The Entropy Pump

While I was initially quite a big fan of the new incarnation of Battlestar Galactica, I was dismayed by its slow disintegration and descent into stupidity. That said, the one thing it had over this new Stargate series, that tries its best to ape as much of the style of the BG series as it can, is that at least the actors were convincing. And in general, more drama doesn’t automatically equals more depth and more character bits doesn’t automatically mean your characters become more interesting.

I dunno, but here we have a group of people stranded on an ancient spaceship started millions of years ago. This thing has FTL capabilities, so it could have gone beyond the edge of the observable universe (since I have no idea how fast the thing flies, it might or might not be able to do that). This is an incredibly powerful set-up, from a SFnal point of view. But all that is merely the scenery for boring character quarrels, for the same cheap drama that plagues most of the television landscape these days. And worst of all, it’s not even as good as BG or others of its ilk when it comes to the drama aspect. Really, what’s the point.

Daw’s program for July and August has mostly generic fantasy mixed up with some generic SF. Nothing that sounds remotely interesting or exiting (which doesn’t mean some couldn’t be really great, but the descriptions makes it sounds so generic that I’m already bored reading the descriptions).

Julie E. Czerneda: Stratification 2 – Riders of the Storm (Jul 09) (SF)
Julie E. Czerneda: Stratification 3 – Rift in the Sky (Jul 09) (SF)

The descriptions make it not entirely clear whether the Czerneda are SF or fantasy, but I assume it’s the former, as most of her stuff is SF. Not that I’m interested in them, I once read one of her novels and it was such a drag that I don’t see myself reading any of more of her stuff anytime soon.

Gamer Fantastic (Anthology) (Jul 09) (SF)

Generic done by the numbers anthology mixing fantasy RPGs with virtual reality. How novel.

Sherwood Smith: Inda 3 – King’s Shield (Jul 09) (F)
Kristen Britain: Green Rider 2 – First Rider’s Call (Jul 09) (F)
Kristen Britain: Green Rider 3 – The High King’s Tomb (Aug 09) (F)
C.F. Bentley: Harmony (Aug 09) (SF)
C.F. Bentley: Enigma (sequel to Harmony) (Aug 09) (SF)
Sherwood Smith: Inda 4 – Treason’s Shore (Aug 09) (F)
S. Andrew Swann: Dragons and Dwarves (Omnibus) (Aug 09) (F)

Definitely more fantasy than SF here. And the lone SF novel seems like a boring SF disaster piece (Moonfall). The rest is a mix of standard fantasy (I read the first two Swainston novels and I don’t think I’ll continue), urban fantasy and even a reworking of the Peter Pan story (The Child Thief).

A least there’s something interesting for me. A new Richard Kadrey novel is always something to look forward to, especially since this sounds as much fun as his last one.

Jack McDevitt – Moonfall (Jul 09) (SF)
Richard Kadrey – Sandman Slim (Jul 09) (F)
Dakota Banks – Dark Time (Jul 09) (F)
Eldon Thompson – The Legend of Asahiel 3 – The Divine Talisman (Jul 09) (F)
Steph Swainston – Fourlands 1 – The Year of Our War (Aug 09) (F)
Steph Swainston – Fourlands 2 – No Present Like Time (Aug 09) (F)
Steph Swainston – Fourlands 3 – Dangerous Offering (aka “The Modern World”)
Brom – The Child Thief (Aug 09) (F)
Tracey O’Hara – Night’s Old Kiss (Aug 09) (F)
Unbound (Anthology) (Aug 09) (F)

Orbit, who has localized units for the UK, the US and Australia, has an easy to find schedule on their website, but strangely only forthcoming books up to the end of the year for their US unit. For the other two units it only shows what’s been published up to the present.

The whole local segmentation looks quite odd for someone who solely buys through the web. I can get most English published books from the UK and US through Amazon.de (apart from some small press stuff like Nesfa, they don’t seem to get their new stuff any more, with is quite a headache for me) and for the rest there’s always Abebooks. I know it makes full sense from a publishing POV, but to me it looks oddly backward. At least I can choose between versions with different price tags and different covers.

Sadly, the only book that looks slightly interesting is Soulless, which is described as a comedy of manners set in a Victorian London with werewolves and vampires. Reminds me a little bit of Kim Newman’s Anno Dracula, which was excellent. On the other hand, the last time someone used the tag comedy of manners for a book, I abandoned reading it because of its awfulness (Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell).

