All Tomorrow's Parties

So what to do, what to do?

Sometimes I can kind of autopilot through a week's worth of blog posts, with a couple of news articles here and my thoughts on them there - look, Guillermo del Toro's off The Hobbit, maybe Peter Jackson will ditch Tintin 2 to takes his rightful place - an edition of The BoSS and a few reviews to break up all the current events razzmatazz. And some weeks I have to, just to keep up the pace. These next few weeks, though... not so much. I've been beavering away behind the scenes, reading till my eyes bled and writing about what I've read till I had no choice but to call Specsavers and casually inquire about a plan for bionic optics.

So what's on the drawing board for the next wee while? Well, since you ask, in a few days I'll be posting reviews of The Leaping by Tom Fletcher, and Stories: All-New Tales, the ubiquitous and needless to say rather lovely anthology edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio. You can read the first story from the collection, the excellent "Blood" by Roddy Doyle, over on The Times' website for free - I'd urge you to do so - and my take on one of the highlights of the anthology, Neil Gaiman's "The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains," over on NextRead, as part of Gav's late, great short story month.

Next week, meanwhile, is going to be Mark Charan Newton week. Serious face: it is. I'll be reviewing both of The Legends of the Red Sun books as well as giving away a signed proof copy of Nights of Villjamur - not to mention interviewing the gent himself. I'm trading emails with Mark as I write this, in fact, and I think it's safe to say that he's got a lot of interesting - perhaps even provocative - things to say. You wouldn't think it of the internet troublemaker extraordinaire, would you? He even disagrees about that!

Mark will also be stopping by to post a little write-up of his own, on some of the literature, genre and otherwise, that were an inspiration to him during the writing of what critics have called the breakthrough fantasy series of 2009. It promises to be an exciting week, and I hope you'll all join me in welcoming Mark to The Speculative Scotsman. He was an early supporter of the site - calling TSS "a lesson to bloggers," as I recall - and I'm a huge fan of the man and his fiction in return. It's going to be a privilege having him on these here pages, I have no doubt. I might even design a little banner in his honour!

So that's this week, and next week. The week after that, reviews of both Twelve and Thirteen Years Later by Jasper Kent will kick off a bit of a celebration and/or public pillorying of vampires.

Which you might think is more than enough forward planning for the moment, but I can hardly help myself: I'm already thinking ahead. If you've browsed through The BoSS of late, you'll already know what an incredible selection of books and proofs I've received recently, and I'm very much looking forward to the chance to devote myself to them just as soon as possible. Stone Springs by Stephen Baxter, Far North by Marcel Theroux, The Dervish House by Ian McDonald... the list goes on.

Trouble is: The Passage - which I got a copy of months in advance of its publication date - is rather creeping up on me. It promises to be among the most important new releases of 2010, and I'd love to weigh in with my opinion on this speculative heavyweight in a timely fashion. Trouble is, it's a massive book, and however many reviews you see here on TSS, when it comes right down to it, I'm a fairly slow reader. And I have to be honest here. However significant Justin Cronin's tome is, at just shy of 1000 pages, it's either going to be that or three other books; not necessarily the three I've mentioned, of course.

So what should I do? Go dark for a bit, the better to cover one massive, and potentially massively important book, or keep the show on the road as per usual. Help me out here, guys.

For whatever it's worth, here's the very stylish book trailer for The Passage to help you make up your minds:

Help?

The BoSS for 30/05/10

Nothing huge this week - nothing, I should say, quite on the level of City of Ruin (though as one of this year's must-read fantasies, that isn't a huge surprise) - but nonetheless, the BoSS troops ever onward. Featuring the likes of Stephen Deas, Jay Lake and George Mann, all acclaimed authors who I hate to admit I've never read, the theme this week seems to be new experiences. And I'm all for new experiences. Did I ever tell you all about that one time, at band camp, when I ---

What?

Oh. My apologies. Now what was it we were talking about again?

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.

***

The Poison Diaries
by Maryrose Wood

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

27/05/10 by HarperCollins

Review Priority:

4 (Very High)

Plot Synopsis: "A dark, gothic tale of romance... and murder. In the right dose, everything is a poison. Jessamine has spent her whole life in a cottage close to her father's apothecary garden, surrounded by medicinal plants and herbs that could kill her - although her father has never allowed her into the most dangerous part of the grounds... the poison garden. And so she's never had reason to be afraid - until now. Because now a newcomer has come to live with the family, a quiet but strangely attractive orphan boy named Weed. Though Weed doesn't say much in words, he has an instant talent for the apothecary's trade, seeming to possess a close bond with the plants of the garden. Soon, he and Jessamine also share a close bond. But little does Jessamine know that passion can be just as poisonous as the deadliest plants in the garden - for behind Weed's instinctive way in the garden is a terrible secret. The plants can talk to him - and not just the kind ones that can heal, but the ruthless ones that can kill too."

Commentary: All of which sounds very promising - very Little Shop of Horrors (oh relax, I'm kidding) - until you get to the bit in the publicity blurb which says, with a straight face, that The Poison Diaries comes to us care of an idea by the Duchess of Northumberland and the writer of such classics as How I Found the Perfect Dress and Why I Let My Hair Grow Out. But I'm being a bit mean here, aren't I? Perhaps it's just knee-jerk defensiveness, because despite the dubious talent behind Maryrose Wood's all-ages dark fantasy, I'm kind of interested. No really - I am.

