to access his memories.

She—in Jared’s point of view—bounded up the stairs and out a gray utility door. There was a stark contrast of bright sun and deep shadow that she recognized as late afternoon. She looked left, then right, along the deserted side street, little more than an alley, really. Then she darted across the street and into the back of a place.

Inside she emerged into a small grocery, a mini-mart. It was deserted, but there were still a few cans and boxes on the shelves. There was a shadow under the front window that moved. It was a black dog wagging its tail slowly. It was lying on several thicknesses of old blankets. It leaned heavily on its front legs as it stood. It approached with a hobbling gait, and Lake soon realized why. The dang thing was missing a right hind leg.

She watched Jared’s hand go out and pet the dog’s head. Hi, girl. Are you hungry?

The dog wagged its tail in reply, and followed Jared around the corner of an aisle, where a food and water dish stood up against a darkened refrigerator case that still contained a few bottles of water and soda. The crude simplicity of the scene, and the fragility of biological life, touched her.

There were tears rolling down her cheeks as she withdrew from the memory. She understood now why Jared was drawn to that pitiful dog. There was something in him that was like his mother, after all: a headstrong determination to provide for another being’s needs, even if it meant self-sacrifice.

Her son and the arbitrator were looking at her. She needed to say something. “Fine. Go.”

Jared ran to her and encircled her torso with his arms, putting his face alongside her neck. She closed her eyes and thought about the beach: the sun on her face, and the wind gently playing with her hair.

It was she who broke the embrace at last, prying his hands from around her. “So go feed your dog.”

His lips quivered as he smiled. His eyes glistened with tears of his own. “Thanks, Mom.”

Lake wanted to say the dog looked like a good one. She wanted to say something encouraging. But she couldn’t. She was reliving the challenges of dealing with all those physical things out there. Buying food. Making meals. Taking showers. Needing a car to drive yourself to work. Shoveling snow. Dusting. Laundry. Calling someone to come fix stuff when it breaks down. God, and the body breaking down. Surely Jared would come to understand mortality when he was older, would come back to Sequester. Everyone would come here, eventually, who could afford it.

Jared reached up and put both hands on her shoulders. It broke her reverie, and she looked down into a pair of sincere eyes. “Bye, Mom. I know you’ll be happy here. I know how much you like it.”

Then he was gone. His virtual form didn’t deflate as before, but simply winked out, like it was no big deal. It was hard to believe he was gone for good. She was seized with the desire to clap her hands, go to him, just to say goodbye again, in her old body, one human to another. But to do so would kick her out of the garden of paradise.

She left Human Affairs and went to the beach, where she bought a mood booster and looked out at the waves rolling in. Up the beach a ways there were several women in burkinis, and children running along the beach. She thought they might be the same Muslim family, the girl Aminah among them, who had helped Jared do a handstand. Lake waved, feeling the freedom in her arm, light as the breeze. She could go to her beta testing job now, and work as long as she liked.

She bought the memory excision tool, and carved away the worst about David and Jared, leaving just enough of the pain so she wouldn’t miss them. Then she went into her settings and deselected her feeding functions. She may as well speed things up.

She received a message a few days later that her body had been vacated and cremated. There was no going back now. She was fully instantiated. What a relief, she told herself.

David and Jared could reach her through the interface, but the outside world operated at a much slower pace. By the time they initiated messaging through the interface, they’d be old as history to her.

In the meantime, she’d made it. She was in the better world for good.

Text copyright © 2018 by Lettie Prell
Art copyright © 2018 by Mary Haasdyk

It is with great sorrow and frustration that I say another potentially promising TV show bites the dust. Mere hours before drafting this essay in bed while flipping through TV news, I learned that NBC has cancelled the sci-fi adventure series Timeless. Again. It’s almost as if, for a show about going back in time to repair and safeguard history, this show just couldn’t change its own fate, no matter how vocal and obsessed the fan base (among whom I count myself as a member).

The death knell hasn’t totally rung out just yet—there are talks of one final salvo in order to bring closure to the entire story. Especially considering the big, dramatic cliffhanger of the season two finale—the death of one major character, and the appearance of the badass future versions of two others—as well as all of the season’s still-unanswered mysteries, a lot of people are hoping for more of the story to emerge.

But according to Shawn Ryan, the word is to give the show a finale two-hour movie special.

I say what I’m about to say as a fan, as someone who loves the characters and worldbuilding of Timeless a whole lot, and would do anything to see even more of them next year—

Please, for the love of all that is wholesome and noble on this pale blue dot, can folks just cut it out with the two-hour movie specials to wrap up canceled television plots? First Sense8, which I also loved and hated to lose, and now this?

I don’t mean to be cruel, but does anyone remember Serenity?

Okay, I think I can guess what you’re about to say. “What’s wrong with Serenity? That was a good movie!” And it was. I’m not saying it’s bad—it provably wasn’t. It was good! It was shiny, even! I enjoyed it a hell of a lot!

But… and I don’t know how to broach this topic to fellow Browncoats without a lot of frustration… Serenity isn’t Firefly. Not by a long shot. I’d even go so far as to say that if you put them beside each other, they’d only superficially resemble. Captain Malcolm Reynolds shifts almost suddenly from a snarky, charming rogue to a bitter, churlish old man who hangs up on the film’s call to action as often as the call is made, but somehow still finds himself moving forward within it based solely on reaction, taking the crew of his ship into unnecessary risks on barely any justification, all the while insisting he doesn’t like or want any of it. Why does he take the fugitive brainwashed assassin River Tam on a mission? Why does he seem not adequately bothered by the fact that a kill command can play on any television that can turn River into an unrestrained agent of mass murder? No matter how valuable the information is in theory, why does Mal decide to travel to Miranda if he knows it’s swimming with Reavers and he doesn’t even know what he’ll learn there? Why is this how we learn about the Reavers at all? Why is this the first we’re hearing of a soldier as good as The Operative? Why is his confrontation with The Operative the first we’re even learning about this war injury that renders him immune to pressure-point paralysis when even the earlier points of the film don’t properly establish the wound at all?

Serenity works in large part if you don’t think very much about how much more convenient it would have been to let each individual element of it breathe within a whole season: to let us see what makes Mal so bitter and expose us more to his personal consequences of the war, to step slowly toward the Reaver revelation and more secrets of the Alliance, and to tell a better story about how the access to information undoes despotism.

A movie isn’t that room. In fact, I’d dare say a movie can often do more harm to closure than just leaving a canceled show unresolved.

This goes especially for a show like Firefly, which it seemed was struggling on the production end to win the faith of execs as much as it had the hearts of viewers. Even a cursory read of the history of the show tells the story of execs who thought it wasn’t compelling enough, stripping it of the chance to even tell the full story of its first season, even if literally every episode was a winner in Browncoats’ eyes (yea, verily, even the finale, which I still have… a lot of harsh words for). A closure movie in circumstances like these seems to be the best of both worlds—more story for the people hungry to continue in that world, and less commitment for the folks who don’t want to pay for it any more.

Let’s look more closely at Sense8, for instance. Again, another show I loved, and didn’t want to go away, cut down by production struggles. Allegedly, Netflix figured the high expense required to make such an arresting, aggressively thematic globe-trotting series wasn’t breaking even with the viewership numbers, so they weren’t eager for a season three. Fans rioted on Twitter, and almost immediately a two-hour special was put on the table to tie up loose ends. Season Two, after all, also had a big cliffhanger—just when the entire world of sensates was beginning to be overturned, Wolfgang had been kidnapped, and the cluster had just resolved to bust him out by any means necessary.

What we got, though, was… a good movie. It’s good! I enjoyed it!

Except… what did it do to Capheus, and why did it just conveniently gloss over the fact that he was running for a major election in his home country of Kenya while all of this is happening, and hasn’t been seen by his constituents in days? Why does Lito contribute so little to the film except intense anxiety? While I love that the film gives so much room to develop the relationships between Kala and Wolfgang, and Nomi and Neets respectively, why are those the only ones it seems to value? Why does it attempt to rush through what should be the disturbing realization that so much of Wolfgang’s conflicts within his family are borne from his discovery that he is the offspring of an incestuous sexual assault, only to immediately drop the whole thing and give Wolf no further emotional catharsis? Why does the final confrontation feel so… lackluster?

The answer to all of these questions is, “because the fans deserved a final season”.

Buy it Now

I get if the powers that be don’t want to commit any further to a show they have lost faith in. I get that they want to just put the thing out of its misery without losing the trust of audiences. But at least to me, it would always just be worth more to give a show another smaller season, even if it’s eight episodes, even if it’s six, than to strain the answers into two hours and hope for the best. A television season is a marathon—trying to close it out in one breathless sprint does the story less favors than just killing it. Or, to offer another analogy: if fans came for a full course meal and you tell us you don’t have the ingredients or the hands to prepare it, it’s much better for you to guide us away than to give us a burger and a shake to appease us.

The worldbuilding and character development of Timeless is too big, especially now, to just close with a film. Rufus was murdered, only for future versions of his comrades Lucy and Wyatt to come back to their time and volunteer to bring him back—their very presence breaking a temporal law the team had sworn by for months. The mystery of Garcia Flynn’s secret book containing all the plots and plans of the big bad organization Rittenhouse has yet to be solved, and further, what it implies about Flynn’s relationship with Lucy was barely explored this season in favor of shipping #Lyatt—and I want to be sure, I have no judgments about the ship one way or the other, but story is story, and especially considering that Lucy’s future, battle-worn badass self was staring her in the eye in the season finale, the idea of her actually going back in time just to guide Flynn on this path seems worthy of showing now. Also, Jiya can control her visions now, apparently, which is a big damn deal, especially considering that apparently she also taught herself how to fight?!? And not to mention all of the character potential we were just beginning to plumb the truest depths of regarding Connor Mason, Agent Denise Christopher, and even Rittenhouse agents Emma Whitmore and Jessica Logan the latter of which was Wyatt’s temporally resurrected wife.

Count all of those beats. Just imagine each of them being explored at their very fullest. If you commit even just twenty minutes to breathlessly giving each individual element space to breathe, you’d be wildly over the two-hour mark.

Why tease fans with the idea of telling a good story anxiously when you can just give it room to be told well—or, alternatively, not at all?

A lot of TV seems to be a struggle to balance fans with funds, and it plays out like the behind-the-scenes staff responsible for making these shows happen at all are experimenting with ways to produce the barest minimum viable product and not lose consumer trust. If the two-hour special is that new minimum viable product, I’m not sure that I’m for it. Stories don’t get to grow and flower in such small pots. The small portion of extra effort required to truly fulfill those stories to their best would have been worth it in my mind, not merely to give fans the story at its summit, but to hopefully give them faith that no matter your challenges producing those stories, you can be trusted by them to at least do them justice to the end. Without that, you’re not letting those shows pass on gracefully, you’re leaving them to bleed out in misery.

I want to be wrong. I want to be able to say that if Timeless got a movie special it would be grand and interesting and engaging just like each episode of its first two beautiful seasons. But I can’t lie. I suspect that no matter how enjoyable such a potential movie may be, it would pale in comparison to even six more proper episodes, even four. And I wish I could borrow their Lifeboat and travel back to the very first TV boardroom where the very first person ever thought up the two-hour-movie-special cop-out, and somehow bring them to their senses.

Brandon O’Brien is a performance poet and writer from Trinidad. His work is published or upcoming in Uncanny Magazine, Strange Horizons, Sunvault: Stories of Solarpunk and Eco-Speculation, Arsenika, and New Worlds, Old Ways: Speculative Tales from the Caribbean, among others. He is also the poetry editor of FIYAH Magazine. You can find his blog at therisingtithes.tumblr.com or on Twitter @therisingtithes.

WALL-E is generally referred to as a children’s film, and I’m not going to argue: it’s an excellent children’s film—a classic, absolutely. I also happen to think that it’s an even better movie for adults, for whom its lessons are more poignant, possibly more resonant, and more necessary. Pixar has a knack for producing films which consistently operate on two different levels: one which speaks to a young audience without condescension or pandering, and one which reflects adult experience, rather than just exploiting nostalgia for idealized conceptions of childhood or simply spiking the cinematic punch with snarky, Grown-Ups Only pop culture references and in-jokes.

Movies like WALL-E and Up deftly evoke complicated emotional responses in adults in a way that most children’s films don’t, speaking to adults on their own level through smart, subtle storytelling that’s often amazingly, heartbreakingly simple. Consider the opening sequence of Up, for example, which has the power to make grown men break down and sob as if they’ve just been kicked in the heart, but doesn’t seem particularly traumatic for small children at the same time; it’s not that kids don’t “get it”—they just don’t necessarily react to the sequence in the same way that adults, carrying a little more emotional baggage into the theater, tend to respond.

WALL-E is Pixar’s most sustained and arguably most successful experiment in employing this radical narrative simplicity. For the first twenty minutes of the movie, there’s basically no spoken dialogue, only recorded human voices echoing around a long-abandoned Earth. During the making of the movie, the Pixar team studied and drew inspiration from silent films, particularly those of Chaplin and Buster Keaton, and the influence is palpable throughout the movie, but especially in these opening scenes.

The irony, of course, is that the era of the silent film greats was defined by the limits of available technology—these artists were driven to perfect a unique mode of expression because of the challenges they faced in the early days of cinema. WALL-E himself is literally a product of technology, the discarded creation of a society with no such limits, but also no vision, which eventually self-destructed in a downward spiral of mindless consumption and apathy. In WALL-E’s reality, there isn’t any dialogue because there’s no longer anyone to talk to, to talk with. Oddly enough, when we eventually get a glimpse of human existence later in the movie, there’s still no dialogue—plenty of noise, prerecorded messages, automated announcements, and verbal commands, but no conversation, and certainly no meaningful interactions between people.

WALL-E shares a kinship with Keaton and Chaplin that goes beyond his movements and mannerisms—in short, he is an artist. The opening scenes of the movie establish the fact that he possesses a remarkable capacity for aesthetic appreciation. His function, as a robot, is to clean up the planetful of garbage left behind by humanity—a mindless, thankless task, or it would be, if he wasn’t able to spend his days sorting through the rubble, collecting objects which appeal to his natural curiosity and sense of beauty. His prized possession, of course, is a beat-up VHS tape of Hello, Dolly! —his (and our) only link to a vibrant, thriving human past. In a sense, WALL-E is the last holdout of romanticism, stranded in an isolated industrial wasteland—and where Keats had a Grecian urn and Wordsworth had all sorts of abbeys and daffodils to inspire him, WALL-E’s experience of the sublime stems from a random 1969 Barbra Streisand musical…and that is genius.

