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Thursday, December 23, 2021

Fantasy Book Critic's Most Anticipated Books of 2022 (Part I) [by Caitlin G., Lukasz P. & Mihir W.]

 


As 2021 comes to an end, we at Fantasy Book Critic are looking forward to 2022 and the plethora of wonderful books that will be unleashed. Caitlin, Lukasz and I (Mihir) are eagerly awaiting quite many titles from our favourite authors, some debuts and many whose preceding series titles were fantastic.  We have tried to collect as much accurate information from the authors, their websites, the publishers and Amazon/GR sites. If there's any mistakes to be found, please let us know and we will correct them pronto. 



This is in no way a comprehensive catalogue but a list of titles that we as a team are collectively excited about.  So without any further ado here's part 1 of our most anticipated SFF titles:



The Starless Crown by James Rollins

Series/Standalone: The Moonfall Saga #1

Release date: January 4th 2022

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Official Blurb: A gifted student foretells an apocalypse. Her reward is a sentence of death.

Fleeing into the unknown she is drawn into a team of outcasts:

A broken soldier, who once again takes up the weapons he’s forbidden to wield and carves a trail back home.

A drunken prince, who steps out from his beloved brother's shadow and claims a purpose of his own.

An imprisoned thief, who escapes the crushing dark and discovers a gleaming artifact - one that will ignite a power struggle across the globe.

On the run, hunted by enemies old and new, they must learn to trust each other in order to survive in a world evolved in strange, beautiful, and deadly ways, and uncover ancient secrets that hold the key to their salvation.

But with each passing moment, doom draws closer.

WHO WILL CLAIM THE STARLESS CROWN?



Deep Dive by Ron Walters

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: January 11th 2022

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Official Blurb: When your reality shatters, what will you do to put it back together again?

Still reeling from the failure of his last project, videogame developer Peter Banuk is working hard to ensure his next game doesn’t meet the same fate. He desperately needs a win, not only to save his struggling company, but to justify the time he’s spent away from his wife and daughters.

So when Peter’s tech-genius partner offers him the chance to beta-test a new state-of-the-art virtual reality headset, he jumps at it. But something goes wrong during the trial, and Peter wakes to find himself trapped in an eerily familiar world where his children no longer exist.

As the lines between the real and virtual worlds begin to blur, Peter is forced to reckon with what truly matters to him. But can he escape his virtual prison before he loses his family forever?

 


A Practical Guide to Conquering the World by K. J. Parker

Series/Standalone: The Siege #3

Release date: January 11th 2022

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Official Blurb: A Practical Guide to Conquering the World can be read by itself, but for those who like endings it can also be considered the refreshingly pragmatic conclusion to World Fantasy Award-winning author K.J. Parker’s acclaimed sequence of novels that began with Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City and continue with How to Rule an Empire and Get Away with It.

 This is the true story of Aemilius Felix Boioannes the younger, the intended and unintended consequences of his life, the bad stuff he did on purpose, and the good stuff that happened in spite of him.

It is, in other words, the tale of a war to end all wars, and the man responsible.



How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: January 18th, 2022

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Official Blurb: In 2030, a grieving archeologist arrives in the Arctic Circle to continue the work of his recently deceased daughter at the Batagaika Crater, where researchers are studying long-buried secrets now revealed in melting permafrost, including the perfectly preserved remains of a girl who appears to have died of an ancient virus.
Once unleashed, the Arctic plague will reshape life on Earth for generations to come, quickly traversing the globe, forcing humanity to devise a myriad of moving and inventive ways to embrace possibility in the face of tragedy. In a theme park designed for terminally ill children, a cynical employee falls in love with a mother desperate to hold on to her infected son. A heartbroken scientist searching for a cure finds a second chance at fatherhood when one of his test subjects—a pig—develops the capacity for human speech. A widowed painter and her teenaged granddaughter embark on a cosmic quest to locate a new home planet. 
From funerary skyscrapers to hotels for the dead to interstellar starships, Sequoia Nagamatsu takes readers on a wildly original and compassionate journey, spanning continents, centuries, and even celestial bodies to tell a story about the resilience of the human spirit, our infinite capacity to dream, and the connective threads that tie us all together in the universe.

 


Servant Mage by Kate Elliot

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: January 18th, 2022

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Official Blurb: Fellion is a Lamplighter, able to provide illumination through magic. A group of rebel Monarchists free her from indentured servitude and take her on a journey to rescue trapped compatriots from an underground complex of mines.