Frostbitten

by Kelley Armstrong

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

06/05/10 by Orbit

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "After years of struggle, Elena Michaels - journalist, investigator, werewolf - has finally come to terms with her strange fate, and learned how to control her wild side. At least, that's what she believes when she sets off to Alaska with her partner Clay. A series of gruesome maulings and murders outside Anchorage seem to implicate a rogue band of werewolves. But the truth is more complicated. Trapped in a frozen, unforgiving terrain, they are forced to confront a deadly secret, and their own, untamed nature..."

Commentary: And so, to the last of Orbit's releases this month. Frostbitten is, yes, unless I'm mistaken, more urban fantasy. But you know what? This doesn't sound bad at all - though what with Bareback and The Leaping a few weeks ago this seems to be werewolf season - and all the raves on the Amazon page where I tend to pilfer assorted publication information for the BoSS have rather assuaged my usual fears. Will give this one a go, I think, and report back.

Pinion
by Jay Lake

Release Details:

Published in the US on

03/05/10 by Tor

Review Priority:

4 (Very High)

Plot Synopsis: "Rejoin the adventure in Lake's Clockwork Earth. Paolina Barthes, young sorceress, is crossing the Equatorial Wall, attempting to take herself and her magic away from the grasp of powerful men in the empires of the north. Emily Childress is still aboard the renegade Chinese submarine, along with her devoted Captain and the British chief petty officer, Angus al-Wazir. They are all being sought most urgently by the powers that secretly rule the Northern Earth the Silent Order and the White Birds. A third power, of the Southern Earth, has its eye on Paolina; she will not be allowed to bring the political turmoil of the North into the more mystical South."

Commentary: Another week, another embarrassing confession. I've never read Jay Lake before... but I've heard great things; particularly, I should say, about his short stories. A quick glance at the Amazon reviews of his last few novels has rather knocked my anticipation for six, but it'll recover, I'm sure. I'm a little concerned about my first experience of the author being the third part of a trilogy, though, so let me ask you: will it be safe for me to start with Pinion, do you think? I don't want to sell the gent short.

Totally loving the gruesome cover art, incidentally. Very Clive Barker...

The Thief-Taker's Apprentice

by Stephen Deas

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

26/08/10 by Gollancz YA

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "Berren has lived in the city all his life. He has made his way as a thief, paying a little of what he earns to the Fagin like master of their band. But there is a twist to this tale of a thief. One day Berren goes to watch an execution of three thieves. He watches as the thief-taker takes his reward and decides to try and steal the prize. He fails. The young thief is taken. But the thief-taker spots something in Berren. And the boy reminds him of someone as well. Berren becomes his apprentice. And is introduced to a world of shadows, deceit and corruption behind the streets he thought he knew. Full of richly observed life in a teeming fantasy city, a hectic progression of fights, flights and fancies and charting the fall of a boy into the dark world of political plotting and murder this marks the beginning of a new fantasy series for all lovers of fantasy."

Commentary: Ah, damn and blast it. What with all the huge new releases over the past few months, I still haven't read the two adult fantasy novels by Stephen Deas previously recounted in the BoSS - despite their gorgeous covers, and indeed my interest in gritty, Abercrombie-esque fantasy with dragons et al. Still! Another day, another opportunity, and wouldn't you know it, August will see the publication of the first in the author's YA series. As I've twittered, from my quick skim of the first few chapters, The Thief-Taker's Apprentice doesn't read at all like typical all-ages fiction to me - a good thing considering the condescension that's so prevalent in the genre - and so I'm rearing to get going with this one. Were it not for the fact that for once time is actually on my side, the review priority would be higher. Stay tuned!

The Edge of the World

by Kevin J. Anderson

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
03/06/10 by Orbit

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "After generations of friction, the leaders of two lands meet in the holy city of Ishalem to bring an end to the bloodshed and to divide the world between them. Sadly, this new spirit of fellowship is shortlived. A single tragic accident destroys, in minutes, the peace that took years to build. The world is once more cast into the fires of war - and this time the flames may burn until nothing remains. From the highest lord to the lowest servant, no man or woman will be unchanged by the conflict. But while war rages across both continents, a great quest will defy storms and sea serpents to venture beyond the horizon, where no maps exist - to search for a land out of legend. It is a perilous undertaking, but there will always be the impetuous, the brave and the mad who are willing to leave their homes to explore the unknown - even unto the edge of the world!"

Commentary: But the Orbit books keep on coming! This is a publisher with such steady output that it practically beggars belief, and though a fair proportion of Orbit's publications are urban fantasy - not exactly my cup of tea (the occasional Earl Grey if you're asking) - the remainder are often enough to get me good and excited. Curiously, Kevin J. Anderson is neither one thing nor quite the other. In my younger years, I'll fess up: I read a few books based on The X-Files, and though I remember precious little about them, I remember Kevin J. Anderson being one of the writers. Perhaps I was a less discerning reader back then, but I don't recall ever being disappointed by one of those novelisations. And so the first volume of an adult fantasy saga - set on the high seas, no less - rather appeals to me on that somewhat nostalgic level. On the other hand, this is the same fellow who rather ruined Dune, isn't it? So I'm torn. Any devoted Kevin J. Anderson readers out there prepared to make their case for The Edge of the World? I'm all ears.