I love that we’re never given any background on Hello, Dolly!, no belabored exposition on what it was and why we should care, no cute backstory about WALL-E finding his precious video cassette—all that matters is the feeling it evokes, within the context of the story. It’s such a fascinating choice for such a central plot device—a bloated, big-budget spectacle that was both one of the last great Hollywood musicals (directed by none other than the legendary Gene Kelley), and also a box office disappointment which helped usher in the end of an era, as cheery showtunes and sequins failed to impress late 60s audiences more interested in edgier fare. The movie version of Hello, Dolly! isn’t iconic enough to be instantly familiar to most audiences, but that fact makes it such a brilliant choice in a movie that urges you to look at the world differently, to appreciate the inherent value of creation and expression wherever you can find it.

Through WALL-E’s eyes, a campy Sixties musical suddenly becomes a lightning rod of varying emotions: joy, longing, passion…it brings WALL-E and EVE together, reunites them when they’re separated, and even serves as a call to action in a robot revolt in the second half of the movie. When the captain of the Axiom starliner views the recorded video of Earth stored in EVE’s memory, he’s initially discouraged—until the clip of “Put on Your Sunday Clothes” magically appears, steeling his resolve and inspiring him, finally, to return to Earth. The lesson is driven home again and again: singing, dancing, music, and art have the power to connect, to further our understanding of the world; art is how we communicate—it can inspire revolution, redemption, and change for the better.

More than anything else, WALL-E is a movie about the importance of appreciating and creating art—without it, we are cut off from each other, and from ourselves. As far as depictions of dystopian futures are concerned, the movie is rather gentle—nothing about the cushy Axiom is likely to traumatize small children… but at the same time, its indictment of a culture entirely devoted to the mindless consumption of “entertainment” with no artistic merit or intellectual value is chilling the more you think about it. And the movie really, really wants you to think about it.

When you get right down to it, WALL-E can be considered Pixar’s mission statement; it’s basically a gorgeous, animated manifesto. Over and over again, it drives home the point that civilization and self-expression go hand in hand—humanity is defined by its ability to move beyond mere survival into the realm of art: it’s no coincidence that, after meeting WALL-E, the captain’s crash course in the history of the world moves from learning about basics like “soil,” “earth,” and “sea” directly into “hoedown” and “dancing”: this is a natural progression, according to the movie’s logic. WALL-E spends 700 years on his own (Hal, his adorable cockroach friend notwithstanding), but as soon as he encounters EVE, he immediately attempts to reach out to her by building a sculpture in her image–that gesture alone betrays more passion and humanity than any of the any of the actual humans in the movie are capable of mustering, until the very end. And this is why I think adults may have more to learn from WALL-E than kids do….

George Carlin famously said, “Scratch any cynic and you’ll find a disappointed idealist.” For me, more than anything else, WALL-E is a movie that speaks directly to the cynics, the apathetic, and to anyone who has lost touch with the fundamental urge toward creativity and expression, with the sheer joy and heights of emotion that art can bring. Just watching the closing credits is inspiring, as they move through the style of cave drawings, Greek and Roman art, Seurat, Van Gogh, all the way up through 8-bit video game-style graphics. It drives home the message that the world is full of inspiration, sometimes where we least expect to find it. It’s clear that the folks at Pixar see themselves as participating in this grand tradition that includes everything from ancient graffiti to Renaissance masterpieces to Modern Times, and 2001, and even Hello, Dolly! Every aspect of this movie is imbued with the power of its creators’ convictions: WALL-E is Pixar’s luminous love letter to the creative process…one which will hopefully continue to inspire adults and children alike for many years to come.

Originally published in June 2012.

Bridget McGovern is the non-fiction editor of Tor.com. She is making it her mission in life to mount an all-robot production of Mame, just as soon as she finishes building her Bea Arthur-bot. You can follow her on Twitter.

Let’s face it, Native Americans/First Nations characters don’t show up very often in mainstream science fiction and fantasy stories, and when they do, they’re often plagued by stereotypes. They’re monosyllabic mystics, stuck in the 1800s, or they’re relegated to laconic (a.k.a stoic) warriors in horse cultures, or, even worse, erased from the continent entirely.

I’m not sure why the Indigenous people of North America fail to evolve in the imagination of science fiction and fantasy writers. Why we get trapped in the amber of yesteryear, never to break out of notions of noble savagery, braids, and loincloths. In a field known for its creativity, science fiction and fantasy has let its readers, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, down. But I am happy to say this is changing, and it’s mostly changing because readers are getting to hear a lot of great Indigenous voices telling their own stories in the genre. From novels to short fiction to comic books, Indigenous writers are claiming speculative fiction as their own, weaving original worlds that critique colonialism or simply tell a great story that don’t necessarily engage European conquest at all.

I’ve rounded up five speculative fiction books written by Indigenous to the Americas authors that I think everyone should read. Each one tells a story about our continued existence now and into the future.

The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline

The Marrow Thieves has won a ton of awards in Canada and the United States, including the coveted Kirkus prize for 2017, and for good reason.

It’s a YA novel set in a dystopian future where the non-Indigenous population have lost the ability to dream. Indigenous people can still dream and they are hunted by government goon squads for the marrow in their bones, which is used to make a dreaming cure. Our protagonist is a boy named Frenchie who meets up with a ragtag crew of other Indigenous people on the run as they all head north to the places rumored to be safer than the cities. Each crew member has their own story of horror and survival and loss, but together they are strong.

It’s a beautifully written but exceedingly creepy tale that mirrors almost too closely the very real exploitation of natural resources on Indigenous land and the history of forcing children into boarding schools to force assimilation and destroy their culture. Not everyone makes it out alive, but the story still manages to resonate with hope and found family.

Dimaline also has another YA novel from 2013 called The Girl Who Grew A Galaxy about a girl whose emotions become planets that circle around her head. I haven’t read it yet, but it’s going on my TBR.

Mapping the Interior by Stephen Graham Jones

Stephen Graham Jones is a prolific and award-winning horror writer. His contemporary werewolf novel, Mongrels, made a handful of Best of lists in 2016 and was nominated for a Bram Stoker and a Shirley Jackson award.

But the work I love, and I’m recommending today, is his Tor.com Publishing novella, Mapping the Interior, which won the Bram Stoker award for 2017. This story is told primarily from the perspective of a twelve-year-old boy whose dead father has come back to life as a ghost. But any benevolence on the part of the ghost is quickly put to rest as the boy realizes his father has returned for his own purposes, and they aren’t good. It’s a story about fathers and son and cycles of violence, but it’s also a tense and creepy old-fashioned haunting that had me putting down the book a few times to take a breath when things got too intense.

That’s not a complaint, by the way.

Graham’s voice is powerful and immediate, and I love the details in his work and his turn of phrase that rings so familiar to me as both a Texan and an Indigenous woman.

Robopocalyse by Daniel Wilson

While the premise of Wilson’s book may sound familiar, it takes on new life in Wilson’s superior storyteller hands. Having a PhD in Robotics probably doesn’t hurt, either.

Fast-paced and thrilling, this story of robots taking over the world is told in a montage of first-person accounts and lost camera footage from various corners of the world. But the heart of the story, the place where rebellion begins and ends, is Osage land. In Wilson’s world, the things that might be seen as drawbacks to reservation life, e.g. lack of technology and traditional ways, become humanity’s strengths, as the war between man and machine escalates into a final battle. Robopocalypse is a lot of fun, but also a lot of smart.

Wilson is also pretty prolific and his works include a sequel to Robopocalyse called Robogenesis, a recent novel The Clockwork Dynasty and a new anthology of short fiction called Guardian Angels and Other Monsters.

Love Beyond Body, Space and Time edited by Hope Nicholson

Chihuahuas in space, boys who transform into hummingbirds, cyborgs and legends in the making await you in this collection of Indigenous science fiction and urban fantasy focusing on LGBT and Two-Spirit characters. There’s such a great mix here of heart-breaking and heart-warming and a lot of truth-telling in-between from voices that rarely get heard in the genre. Some of the standout favorites for me were Darcie Little Badger’s “Né łe” and Richard Van Camp’s “Aliens.”

Deer Woman: An Anthology edited Elizabeth Lapensée and Weshoyot Alvitre

It may be cheating a bit to recommend this graphic novel because I have a short flash piece in this collection, but don’t read it for me. Read it because it’s a collection of short fiction and comics written by and about Indigenous women reinterpreting and reinventing the Deer Woman legend. The imagery varies from the violence of Deer Woman taking revenge on behalf of victimized women to Deer Woman inspiring a lesbian couple to stand up to the literal arrows of micro aggressions. It’s in turns lush and darkly violent and truly my aesthetic.

A portion of the proceeds go to funding an organization that teaches Indigenous women self-defense. This is an important cause as one in three Indigenous women are victims of violence, and thousands of Indigenous women go missing every year, a horrific fact most people outside of Indigenous communities aren’t even aware of.

Rebecca Roanhorse is a Nebula Award-winning speculative fiction writer and a Hugo/Sturgeon/Locus Award Finalist for her short fiction, Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience (TM), and a 2017 Campbell Award Finalist for Best New SFF writer. Her debut novel Trail of Lightning, book #1 in the Sixth World Series (Saga Press) drops June 26th, 2018. Book #2, Storm of Locusts, will follow in 2019. She also has a middle grade novel coming in 2019 from Rick Riordan Presents, titled Race to the Sun. And in 2020, an Anasazi-inspired epic fantasy Between Earth and Sky (Saga Press). She lives in Northern New Mexico with her husband, daughter, and pug.

Most heists that I’ve seen are either criminals in for one last score, super glitzy fluff like the “Oceans” movies or The Italian Job, or desperate political heists like Rogue One. When they’re about money they’re usually about money as a macguffin, and when they’re about class it’s usually in an escapist way, watching Danny Ocean or later his sister Debbie slink around in gorgeous clothes and glittering settings. While author Andy Weir tends to say that his books are pure fun, Artemis is one of the few heist stories I’ve come across that, for me at least, is explicitly about money and about class.

Buy it Now

Artemis is a frontier town, with a frontier town’s haphazard structure, uneasy diversity, and DIY justice. There’s one cop, a former Mountie named Rudy who polices the city. There’s an Administrator, Madame Ngogi, a Kenyan economist who essentially created Artemis as a carrot to wave at the nascent space tourism industry. There are a few rich citizens and a lot of rich tourists, and the resulting thriving markets in sex work, guided tours, and illicit substances. Because Artemis isn’t really its own nation, but just a cobbled-together outpost, it can’t have its own currency, and instead traffics in slugs—chits that can be converted into and out of a variety of Earth currencies, and which are transferred between citizens via a Gizmo. Gizmos are near-future iPads, sort of catch-all devices that have your ID, bank account, photos, internet access (connection is slow because it has to bounce back and forth with Earth), and even an old-fashioned phone.

Jazz Beshara is a subsistence level delivery girl who smuggles as a side hustle. She lives in a coffin room in a shitty neighborhood on the moon—but it’s better than the odd corners and storage closets she used to squat in. When we meet her, she’s in the process of failing her latest EVA exam, which is a giant problem. First of all, failing an EVA exam might kill you. But more importantly, she needed to pass the exam so she could start taking tourists on guided EVA hikes, thus earning her thousands of slugs per trip. Now she’s lost her shot at a better side hustle (soul-crushing), she’ll have to get her EVA suit repaired (expensive), and she can’t take the test again for six months (it’s a small city, so of course everyone knows she failed). But really, the problem is money. She knows exactly how much money is in her account at all times. She knows exactly how much she needs to pay off an old debt—416,922 slugs—and she spends most of her free time calculating how to save toward that goal. Of course, as everyone who’s ever been truly poor knows, usually those calculations show you that there’s no fucking way.

There’s no fucking way.

So, she gambles on a much larger crime than her usual smuggling, and brings her tiny duct-tape-and-spit world crashing down on her head.

This is a brilliant move, taking a story of abject poverty and sticking it in a city on the moon. Normally when you think of that you’d think of a hi-tech future—space ports and ray guns and FTL. And yeah, there have been other stories about working class people on the moon (I wrote about a couple of them in my look at Samuel Delany’s Driftglass) but this one is the first one I’ve read that keeps a constant running tally of accounts. When Jazz has to go on the lam and buy supplies, we know what it cost. When she has to pay her friends for tech, we see the debit. When a friend offers to help her for free, we note how much she’s just saved. It’s a constant flow underlining that everything in this world has a dollar value. It’s claustrophobic, and if you’ve ever been poor, horrible. But it’s also fucking exhilarating.

I know some people had issues with Weir’s writing of women, but I found Jazz perfectly believable—a snarky woman who has a bunch of guy friends, a complicated relationship with the religion she was raised in, a lot of anger toward capitalism, swears a lot…

Huh. I wonder why I like her?

And as in The Martian I thought Weir’s casual diversity was fine—people have emigrated to the moon from all over the world, so each industry and neighborhood tends to have its own ethnic majorities and minorities, and people get along with each other just about as well as they do in New York—i.e., they fight a lot, but if an outsider threatens them they become one angry growling entity.

The city on the moon is perfect because it’s so grounded in reality. This is only 70 years in the future, so the tech is good enough to get us up there and back but that’s kind of it. There’s a monorail that takes tourists out to the Apollo 11 landing site, and there are bubbles with extremely layered glass , but most people live underground. And given how much it costs to ship things to the moon there aren’t a lot of frills. Very little decoration. Open flame is frowned upon, so there goes a lot of gourmet cooking. Most people subsist on Gunk, which is kind of like the cockroach slurry cakes from Snowpiercer. Air and water are all endlessly recycled. Most of all there’s very little, er, space. Everyone’s packed into bubbled linked by narrow corridors—more interior space = more money, so the floors are lined with narrow hallways that barely allow two people to pass through at once. Everyone knows everyone, which makes it hard for someone to live a private life, let alone plan and perpetrate a heist.

The crime scenes and action are all really well done, my only issue being that Weir does have a tendency to describe a scene, give some hints about how Jazz will get out of trouble, and then surprise the reader with a detail later, but obviously if we had full access to her point of view it would kill a lot of the suspense.