The other books either have descriptions that don’t give you a good idea what the book is about (for example Transition by Banks) or give the impression of completely generic fantasy or urban fantasy. I also find most of the cover designs unappealing.

Iain M. Banks: Transition (Sep 09) (SF)
Amanda Downum: The Drowning City (Sep 09) (F)
Jennifer Rardin: Biting the Bullet (Sep 09) (F)
K. J. Parker: The Company (Sep 09) (F)
Gail Carriger: Soulless (Oct 09) (F)
Philip Palmer: Red Claw (Oct 09) (SF)
Stan Nicholls: Orcs – Army of Shadows (Oct 09) (F)
Jennifer Rardin: Bite Marks (Oct 09) (F)

No interesting SF novels by newer writers, but the Egan and the Baxters are welcome. The rest is a mix of urban and traditional fantasy. Even a media-tie in.

Richard Morgan: The Steel Remains (Jul 09) (F)

Robert Holdstock: Mythago Wood (Jul 09) (F)

The premise reminds me of Paul Kearney’s A Different Kingdom, one of my favorite fantasy novels. Intriguing.

Robert Holdstock: Avilion (Jul 09) (F)

This sequel to Mythago Wood. Sounds less interesting and more generic than its precursor.

Stephen Baxter: Flood (Jul 09) (SF)

When I heard the first time that Baxter wanted to write a disaster novel I wasn’t that interested. I find that subgenre of What If fiction generally braindead. Some normal disaster happens, scaled to the max. We follow different groups of people who will meet at the end, having lost many of their members to the disaster in the interim. It’s all quite boring. But after reading the description, it seems like Baxter has a clever, SFnal spin on the flood-type-disaster and I’m intrigued where he’s going with it.

Carrie Ryan: The Forest of Hands and Teeth (Jul 09) (F)

Greg Egan: Oceanic (Jul 09) (SF)

I’ve waited quite some time for another collection of Egan’s stories. And while I read most of them already, I’ll can’t wait to have them as a book in my hands.

Mark Chadbourn: Kingdom of the Serpent 3 Destroyer of Worlds (Jul 09) (F)

Epic, apocalyptic fantasy. Somehow I find the description appealing. Must read some reviews to find out whether this is good. –> (turns out this is the not only the end of this trilogy, but also the third part in a trilogy of trilogy’s and the first trilogy is apparently published by Pyr in the US as the Age of Misrule, whose description I found less than interesting just recently, odd)

Suzanne McLeod: Spellcrackers 2 – The Cold Kiss of Death (Jul 09) (F)

Seems like a typical generic urban fantasy series. While I like those, I’ve still enough of them that I haven’t read yet.

Charlaine Harris: Sookie Stackhouse 1 – Dead As A Doornail (Jul 09) (F)
Charlaine Harris: Sookie Stackhouse 2 – Definitely Dead (Jul 09) (F)
Charlaine Harris: Sookie Stackhouse 3 – Dead To The World (Jul 09) (F)
Charlaine Harris: Sookie Stackhouse 4 – Club Dead (Jul 09) (F)
Charlaine Harris: Sookie Stackhouse 5 – Living Dead In Dallas (Jul 09) (F)
Charlaine Harris: Sookie Stackhouse 6 – From Dead to Worse (Jul 09) (F)
Charlaine Harris: Sookie Stackhouse 7 – All Together Dead (Jul 09) (F)

I’ve read the first four novels. Very enjoyable urban fantasy novels that manage a good balance between adventure and romantic elements.

Carrie Vaughn: Kitty and the Dead Man’s Hand (Jul 09) (F)

Another urban fantasy series, the fifth part.

Ian Mcdonald: River of Gods (Jul 09) (SF)

Robert V.S. Redick: Chathrand 2 – The Rats and the Ruling Sea (Aug 09) (F)

A fantasy novel that moves the setting from land to sea.

Stephen Baxter: Ark (Aug 09) (SF)

The sequel to Flood, which sports a generation ship with those fleeing Earth. The description also implies that there are still some who survived on Earth. Baxter has an unhealthy fascination with tribal-like structures that can drown the more interesting aspects of his stuff. If the book concentrates too much on the generation ship and shows their social structure disintegrating to something more primitive, I’m less interested in reading it.