 

The Osiris Ritual

by George Mann

Release Details:

Published in the US on
03/08/10 by Tor US

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "Welcome to the bizarre and dangerous world of Victorian London, a city teetering on the edge of revolution. Its people are ushering in a new era of technology, dazzled each day by new inventions. Airships soar in the skies over the city, whilst ground trains rumble through the streets and clockwork automatons are programmed to carry out menial tasks in the offices of lawyers, policemen and journalists. But beneath this shiny veneer of progress lurks a sinister side.For this is also a world where lycanthropy is a rampant disease that plagues the dirty whorehouses of Whitechapel, where poltergeist infestations create havoc in old country seats, where cadavers can rise from the dead and where nobody ever goes near the Natural History Museum. Sir Maurice Newbury, Gentleman Investigator for the Crown, imagines life can be a little quieter from now on after his dual success in solving The Affinity Bridge affair. But he hasn't banked on his villainous predecessor, Knox, hell bent on achieving immortality, not to mention a secret agent who isn't quite as he seems.

Commentary: Oh no! This is the second in the series? And I've been so looking forward to reading my first Newbury and Hobbes investigation. I'm just going to have to go and get myself a copy of The Affinity Bridge and see what's what, aren't it? The gorgeous covers Snow Books have adorned the UK editions with certainly aren't hurting in that regard...

Feed

by Mira Grant

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
03/06/10 by Orbit

Review Priority:

4 (Very High)

Plot Synopsis: "The year was 2014. We had cured cancer. We had beaten the common cold. But in doing so we created something new, something terrible that no one could stop. The infection spread, virus blocks taking over bodies and minds with one, unstoppable command: FEED. Now, twenty years after the Rising, bloggers Georgia and Shaun Mason are on the trail of the biggest story of their lives - the dark conspiracy behind the infected. The truth will get out, even if it kills them."

Commentary: More zombies! Actually, this looks rather good. I particularly like the wi-fi icon painted in blood on the front cover. Feed is book one of the Newsflesh trilogy, which rather puts me in mind of the new flesh of David Cronenberg's Videodrome (which, apropos of nothing much, I wrote my University dissertation on). I'll be gobbling this one up like so much fresh meat, make no mistake. Doesn't hurt that it's about bloggers, I suppose.

Publishing Apocalypse... Now

"In the world nothing can be said to be certain except death and taxes."

So says Benjamin Franklin, whom I understand to be some sort of semi-important historical figure. I hear he's even on money in the States! Thus, I can only conclude he's the American equivalent of our own Robert Burns.

The Speculative Scotsman is perhaps not the most appropriate venue for a discussion of taxes, but Franklin's other sure thing seems to coming up a lot these days. Spend any amount of time on the internet reading about books, video games, movies, CDs, TV... whatever you please, in fact, and sooner or later - very likely sooner in this age of miserable navel-gazing - someone, somewhere is going to be predicting the death of it.

So what's dying today?

Well, publishing, of course. Of late, it's become almost vogue to gainsay the imminent demise of publishing. And I suppose it's not difficult to see why: what with the widespread adoption of eBook readers and the addition of the iPad to an already rather overbalanced equation, it seems that more and more, people are reading elsewhere, if they're reading at all. Sales are down across the board, self-publishing is up, up, up.

As Garrison Keillor writes in his column for the Baltimore Sun:

"Call me a pessimist, call me Ishmael, but I think that book publishing is about to slide into the sea. We live in a literate time, and our children are writing up a storm, often combining letters and numerals (U R 2 1derful), blogging like crazy, reading for hours off their little screens, surfing around from Henry James to Jesse James to the epistle of James to pajamas to Obama to Alabama to Alanon to non-sequiturs, sequins, penguins, penal institutions, and it's all free, and you read freely, you're not committed to anything the way you are when you shell out $30 for a book, you're like a hummingbird in an endless meadow of flowers.

"And if you want to write, you just write and publish yourself. No need to ask permission, just open a website. And if you want to write a book, you just write it, send it to Lulu.com or BookSurge at Amazon or PubIt or ExLibris and you've got yourself an e-book. No problem. And that is the future of publishing: 18 million authors in America, each with an average of 14 readers, eight of whom are blood relatives. Average annual earnings: $1.75."

Of course he's going a point - publishing, as we know it, is perhaps dying. But it's difficult to discern Keillor's meaning in amongst all the grumpy old man moaning. So what is it that's killing publishing, Garrison? Is it the text-speak? The economy? The bloggers? The internet?

What a lot of horse. Here's another of his so-called gripes:

"Children, I am an author who used to type a book manuscript on a manual typewriter. Yes, I did. And mailed it to a New York publisher in a big manila envelope with actual postage stamps on it. And kept a carbon copy for myself. I waited for a month or so and then got an acceptance letter in the mail. It was typed on paper. They offered to pay me a large sum of money. I read it over and over and ran up and down the rows of corn whooping. It was beautiful, the Old Era. I'm sorry you missed it."

This is priceless stuff, isn't it?

Clearly, if you don't write your manuscript on a typewriter, it isn't worth the paper it isn't written on. If you communicate via email or use word processing software, you're an amateur.

The man obviously wants to make a fuss. His use of inflammatory language is a deliberate ploy to stir the pot. Publishing is assuredly not, as Keillor would have it, dying. It is only changing - as all things do. That it is not what it once was, that the industry has had to adapt to new technology, new media, new modes of communication, is symptomatic not of the end - woe betide us all - but of evolution.