Along the way they get caught up in a conspiracy to kill the latest royal child and wipe out the Monarchist movement for good.

But Fellion has more than just her Lamplighting skills up her sleeve…

 


A Sorrow Named Joy by Sarah Chorn

Series/Standalone: Standalone novella

Release date: January 2022

No GR or Amazon links yet

No Official Blurb Yet

 


Dead Silence by S.A. Barnes

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: February 8th 2022

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Official Blurb: A GHOST SHIP.
A SALVAGE CREW.
UNSPEAKABLE HORRORS.

Claire Kovalik is days away from being unemployed―made obsolete―when her beacon repair crew picks up a strange distress signal. With nothing to lose and no desire to return to Earth, Claire and her team decide to investigate.

What they find at the other end of the signal is a shock: the Aurora, a famous luxury space-liner that vanished on its maiden tour of the solar system more than twenty years ago. A salvage claim like this could set Claire and her crew up for life. But a quick trip through the Aurora reveals something isn’t right.

Whispers in the dark. Flickers of movement. Words scrawled in blood. Claire must fight to hold onto her sanity and find out what really happened on the Aurora, before she and her crew meet the same ghastly fate.

 


Rise Of The Mages by Scott Drakeford

Series/Standalone: The Age Of Ire #1

Release date: February 8th 2022

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Official Blurb: Emrael Ire wants nothing more than to test to be a weapons master. His final exam will be a bloody insurrection, staged by corrupt nobles and priests, that enslaves his brother.

With the aid of his War Master tutor, herself an undercover mage, Emrael discovers his own latent and powerful talents.

To rescue his brother, Emrael must embrace not only his abilities as a warrior but also his place as last of the ancient Mage Kings―for the Fallen God has returned.

And he is hungry.

 


The Bear of Byzantium by S. J. A. Turney

Series/Standalone: The Wolves of Odin #2

Release date: February 10th 2022

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Official Blurb: AD 1041. After successfully avenging the death of his father, Halfdan and the crew of the Sea Wolf seek adventure in strange new lands, far from their Scandinavian home.

They join the fleet of Harald Hardrada, the legendary Viking commander, sailing back to Constantinople from the battlefields of Georgia. There they join the Varangians, the personal bodyguard of the Byzantine Emperors populated almost exclusively by Viking warriors. But Constantinople has changed during Hardrada’s long absence.

The Emperor, Michael IV, is ailing visibly, and powerful factions in his court are setting their plans in motion ahead of his inevitable demise. While courtiers scheme, elements even within the Varangian Guard are picking sides.

Gunnhild, the seer among the Sea Wolf crew, has struck out on her own in the big city. Unable to join the all-male Guard alongside her friends, she establishes herself in a small side-street near the port as a healer and soothsayer, offering cures to the sick and glimpses of the future to the desperate, or the conspiratorial. But in all her visions she sees a wolf, a boar and a golden bear fighting together to support the Byzantine throne. The Norns aren’t finished with them yet…



The Justice of Kings by Richard Swan

Series/Standalone: Empire of the Wolf #1

Release date: February 22nd 2022

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Official Blurb: The Empire of the Wolf simmers with unrest. Rebels, heretics, and powerful patricians all challenge the power of the Imperial throne. 

Only the Order of Justices stands in the way of chaos. Sir Konrad Vonvalt is the most feared Justice of all, upholding the law by way of his sharp mind, arcane powers, and skill as a swordsman. At his side stands Helena Sedanka, his talented protégé, orphaned by the wars that forged the Empire. 

When the pair investigates the murder of a provincial aristocrat, they unearth a conspiracy that stretches to the very top of Imperial society. As the stakes rise and become ever more personal, Vonvalt and Helena must make a choice: Will they abandon the laws they’ve sworn to uphold, in order to protect the Empire?

 


Last Exit by Max Gladstone

Series/Standalone: Standalone (for now)

Release date: February 22nd 2022

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Official Blurb: Ten years ago, Zelda led a band of merry adventurers whose knacks let them travel to alternate realities and battle the black rot that threatened to unmake each world. Zelda was the warrior; Ish could locate people anywhere; Ramon always knew what path to take; Sarah could turn catastrophe aside. Keeping them all connected: Sal, Zelda’s lover and the group's heart.

Until their final, failed mission, when Sal was lost. When they all fell apart.

Ten years on, Ish, Ramon, and Sarah are happy and successful. Zelda is alone, always traveling, destroying rot throughout the US.

When it boils through the crack in the Liberty Bell, the rot gives Zelda proof that Sal is alive, trapped somewhere in the alts.