James Barclay: Ravensoul (Aug 09) (F)

Tony Gonzales : EVE – The Empyrean Age (Aug) (SF)

Del Rey has media-tie ins, fantasy by Terry Brooks, AH by Turtledove and a little bit SF. Nothing really exciting, but one of the Turtledoves sounds at least interesting.

Harry Turtledove: The Man with the Iron Heart (Jul 09) (AH)

I’m not really into AH, but a “What if there had be a Nazi resistance after the war had ended” sounds interesting. I think the obvious solution would have been to nuke our whole country, but I think neighboring countries would have slightly objected.

David Gunn: Death’s Head 2 – Day of the Damned (Jul 09) (SF)

Pablo Hidalgo: G.I. Joe vs. Cobra – The Essential Guide (Jul 09) (non-fiction)

Karen Traviss: Gears of War – Jacinto’s Remnant (Jul 09) (SF)

Terry Brooks: Genesis of Shannara 3 – The Gypsy Morph (Jul 09) (F)

Another book of Brooks ongoing attempt to bridge his Shannara and his Word & Void series. Are there any other than financial reasons for this, or why do some genre writer have the need to make ever vaster fictional universe by connecting their disparate works?

Terry Brooks: The Magic King of Landover Volume 1 (Aug 09) (F)
Terry Brooks: The Magic King of Landover Volume 2 (Aug 09) (F)

Two Landover omnibuses, with the first collecting the first three novels and the second one the last two. I do remember starting to read the first novel years ago, but I can’t remember whether I ever finished it. It’s of the guy-from-our-world-goes-to-a-magic-world kind. I still want to read it some day, as I’m fond of Brooks books in general. But time is ever in short supply.

Terry Brooks: Landover 6 – A Princess of Landover (Aug 09) (F)

The sixth novel sees the daughter of Ben Holiday taking the spot-light. An attempt to appeal to Harry Potter fans or merely the need to introduce some new blood into an old formula?

Terry Brooks: The World of Shannara (Aug 09) (non-fiction)

Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl: The Last Theorem (Aug 09) (SF)

The last novel written by Clarke. Doesn’t sound too interesting and too be honest, the last novels written by even the best writer rarely excite.

Harry Turtledover: Hitler’s War (Aug 09) (AH)

How many AH novels can one author write about the second world war before it gets old? I have no idea, but Del Rey seems to think the answer is, as long as people buy it, which is sound reasoning.

Baen has its usual mix of old school SF, AH and fantasy with some odd experiments mixed in there. I also need to mention how accessible their website is. Looking for forthcoming books at some publishers websites (Tor seems to be the worst so far in that regard) is a nightmare, but Baen’s forthcoming schedule is easy to find and maneuver.

John Ringo: Posleen 5 – Eye of the Storm (Jul 09) (SF)

While I’ve read some military SF in the past, I’m not the most ardent fan and this over-the-top modern pulp variant never appealed to me. But I must admit the description of the story sounds hilarious. I don’t doubt that in fifty years some people will look back with nostalgia to the Posleen books. It’s the new pulp.

P. C. Hodgell: Seeker’s Bane (Jul 09) (F)

Omnibus of the third and fourth God Stalkers chronicles. Sounds like it could actually be a good read.

Eric Flint & Virginia DeMarce: 1634 – The Bavarian Crisis (AH)

Alternate history about a modern city turning up in seventeenth century Europe. AH has rarely appealed to me in the past, this is no exception. Follows the typical pattern of modern day people turning up in the past and trying to use their knowledge to survive and create a position of power. I dunno, I think that these kind of narratives seriously underestimate or downplay the effects of cultural displacement on the displaced, only giving a token acknowledgment to the consequences.

Robert A. Heinlein: Farmer in the Sky (Jul 09) (SF)

Howard L. Myers: A Sense of Infinity (Jul 09) (Collection) (SF/F)

I remember reading in the first collection of Myers fiction by Baen that Flint wanted to do a second one collecting the rest of his oeuvre. While I wasn’t completely overwhelmed by Myers stuff, it was interesting enough to make me want to read the rest of his stuff. I also like the cover design, which seems quite untypical for Baen and more in line with a cover I would expect from Tor.