Over on Flavorpill - thanks to Robert Jackson Bennet for the link - Judy Berman has touched base with a bunch of industry professionals to see what they had to say about Keillor's shameless attention-seeking. If all this doomsaying has gotten you half as riled up as it has me, I'd urge you to click on through and read the responses for yourself. But let me end on a particularly choice rebuttal, from literary agent Colleen Lindsay:

"It is his snobbery that got publishing into this mess. He talks about the coveted New York Times, but the Times doesn’t review the books that keep publishing alive. He is afraid of genre fiction. Publishing isn’t dying, it is evolving, and evolution hurts... Werewolf and vampire porn saved publishing."

Video Game Review: Alan Wake

Alan Wake, you say? Yeah, I remember that one. Hard to forget, really. Alan Wake / awake, right? That game from the Max Payne guys that doesn't actually exist. Vapourware, you know, a la the oft-cited Duke Nukem Forever.

Wait, what? It came out?

...well. Then, surely --- I mean, it's got to be a bit rubbish, right, taking that long?

No.

Remedy Entertainment have been talking about Alan Wake for as long as there've been next generation consoles on the market for us to play it on. They've been alluding to it since before the iPhone was even mooted. Their noirish breakthrough efforts - Max Payne and its superior sequel - fantastic games though they were in their day, are old hat now. Developers have been condescending to a new generation of gamers for half a decade since Remedy announced Alan Wake, and given its unnaturally long gestation period, what's perhaps most remarkable about this game is just how thoroughly modern a product the Swedes have been cooking up.

Alan Wake is a bestselling author suffering from writer's block. The better to clear his head, he and his wife Alice arrive in the town of Bright Falls just in time for Deerfest, an annual celebration of... well, walking venison steaks. Alan just wants to take it easy, but Alice has other plans: she's brought her husband's typewriter to their ramshackle cottage on the lake, thinking the disquieting atmosphere might inspire him, and tells Alan of a clinic in the village which specialises in helping artists whose muses have deserted them. Needless to say, the author's not a fan of Alice's surprise, and they squabble.

And then the lights go out.

And all hell breaks loose.

That's the prologue in a nutshell. I wouldn't want to ruin any of the surprises the remainder of Alan Wake has in story - suffice it to say they are plentiful and utterly satisfying - but the narrative is pacy, clever and ultimately the thing that'll keep you coming back for more. Told through in-engine conversations with NPCs, manuscript pages you'll find scattered around the shadow-shrouded environs when you go down to the woods to play, and of course cut-scenes, the team at Remedy have, with more than a tip of the hat to Stephen King, crafted a brilliantly pulpy and self-aware tale divided into six distinct episodes that hits all the terrifying highs and lows of the very best in mediocre horror.

And it's a pleasure to say that the game between all the story bits plays to the narrative's very strengths. Really, we shouldn't have doubted Remedy: the Max Payne games were solid experiences through and through, and Alan Wake takes its cues from them. It's a third-person action adventure game, when you come right down to it; a shooter, mostly, with the prerequisite that you point your torch at any enemies before you can actually damage them, with its fair share of exploration to break up all the running and gunning.

It's as well, really. The action is great initially - though hardly revolutionary even then - but from the halfway point of this ten-hour experience on, the repetition entailed by a single combat mechanic, however polished and impactful, a largely unchanging setting and such a small selection of fodder for you to take down with your torch and pistol combo that it's positively short-sighted starts to shine through. Alan Wake is never dull, though. The beats of the narrative are perfectly spaced out, so much so that they serve to reinvigorate the experience each time it threatens to bottom out, and there's always one collectible or another to be found throughout the densely forested areas of Bright Falls you explore: manuscript pages, coffee thermoses in a neat shout-out to Twin Peaks, friendly chatter from an authentic AM radio host and several episodes of Night Springs, a gloriously awful take on The Twilight Zone.

Alan Wake is not without its faults, then, but a touch here and a touch there demonstrate that Remedy have poured a whole lot of love into this game, and between its wonderfully pulpy narrative which pits you against the world, good against evil and light against darkness, its near-enough unique episodic structure, its gorgeous looks and atmospheric audio, there's no shortage of things for those of us on the receiving end of the experience to love about it either.

David Lynch Does Dior

Does anyone else troll Wikipedia in the wee hours? When all is quiet through the house and not a creature stirring - not even a mouse - am I alone in finding myself wandering the web in search of tantalising new information on some nostalgic old favourite?

Every now and then something I'll come across something - a song in the background of a show, a DVD in someone else's collection, an image on a billboard - something that reminds me of some old interest that's been dormant so long I've almost, but not quite, forgotten it. The other day, say, my mp3 player spat out a classic Deftones track during a random roustabout, and a quick Wiki later, what do you know? They've got a new album, their first in four years: Diamond Eyes. A damn fine new album at that.

But never fear, I'm not on the metal bent again.

So now the scene's set. Over the weekend, then, something - for the life of me I can't put my finger on exactly what - reminded me of David Lynch. He's never been the most prolific of filmmaker, but I thought it's been... what, five years since Inland Empire? He's got to have done something with himself in that time.