I also loved how he sets up so much of the action by showing us fantastic details of every day life on the moon, and then pulls the trigger a hundred pages later when the details become vital. I don’t want to spoil anything, but he spends a lot of time explaining how fire safety works on the moon—basically since Artemis is in a closed system with no way of escape (not too much breathable air on the moon) every room has to be as fire proof as possible, so they’re equipped with little airlock rooms. If the station detects a fire, it give the room’s occupants a few minutes to bolt to the safety of the airlock before sucking all the air out of the main room—thus killing the fire with lack of oxygen. The issue being that if you don’t make it to the airlock…well, as Spock said when he was in a similar airlock, “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” Also of course, if you do make it to the airlock you’re trapped until the fire brigade comes and lets you out—but hey, at least you can breathe. As in The Martian, the details and wonkiness transcend any traditional notion of the infodump, because the barrage of info is an inextricable part of the story, and there are only a few points where I thought it got a little too detailed for its own good. I would also say that a few of the supporting characters could have been fleshed out a bit more, although some, like Jazz’s frenemy Dale and her exceedingly rich associate, Trond, come through perfectly. And Weir has a great eye for people whose dedication to their work turns them into villains, or at least big jerks.

And to come back to that money? Just keep track of it as you read, because it tells a whole fascinating story of its own, dancing around all of Jazz’s smart aleck comments and low-gravity fights.

Leah Schnelbach agrees with Ernie that living on the moon would probably be annoying after a while. Come howl with her on Twitter!

You know the story: boy discovers there’s a world of witches and wizards, where friends come in the forms of a courageous girls and aging professors, where sinister forces stir in ancient tombs and only he, riddled with self-doubt from behind his glasses, can stop them.

You do realize I’m not talking about Harry Potter.

It’s Lewis Barnavelt, obviously. You know, by John Bellairs? Wait, YOU DON’T KNOW JOHN BELLAIRS?

My inner eleven-year-old gets a little defensive about Bellairs, because he’s my J.K. Rowling.

Bellairs’ The House with a Clock in Its Walls is my Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone. The book where I, as an awkward, inhaler-puffing, glasses-wearing kid, found a hero who sounded a whole lot like me, struggling to find his place in a ever-frightening world.

Buy it Now

I am not suggesting that Rowling at all ripped off any ideas from my boy John. Because criticizing J.K. in my house, where my daughters constructed Quidditch brooms out of pool noodles from the Harry Potter day camp they just attended, is blasphemy. Rowling conjured her own world and every detail is original and we will fight you if you disagree.

But make no mistake: Bellairs paved the way, and I won’t be satisfied until a global “John Bellairs Day” is declared by the U.N.

Let me rein it in a bit and explain why. I owe a lot to Bellairs, not only for writing the books that gave me so much comfort and thrills as a child, but for also implanting how fear should not be rejected or stymied, how it is important to development and a vital catalyst for courage.

Bellairs does this masterfully in House. The anxiety for his ten-year-old protagonist, Lewis, is revealed in the very first sentence, describing him fidgeting and wiping his sweaty hands on a 1948 bus seat. Orphaned by a terrible car accident that killed his parents, he is on his way to a new state to live with his uncle Jonathan, whom he had never met.

At about the same age as Lewis, I read the book when I too was leaving the only life I had ever known. My father had lost his job, and my brother and I were shuffled downstate to rural Southern Illinois. While not nearly as catastrophic as Lewis’ journey, I was still a nervous wreck.

By the second page of House, Lewis thinks, “Where am I going? Who will I meet? Will I like them? What will happen to me?”

How often have we all experienced those thoughts; after a shattered marriage, a demotion, or a medical diagnosis.

Young Lewis’ journey does not get easier, as he enters his uncle’s life in a gothic mansion that hides a secret so dark that it could spell the end of the world.

Although he is warned by his Baptist aunts that Uncle Jonathan smokes and drinks and plays poker (therefore instantly likeable in my view), Lewis quickly learns the truth about him: he is a warlock, and his eccentric next door neighbor, Mrs. Zimmerman, is a witch.

I won’t ruin the plot of what unfolds next, for that would ruin the fun. But it’s important to reveal Lewis’ struggles throughout.

Sadness over the loss of his parents. Ostracized for being the self-described fat kid who can’t play baseball. Jealously over an athletic, thinner friend that results in a terrible mistake that awakens evil. And not just a spooky evil, but a truly dangerous, deadly evil.

Lewis doesn’t face it all with unbridled courage and bravery. He stumbles, he fails and weeps and cowers.

He also learns he is not alone in his trials. Uncle Jonathan is more than just his caretaker and becomes the foundation Lewis so desperately needs. Miss Zimmermann, with her wrinkles and tight bun, is a powerful defender. And when Lewis experiences an act of cruelty by a friend, he then discovers the tomboy Rose Rita, whose courage is displayed in the books to come.

Fear is never truly conquered. Our heroes, at the end, are described as wearily going off to bed. It is an ever-present part of life, faced page by page.

In the world before Harry Potter, Bellairs provided books that carried the same themes. Magic is very much real, but so are the social challenges, from bullies to isolation, always told from children navigating strange, uncertain times.

Bellairs continues this theme with other characters in different stories, but always links his young protagonists with older caretakers, either as friends or family members. Prior to Harry and Professor Dumbledore, Bellairs created the friendship between Johnny Dixon and Professor Childermass in The Curse of the Blue Figurine.

I think Bellairs and Rowling were on to something. Both writers often eliminate parents from the narrative, driving right to the relationship between children and senior citizens. There’s something about pairing wary kids with world-weary adults that introduce, often with hesitation, that magic is real, but not without consequences.

Imagine my delight in seeing that what looks to be a top notch film adaptation of House is set to be released this year, featuring actors that often guarantee a well-made film, including Cate Blanchett and Jack Black.

Hopefully, it introduces a whole new generation of fans to Bellairs’ works. While there may be new releases of the novel as tie-ins to the film, I secretly hope everyone scrounges for the versions I still keep on my bookshelf, in which the brilliant Edward Gorey drew the interior artwork.

My eleven-year-old daughter is chomping at the bit for more of what she devoured in Harry Potter. So with an eyebrow raised and a wicked smile, channeling my best Uncle Jonathan, I handed her my copy of House, thinking of what he said to Lewis as they were about to enter the mansion for the first time.

“Come on. Let’s go in. Don’t be bashful. It’s your house now.”

Jeremy Finley’s investigative reporting has resulted in criminal convictions, hearings before the U.S. Congress, more than a million dollars paid out to scam victims, and the discovery of missing girls. He is the chief investigative reporter for WSMV-TV in Nashville, TN, where he lives with his wife and daughters. His first speculative thriller, The Darkest Time of Night, will be released on June 26.

We really don’t know where to tell you to start with this month’s plethora of new fantasy releases. With Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne’s humorous fantasy, Kill the Farm Boy? With Sam Hawke’s epic fantasy debut, City of Lies? With the sequel to Hocus Pocus? With the latest from Naomi Novik or Kameron Hurley, or the new book from the creators of The Adventure Zone? With the latest in JY Yang’s Tensorate series or Kiersten White’s third And I Darken book? Where will you start?

Keep track of all the new releases here. Note: All title summaries are taken and/or summarized from copy provided by the publisher.

WEEK ONE

Smoke and Iron (The Great Library #4)—Rachel Caine (July 3, Berkley)
Young adult. The opening moves of a deadly game have begun. Jess Brightwell has put himself in direct peril, with only his wits and skill to aid him in a game of cat and mouse with the Archivist Magister of the Great Library. With the world catching fire, and words printed on paper the spark that lights rebellion, it falls to smugglers, thieves, and scholars to save a library thousands of years in the making…if they can stay alive long enough to outwit their enemies.

The Book of Hidden Things—Francesco Dimitri (July 3, Titan)
Four old school friends have a pact: to meet up every year in the small town in Puglia they grew up in. Art, the charismatic leader of the group and creator of the pact, insists that the agreement must remain unshakable and enduring. But this year, he never shows up. A visit to his house increases the friends’ worry; Art is farming marijuana. In Southern Italy doing that kind of thing can be very dangerous. They can’t go to the Carabinieri so must make enquiries of their own. This is how they come across the rumours about Art; bizarre and unbelievable rumours that he miraculously cured the local mafia boss’s daughter of terminal leukaemia. And among the chaos of his house, they find a document written by Art, The Book of Hidden Things, that promises to reveal dark secrets and wonders beyond anything previously known.

Monster Hunter Memoirs: Saints—Larry Correia, John Ringo (July 3, Baen Books)
“This is New Orleans.” That mantra had rung in Chad Gadenier’s ears since his first day working in the Big Easy. Everything was different in New Orleans. The food. The climate. The monsters. Even the shadowy and reprehensible MCB was different. But that’s just the beginning. The real reason New Orleans is so different is a larval Great Old One growing day by day in power and just about ready to pop. If Chad can’t convince “the powers that be” to get involved not only New Orleans but the entire world is going to fall under the power of the nastiest of nasties. Now on the outs with the US government and in exile from his usual job of saving the world, Chad must rally the forces of light against the coming darkness. The problem is one guy with a sword and a sub-gun isn’t going to solve this one. Fortunately, Chad’s made a few friends over the years. And the Fey hate Old Ones as much as God’s people, and they’re not about to give up this world without a fight.

The Silver Scar—Betsy Dornbusch (July 3, Talos)
When Trinidad was twelve, his Wiccan parents blew themselves up in an ecoterr attack that killed several Christians. Orphaned and disillusioned, he fled his home and his best friend Castile to become a soldier for the powerful Christian church. Raised by a priest and trained by a godless warrior, Trinidad learned the brutal art of balancing faith and war. He is the perfect archwarden. But when the church’s bishop arrives with a silver scar she claims is proof of angelic orders to crusade, Trinidad alone knows her story is a lie. The silver scar comes from a mystical, ancient graveyard called the Barren—a place of healing reached only by Wiccan magic, a place that could turn Christianity on its head. Accusing her outright would be treason. Searching for proof would mean committing heresy. Either is a death sentence. Torn between the lure of powerful magic, his love for Castile, and his vows to defend the Church, Trinidad must turn to the very people he’d left in his past to stop the crusade.

Kiss of the Royal—Lindsey Duga (July 3, Entangled Teen)
Young adult. In the war against the Forces of Darkness, the Royals are losing. Princess Ivy is determined to end this centuries-long conflict once and for all, so her new battle partner must succeed where the others failed. Prince Zach’s unparalleled skill with a sword, enhanced by Ivy’s magic Kiss, should make them an unstoppable pair—but try convincing Zach of that. Prince Zach has spent his life preparing for battle, but he would rather be branded a heretic than use his lips as nothing more than a way to transfer magic. A kiss is a symbol of love, and love is the most powerful weapon they have—but try convincing Ivy of that. With the fate of their world on the line, the battlefield has become a testing ground, and only one of them can be right. Falling for each other wasn’t part of the plan—but try convincing their hearts of that.

City of Lies (The Poison Wars #1)—Sam Hawke (July 3, Tor Books)
Outwardly, Jovan is the lifelong friend of the Chancellor’s charming, irresponsible Heir. Quiet. Forgettable. In secret, he’s a master of poisons and chemicals, trained to protect the Chancellor’s family from treachery. When the Chancellor succumbs to an unknown poison and an army lays siege to the city, Jovan and his sister Kalina must protect the Heir and save their city-state. But treachery lurks in every corner, and the ancient spirits of the land are rising … and angry.

Marked (Alex Verus #9)—Benedict Jacka (July 3, Ace)
When Mage Alex Verus ends up with a position on the Light Council, no one is happy, least of all him. But Alex is starting to realize that if he wants to protect his friends, he’ll need to become a power player himself. His first order of business is to track down dangerous magical items unleashed into the world by Dark Mages. But when the Council decides they need his help in negotiating with the perpetrators, Alex will have to use all his cunning and magic to strike a deal—and stop the rising tension between the Council, the Dark Mages, and the adept community from turning into a bloodbath.

Heroine’s Journey (Heroine Complex #3)—Sarah Kuhn (July 3, DAW)
Beatrice Tanaka’s powers of emotional projection should have made her one of the most formidable superheroes of all time. And she should have been allowed to join her older sister Evie as a full-fledged protector of San Francisco. But Evie and her superheroing partner, Aveda Jupiter, insist on seeing Bea as the impulsive, tempestuous teenager she used to be—even though she’s now a responsible adult. And that means Bea is currently living a thoroughly normal life. She works as a bookstore lackey, hangs out with best friends Sam Fujikawa and Leah Kim, and calms her workplace’s more difficult customers. Sure, she’s not technically supposed to be playing with people’s mental states. But given the mundanity of her existence, who can blame her? When a mysterious being starts communicating with Bea, hinting at an evil that’s about to overtake the city, she seizes the opportunity, hoping to turn her “should haves” into the fabulous heroic life she’s always wanted. But gaining that life may mean sacrificing everything—and everyone—she holds dear…

The Collide (Outliers #3)—Kimberly McCreight (July 3, HarperCollins)
Young adult. Wylie is finally out of the detention center, but that doesn’t mean she’s safe. As much as she wants to forget everything that’s happened and return to her normal life, Wylie knows that true freedom means discovering, once and for all, who is hunting the girls who are Outliers—and why. Armed with only a few clues and a handful of trusted allies, Wylie sets out to separate fact from fiction. But soon she is unearthing long-buried secrets and finds herself entangled in a conspiracy that is much bigger and more dangerous than she ever could have imagined. Worse yet, the nearer Wylie gets to discovering the truth, the closer her enemies get to silencing her and the other girls. This time, maybe forever.

The Complete Fairy Tales—Charles Perrault (July 1, Oxford University Press)
Charles Perrault’s versions gave classic status to the humble fairy tale, and it is in his telling that the stories of Little Red Riding-Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella and the rest have been passed down from the 17th century to the present day. Perrault’s tales were enjoyed in the salons of Louis XIV as much as they were loved in the nursery, and it is their wit, humor, and lively detail that capture the imagination of adult and child alike. They transmute into vivid fantasies the hidden fears and conflicts by which children are affected: fears of abandonment, or worse, conflicts with siblings and parents, and the trials of growing up. In addition to the familiar stories, this edition also includes the three verse tales—the troubling account of patient Griselda, the comic Three Silly Wishes, and the notorious Donkey-Skin.

