The BoSS for 01/08/10

A trio of very interesting books stand out from the rest of the mailbag this week. The Nemesis List, firstly, is the winner of last year's War of the Words competition; God of Clocks is the last book in The Deepgate Codex, and it's proven rather divisive; and while The Silent Land won't be out till November - as with the R. J. Frith (this week's theme seems to be books you can't read for ages) - I'm over the moon to have received a proof of the new Graham Joyce this far out from publication. Perks!

Click through to read Meet the BoSS for an introduction and an explanation as to why you should care about the Bag o' Speculative Swag.

Read on for a sneak peek at some of the books - past, present and future - you can expect to see coverage of here on The Speculative Scotsman in the coming weeks and months.

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The Nemesis List

by R. J. Frith

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

05/11/10 by Macmillan

Review Priority:

4 (Very High)

Plot Synopsis: "Humanity has expanded into the stars but at the price of its freedom. An autocratic and overbearing Government now rigidly controls every technical and scientific advancement. Deviation is punishable by death.

"Out on the edges of space, criminals thwart the law, making money out of illegal tech, their ships jumping from galaxy to galaxy to avoid detection. Ex-soldier Frank Pak doesn’t care about politics or breaking the law, he just wants to keep his ship running. When he’s offered a contract to escort a runaway back home to his loving family – he doesn’t ask questions.

"But his cargo is more dangerous than he realizes. Jeven Jones is no ordinary passenger. A result of illegal human experimentation, he’s a fast-tracked evolutionary leap into future. Thanks to his ability for perfect recall and a series of mental skills that he has no control over, Jones is a wanted man. The Government wants him dead. A fledgling revolution want to use him to unlock all the technology the Government has ever denied them.

"If Jones lives he’ll start a war. If he dies the entire future of humanity dies with him..."

Commentary: R. J. Frith's debut was the winner of the worldwide War of the Words competition Tor ran in conjunction with SciFiNow last year, so there's potential positively dripping off of this one. Latterly, The Nemesis List was also subject to a bit of a Twitter vote-off in terms of its cover design: of the two options offered, this was the one I preferred, and though it's a little meh yet, that spaceship, I assure you, is far and away more appealing than the Photoshopped portrait of a handsome, be-stubbled twentysomething that was the alternative. But enough nonsense about covers. This could be great... I hope it is. I've plenty of time to find out before The Nemesis List is released in November.

The Terminal State

by Jeff Somers

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
05/08/10 by Orbit

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "Avery Cates is in better shape than ever with the top-class augments the army's fitted him with. Pity he's no more than a puppet then, because they've also got a remote that can fry his brain at any second. And now a corrupt colonel is selling his controls to the highest bidder. Avery has visions of escape and bloody revenge - until he realises just who's bought him. Because the highest bidder is Canny Orel himself, Avery's oldest enemy. And as the System slides into chaos, Canny wants Cates to do one last job. Avery just needs one chance to get back at the old gunner - but this time, it's Canny who's holding all the cards."

Commentary: I really rather like the look of this one, and it sounds like loads of fun - kind of puts me in mind (who knows why) of Charlie Huston. Sadly, we've come a-cropper of that old chestnut again: The Terminal State is the fourth novel starring Avery Cates, and I've read not a one of those before it. Anyone out there able to make a case for me going for it regardless?

Noir: A Novel
by Robert Coover

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

24/06/10 by Duckworth

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "You are Philip M. Noir, Private Investigator. A mysterious young widow hires you to find her husband's killer... but has he really been killed? Then your client is killed and her body disappears... but was she really your client? Your search for clues takes you through all the layers of the city, from classy lounges to lowlife dives, from jazz bars to swimming pools, from yachts to the morgue. 'The Case of the Vanishing Black Widow' unfolds over five days above ground and three or four in smugglers tunnels, through flashback and anecdote, and expands time into something much larger. You don't always get the joke, though most people think what's happening to you is pretty funny."

Commentary: The New York Times have called Robert Coover "a one-man Big Bang of exploding creative force," and this stark, self-aware crime thriller - told in the second person, no less - seems to be ample proof of the author's postmodern sensibilities. This is a nice short novel I mean to read for a week of crime fiction reviews I have on the drawing board. Here's hoping it doesn't blow my mind so explosively that I can't read for weeks afterward...