Well, he has. This is it:

Apparently Dior called him up and said "Would you like to make a short film for the Internet? You can do anything you want, you just need to show the handbag, the Pearl Tower and some old Shanghai."

Lynch said yes. One imagines a wad of cash might have been involved in the bargain at some stage. And so we have Lady Blue Shanghai, a short film that does not just involve a handbag, old Shanghai and the Pearl Tower, but revolves around them.

It's a little amateurish, to be sure, but what most interests me is that in the space of fifteen minutes, with an obviously limited budget, Lynch manages to communicate all that makes his work his. In Marion Cotillard, we have a beautiful woman. We have some striking use of colour, not to mention another red room. And that underwater synth soundtrack...

Utterly baffling, of course - what do you expect - and a far cry from a proper David Lynch film, but a worthwhile watch nonetheless. Certainly I wouldn't have spent fifteen minutes watching Dior commercials. This, though; this I can justify to myself.

And it does leave me wondering. What would happen if I called David Lynch up and said to him, here, have a wad of cash, and make me a film for the internet about an elf, an axe and the colour purple?

Book Review: The Prince of Mist by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Buy this book from

Amazon.co.uk / Amazon.com /

IndieBound / The Book Depository

"Max Carver's father - a watchmaker and inventor - decides to move his family to a small town on the coast, to an old house that once belonged to a prestigious surgeon, Dr Richard Fleischmann. But the house holds many secrets and stories of its own. Behind it is an overgrown garden full of statues surrounded by a metal fence topped with a six-pointed star. When he goes to investigate, Max finds that the statues seem to consist of a kind of circus troop with the large statue of a clown at its centre. Max has the curious sensation that the statue is beckoning to him.

"As the family settles in they grow increasingly uneasy: they discover a box of old films belonging to the Fleischmanns; his sister has disturbing dreams and his other sister hears voices whispering to her from an old wardrobe. They also discover the wreck of a boat that sank many years ago in a terrible storm. Everyone on board perished except for one man - an engineer who built the lighthouse at the end of the beach. During the dive, Max sees something that leaves him cold - on the old mast floats a tattered flag with the symbol of the six-pointed star. As they learn more about the wreck, the chilling story of the Prince of the Mist begins to emerge."

***

 

"Max would never forget that faraway summer when, almost by chance, he discovered magic." So begins The Prince of Mist, the first novel by Spain's most notable literary export since Cervantes. And it's an extraordinary start; punchy, memorable and telling. Combined with the great expectations of all those readers won over by the dizzying charms of The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game, it sets a high bar for the remainder of this short, sharp novel to reach.

It's taken nearly 20 years for Carlos Ruiz Zafon's all-ages debut to overcome the language barrier, and it arrives on our English-speaking shores courtesy of the same superlative translator - Lucia Graves - who brought us the author's more adult efforts. In that time, Zafon has been catapulted from moderate renown in a modest nation to global literary stardom, and it's little wonder: The Shadow of the Wind was a spellbinding meta-textual labyrinth of a narrative, and though less critically acclaimed, I found its physical and spiritual successor to be nearly the equal of that unforgettable experience.

The lineage of The Prince of Mist, however, is a less certain thing. The tale of a young boy whose close-knit family the war has forced into a seaside retreat, and who finds in the overgrown garden behind his idyllic new home the beginnings of a mystery that soon comes to captivate his shell-shocked imagination, Zafon's reclaimed debut is fun, no doubt about it, and accomplished - for a first novel - but otherwise... unremarkable. Needless to say it's no regression, but reading a novel divorced from its proper chronological order in which the ideas and themes that so dazzled in Zafon's later adult fiction are but sparks, glittering beneath the waves of the coastal refuge Max finds with a friend, is a curious and somewhat deflating experience.

So put your expectations away: this is not - not quite - the sort of fiction that we have come to stand in awe of Carlos Ruiz Zafon for. In fact, those glimmers that point to the author's eventual literary evolution can be so distracting as to prove problematic. If you can hide that context in the back of your mind, you'll find what The Prince of Mist is, assuredly, is a fine example of fanciful, young adult fantasy. You'll read it in an evening and perhaps forget it in a week, but for those few hours spent immersed in its evocative environs, you can be sure you'll have a jolly old time of it.

The plan is to publish Zafon's three remaining YA novels over the next three years, and I for one will be there for them, but ultimately, The Prince of Mist is but a pleasant blip of a book. Readers of all ages will find within its pages a grand, fast-paced and involving narrative, and while there will be among those a few who hold The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game in such high regard that they'll surely struggle to see past their preconceptions, bear in mind that, in the author's own words, The Prince of Mist "was the book that allowed me to become a professional writer and to start my career as a novelist," and for that - and not that alone, I should stress - we must be thankful.

***

The Prince of Mist

by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

May 2010, Orion

Buy this book from
Amazon.co.uk / Amazon.com /
IndieBound / The Book Depository

Recommended and Related Reading

The BoSS for 23/05/10

No real time to out-burble an introduction this week, but look, everyone: books! Books, I tell you!

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.

***

City of Ruin
by Mark Charan Newton

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

04/06/10 by Tor

Review Priority:

5 (Immediate)

Plot Synopsis: "Villiren: a city of sin that is being torn apart from the inside. Hybrid creatures shamble through shadows and barely human gangs fight turf wars for control of the streets.