The Empire of Ashes (Draconis Memoria #3)—Anthony Ryan (July 3, Ace)
For hundreds of years, the Ironship Trading Syndicate was fueled by drake blood—and protected by the Blood-blessed, those few who could drink it and wield fearsome powers. But now the very thing that sustained the corporate world threatens to destroy it. A drake of unimaginable power has risen, and it commands an army of both beasts and men. Rogue Blood-blessed Claydon Torcreek, Syndicate agent Lizanne Lethridge, and Ironship captain Corrick Hilemore, spread to disparate corners of the world, must rely upon the new powers and knowledge they have gained at great price to halt its forces–or face the end of all they know.

Age of War (Legends of the First Empire #3)—Michael J. Sullivan (July 3, Del Rey)
The alliance of humans and renegade Fhrey is fragile—and about to be tested as never before. Persephone keeps the human clans from turning on one another through her iron will and a compassionate heart. The arrogant Fhrey are barely held in check by their leader, Nyphron, who seeks to advance his own nefarious agenda through a loveless marriage that will result in the betrayal of the person Persephone loves most: Raithe, the God Killer. As the Fhrey overlords marshal their army and sorcerers to crush the rebellion, old loyalties will be challenged while fresh conspiracies will threaten to undo all that Persephone has accomplished. In the darkest hour, when hope is all but lost, new heroes will rise . . . but at what terrible cost?

Lost Gods—Micah Yongo (July 3, Angry Robot)
Neythan is one of five young warriors trained and raised together by a mysterious brotherhood of assassins known as the Shedaím. When Neythan is framed for the murder of his closest friend, he pursues his betrayer – and in so doing learns there’s far more to the Brotherhood, and the machinations of the rulers of the warring kingdoms, than he’d ever thought possible. His journey will lead him across the five realms, from the Forest of Silences to the Ash Plains of Calapaar, and reveal the breaches that lie beneath the world, and the hidden truths of his oath.

WEEK TWO

The Traitor’s Ruin (Traitor’s Trilogy #2)—Erin Beaty (July 10, Imprint)
Young adult. After proving her worth as a deft spy and strategic matchmaker, Sage Fowler is now comfortably positioned in high society as the royal tutor. When she learns of a secret mission, she jumps at the chance to serve her kingdom once more—and to be reunited with her fiancé, Captain Alex Quinn. However, Sage’s headstrong insistence clashes with Alex’s gruff military exterior. And after a skirmish with a bordering kingdom, they’re separated when tragedy strikes. Now in enemy territory, Sage desperately scrambles to complete Alex’s reconnaissance mission. Can she save her kingdom once more?

The Naming of the Beasts (Felix Castor #5)—Mike Carey (July 10, Orbit)
They say the road to Hell is paved with good intentions, but if you ask Castor, he’ll tell you there’s quite a bit of arrogance and reckless stupidity lining the streets as well. He should know. There’s only so many times you can play both sides against the middle and get away with it. Now, the inevitable moment of crisis has arrived and it’s left Castor with blood on his hands. Castor drowns his guilt in cheap whiskey, while an innocent woman lies dead and her daughter comatose, his few remaining friends fear for their lives, and there’s a demon loose on the streets. But not just any demon—this one rides shotgun on Castor’s best friend’s soul, and can’t be expelled without killing him. Looks like Felix Castor’s got some tough choices to make, because expel the demon he must—or all Hell will break loose.

Lost (House of Night Other World #2)—P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast (July 10, Blackstone Publishing)
The moment Other Kevin returns to his world trouble begins. Thankfully, he finds friends and allies—some expected, some unexpected—and soon discovers he, like his sister, can wield Old Magick. Back in our Tulsa, things have settled down since Zoey and the gang closed the tear between worlds. But why is Zoey increasingly withdrawn and moody? Stark thinks he knows what’s wrong—and he is determined not to lose Zoey to the Other World and Heath. Stevie Rae thinks she knows what’s wrong—Z just needs a break. And the rest of the Nerd Herd thinks their Z will be fine—just give her some time to stop missing (and worrying about) Other Kevin. But Zoey knows the truth. In the Other World her brother is using Old Magick, unaware of the dangers it holds. Without guidance, what will stop him from giving in to the potent pull of Old Magick? Without her guidance, Other Kevin could lose more than the war against Neferet—he could lose his soul.

Bloody Rose (Band #2)—Nicholas Eames (July 10, Orbit)
Tam Hashford is tired of working at her local pub, slinging drinks for world-famous mercenaries and listening to the bards sing of adventure and glory in the world beyond her sleepy hometown. When the biggest mercenary band of all rolls into town, led by the infamous Bloody Rose, Tam jumps at the chance to sign on as their bard. It’s adventure she wants—and adventure she gets as the crew embark on a quest that will end in one of two ways: glory or death.

Deep Roots (Innsmouth Legacy #2)—Ruthanna Emrys (July 10, Tor.com Publishing)
Aphra Marsh, descendant of the People of the Water, has survived Deep One internment camps and made a grudging peace with the government that destroyed her home and exterminated her people on land. Deep Rootscontinues Aphra’s journey to rebuild her life and family on land, as she tracks down long-lost relatives. She must repopulate Innsmouth or risk seeing it torn down by greedy developers, but as she searches she discovers that people have been going missing. She will have to unravel the mystery, or risk seeing her way of life slip away.

The Brink of Darkness—Jeff Giles (July 10, Bloomsbury)
In this sequel to The Edge of Everything, star-crossed X and Zoe must overcome the boundaries of their two worlds in order to find their way back to each other. Things have changed for seventeen-year-old Zoe ever since the otherworldly events that brought her together with the mysterious bounty hunter she calls X. In order to save Zoe and her family, X has done the unthinkable—he’s given up his freedom and returned to captivity in the Lowlands. X is determined to break the lords’ hold on him once and for all, but being stripped of his power pushes him toward a darkness he’s never experienced and a past he’s never known. The secrets that surface could be the key to reuniting X and Zoe … or they could mean the destruction of everything they have been fighting for.

European Travels for the Monstrous Gentlewoman (Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club #2)—Theodora Goss (July 10, Saga)
Mary Jekyll’s life has been peaceful since she helped Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson solve the Whitechapel Murders. Beatrice Rappaccini, Catherine Moreau, Justine Frankenstein, and Mary’s sister Diana Hyde have settled into the Jekyll household in London, and although they sometimes quarrel, the members of the Athena Club get along as well as any five young women with very different personalities. At least they can always rely on Mrs. Poole. But when Mary receives a telegram that Lucinda Van Helsing has been kidnapped, the Athena Club must travel to the Austro-Hungarian Empire to rescue yet another young woman who has been subjected to horrific experimentation. Where is Lucinda, and what has Professor Van Helsing been doing to his daughter? From Paris to Vienna to Budapest, Mary and her friends must make new allies, face old enemies, and finally confront the fearsome, secretive Alchemical Society. It’s time for these monstrous gentlewomen to overcome the past and create their own destinies.

Hocus Pocus and The All-New Sequel: The Original & The Sequel—A. W. Jantha, Matt Griffin (July 10, Freeform)
Young adult. Diving once more into the world of witches, this two-part young adult novel, released on the 25th anniversary of the 1993 film, marks a new era of Hocus Pocus. Shortly after moving from California to Salem, Massachusetts, Max Dennison finds himself in hot water when he accidentally releases a coven of witches, the Sanderson sisters, from the afterlife. Max, his sister, and his new friends (human and otherwise) must find a way to stop the witches from carrying out their evil plan and remaining on earth to torment Salem for all eternity. Twenty-five years later, Max and Allison’s seventeen-year-old daughter, Poppy, finds herself face-to-face with the Sanderson sisters in all their sinister glory. When Halloween celebrations don’t quite go as planned, it’s a race against time as Poppy and her friends fight to save her family and all of Salem from the witches’ latest vile scheme.

Beast: A Tale of Love and Revenge—Lisa Jensen (July 10, Candlewick)
Young adult. They say Château Beaumont is cursed. Servant-girl Lucie can’t believe such foolishness about handsome Jean-Loup Christian Henri LeNoir, Chevalier de Beaumont, master of the estate—but when the chevalier’s cruelty is revealed, Lucie vows to see him suffer. A wisewoman grants her wish, with a spell that transforms Jean-Loup into monstrous-looking Beast, reflecting the monster he is inside. But Beast is nothing like the chevalier. Jean-Loup would never patiently tend his roses; never attempt poetry; never express remorse for the wrong done to Lucie. Gradually, Lucie realizes that Beast is an entirely different creature from the handsome chevalier, with a heart more human than Jean-Loup’s ever was. Lucie dares to hope that noble Beast has permanently replaced the cruel Jean-Loup—until an innocent beauty arrives at Beast’s château with the power to break the spell.

Spinning Silver—Naomi Novik (July 10, Del Rey)
Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her father’s inability to collect his debts has left his family on the edge of poverty—until Miryem takes matters into her own hands. Hardening her heart, the young woman sets out to claim what is owed and soon gains a reputation for being able to turn silver into gold. When an ill-advised boast draws the attention of the king of the Staryk—grim fey creatures who seem more ice than flesh—Miryem’s fate, and that of two kingdoms, will be forever altered. Set an impossible challenge by the nameless king, Miryem unwittingly spins a web that draws in a peasant girl, Wanda, and the unhappy daughter of a local lord who plots to wed his child to the dashing young tsar. But Tsar Mirnatius is not what he seems. And the secret he hides threatens to consume the lands of humans and Staryk alike. Torn between deadly choices, Miryem and her two unlikely allies embark on a desperate quest that will take them to the limits of sacrifice, power, and love.

Half-Witch—John Schoffstall (July 10, Big Mouth House)
Young adult. In the world in which Lizbet Lenz lives, the sun still goes around the earth, God speaks directly to his worshippers, goblins haunt every cellar and witches lurk in the forests. Disaster strikes when Lizbet’s father Gerhard, a charming scoundrel, is thrown into a dungeon by the tyrant Hengest Wolftrow. To free him, Lizbet must cross the Montagnes du Monde, globe-girdling mountains that reach to the sky, a journey no one has ever survived, and retrieve a mysterious book. Lizbet is desperate, and the only one who can help her is the unpleasant and sarcastic witch girl Strix. As the two girls journey through the mountains and into the lands of wonder beyond, on the run from goblins, powerful witches, and human criminals, Lizbet discovers, to her horror, that Strix’s magic is turning Lizbet into a witch, too. Meanwhile, a revolution in Heaven is brewing.

Bright We Burn (And I Darken #3)—Kiersten White (July 10, Delacorte Press)
Young adult. Haunted by the sacrifices he made in Constantinople, Radu is called back to the new capital. Mehmed is building an empire, becoming the sultan his people need. As emperor, he is more powerful than ever … and desperately lonely. Does this mean Radu can finally have more with Mehmed … and would he even want it? Lada’s rule of absolute justice has created a Wallachia free of crime. But Lada won’t rest until everyone knows that her country’s borders are inviolable. Determined to send a message of defiance, she has the bodies of Mehmed’s peace envoy delivered to him, leaving Radu and Mehmed with no choice. If Lada is allowed to continue, only death will prosper. They must go to war against the girl prince. But Mehmed knows that he loves her. He understands her. She must lose to him so he can keep her safe. Radu alone fears that they are underestimating his sister’s indomitable will. Only by destroying everything that came before—including her relationships—can Lada truly build the country she wants.

WEEK THREE

Son of the Night—Mark Alder (July 17, Gollancz)
As the armies mass around Crecy the rivalries between Lucifer, Satan and God become ever deeper and more violent. Combining a cast of larger than life (yet real) characters and a truthful, deeply researched take on the religious beliefs of the time Mark Alder is embarked on a truly unique historical fantasy that will ensure you never see the 100 Years War and the history of medieval Europe in the same way again.

Competence (Custard Protocol #3)—Gail Carriger (July 17, Orbit)
All alone in Singapore, proper Miss Primrose Tunstell must steal helium to save her airship, the Spotted Custard, in a scheme involving a lovesick werecat and a fake fish tail. When she uncovers rumors of a new kind of vampire, Prim and the Custard crew embark on a mission to Peru. There, they encounter airship pirates and strange atmospheric phenomena, and are mistaken for representatives of the Spanish Inquisition. Forced into extreme subterfuge (and some rather ridiculous outfits) Prim must also answer three of life’s most challenging questions: Can the perfect book club give a man back his soul? Will her brother ever stop wearing his idiotic velvet fez? And can the amount of lard in Christmas pudding save an entire species?

Spellslinger—Sebastien de Castell (July 17, Orbit)
Kellen is moments away from facing his first duel and proving his worth as a spellcaster. There’s just one problem: his magic is fading. Facing exile unless he can pass the mage trials, Kellen is willing to risk everything – even his own life – in search of a way to restore his magic. But when the enigmatic Ferius Parfax arrives in town, she challenges him to take a different path. One of the elusive Argosi, Ferius is a traveller who lives by her wits and the cards she carries. Daring, unpredictable, and wielding magic Kellen has never seen before, she may be his only hope.

Mystic Dragon (Mystic Trilogy #2)—Jason Denzel (July 17, Tor Books)
Seven years have passed since lowborn Pomella AnDone became an unlikely Mystic’s apprentice. Though she has achieved much in a short time, as a rare celestial event approaches, Pomella feels the burden of being a Mystic more than ever. The Mystical realm of Fayün is threatening to overtake the mortal world, and as the two worlds slowly blend together, the land is thrown into chaos. People begin to vanish or are killed outright, and Mystics from across the world gather to protect them. Among them is Shevia, a haunted and brilliant prodigy whose mastery of the Myst is unlike anything Pomella has ever seen. Shevia will challenge Pomella in every possible way, from her mastery of the Myst to her emotional connection with Pomella’s own friends—and as Shevia’s dark intentions become more clear, Pomella fears she may be unstoppable.

Dark Paths (The Legends of the Älfar #3)—Markus Heitz (July 17, Quercus)
There are four races: the Elves, the Dwarves and the Humans and the Älfar. The other three all know the Älfar to be dark, relentless warriors, set on conquest; they have been deadly enemies since time immemorial. But are things about to change? The young älfar triplets Sisaroth, Tirigon and Firüsha have been banished to the deadly underground realm of Phondrasôn, two of them exiled for a murder they did not commit, the third determined to stay with them, to help them survive this terrifying place full of monsters. Then Sisaroth meets a dwarf, Tungdil, who has been locked up in the Dark Abyss (Tungdil will be well-known to readers of the Dwarves series!)—and their unexpected relationship will change the fate of the älfar and the dwarves – for ever.