Eric Flint: Grantville Gazette Volume V (Aug 09) (AH)

Eric Flint & David Drake: Belisarius 3 – The Flames of Sunset (Aug 09) (AH)

Hank Reinhardt: The Book of the Sword (Aug 09) (non-fiction)

A non-fiction book about swords. Odd seeing something like this at Baen, but somehow fitting, considering all the fantasy and especially alternate history Bean publishes. Should appeal to fans of those.

Robert A. Heinlein: The Puppet Master (Aug 09) (SF)

My favorite Heinlein. It’s about an alien invasion that would set the pattern for the Body Snatchers movies. The paranoia is already there, but the overall attitude is more gung-ho and it’s definitely more fun than any of the movies (okay, except Faculty).

Mercedes Lackey & Roberta Gellis: And Less Than Kind (Aug 09) (F)

Dark Elves trying to subvert the throne of England after King Henry VIII died. Sounds interesting.

Larry Correia: Monster Hunter International (Aug 09) (F)

Seems like a urban fantasy novel. Since there’s a male hero at work, action and not romance seems to be the focus. Definitely something I will check out.

Norvell W. Page: The Spider – City of Doom (Aug 09) (Pulp)

Seems like an (already the second) attempt to resurrect an old pulp hero. Not my cup of coffee, especially after reading the excerpt. Either the writer is bad or he’s successfully trying to emulate pulp writing.
“My God!” he gasped hoarsely. “It’s—the Spider!”

The third quarter of 09 sees Pyr plagued by sequelitis, all of them fantasy. As I still have enough unread fantasy series lying around the house, I don’t have much interest in starting another.

Mark Chadbourn: Age of Misrule 3 – Always Forever (Jul 09) (F)

Hmm, somehow this reminds me about a movie I never saw some years back about dragons coming back. I always wondered how some big monsters could threaten civilization, with all the ABC weaponry we have at hand.

Ian McDonald: Desolation Road (Jul 09) (SF)

I still have enough unread McDonald novels lying around that need to be read before I can even think about another one. It’s a reprint of McDonald’s first novel, outlining the history of a town on a terraformed Mars. Also, it doesn’t sound too interesting.

Justina Robson: Quantum Gravity 4 – Chasing the Dragon (Aug 09) (F/SF)

Mike Resnick: John Justin Mallory 3 – Stalking the Dragon (Aug 09) (F)

I read the first one years ago and loved it, but then I’m a sucker for mixing crime with fantasy. Still, need to get the get second one before I can even start of thinking about reading this.

James Barclay: Chronicles of the Raven 1 – Dawnthief (Sep 09) (F)

Tom Lloyd: Twilight Rain 3 – The Grave Thief (Sep 09) (F)

Paul McAuley: The Quiet War (Sep 09) (SF)

PMcA has been quite hit and miss for me in the past. I hated every part of the Four Hundred Billion Stars trilogy with passion, but was also really fond of Red Dust. That said, it’s not clear to me whether this book is a fix-up of the stories that PMcA has written in the past years and which I found less appealing when I read them in the various Best Ofs, or whether this is a completely new novel. The cover is lovely, thought.

I start this new category on my blog with looking at the forthcoming first books by the new SF/F/H line of VizMedia, whose intend is to bring some Japanese SF/F/H to English-speaking shores. Hopefully it works, as more variety is always something I appreciate.

Hiroshi Sakurazaka: All You Need Is Kill (Jul 09) (SF)

This, to be honest, doesn’t sound all too interesting. Young guy becomes a soldier in a war against some aliens. Each time he dies he gets restored to life, to fight again. I dunno, doesn’t sound too exiting.

Issui Ogawa: The Lords of the Sands of Time (Jul 09) (SF)

A time travel story where someone goes back to the past to save the future (alien invaders killed humanity). I’m not a big fan of time travel stories and I find the old going-back-to-the-past-to-save-the-future plot even less appealing.

Otsuichi: Z00 (Sep 09) (Collection: H/SF)

I’m always a sucker for a good collection and the description makes it look quite interesting. Also the excerpt was quite compelling, made me want to read more.

Housuke Nojiri: Ursurper of the Sun (Sep 09) (SF)

Probably the one that piqued my interest the most. It’s high-concept SF time: someone is building a tower on Mercury and soon after a ring around the sun whose shadow becomes harmful to Earth. Now that sounds interesting. Hopefully it as good as it sounds.