"Amidst this chaos, Commander Brynd Lathraea, commander of the Night Guard, must plan the defence of Viliren against a race that has broken through from some other realm and already slaughtered hundreds of thousands of the Empire’s people.

"When a Night Guard soldier goes missing, Brynd requests help from the recently arrived Inqusitor Jeryd. He discovers this is not the only disapearance the streets of Villiren. It seems that a serial killer of the most horrific kind is on the loose, taking hundreds of people from their own homes. A killer that cannot possibly be human.

"The entire population of Villiren must unite to face an impossible surge of violent and unnatural enemies or the city will fall. But how can anyone save a city that is already a ruin?"
Commentary: What a great start, eh? The arrival of a finished copy of City of Ruin - at last! - is tremendously exciting, not least because its predecessor was among the very best books I read last year. And to think all that time ago, I picked Nights of Villjamur up because someone, somewhere, said it was a bit like China Mieville. Sorry Mark!

Speaking of whom, thanks to his fantastic blog, his presence on Twitter and his penchant, shall we say, for setting the cat amongst the pigeons here on the blogosphere, we all know and love Mark Charon Newton; he's a swell guy. Don't laugh, he is! And thanks to his general swellness, there's not just a review of City of Ruin to look forward to, but a giveaway, an interview (weather permitting) and my perspective on Nights of Villjamur too - just as soon as I've finished the re-read I embarked on as of a few days ago. That's right: we're going to have a jolly old Mark Charan Newton week here on TSS, and I can hardly wait to kick it off.

 

The Iron Hunt

by Marjorie M. Liu

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

06/05/10 by Orbit

Review Priority:

2 (Fair)

Plot Synopsis: "During the day, Maxine's tattoos are her armour and she is invincible. At night they peel from her skin to take on forms of their own, leaving her human and vulnerable, and revealing themselves to be demons sleeping beneath her skin. But these demons are the best friends and bodyguards a woman could have. And Maxine needs bodyguards. She is the last in a line of women with power in their blood, trained to keep the world safe from malignant beings who would do us harm. But ten thousand years after its creation, the prison dimension that kept the worst of these from us is failing, and all the Wardens save Maxine are dead. She must bear the burden of her bloodline and join the last wild hunt against the enemy."

Commentary: I've heard some real horror stories lately. Tales of sci-fi and speculative fiction shelves in bookstores here in the UK and in the States being cleared out to make room for stockpiles of urban fantasy. The very thought makes my skin crawl. I get that urban fantasy, so-called, is a consciously populist genre, but bleh. My considered thought for the day, there.

Then again, I don't usually have the opportunity to get into one of these often interminable series before they're well and truly into the swing of things, so perhaps this is my chance... perhaps.

Firespell
by Chloe Neill

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

20/05/10 by Gollancz

Review Priority:

2 (Fair)

Plot Synopsis: "As the new girl at the elite St. Sophia's boarding school, Lily Parker thinks her classmates are the most monstrous things she'll have to face. When Lily's guardians decided to send her away to a fancy boarding school in Chicago, she was shocked. So was St. Sophia's. Lily's ultra-rich brat pack classmates think Lily should be the punchline to every joke, and on top of that, she's hearing strange noises and seeing bizarre things in the shadows of the creepy building. The only thing keeping her sane is her roommate, Scout, but even Scout's a little weird - she keeps disappearing late at night and won't tell Lily where she's been. But when a prank leaves Lily trapped in the catacombs beneath the school, Lily finds Scout running from a real monster. Scout's a member of a splinter group of rebel teens with unique magical talents, who've sworn to protect the city against demons, vampires, and Reapers, magic users who've been corrupted by their power. And when Lily finds herself in the line of a firespell, Scout tells her the truth about her secret life, even though Lily has no powers of her own - at least, none that she's discovered yet..."

Commentary: Urban bloody fantasy, wherever I look! Here's a handy tip for those of you terrified of accidentally reading one of these literary travesties after Charlaine Harris' crown: if there's a picture of a pretty lady on it, adorned with a tattoo or a piercing or some other vaguely alternative thing - a candle in this case (ooooh) - it's not for you. Firespell, a novel of The Dark Elite I am told, is thus... not for me. Sorry!

The Mirrored Heavens

by David J. Williams

Release Details:

Published in the UK on

01/05/08 by Bantam Spectra

Review Priority:

4 (Very High)

Plot Synopsis: "In the 22nd century, the first wonder of a brave new world is the Phoenix Space Elevator, designed to give mankind greater access to the frontier beyond Earth. Cooperatively built by the United States and the Eurasian Coalition, the Elevator is also a grand symbol of superpower alliance following a second cold war. And it’s just been destroyed.

"With suspicions rampant, armies and espionage teams are mobilized across the globe and beyond. Enter Claire Haskell and Jason Marlowe, U.S. counterintelligence agents and former lovers—though their memories may only be constructs implanted by their spymaster. Now their agenda is to trust no one. For as the crisis mounts, the lives of all involved will converge in one explosive finale—and a startling aftermath that will rewrite everything they’ve ever known—about their mission, their world, and themselves."

Commentary: A few weeks ago, Graeme Flory from the ubiquitous Fantasy Book Review ran a competition to win a signed copy of this very book. I duly entered; I've had my eye on David J. William's books for a while now, so the opportunity to score a copy of his first novel gratis certainly appealed.