When Life Gives You Demons—Jennifer Honeybourn (July 17, Swoon Reads)
Young adult. Some people have school spirit. Shelby Black has real ones. Shelby Black has spent the past six months training to be an exorcist. Her great-uncle Roy—a Catholic priest—has put her through exorcist boot camp hell, hoping to develop her talent, but ohmygod, he still doesn’t trust her to do an exorcism on her own. High school is hard enough without having to explain that you fight demons for a living, so Shelby keeps her extracurricular activity to herself. The last thing she wants is for her crush, Spencer, to find out what she does in her off time. But Shelby knows how to keep a secret—even a big one. Like the fact that her mom left under mysterious circumstances and it’s all her fault. Shelby is hellbent on finding her mom, no matter what it costs her—even if what it ends up costing her is her soul AND a relationship with Spencer.

Apocalypse Nix—Kameron Hurley (July 17, Tachyon)
Ex-government assassin turned bounty-hunter, Nyx is good at solving other people’s problems. Her favorite problem-solving solution is punching people in the face. Then maybe chopping off some heads. Hey—it’s a living. Nyx’s disreputable reputation has been well earned. After all, she’s trying to navigate an apocalyptic world full of giant bugs, contaminated deserts, scheming magicians, and a centuries-long war that’s consuming her future. Managing her ragtag squad of misfits has required a lot of morally-gray choices. Every new job is another day alive. Every new mission is another step toward changing a hellish future—but only if she can survive.

Constance Verity Saves the World (Constance Verity #2)—A. Lee Martinez (July 17, Saga Press)
Constance successfully became an ordinary person. People warned her it would be boring—and they were right. That’s exactly why Connie loves it. But there’s an Adventurer-shaped hole in the cosmos now, and a lot of interested parties eager to fill it. Not all of those candidates are fit for the role, and if The Adventurer falls into the wrong hands, it can lead to chaos and destruction. Constance still has all the skills of her old life, but she’s no longer chosen. Yet when the fate of the world is at stake, she sets off, reluctantly, to keep the forces of evil from stealing the destiny she abandoned.

The Adventure Zone: Here There Be Gerblins—Clint McElroy, Griffin McElroy, Justin McElroy, Travis McElroy & Carey Pietsch (July 17, First Second)
Welcome to the Adventure Zone! SEE! The illustrated exploits of three lovable dummies set loose in a classic fantasy adventure! READ! Their journey from small-time bodyguards to world-class artifact hunters! MARVEL! At the sheer metafictional chutzpah of a graphic novel based on a story created in a podcast where three dudes and their dad play a tabletop role playing game in real time! Join Taako the elf wizard, Merle the dwarf cleric, and Magnus the human warrior for an adventure they are poorly equipped to handle AT BEST, guided (“guided”) by their snarky DM, in a graphic novel that, like the smash-hit podcast it’s based on, will tickle your funny bone, tug your heartstrings, and probably pants you if you give it half a chance.

The Girl in the Green Silk Gown (Ghost Roads #2)—Seanan McGuire (July 17, DAW)
For Rose Marshall, death has long since become the only life she really knows. She’s been sweet sixteen for more than sixty years, hitchhiking her way along the highways and byways of America, sometimes seen as an avenging angel, sometimes seen as a killer in her own right, but always Rose, the Phantom Prom Date, the Girl in the Green Silk Gown. The man who killed her is still out there, thanks to a crossroads bargain that won’t let him die, and he’s looking for the one who got away. When Bobby Cross comes back into the picture, there’s going to be hell to pay—possibly literally. Rose has worked for decades to make a place for herself in the twilight. Can she defend it, when Bobby Cross comes to take her down? Can she find a way to navigate the worlds of the living and the dead, and make it home before her hitchhiker’s luck runs out? There’s only one way to know for sure.

WEEK FOUR

Kill the Farm Boy—Delilah S. Dawson & Kevin Hearne (July 24, Del Rey)
Once upon a time, in a faraway kingdom, a hero, the Chosen One, was born … and so begins every fairy tale ever told. This is not that fairy tale. There is a Chosen One, but he is unlike any One who has ever been Chosened. And you have never been to a magical world quite like the land of Pell. There, a plucky farm boy will find more than he’s bargained for on his quest to awaken the sleeping princess in her cursed tower. First there’s the Dark Lord, who wishes for the boy’s untimely death … and also very fine cheese. Then there’s a bard without a song in her heart but with a very adorable and fuzzy tail, an assassin who fears not the night but is terrified of chickens, and a mighty fighter more frightened of her sword than of her chain-mail bikini. This journey will lead to sinister umlauts, a trash-talking goat, the Dread Necromancer Steve, and a strange and wondrous journey to the most peculiar “happily ever after” that ever once-upon-a-timed.

Endless Water, Starless Sky (Bright Smoke, Cold Fire #2)—Rosamund Hodge (July 24, Balzer + Bray)
Young adult. In the last days of the world, the walls of Viyara are still falling, and the dead are rising faster than ever. Juliet is trapped—ordered by Lord Ineo of the Mahyanai to sacrifice the remaining members of her family, the Catresou, to stave off the end of the world. Though they’re certain his plan is useless, Juliet and her former friend Runajo must comply with Lord Ineo’s wishes—unless they can discover a different, darker path to protecting Viyara. Romeo is tortured: Finally aware that his true love is alive, he is at once elated and devastated, for his actions led directly to the destruction of her clan. The only way to redemption is to offer his life to the Catresou to protect and support them … even if it means dying to do so. When Romeo’s and Juliet’s paths converge once again, only a journey into Death will offer answers and the key to saving them all—but is it a journey either of them will survive?

The Tower of Living and Dying (Empires of Dust #2)—Anna Smith Spark (July 24, Orbit)
Marith has been a sellsword, a prince, a murderer, a demon, and dead. But something keeps bringing him back to life, and now there is nothing stopping him from taking back the throne that is rightfully his. Thalia, the former high priestess, remains Marith’s only tenuous grasp to whatever goodness he has left. His left hand and his last source of light, Thalia still believes that the power that lies within him can be used for better ends. But as more forces gather beneath Marith’s banner, she can feel her influence slipping.

Redemption’s Blade (After the War #1)—Adrian Tchaikovsky (July 26, Solaris)
Ten years ago, the Kinslayer returned from the darkness. His brutal Yorughan armies issued from the pits of the earth, crushing all resistance, leaving burnt earth and corruption behind. Thrones toppled and cities fell. And then he died. Celestaine—one of the heroes that destroyed him – has tasked herself with correcting the worst excesses of the Kinslayer’s brief reign, bringing light back to a broken world. With two Yorughan companions, she faces fanatics, war criminals and the Kinslayer’s former minions, as the fragile alliances of the War break down into feuding and greed. The Kinslayer may be gone, but he cast a long shadow: one from which she may never truly escape.

WEEK FIVE

Grace and Fury—Tracy Banghart (July 31, Little, Brown Books for Young Readers)
Young adult. In a world where women have no rights, sisters Serina and Nomi Tessaro face two very different fates: one in the palace, the other in prison. Serina has been groomed her whole life to become a Grace–someone to stand by the heir to the throne as a shining, subjugated example of the perfect woman. But when her headstrong and rebellious younger sister, Nomi, catches the heir’s eye, it’s Serina who takes the fall for the dangerous secret that Nomi has been hiding. Now trapped in a life she never wanted, Nomi has only one way to save Serina: surrender to her role as a Grace until she can use her position to release her sister. This is easier said than done. A traitor walks the halls of the palace, and deception lurks in every corner. But Serina is running out of time, imprisoned on an island where she must fight to the death to survive and one wrong move could cost her everything.

Heart of Thorns—Bree Barton (July 31, Katherine Tegen Books)
Young adult. In the ancient river kingdom, where touch is a battlefield and bodies the instruments of war, Mia Rose has pledged her life to hunting Gwyrach: women who can manipulate flesh, bones, breath, and blood. The same women who killed her mother without a single scratch. But when Mia’s father announces an alliance with the royal family, she is forced to trade in her knives and trousers for a sumptuous silk gown. Determined to forge her own path forward, Mia plots a daring escape, but could never predict the greatest betrayal of all: her own body. Mia possesses the very magic she has sworn to destroy. Now, as she untangles the secrets of her past, Mia must learn to trust her heart … even if it kills her.

Storm-Wake—Lucy Christopher (July 31, Scholastic Press)
Young adult. Moss has grown up on the strangest and most magical of islands. Her father has a plan to control the tempestuous weather that wracks the shores. But the island seems to have a plan of its own once Callan—a wild boy her age—appears on its beaches. Her complex feelings for Callan shift with every tide, while her love for the island, and her father, are thrown into doubt… And when one fateful day, a young man from the outside world washes up on the beach, speaking of the Old World, nothing will ever be the same.

Sea Witch—Sarah Henning (July 31, Katherine Tegen Books)
Young adult. Ever since her best friend Anna died, Evie has been an outcast in her small fishing town. Hiding her talents, mourning her loss, drowning in her guilt. Then a girl with an uncanny resemblance to Anna appears on the shore, and the two girls catch the eyes of two charming princes. Suddenly Evie feels like she might finally have a chance at her own happily ever after. But magic isn’t kind, and her new friend harbors secrets of her own. She can’t stay in Havnestad—or on two legs—without Evie’s help. And when Evie reaches deep into the power of her magic to save her friend’s humanity—and her prince’s heart—she discovers, too late, what she’s bargained away.

Dreadful Company (Dr. Greta van Helsing #2)—Vivian Shaw (July 31, Orbit)
When Greta Helsing, doctor to the undead, is unexpectedly called to Paris to present at a medical conference, she expects nothing more exciting than professional discourse on zombie reconstructive surgery and skin disease in bogeymen—and hopefully at least one uneventful night at the Opera. Unfortunately for Greta, Paris happens to be infested with a coven of vampires—and not the civilized kind. If she hopes to survive, Greta must navigate the darkest corners of the City of Lights, the maze of ancient catacombs and mine-tunnels underneath the streets, where there is more to find than simply dead men’s bones.

The Descent of Monsters (Tensorate #3)—JY Yang (July 31, Tor.com Publishing)
Something terrible happened at the Rewar Teng Institute of Experimental Methods. When the Tensorate’s investigators arrived, they found a sea of blood and bones as far as the eye could see. One of the institute’s experiments got loose, and its rage left no survivors. The investigators returned to the capital with few clues and two prisoners: the terrorist leader Sanao Akeha and a companion known only as Rider. Investigator Chuwan faces a puzzle. What really happened at the institute? What drew the Machinists there? What are her superiors trying to cover up? And why does she feel as if her strange dreams are forcing her down a narrowing path she cannot escape?

Welcome back to the Lovecraft reread, in which two modern Mythos writers get girl cooties all over old Howard’s sandbox, from those who inspired him to those who were inspired in turn.

Today we’re reading Shirley Jackson’s “The Summer People,” first published in 1948 in Come Along With Me. Spoilers ahead.

“I’d hate to leave myself,” Mr. Babcock said, after deliberation, and both he and Mrs. Allison smiled. “but I never heard of anyone ever staying out at the lake after Labor Day before.”

Summary

The Allisons’ country cottage stands on a grassy hill above a lake, seven miles from the nearest town. For seventeen summers now, Janet and Robert have happily endured its primitive accommodations—well water to be pumped, no electricity, that (for the neophyte city sojourner) unspeakable outhouse—for the sake of its rustic charms. And the locals are great people! The ones they’re acquainted with, you know, the tradespeople in the town, “so solid, and so reasonable, and so honest.” Take Mr. Babcock, the grocer. He could model for a statue of Daniel Webster, not that he has Webster’s wit. Sad how the Yankee stock’s degenerated, mentally. It’s inbreeding, Robert says. That, and the bad land.

Like all the other summer people, they’ve always gone back to New York right after Labor Day. Yet every year since their children have grown, they’ve wondered why they rush. September and early October must be so beautiful in the country. Why not linger this year?

On their weekly shopping trip to town, Janet spreads the word she and Robert will be staying on at the lake. The merchants are laconically amazed, from Mr. Babcock the grocer and old Charley Walpole at the general store, from Mrs. Martin at the newspaper and sandwich shop to Mr. Hall, who sells the Allisons butter and eggs. Nobody’s stayed out to the lake past Labor Day before, they all say. Nope, Labor Day’s when they usually leave.

Not exactly an enthusiastic oh, stay as long as you like, but Yankee dourness can’t compete with the seductions of lake and grass and soft wind. The Allisons return to their cottage, well pleased with their decision.

Their satisfaction wanes over the next few days as difficulties arise. The man who delivers kerosene—Janet can’t remember his name—says he doesn’t deliver after Labor Day. Won’t get another delivery of oil himself until November. Didn’t expect anyone would be staying on at the lake, after all. The mail is getting irregular. Robert frets at how tardy their adult kids Jerry and Anne are with their weekly letters. The crank phone seems crankier than ever. And now Mr. Babcock can’t deliver groceries anymore. He’s only got a boy delivering summers. Boy’s gone back to school now. Oh, and as for butter and eggs? Mr. Hall’s gone upstate for a visit, won’t have none for you for a while.

So Robert will have to drive to town to get kerosene and groceries. But the car won’t start. His attempts to ring the filling station are fruitless, so he goes for the mail, leaving Janet to pare apples and watch for dark clouds in a serene blue sky; it’s in herself she feels the tension that precedes a thunderstorm. Robert returns with a cheerful letter from son Jerry, but the unusual number of dirty fingerprints on the envelope disturbs Janet. When Robert tries to call the filling station again, the phone’s dead.

By four in the afternoon, genuine clouds turn day dark as evening. Lightning occasionally flashes but the rain delays, as if lovingly drawing out the moments before it breaks on the cottage. Inside Janet and Robert sit close together, their faces illuminated only by lightning and the dial of a battery-powered radio they brought from New York. Its city dance band and announcers sound through the flimsy walls of the summer cottage and echo back into it, “as though the lake and the hills and the trees were returning it unwanted.”

Should they do anything? Janet wonders.

Just wait, Robert thinks. The car was tampered with, he adds. Even he could see that.

And the phone wires, Janet says. She supposes they were cut.

Robert imagines so.

The dance music segues into a news broadcast, and a rich voice tells them about events that only touch them now through the fading batteries of the radio, “almost as though they still belonged, however tenuously, to the rest of the world.”