God of Clocks

by Alan Campbell

 

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
07/05/10 by Tor

Review Priority:

4 (Very High)

Plot Synopsis: "The gates to Hell have been opened, releasing unnatural creatures and threatening to turn the world into a killing field. In the middle, caught between warring gods and fallen angels, humanity finds itself pushed to the brink of extinction. Its only hope is the most unlikely of heroes...

"Former assassin Rachel Hael has rejoined the blood-magician Mina Greene and her devious little dog Basilis on one last desperate mission to save the world from the grip of Hell. Carried in the jaw of a debased angel, they rush to the final defensive stronghold of the god of clocks – pursued all the while by the twelve arconites, the great iron-and-bone automatons controlled by King Menoa, the lord of the maze.

"But the strange fortress of the god of clocks is unlike anything they could ever have expected. And now old enemies and new allies join in a battle whose outcome could end them all..."

Commentary: Some very disappointed people who loved this series began to loudly declaim it after God of Clocks - after something of a deus ex machina took the edge off the conclusion, I hear. Well, we'll see for ourselves soon enough. The Deepgate Codex came out as the runner-up in the holiday reading poll I ran months ago, and now that the third book's out in paperback, I'm rearing to get on with it. Might even be having a word with Alan about his work when I've got reviews of the trilogy ready, as a matter of fact...

Blood and Iron

by Tony Ballantyne

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

18/06/10 by Tor

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "Appointed Commander of the Emperor’s Army of Sangrel, Wa-Ka-Mo-Do of Ko tries to establish relations between the existing robot population and the humans who have recently arrived on Yukawa.

"On the continent of Shull, Kavan forms the Uncertain Army and is marching to Artemis City. Upon discovery that the city's generals have made an alliance with the humans, he retreats to Stark where he plans the eventual overthrow of Artemis and the humans.

"Meanwhile, Karel is heading South, hoping to be reunited with Susan, his wife. As he walks, he hears more of the stories of the robots, and begins to understand something about his place on the world of Penrose.

"But with limited resources and tensions growing between robot and human it’s only a matter of time before problems arise. And it’s becoming more and more apparent that the humans are a lot more powerful than the robots first expected..."

Commentary: Book two of the Penrose trilogy and I haven't read book one. What a surprise. Might look into getting my hands on a copy of Twisted Metal and report back... though, huh, a whole lot of people seem to hate it. One solid idea stretched to breaking point for the sake of trilogising, it sounds like. Hmm.

The Silent Land
by Graham Joyce

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

18/11/10 by Gollancz

Review Priority:

5 (Immediate)

Plot Synopsis: "A young couple are caught in an avalanche during a ski-ing holiday in the French Alps. They struggle back to the village and find it deserted. As the days go by they wait for rescue, then try to leave. But each time they find themselves back in the village. And, increasingly, they are plagued by visions and dreams and the realization that perhaps no-one could have survived the avalanche. The Silent Land is a brooding and tender look at love and whether it can survive the greatest challenge we will ever face."

Commentary: I can haz read this one already, I confess. And I'll say this: peel your peepers, ladies and gentlemen, because The Silent Land is a hell of a book. It might be ages away yet, but be sure that it's an age worth waiting out. Not only that - I just got word back from everyone's favourite Uncle, and he's good with me reviewing this whenever I please.

So... shall we say next week? ;)

The Complete Birgadier Gerard

by Arthur Conan Doyle

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
05/08/10 by Canongate

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Brigadier Gerard stories surely constitute the finest series of historical short stories in literature, mingling the comedy and the tragedy, the pathos and the irony, or, in Napoleon's phrase, the sublime and the ridiculous. It is Napoleon and his Europe, his dedicated followers and the awakened nationalisms of the peoples they enraged, possessing our minds in savage realism and enrapturing romance. And in Brigadier Etienne Gerard, Arthur Conan Doyle created a hero worthy to take his place in the great line stretching from Homer's Odysseus to George MacDonald Fraser's Flashman, nearest of all perhaps to Stevenson's Allan Breck and Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster."

Commentary: Now I'm not in the least bit sure what to make of this one. I very much like the design, and in theory, I like the idea of reading through a few of Arthur Conan Doyle's lesser-known works too, but... I don't know. It could be a great, gastric whale of a time, or, I suppose, there could be a reason the relatively obscure novellas and shorts stories collected together in The Complete Brigadier Gerard are so... lesser known. I'll dip into this at the very least and report back if its contents are interesting enough.