But wouldn't you know it... Graeme, despite have just welcomed one Hope Aleta Flory into the world - with the not insubstantial aid of his other half, of course (congrats to you both!) - found the time to intercept my entry and introduce me to Dave himself, who was gracious enough to sign, personalise and send me a copy of his novel himself. Isn't that just lovely? Here, right here, this is why I love blogging. Cyberpunk fun here I come!

The Ambassador's Mission

by Trudi Canavan

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
06/05/10 by Orbit

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "Sonea, former street urchin, now a Black Magician of Kyralia, is horrified when her son, Lorkin, volunteers to assist Dannyl in his new role as Guild Ambassador to Sachaka, a land still ruled by cruel black magicians. When word comes that Lorkin has gone missing Sonea is desperate to find him, but if she leaves the city she will be exiled forever, and besides, her old friend Cery needs her help. Most of his family has been murdered - the latest in a long line of assassinations to plague the leading Thieves. There has always been rivalry, but lately it seems the Thieves have been waging a deadly underworld war, and now it appears they have been doing so with magical assistance..."

Commentary: Oh no. Wasn't it just last month when I covered The Magician's Apprentice here on the BoSS?

*checks*

Yes, yes indeed it was. Ah well. I haven't got to it yet, I'm afraid, though I still do mean to. Then again, what's the road to hell paved with again? The road to missing out on some great fantasy, more like. This is book one of The Traitor Spy trilogy, successor to The Magician's Apprentice and The Black Magician triumvirate, and one day, its generic (though purple; always a plus) cover notwithstanding, I will read it.

Absorption

by John Meaney

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
20/05/10 by Gollancz

Review Priority:

4 (Very High)

Plot Synopsis: "600 years from now on the world of Fulgor Roger Blackstone, son of two Pilots (long-time alien spies, masquerading as ordinary humans) aches to see the mythical Pilot's city of Labyrinth, in the fractal ur-continuum of mu-space. In 8th century Norseland, a young carl called Wulf kills a man, watched by a mysterious warrior who bears the mark of Loki the Trickster God. In 1920s Zurich, Gavriela Silberstein enters the long, baroque central hallway of the Eidgenossische Technische Hochschule where Einstein so recently studied. And on a nameless world, not knowing his human heritage, a silver-skinned youth tries to snatch back an Idea - but it floats away on gentle magnetic currents. There are others across the ages, all with three things in common: they glimpse shards of darkness moving at the edge of their vision; they hear echoes of a dark, disturbing musical chord; and they will dream of joining a group called the Ragnarok Council."

Commentary: This came out already? Ach! Well, there goes my lead time. Still, I'm pysched to get started on Absorption, the first book of Ragnarok, a new trilogy from - as The Times describes him - "the first important new SF writer of the 21st century." Colour me very interested indeed.

The Fall of the House of Usher
and Other Stories

by Edgar Allan Poe

Release Details:

Published in the UK on
06/05/10 by Vintage Classics

Review Priority:

3 (Moderate)

Plot Synopsis: "Edgar Allan Poe was a writer of uncommon talent; in "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" he created the genre of detective fiction while his genius for finding the strangeness lurking within us all has been an influence on everyone from Freud to Hollywood. This complete collection of all his short stories and novellas contains well-known tales 'The Pit and the Pendulum' and 'The Tell-Tale Heart' alongside hidden gems that both unsettle and enthrall the reader."

Commentary: What better way to wrap up this latest look at a few forthcoming books than with a collection of stories going on a hundred and fifty years old? There's not a whole lot I can say about this classic tome that hasn't been said already - and no doubt more eloquently than I could manage - but at nearly 1000 pages long and beautifully presented, this new Vintage Classics edition of the collection Edgar Allan Poe will make for a lovely addition to my library. I'm not sure if a review of The Fall of the House of Usher and Other Stories will do anyone any good, but don't be surprised if I report back on a few of my favourites in due course.

In Lieu of a Review

You know, I was going to review a thing for you all today. A thing, do you hear? It could have been a book, a video game, it could have even been the sequel to a low-budget Spanish horror movie! Nay, it was a sequel to a low-budget Spanish horror movie. [rec] 2 don't you know.

But no. I'm going to sulk instead. Because all the other bloggers got to play last night. And I didn't. Can you imagine?

*harrumph*

All kidding aside, I am beginning to feel a bit isolated all the way up here in Scotland. All these star-studded events oriented around the blogosphere - and I'm already hearing rumbling of more to come - and of course they're all happening in London. Pretty much the opposite end of the UK from me. That said, if they were in Glasgow or Edinburgh, I suppose I'd be about the only surefire attendee. But damn, I wanted to meet Mark Charan Newton and China Mieville and Adam Neville too, not to mention all the lovely blogging chums I've spoken to since lauching this wee blog in January.

One day, eh? One day I'll drink you all under the table, be sure of that...

In the interim, I'll just have to make do with the pictures and first-hand accounts of those lucky enough to have spent Thursday evening chatting with the stars of speculative fiction. Amanda from Floor to Ceiling Books recounts her adventures here, while Cara of the Speculative Book Review tells of her evening here and Chloe Healy, the lovely publicist of the Tor UK brigade, has a flickr set up for your perusal. Looks and sounds like a hell of a time was had by all.

To Gav, Adele and whosomever else was lucky enough to attend but too hungover to post their thoughts before the afternoon, do stop by and point us in the right direction when you have. :)

Now. Back to my self-imposed sulk. Next time, internet! Next time!