What’s Cyclopean: This week’s language is sober and methodical, like Mr. Walpole’s package-tying.

The Degenerate Dutch: Physically Mr. Babcock could model for Daniel Webster, but mentally… it’s horrible to think how old New England Yankee stock has degenerated. Generations of inbreeding, that’s what does it.

Mythos Making: Step outside the neat boundaries of your civilized world, and you’re going to regret it. Especially in rural New England.

Libronomicon: The Allisons’ son sends a letter… unless he doesn’t. Something about it doesn’t seem… quite… right.

Madness Takes Its Toll: See above; Mrs. Allison comments rather dismissively about Mr. Babcock’s mental state. That he might not be feeling entirely cooperative with a couple of Summer People never does occur to her.

Ruthanna’s Commentary

Buy it Now

First, I have a confession to make, as a now-expatriate native of a Cape Cod tourist town: this is totally what happens to people who fail to cross the Sagamore Bridge in an orderly fashion by Labor Day.

I assume so, at least. I haven’t been back for a while; I’ll have to ask my folks what everyone decided at the last town meeting.

There’s horror on both sides of the weird symbiosis/hate relationship between host community and temporary visitors. This place you visit, where half the population is people like you and the other half are trying not to lose their tempers from the other side of the overcrowded fried clams counter—what mysteries do they perform on the deserted beach after you go home? Those Summer People, wafting in from parts unknown to rearrange your world and turn all ordinary rules of conduct upside down—what secret plans and cunning arts do they practice after they return underhill?

We’re not always good at welcoming, are we? Sometimes we’re not so comfortable being welcomed, either. Even—especially—when Locals depend on Visitors’ gifts to keep their community thriving, we suspect resentment hiding behind those masks. And all too often we’re right. But the tourist/town relationship is ephemeral. Everyone involved knows it will blow away as vacation season ends—so the fear and resentment and mystery can afford to remain unspoken. Unless you’re Shirley Jackson.

Jackson’s Lake Country distills all this anxiety into a sort of inverse fairyland/Brigadoon. Stay past dawn/Labor Day, and you’ll never return to ordinary life. But this isn’t the simple narrative, either, of being forced to stay in the world where you tarried too long. Instead the town’s welcome, its services, even your ability to travel to and fro vanish out from under you. Never say you weren’t warned. And never mistake those warnings for simple Country Manners.

And then… Jackson doesn’t need to complete the circle. She doesn’t even need to provide a clear implication about what happens next. All we need to understand is that it’s bad. Worse than an Autumn without heat or cooking oil, worse than a sabotaged car or cut phone line.

In much of horror, Lovecraft included, even a short visit to a rural New England community is fraught with peril. Plan a day trip and you could get stranded in a cursed house, or be subjected to an unpleasant monologue from a cannibal who won’t shut up. A longer stay may teach you more about local genealogy than you wanted to know—or more about your own. “Summer People” is definitely more on the “gambrel” side of fearful communities than the “cyclopean” side, and heading towards the unexplored-by-Lovecraft “I guess it has a roof” end of the spectrum. Different sorts of residents, and different sorts of fear, lie behind all these diverse facades.

Different types of vulnerability, too. Lovecraft’s protagonists are often drawn by curiosity, the desire to learn what’s behind a community’s mask. Poor Mr. and Mrs. Allison, though, never even suspected there was a mask. Out of all the motivations leading to all the bad ends in all of horror, the simple desire to look out over a beautiful lake seems particularly distressing. It’s one thing if you really, really, wanted to seek out Things Man Was Not Meant To Know and copy out passages of the Necronomicon. It’s another if all you want is to join the landscape and community that you’ve come to love.

Anne’s Commentary

Buy it Now

Oh yes. Anyone who has lived in a community with a tourist-driven economy will recognize this uneasy dynamic: We need you to come and spend, and you come and spend, and so we love you. Until you realize we need you to come and spend, and expect subservient gratitude along with service. And then we hate you. The dynamic grows uneasier still in a community that depends more heavily on seasonal residents—people who own property in the community but occupy it only occasionally, when the weather’s nicest. People richer than us. People more sophisticated than us. People more important than us. People who know it, too, don’t be fooled by their condescending talk about us being the salt-of-the-earth. They don’t use salt-of-the-earth. Only the finest turquoise-flecked sea salt from Fiji is good enough for them!

It’s Otherdom based on class, on one’s place in the economic pecking order, on one’s social prestige. Factors like race and gender certainly enter into these complex equations, but they need not. I think it’s reasonably safe to assume that all the characters in Jackson’s story are white, but the Allisons dwell on a hilltop in more than the literal sense. Not only can they afford that hilltop over that lake, they can afford an apartment in New York City! Their normal lives must be awfully soft for them to enjoy roughing it in the cottage during the easy summer months! They must think themselves pretty woke for their era, not yelling at the delicate country bumpkins the way they can yell at the tough city help and allowing that they’re fine physical specimens, even if inbreeding has weakened their wits.

You know who else dwelt on a hilltop? HPL, that’s who. Back in the day, when the Phillips were quite well-to-do, thanks. That wealth didn’t endure into his adulthood, but there may be no gentility that shrinks from the lower classes with more visceral shuddering than genteel poverty. The mongrels of the Providence waterfront and Red Hook were bad, very bad. A little less so, perhaps, were the Italians on Federal Hill. But not to be let off were the indisputably Caucasian denizens of so many rural locales in Lovecraft’s fiction. I doubt he’d have joined Janet Allison in her praise of countryfolk, for he wrote: “The true epicure in the terrible esteems most of all the ancient, lonely farmhouses of backwoods New England; for there the dark elements of strength, solitude, grotesqueness, and ignorance combine to form the perfection of the hideous.”

That’s from “The Picture in the House,” whose fiendish bumpkin is a carnivorous old man, or I should say anthropophagous. Dunwich hosts a fine nest of backwoods degenerates, of course, though the porous landscape around the Martense manse might harbor even worse. I’d like to suggest that when the storm breaks over Jackson’s cottage, lightning will open a fissure beneath it, and white ape-like mutants will swarm out and drag Jackson’s summer people to gnashing doom in the fetid earth of their tunnelings.

Jackson would never do that, though. However, she might allow the town merchants to ring the cottage with knives drawn, ready to filet these pesky city people for the Beast of the Lake, even as It rises swaying and ululating in strange blue-green lightning flashes.

No?

Yeah, no.

Jackson is going to let us imagine what ends this particular battle in the class wars. I think it’s going to be terrible when the radio batteries die, and the Allisons hear the concussion of heavy rain on the roof, or fists at the door, or both.

Next week, Mariana Enriquez’s “Under the Black Water” looks at what horrors really taint a river. Translated into English, you can find it in her Things We Lost in the Fire collection.

Ruthanna Emrys is the author of the Innsmouth Legacy series, including Winter Tide and Deep Roots (available July 10th, 2018). Her neo-Lovecraftian stories “The Litany of Earth” and “Those Who Watch” are available on Tor.com, along with the distinctly non-Lovecraftian “Seven Commentaries on an Imperfect Land” and “The Deepest Rift.” Ruthanna can frequently be found online on Twitter and Dreamwidth, and offline in a mysterious manor house with her large, chaotic household—mostly mammalian—outside Washington DC.

Anne M. Pillsworth’s short story “The Madonna of the Abattoir” appears on Tor.com. Her young adult Mythos novel, Summoned, is available from Tor Teen along with sequel Fathomless. She lives in Edgewood, a Victorian trolley car suburb of Providence, Rhode Island, uncomfortably near Joseph Curwen’s underground laboratory.

Lyn: Welcome back, intrepid re-readers, and an extra special welcome back to Alice! It was fun trading puns with Ross while you were gone, but no one’s better than you at reminding me of all the things I’ve forgotten about these books! (Let’s face it, I get way too caught up in character motivations to spend much time on Cosmere theorycrafting…)

Alice: I’m ba-ack! Thanks to you and Ross for doing a fantastic job while I was gone! But it’s also good to be back, and the end of this chapter was one of my fist-pump moments, so it’s a good time to be back. Dalinar has multiple frustrations, a couple of difficult conversations, and one shining light-bulb moment.

Reminder: we’ll potentially be discussing spoilers for the ENTIRE NOVEL in each reread. There are speculations regarding Adonalsium in the Cosmere Connections section this week; if you haven’t read anything outside The Stormlight Archive, you might either be confused or find it to be spoilerish, so feel free to skip that section. But if you haven’t read ALL of Oathbringer, best to wait to join us until you’re done, because we do talk about some further events a little.

Chapter Recap

WHO: Dalinar
WHERE: Urithiru
WHEN: 1174.1.4.5 (Two days after Chapters 24, 25, and 27)

Buy it Now

Dalinar receives answers from the Azish and from Queen Fen in Thaylenah, both of which can be summed up as “no, you may not march an army through our Oathgates, now kindly bugger off.” He’s summoned away to where Bridge 4 has made an interesting discovery—Oathbringer (the sword, not the book) has been discovered. Dalinar gives the Shardblade to Ialai and has a brief but troubling conversation with Amaram, then heads back to his own rooms where he has a longer but no less troubling conversation with Taravangian about the morality of innocent casualties in war. The chapter ends with the Stormfather revealing that, while a Highstorm is sweeping over a distant land, he can pull people in that land into the visions that were left by Honor for Dalinar.

Threshold of the storm

Title: Another Option

“What he did was, nevertheless, another option.”

This was Dalinar’s evaluation of the landlord’s choice in Nohadon’s story: rather than the false binary of either killing all four men or letting them all go, the landlord chose to imprison them all. But talk about double meanings! Dalinar now has another option for meeting with monarchs and convincing them to join him.

Heralds

Nalan and Jezrien: Judge and King, Skybreakers and Windrunners, Herald of Justice and Herald of Kings, Just & Confident and Protecting & Leading.

A: I rather think that both of them are here for the Nohadon story, in which a king considers matters of justice.

Icon: The Kholin Shield designates Dalinar’s POV for the chapter.

Epigraph

Finally, I will confess my humanity. I have been named a monster, and do not deny those claims. I am the monster that I fear we all can become.
–From Oathbringer, preface

A: Aside from fitting in with the sequence of “things Dalinar must confess,” this statement fits frighteningly well into the context of this chapter—especially so, the more we know about Dalinar’s past. As Lyn mentioned above, both Azir and Thaylenah are (ahem!) reluctant to let Dalinar bring an army into their capital cities. He has indeed been named a monster, rightly so in some cases, and the whole world knows his reputation. Also valid, however, Dalinar makes the point that humans all too readily do behave like monsters.

Stories & Songs

He was a good man, the Stormfather said.

“Nohadon?” Dalinar said.

Yes.

L: I wonder if Nohadon was a Bondsmith, and had bonded the Stormfather previously. Was it ever said whether or not Way of Kings was written before or after the Recreance?

A: It’s not stated in so many words, but there’s a pretty strong indication that Nohadon was around before the Knights Radiant were founded. In the vision where Dalinar first meets him (TWoK Chapter 60), he talks about Surgebinders quite a bit, and wonders how to constrain their behavior—but he noticeably does not mention Knights Radiant. In retrospect, I think it’s quite possible that not only was Nohadon a Bondsmith, he may have been the first Bondsmith. It may have been in the aftermath of that Desolation that Ishar set up the Ideals and made the agreements with the spren that resulted in the Radiant orders. This does raise questions about the presence of Urithiru, however… Who built it, and when, in order for Nohadon to make his pilgrimage to “the holy city”?

(Also, I’d like to take this moment to point out that I WAS RIGHT. Back during the TWoK discussions, I kept claiming that Surgebinders and Knights Radiant, historically, might not have been exactly the same thing. People got mad at me for that. But I was right. Just sayin’.)

Places & Peoples

A: The chapter opens with the final responses—well, they intended them to be final!—from Azir and Thaylenah regarding Dalinar’s request for them to open their Oathgates and become allies. The Azish are much more round-about than Queen Fen, but she summed them both up pretty well:

“No.”

Well, okay then! They both have much the same rationale, and it’s valid based on what they know so far. “The Alethi warmongers, led by Dalinar Blackthorn Kholin, would like you to kindly allow their armies free access to the center of your ruling city, thankyouverymuch, and they promise not to do anything untoward. Really. They only want to be your friend.” Can’t say as I blame them for being reluctant!

L: Neither can I, especially after all of these flashbacks we’ve been getting of Dalinar’s past. I wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw him if were them, either.

On a completely different note:

It was three feet wide, and about one foot tall. It seemed endless, and he could feel a faint breeze coming out of it.

A: So Dalinar climbs up on a chair he stuck to the wall (!!) to peer into the hole in the wall in his chambers. Aside from mink and rats, there is air circulating. I was bummed not to be able to comment on this (very limited internet connectivity!) when Ross and Lyn talked about this a couple of weeks ago, but I’m pretty well convinced that these really, truly are ventilation shafts. Sure, we can think of a hundred or so nefarious purposes for them, but this place is enormous. These lower levels are probably at least half a mile in diameter, and without some kind of forced air movement, the inner regions would be uninhabitable.

That’s my two cents, anyway.

L: It almost seems too simple to be the only explanation. Whenever I come across a “too-simple” explanation in one of Sanderson’s books I start giving it the side-eye. I’ve been fooled by him too many times.

A: I know, it does seem like it’s too simple for Sanderson. At the same time, you’ve got to move air around that place, or anyone in the inner rooms will suffocate on carbon dioxide. So I do think it’s possible that he’s subverting his own trope and making it something really simple… but I’ll admit it’s not probable. (I suppose, inevitably, we’ll find out that it’s both ventilation AND something we never even imagined.)

Tight Butts and Coconuts

Your garnet-lit tongue and pleasant words make it seem like you really assume this will work.

A: Aside from making me giggle, I thought it was worth noting that garnet is associated with Lightweavers. Is this phrase a carry-over from the times of the Knights Radiant, and the ability of Lightweavers to influence people to do things that were, perhaps, not in their own best interests? I’m thinking of that epigraph in Words of Radiance, Chapter 47:

Yet, were the orders not disheartened by so great a defeat, for the Lightweavers provided spiritual sustenance; they were enticed by those glorious creations to venture on a second assault.

L: I think you’re definitely right on this one.

Mature Motivations

L: Heeeeeere we go. Hope you’re all ready for some deep philosophizing on the nature of war, because Sanderson sure laid all the cards on the table in this chapter.