Mister Sandman Introduces Stories: All-New Tales

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the one, the only... Neil Gaiman.

"Hello to everyone who has clicked on a widget and now has me talking to them," he begins. Back in the good old days, when there was more than one bookstore in Glasgow or Edinburgh prestigious enough to have authors stop over for readings, I attended a few Neil Gaiman events - the one I remember most clearly was for the release of Coraline (I have a mouse scribbled in my proof copy to show for that) - and then, as now, he was every bit the humble English gentleman.

He's recorded a few minutes worth of introduction to Stories: All-New Tales, "a huge book of stories by wonderful writers... and me" coming from Headline Review on June 15th. Not soon enough, eh? I was lucky enough to get my hands on a manuscript of the collection earlier this month, and what a collection it is. Not a dud in the bunch. I'll say no more till my review, which you can look forward here on The Speculative Scotsman sometime next week.

In the interim, let me turn the floor over to the esteemed Neil Gaiman:

Time to get excited, am I right?

So who's looking forward to what most? For me it was the Joe Hill and the Neil Gaiman - obviously - but I'll say this: they're great stories, but my favourites have been the surprises. The Roddy Doyle, the Al Sarrantonio, the hypnotic, Sunshine-esque Gene Wolfe entry... and so many others.

Do stay tuned!

Book Review: Wolfsangel by M. D. Lachlan

Buy this book from

Amazon.co.uk / Amazon.com /

IndieBound / The Book Depository

"King Authun leads his men on a raid of an Anglo-Saxon village. Men and women are killed indiscriminately but the Viking demands that no child be touched. He is acting on prophecy... a prophecy that tells him that the Saxons have stolen a child from the Gods. If Authun, in turn, takes the child and raises him as an heir, the child will lead his people to glory.

"But Authun discovers not one child, but twin baby boys. Ensuring that his faithful warriors, witness to what has happened, die during the raid Authun takes the children and their mother home, back to the witches who live on the troll wall. And he places his destiny in their hands."

***

 

Wolfsangel begins with a small but perfectly formed novella-length narrative that serves to lift the curtain on the half-breed yet wholly involving species of hallucinatory fantasy and Norse mythology that is its starring attraction. In whispered, reverent tones, it is said that Authun, king of the Northern Vikings, is "descended from Odin, the chief of the Gods," who felt so threatened by his fierce offspring that he "cursed Authun to sire only female children. He could not risk him producing an even mightier son." But the old Viking will have his heir, and so he leads a troop of warriors to a village wherein - according to the witches of the Troll wall - such a creature of Godly lineage exists, there for the taking. And so he takes.

He takes Vali, and into the bargain, he takes Feilig, too; an unexpected twin. A sacrifice, he reasons, if the witches must have one. But the finely threaded destiny of the two raid-born babes intertwines far further than Authun's desperate obeisance. They are separated, one raised royal and the other of the wilds, and yet decades later, something, some powerful force immovable by mere mortal man - be it love, fate, magic or chance - brings Vali and Feilig together. Even then, the games of the Gods are only just beginning.

We have here, simply put, the fantasy debut of 2010. M. D. Lachlan has five novels to his other name, but Wolfsangel marks the author's first blush in terms of genre, and his is an unforgettable arrival. Lachlan weaves a remarkable tapestry of narrative in the first part of this multi-volume epic which, though it stands strong on its own merits, alludes to such great things that the chances are we have the next Peter V. Brett on our hands. In point of fact, one aspect of Wolfsangel - the relatively traditional quest Vali and Feilig join forces to undertake - very much puts one in mind of The Painted Man, though where Brett occasionally came across as amateurish, if utterly beguiling in his enthusiasm, Lachlan's voice and grasp of his novel's onion-skin of a narrative is authoritative, always.

The twins are an involving pair: alien and yet relatable, well differentiated despite their physical and aspirational similarities, Vali and Feilig each come into their own over the course of a journey pockmarked by hardships which twist both characters in interesting ways. Their quest to save Adisla would have made for a fine, if unexceptional fantasy novel in and of itself, but Lachlan has far grander designs, for this is tale of and indeed for the ages. It is but the beginning of a chronicle of "centuries and lives" which will "see the endless battle between the wolf, Odin and Loki - the eternal trickster - spill over into countless bloody conflicts throughout history," and while big ideas are ten-a-penny in genre fiction, Lachlan walks the talk.

Wolfsangel stands alone just fine as a straightforward, mythology-laden quest narrative set against a fascinating world, but what sets it apart as great, rather than merely good, is its ambition. Intermingled with the earthly concerns of Vali and Feilig are disturbing, otherworldly encounters with Gods and monsters alike which truly elevate the scope and imaginative prowess of Lachlan's outstanding first fantasy. In a genre which so often hopes to cater to all comers, and so rarely succeeds, Wolfsangel does the impossible: it is both the beginning of a saga that positively begs to be told and an accomplished and satisfying tale in its own right. Only time will tell what vulpine wonders await the lovelorn beast at the heart of this powerful narrative, but this much I can say for sure: Lachlan makes a fantastic first impression.

***

Wolfsangel

by M. D. Lachlan

May 2010, Gollancz

Buy this book from
Amazon.co.uk / Amazon.com /
IndieBound / The Book Depository

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