“I stand by what I was forced to do, Brightlord,” Amaram said, stepping forward. “The arrival of the Voidbringers only proves that I was in the right. We need practiced Shardbearers. The stories of darkeyes gaining Blades are charming, but do you really think we have time for nursery tales now, instead of practical reality?”

“You murdered defenseless men,” Dalinar said through gritted teeth. “Men who had saved your life.”

Amaram stopped, lifting Oathbringer. “And what of the hundreds, even thousands, your wars killed?”

L: I hate Amaram. This is no secret. I wear that hatred openly and honestly on my sleeve. That’s why is makes me ill to have to say that I can see his side here, especially considering the rest of the conversation in this chapter (which we’ll get into below). Say one thing for Sanderson–he makes his villains have believable and even, dare I say, human motivations. No Dark Lord Saurons here… just regular men and women, making choices based on their (in this case, wrong) beliefs.

A: There is, however, a huge difference (IMO) between killing soldiers on the other side in battle, and killing your own men, in your own headquarters, because you’re going to take something that doesn’t belong to you and you don’t want to risk them outing you. Which is not to diminish the fact that a lot of innocent civilians die during wars—and especially in some of the in-city battles Dalinar led—but Amaram’s actions were premeditated murder.

L: Yes. This, for certain. But the fact that HE can justify his actions to himself at least makes him a three-dimensional hate-able villain and not a two-dimensional one.

A: Agreed. It’s the old principle of “everyone is the hero of his own story” and it rings very true to human nature. Sometimes it’s a bit frustrating of Sanderson to write such human villains; I can usually see their point (even if I don’t agree), and that makes it both easier and harder to hate them.

“Morality is not a thing you can simply doff to put on the helm of battle, then put it back on when you’re done with the slaughter.”

L: AMARAM. Stop making good points and JUST LET ME HATE YOU for f***ing over Kaladin.

A: Hey, if you have no morality to doff, you can just be an evil git all the time. Right, Amaram?

“Is it not our duty, as kings, to ask questions that make the minds and souls of other men cringe?”

L: As our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man is wont to say, “With great power comes great responsibility.” And sometimes that responsibility means making hard choices.

“Three of those men were violent threats, guilty of premeditated murder. One was innocent. What do you do?”

“Hang all four,” Taravangian whispered. “One innocent dead, but three murderers stopped. Is it not the best good that can be done, and the best way to protect your people?”

“If you can’t prove who is guilty–if you can’t be sure–I think you should let them go.”

“You say that,” Taravangian said. “Many men do. But our laws will claim innocent men–for all judges are flawed, as is our knowledge. Eventually, you will execute someone who does not deserve it. This is the burden society must carry in exchange for order. … it’s not a matter of morality, is it? It’s a matter of thresholds. How many guilty may be punished before you’d accept one innocent casualty? A thousand? Ten thousand? A hundred? When you consider, all calculations are meaningless except one. Has more good been done than evil?”

L: This… this is a really heavy conversation, and one which has been echoed time and again both in the book itself and in this reread. It’s nice to think that another choice can always be found. It’s nice to think that there’s always a remedy, somewhere, that will please everyone and satisfy justice. But in real life, such choices are rarely easy or even possible. Sometimes I want to sink into a book, into an alternate reality, and know without a doubt who is evil and who is not. But I usually prefer books like this, books that hold a mirror up to our own reality and, as Wit says, “give us questions to think upon.”

A: It is a heavy conversation. One thing I found very interesting was Taravangian’s pejorative evaluation of both the landlord’s and Nohadon’s responses: “He refused to commit.” Is this Taravangian justifying his own deeds, insisting that you have to commit to the binary choice presented? We know that he’s caught in a bit of an artificial binary himself—he cannot be both highly intelligent and greatly compassionate at the same time. Perhaps he finds himself wishing that he could commit to one or the other, instead of the awkward situation where every day, whether he’s intelligent or compassionate, he has to regret the decisions made when he was the other way.

Cosmere Connections

“I have felt warmth,” Dalinar said, “coming from a place beyond. A light I can almost see. If there is a God, it was not the Almighty, the one who called himself Honor. He was a creature. Powerful, but still merely a creature.”

L: Alice, we talked a little about this concept while you were away, but maybe you’d like to give your two cents here? Do you think this is the God behind the entirety of the Cosmere, or what?

A: Well… this is just me spitballing, you understand, right? Because we don’t have solid proof of what’s going on with that warmth and light gig. That said, I currently believe this to be “the God Beyond,” and a glimpse into the Spiritual Realm.

I also think this ties into the Iriali belief in “the One” who is experiencing the universe as Many. If you’ll permit me a little loony-theory moment, I suspect that “the Shattering of Adonalsium” may not have been what that crew thought it was when they did it. I have sneaking suspicions that Adonalsium, or the God whose physical aspect formed what they knew as Adonalsium, set the whole thing up and let them “shatter” a being far beyond their comprehension. That being still holds firm in the Spiritual realm, and is the true God beyond all that they can see or comprehend. /End loony theory

A Scrupulous Study of Spren

He seized the sword, bracing himself for the screams. The cries of a dead spren. They weren’t the shrill, painful shrieks he’d heard when touching other Blades, but more of a whimper. The sound of a man backed into a corner, thoroughly beaten and facing something terrible, but too tired to keep screaming.

“This one doesn’t scream as loudly as others. Why?”

It remembers your oath, the Stormfather sent. It remembers the day you won it, and better the day you gave it up. It hates you—but less than it hates others.

“Could it be rescued?” Dalinar whispered as they entered the tower and climbed a stairway. “Could we save the spren who made this Blade?”

I know of no way, the Stormfather said. It is dead, as is the man who broke his oath to kill it.

A: I’ll admit that I was surprised by this conversation. I’ve been hard over on the revival of Adolin’s Blade ever since half-way through the beta on Words of Radiance, (so, coming up on five years now!) but it caught me off-guard that the first actual mention of such a concept in-book was about Oathbringer. It’s fascinating that the Stormfather specifically mentions Dalinar’s oath, remembered by a Blade named Oathbringer. I really wonder if this is just a plot bunny, or if it’s going somewhere?

L: “I’ve got a theory… It could be bunnies.” And now that I’ve got that stuck in your head, I’ll say that I think this is simply setup for Adolin’s awakening of his own Blade. Sanderson’s laying the seeds for the eventual reveal that, yes… this can happen. I don’t think there’s any more to it in this case than that.

“I should like to rewatch the vision where I met Nohadon,” Dalinar said. “Though let me go fetch Navani before you begin. I want her to record what I say.”
Would you rather I show the vision to her as well? the Stormfather asked. She could record it herself that way. Dalinar froze. “You can show the visions to others?”

A: This is one of my favorite mind-blown-moments in the book, especially coming in Part 1, where I (foolishly—this is Sanderson!) don’t really expect to find such shocks. The storming Stormfather can storming show the visions to anyone he wants? As long as they’re either with Dalinar, or in the middle of a highstorm? I practically howled with glee over the concept.

Quality Quotations

Sometimes a hypocrite is nothing more than a person who is in the process of changing.

This is one of my favorite ever quotes from a Sanderson novel.

Well, that’s about enough out of us for this week. Your turn! Be sure to tune in next week for a pair of Shallan’s chapters (29 and 30), as her investigations lead to a series of astounding discoveries.

Alice is glad to be back home and rereading again. She would like to express her gratitude to Lyndsey and Ross for making it so easy to take off the time needed, without worrying about breaking up the reread. If you haven’t already seen it, be sure to check out Deana “Braid_Tug” Whitney’s first article on Cosmere Cuisine, and watch for more to come. One suspects that crustaceans and chickens might feature prominently in at least one episode. Just sayin’…

Lyndsey is too tired to come up with a new byline thing. If you’re an aspiring author, a cosplayer, or just like geeky content, follow her work on Facebook or her website.

Magneto and Professor X. Superman and Lex Luthor. Victor Vale and Eli Ever. Sydney and Serena Clarke. Great partnerships, now soured on the vine.

But Marcella Riggins needs no one. Flush from her brush with death, she’s finally gained the control she’s always sought—and will use her new-found power to bring the city of Merit to its knees. She’ll do whatever it takes, collecting her own sidekicks, and leveraging the two most infamous EOs, Victor Vale and Eli Ever, against each other once more.

With Marcella’s rise, new enmities create opportunity—and the stage of Merit City will once again be set for a final, terrible reckoning. V.E. Schwab’s Vengeful is a super-powered collision of extraordinary minds and vengeful intentions, the thrilling follow-up to Vicious. Vengeful is available September 25 from Tor Books, and Schwab is going on tour! Check out the full list of dates and venues below.

Buy it Now

Tuesday, September 25 at 7:00 PM
Barnes & Noble – The Grove
Speaking/Signing
Los Angeles, CA

Wednesday, September 26 at 7:00 PM
Books, Inc.
Speaking/Signing
Berkeley, CA

Thursday, September 27 at 7:00 PM
Powell’s (Cedar Hill Crossing)
Speaking/Signing
Beaverton, OR

Friday, September 28 at 6:00 PM
Third Place Books
Speaking/Signing
Lake Forest Park, WA

Saturday, September 29 at 7:00 PM
The King’s English Bookshop
Speaking/Signing
Salt Lake City, UT

Sunday, September 30 at 2:00 PM
Tattered Cover
Speaking/Signing
Denver, CO

Monday, October 1 at 7:00 PM
Anderson’s Bookshop
Speaking/Signing
LaGrange, IL

Tuesday, October 2 at 7:00 PM
Barnes & Noble – Roseville II
Speaking/Signing
Roseville, MN

Wednesday, October 3 at 7:00 PM
Coolidge Corner Theatre
(Books sold by Brookline Booksmith)
Speaking/Signing
Brookline, MA

Thursday, October 4
New York Comic-Con
Panels and Signings
New York, NY

Sunday, October 7 at 4:00 PM
Arlington Central Library
(Books sold by One More Page Books)
Speaking/Signing
Arlington, VA

Monday, October 8 at 7:00 PM
The Strand
Speaking/Signing
New York, NY

Saturday, October 27
Texas Book Festival
Panel with John Scalzi/Signing
Austin, TX

SO. MUCH. SCIENCE FICTION. There must be something in the water, because science fiction is crawling out of the woodwork this season. There’s some great fantasy as well, but space is apparently where it’s at right now. Luckily, it’s not just the same old, same old, but a lot of cool premises and tons of racial, gender, and sexual diversity.

Something not on my list but high on yours? Share with the class down in the comments.

Books marked with an asterisk will be reviewed on Tor.com in the coming months.

* Hullmetal Girls by Emily Skrutskie

Desperate for money to pay for her plague-ridden brother’s medical treatment, Aisha Un-Haad reluctantly volunteers to become a Scela. But the process to become one involves severe body modification and mechanical enhancements that could kill her. Scelas are soldiers defending the gaggle 0f spaceships known as the Fleet. Their might enforces the harsh rule of its leaders. Life in the Fleet is great if you’re in the top tier, but for those at the bottom it’s a living hell. Key Tanaka has just recovered from her Scela mods. Physically she’s improved but her memory is shattered. Bits and pieces of her life before flicker through, but nothing sticks. Making it into the elite Scale ranks could help her get her memories back. Aisha and Key are thrust together in their training program, but a fomenting rebellion may ruin both their plans.

July 17, 2018, Delacorte

Star-Touched Stories by Roshani Chokshi

This anthology contains three romantic tales set in the world of the Star-Touched Queen series. The first, “Death and Night,” revolves around the God of Death, Dharma Raja. He meets Night reincarnate, and although he was cursed to lose the woman he loves, a connection blooms between them. “Poison and Gold” stars a vishakanya named Aasha. Vishakanyas have the power to kill a person with their touch. All she wants is to be like humans, but her powers are too deadly. She meets the lovely Spy Mistress and things get heated. And in the final story, “Rose and Sword,” Guari tells her granddaughter Hira the legend of a woman who tried to save the love of her life from death the night before they were set to be married. For fans of the Star-Touched Queen series, and anyone who likes good fantasy short stories, this is a must-have.

August 7, 2018, St. Martin’s Press

* Mirage by Somaiya Daud

Now this is exactly what I love about diverse space-set science fiction. Like Nnedi Okorafor’s excellent Binti series, Mirage transplants African culture—in this case Amazigh and Moroccan—onto a science fictional premise, with compelling results. Amani is kidnapped from her small village on a moon orbiting the planet held by the rulers of the Vathek Empire. Because she looks almost exactly like the cruel princess Maram vak Mathis, she is used as her double to protect the heir from assassination attempts. Once in the palace, her Cadiz culture is stripped from her, and Vathek customs forced upon her. Part of the doubling requires her to spend time with Maram’s fiance, Prince Idris, the last heir to the Vath-conquered Andaalan. This is the first book in the Mirage series.

August 28, 2018, Flatiron Books

Toil and Trouble: 15 Tales of Women and Witchcraft edited by Tess Sharpe and Jessica Spotswood

This anthology collects fifteen short stories centering on a witch, sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes bad only because some dudes say she is. A collection of feminist and super diverse tales by some of the best writers out there. I mean, just look at this talent! Tess Sharpe, Jessica Spotswood, Brandy Colbert, Zoraida Córdova, Andrea Cremer, Kate Hart, Emery Lord, Elizabeth May, Anna-Marie McLemore, Tehlor Kay Mejia, Lindsay Smith, Nova Ren Suma, Robin Talley, Shveta Thakrar, and Brenna Yovanoff. Sadly, I’ve only read two of those authors, with two more on my summer to-read list. Given how exciting this book sounds, I won’t have to worry about that deficit much longer.

August 28, 2018, Harlequin Teen

* A Spark of White Fire by Sangu Mandanna

The first entry in the new Celestial trilogy is inspired in part by the Mahābhārata, an ancient Indian epic poem about two family groups battling for the throne. Esmae longs for her home and family. She was once the princess of Kali, but she was abandoned by her mother in an orphanage in a massive spaceship doubling as the kingdom of Wychstar. When the King holds a royals-only competition to win the battleship Titania, Esmae enters and reveals her noble secret. If she wins the ship, she and her exiled brother Alexi can return to Kali and take back the throne from her usurper uncle. But telling the world who she is will have dire consequences she cannot predict. With gods and prophecies blending fantasy and science fiction, this myth retelling should be all kinds of great.

September 4, 2018, Sky Pony Press

Two Dark Reigns by Kendare Blake

If you’ve been following along with Blake’s heart pounding Three Dark Crowns series, you’re probably really jazzed about the third entry. I know I am! Katharine, the poisoner, was once the weakest of her three sisters, but now holds the throne of Fennbirn. Sisters Mirabella, a powerful elemental once believed strong enough to rule, and Arsinoe, the naturalist with a dangerous animal companion, are far from their homeland. A ghost they believe to be a Blue Queen—a rare fourth daughter so revered the other three are drowned so she can ascend undisturbed—haunts them with warnings about their homeland. All the while, Jules, Arsinoe’s BFF is hiding in Fennbirn. With her new-found abilities, there’s far more to her than meets the eye.

September 4, 2018, HarperTeen

* And the Ocean Was Our Sky by Patrick Ness and Rovina Cai

Think Moby Dick but from the whale’s perspective. In the future, whales and humans are at war. Bathsheba joins Captain Alexandra’s pod, hunting whaling ships and destroying them with the harpoons strapped to their backs. Likewise, humans hunt whales in an endless, ancient war. Bathsheba is searching for the infamous white ship, the Toby Wick, that tore apart her beloved mother. She wants revenge, but the cost of war may be too high. Patrick Ness’ narrative is paired with artwork from the astounding Rovina Cai, an illustrator you may know from the interior art of Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children series. Two creative powerhouses, one story. This oughta be awesome.

September 4, 2018, HarperTeen

Ignite the Stars by Maura Milan

Ia Cocha is infamous. Well, kinda. Everyone thinks the dangerous criminal and master pilot, who’s been striking out against the Olympus Commonwealth for years is a man, but the notorious outlaw is really a teenage girl. When she’s captured, the Commonwealth press-gangs her into the military academy, which she of course immediately tries to scheme her way out of. The biggest obstacle to her escape is Flight Master Knives, a once-dedicated pilot now disillusioned by the death of his sister. He has a device that could kill Ia, so if she wants out she’ll need his help. Also getting in Ia’s way is her roommate, Brinn, a Commonwealth citizen hiding her ethnic heritage for fear of retribution. In the background, Armada slavers conquer Ia’s home. You like space fic and social justice? Then you’ll like this.

September 4, 2018, Albert Whitman

The Navigator’s Touch by Julia Ember

The sequel to last year’s intriguing The Seafarer’s Kiss is inspired half by Norse mythology and half by Peter Pan. That makes it all interesting to me. Where the first followed the POV of Ersel the mermaid, this stars her love interest Ragna. Ragna is a fierce shield-maiden and skilled warrior. She’s eager for vengeance against Jarl Haakon who slaughtered her family and destroyed her village in a bid to capture people like Ragna who have magical maps on their skin. She may be the captain of her ship, but her mercenaries don’t care much for being bossed around by a girl. To win the crew’s allegiance and respect, they set off on a risky voyage to prove her prowess. And as great as all that sounds, gets even better with all the delightfully inclusive gender identities and queerness.

September 13, 2018, Duet

Wildcard by Marie Lu

The Warcross duology wraps up with Wildcard. When we last left Emika Chen, she was still reeling from discovering Hideo’s secret algorithm that can control people’s minds. She also had an offer from the mystery hacker Zero to join his crew and use her tech talents to take down Hideo, the man she cares for. Now with a bounty on her head, she and the Phoenix Riders must go to extremes to stop Hideo’s sinister plan. Forced to side with Zero and his Blackcoats, she learns his darkest secrets and terrible plans. With everyone betraying everyone else and Emika caught in the middle, can she protect the world and the man she loves? Or will she be forced to sacrifice one to save the other?

September 18, 2018, Penguin Teen

Alex Brown is a YA librarian by day, local historian by night, pop culture critic/reviewer by passion, and an ace/aro Black woman all the time. Keep up with her every move on Twitter, check out her endless barrage of cute rat pics on Instagram, or follow along with her reading adventures on her blog.

Tor.com Publishing is thrilled to announce the acquisition of Ragged Alice, a new novella by Gareth L. Powell. Senior Editor Lee Harris negotiated World English rights with Alexander Cochran of C+W.

A small Welsh town. A string of murders. And a detective who can literally see the evil in people’s souls.

Orphaned at an early age, DCI Holly Craig grew up in the small Welsh coastal town of Pontyrhudd. As soon as she was old enough, she ran away to London and joined the police. Now, fifteen years later, she’s back in her old hometown to investigate what seems at first to be a simple hit-and-run, but which soon escalates into something far deadlier and unexpectedly personal—something that will take all of her peculiar talents to solve.

Said Lee Harris:

I’ve been hoping to work with Gareth for some time, and this tale of horror set in the Welsh valleys reflects my childhood, and reminds me of the horrors of my adolescence. So, thanks, Gareth! It’s a great story, brilliantly told.

Said the author:

This is a very personal story for me, as well as a departure from my usual style and genre, and so I’m delighted to be working with Tor.com Publishing. They’ve published some truly impressive novellas by some great writers, and I’m thrilled to see Ragged Alice join their ranks.

Gareth L. Powell is the author of five science-fiction novels and two short story collections. His third novel, Ack-Ack Macaque, book one in the Macaque Trilogy, was the winner of the 2013 BSFA novel award. He lives in Bristol, UK. Find him on Twitter @garethlpowell.

I’ve said it before, in talking about the brilliance of Firelord, Parke Godwin’s novel of Arthur, that I can trace my choice of professional study, at some deep level, to a love of Arthur and his knights. Sure, Arthur is kind of a nebbish in a lot of the tales—which makes me all the more amazed at what Godwin did with him—but there’s just a lot of great stuff in the vast mythic complex that surrounds him.

King Arthur, as I tell my students, is like a little snowball rolled off the top of a tall, snowy peak. It gathers snow to it as it rolls, getting bigger and bigger until it’s really hard to find any trace of the original little clump of stuff that started it off.

Which is one way of explaining why anyone who tells you they know who the real King Arthur was… is full of bull dung.

We have some vague notions, it’s true—he’s likely rooted in regional Brythonic resistance to the Anglo-Saxon invasions of the fifth and sixth centuries—but we don’t have anything resembling a solid case. This rather inconvenient truth has hardly stopped a great many folks on various conspiratorial fringes from claiming otherwise, though. Like those ancient alien hunters, they’ve got the secret that those pointy-headed ivory-tower academics (::waves::) don’t want you to know.

A number of these folks are behind 2004’s King Arthur, directed by Antoine Fuqua and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer—the man who never met something he couldn’t make explode on film: “Okay, yeah, baby, I can see it: King Arthur! Yeah. Knights. Horses. Sexy, baby. Loving it. Swords! And then there’ll be explosions, right?”

Sigh.

Yes, Jerry. You’ll get your goddamn explosions. Because somehow, in defiance of both sense and sensibility, the Picts in this film inexplicably know how to make explosives in the fifth century…

…which pretty effectively sums up a whole lot about the movie’s historical accuracy: it ain’t good.

And that’s, you know, really odd, because the title scroll is keen to assure audiences that this Arthur—unlike all the other Arthurs, apparently—is on historical footing:

Historians agree that the classical 15th century tale of King Arthur and his Knights rose from a real hero who lived a thousand years earlier in a period often called the Dark Ages.

Recently discovered archaeological evidence sheds light on his true identity.

Riiiiiight.

So, again, anyone who says they know the “true identity” of Arthur is selling some wicked snake oil. Also, “the Dark Ages.” Ugh.

Things don’t improve when the film gets underway and we learn that it’s AD 452 and the Sarmatian cavalry, defeated by Rome, is now incorporated into the Roman army: Sarmatian sons are indebted to serve Rome as, ahem, “Knights.” We watch one of these lads being called up to join the Romans. His name? Lancelot. His battle cry? “Rūs!”

::takes deep breaths::

Fifth-century Sarmatians. Knights. Lancelot. Rūs.

Buy it Now

I could write a book on how screwed up this is, and the main plot hasn’t even started.

Credit where it is due, the Sarmatians were a real people, a conglomeration of a number of East Iranian peoples settled around the Black Sea. We don’t know nearly as much as we’d like to know about them, though there’s a lot of consistency between ancient accounts and archaeological findings regarding the fact that women were held in high regard among them as both leaders and fighters… enough that connections between them and the myths of the Amazons are possible.

That’s cool stuff. But that’s not the story here.

No, no. Here the Sarmatians are totally, pointedly bro-centric, and their cry of pride is to shout “Rūs!”

Rūs, which is the name of a people from whom the word Russian derives, is a term with two primary (and very distinct) theories about its origins. One theory is that the word comes from the Old Norse word for “rower” and dates back to the arrival of the Northmen from Scandinavia who took control of the region (making Russia a kind of Scandinavian colony). The other theory is that the word is Slavic, threading back to a particular Sarmatian tribe called the Roxolani, who lived around the mouth of the Danube. Having these fifth-century bros shouting “Rūs!” means this movie is definitely espousing the latter, Slavic-not-Norse theory. That also happens to be the one that nationalist Russians like these days.

So okay, comrade movie, let’s accept that your Sarmatians are specifically Roxolani. Fair enough, I suppose, but they still wouldn’t shout “Rūs!”

You see, the name Roxolani comes from (dead language alert!) Scythian, and it appears to mean something like “Alani of the light”: Alani is the people part of the equation, so if these folks were shouting anything it ought to be “Alans!” And even if you wanted them to be shouting about brightness—for, I dunno, subtle pro-Russian sentimentality—it’d be “Ruxh” and not “Rūs”.

Speaking of languages, Lancelot is a French name—a straight-up, could-only-be-more-French-if-it-was-Francois kind of French name. And as a character he doesn’t even exist in Arthurian stories until the 12th century writer Chrétien de Troyes invents him.

Which of course makes me wonder why the living hell these pro-Russian East Iranians are giving their kids 12th-century French names in the 5th century.

::screaming into the void::

Anyway, the Roxolani in this movie are super good horsemen—which is actually possibly true—who function as knights—which is super not true—and the Romans have taken them to England to fight on their behalf—and, hey, that’s sorta true, too!

I feel like we’re sorta getting somewhere good now. The Sarmatians did indeed become Roman auxiliaris in the early Empire, and it’s true that there was a group of them in England. In Ribchester, in fact! Isn’t that cool? We know exactly where these guys were! You’re really turning things around, comrade movie! This is…

Wait. Wait. Why does this movie have these guys living at Hadrian’s Wall? That’s like 70 miles from Ribchester.

Goddamnit.

And then (then!) the movie jumps forward 15 years and introduces us to a sleepy-eyed Roman commander named Arthur (Clive Owen), who is the leader of the Knights of the Round Table. This makes literally no sense (see problems with Lancelot, listed above). At the same time, I will admit that it’s an excuse for a great cast. Lancelot (Ioan Gruffudd) is all grown up. There’s also Galahad (Hugh Dancy), Bors (Ray Winstone), Gawain (Joel Edgerton), Tristan (Mads Mikkelsen), and Dagonet (Ray Stevenson—who is and will always be my Titus Pullo).

Look, this movie is just silly. Profoundly silly. It has gestures at history—it might be the only Arthurian movie to have the Pelagianism as a subplot—but it consistently sets those gestures on fire just as surely as it sets fire to a bunch of arrows at one point.

Because of course it has flaming arrows.

As an example, the villain in this movie is Cerdic, the leader of a bloodthirsty Saxon invasion. Stellan Skarsgård has a lot of fun playing him in the most over-the-top manner he can manage, and it’s fair to say that, like Alan Rickman in Kevin Hood, he pretty much steals the movie from its bland leading man. And, yeah, the Saxons were indeed invading the island at the time. And the little snowball of what became Arthur might well date from this period. Good, good, and good.

Except this movie has the Saxons landing in modern Scotland and then marching south toward Hadrian’s Wall.

That’s off by 400 miles, give or take, since Cerdic and the Saxons came ashore in Hampshire, on the southern coast of Britain. They never went to Hadrian’s Wall, as they founded Wessex (which derives from “West-Saxons”). Also, this movie is set around 485ish, but Cerdic didn’t arrive until 495 and didn’t die until 534.

Speaking of dates, the Roman withdrawal from Britain is absolutely central to the plot: Arthur and his bro-knights need to rescue a wealthy Roman from his villa north of the wall. That there were no such villas is one problem. That the withdrawal happened 75 years earlier is another.

Oh, and the bishop ordering them to the task on behalf of the Pope (who didn’t yet hold the kind of powers they give him in this movie) is Germanius—whose two visits to Britain were in 429 and 447.

What else … Merlin is a Pictish politician and spiritualist. Guinevere (Keira Knightley) is a Pict, too, only she’s a dying slave to the Romans who is rescued by Arthur … with whom she then exchanges Meaningful Looks(TM) before revealing that she’s (medieval movie cliche alert!) amazing at using a bow apparently on account of her being born on the island of Britain. It’s something in the water, I think. The Picts also use trebuchets that are wildly inaccurate. Oh, and the Saxons have crossbows with—wait for it—“armor-piercing” bolts.

Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow. OW.

Comrade movie, you can’t be all things. Want to be a historical look at the Anglo-Saxon invasions? Cool. Let’s do it. But you can’t also try to name-check like every damn character and moment in the expansive King Arthur mythology. I love both these things, you see, and they Do Not mix.

And—damnit, Jerry—keep your explosions out of my history.

So is there anything redeeming about this film in historical terms? No. Not even a little bit. (If I get started on the arms, armaments, and costume choices in this film we’ll be here all week.)

It’s sadly not very entertaining, either: despite the decent cast and a big budget, the acting paints by numbers, the pacing is painful, and the direction isn’t good. This is a shame, because despite all the historical nonsense the writing has some good lines, especially among Bors and the other knights. Oh, and I loved this exchange:

Lancelot: You look frightened. There’s a large number of lonely men out there.

Guinevere: Don’t worry, I won’t let them rape you.

There’s also a decent set-piece that’s a battle on ice in which Ray Stevenson takes a leading role. But part of that might just be because it doesn’t matter how many times the people in this movie want to call him Dagonet… he’s Titus friggin’ Pullo.

What do y’all think? Did anyone find anything else redeeming about this film?

Michael Livingston is a Professor of Medieval Culture at The Citadel who has written extensively both on medieval history and on modern medievalism. His historical fantasy trilogy set in Ancient Rome, The Shards of Heaven, The Gates of Hell, and The Realms of God, is available from Tor Books.