Zelda’s getting the band back together―plus Sal’s young cousin June, who has a knack none of them have ever seen before.

As relationships rekindle, the friends begin to believe they can find Sal and heal all the worlds. It’s not going to be easy, but they’ve faced worse before.

But things have changed, out there in the alts. And in everyone's hearts.

 


The Paradox Hotel by Rob Hart

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: February 22nd 2022

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Official Blurb: For someone with January Cole’s background, running security at a fancy hotel shouldn’t be much of a challenge.

Except the Paradox is no ordinary hotel. Here, the ultra-wealthy guests are costumed for a dozen different time periods, all anxiously waiting to catch their “flights” to the past. And proximity to the timeport makes for an interesting stay. The clocks run backwards on occasion—and, rumor has it, ghosts stroll the halls.

Now, January’s job is about to get a whole lot harder. Because the U.S. government is getting ready to privatize time-travel technology—and a handful of trillionaires have just arrived to put down their bids.

Meanwhile there’s a blizzard rolling in, and the timestream’s acting strange. Which means nobody’s leaving until further notice.

And there’s a murderer on the loose.

Or at least, that’s what January suspects. Except the corpse in question is one that somehow only she can see. And the accidents stalking their prestigious guests…well, the only way a killer could engineer those is by operating invisibly and in plain sight, all at once. Which is surely impossible.

There’s a reason January can glimpse what others can’t. But her ability is also destroying her grip on reality—and forcing her to confront secrets of her own.

Because here at the Paradox Hotel, the past is waiting around every corner.

 


All The Horses of Iceland by Sarah Tolmie

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: March 1st 2022

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Official Blurb: Everyone knows of the horses of Iceland, wild, and small, and free, but few have heard their story. Sarah Tolmie’s All the Horses of Iceland weaves their mystical origin into a saga for the modern age. Filled with the magic and darkened whispers of a people on the cusp of major cultural change, All the Horses of Iceland tells the tale of a Norse trader, his travels through Central Asia, and the ghostly magic that followed him home to the land of fire, stone, and ice. His search for riches will take him from Helmgard, through Khazaria, to the steppes of Mongolia, where he will barter for horses and return with much, much more.

All the Horses of Iceland is a delve into the secret, imagined history of Iceland's unusual horses, brought to life by an expert storyteller.

 


The Broken Room by Peter Clines

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: March 1st 2022

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Official Blurb: Hector was the best of the best. A government operative who could bring armies to a halt and nations to their knees. But when his own country betrayed him, he dropped off the grid and picked up the first of many bottles.

Natalie can't remember much of her life before her family brought her to the US, but she remembers the cages. And getting taken away to the Project with dozens of other young children to become part of their nightmarish experiments. That's how she ended up with the ghost of a dead secret agent stuck in her head.

And Hector owes Natalie's ghost a big favor.

Now Hector and Natalie are on the run from an army of killers sent to retrieve her. Because the people behind the Project are willing to risk almost anything to get Natalie back and complete their experiments.

 


Ogres by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: March 15th 2022

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Official Blurb: Ogres are bigger than you.
Ogres are stronger than you.
Ogres rule the world.

It’s always idyllic in the village until the landlord comes to call.

Because the landlord is an Ogre. And Ogres rule the world, with their size and strength and appetites. It’s always been that way. It’s the natural order of the world. And they only eat people sometimes.

But when the headman’s son, Torquell, dares lift his hand against the landlord’s son, he sets himself on a path to learn the terrible truth about the Ogres, and about the dark sciences that ensured their rule.



Kundo Wakes Up by Saad Z. Hossain

Series/Standalone: Standalone sequel (set in the same world as The Gurkha and the Lord of Tuesday)

Release date: March 15th 2022

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Official Blurb: Hundreds of miles away from the techno-utopia of Kathmandu, the all-powerful, all-seeing AI known as Karma has gone silent, leaving the dying city of Chittagong—along with all its remaining residents—to continue its inexorable fall into the sea.

Kundo, once a famous artist with the Karma points to prove it, goes searching for his missing wife, only to uncover more inexplicable disappearances. And so Kundo and a group of motley companions embark on a tumultuous journey through an overwhelming maze made up of Chittagong’s neighborhoods, the hidden backrooms of video game parlors, and the depths of cyberspace, culminating in the realm of the djinn themselves, in search of love, redemption, and a good meal.



Reptile Memoirs by Silje Ulstein

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: March 15th 2022

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Official Blurb: Liv has a lot of secrets. For her, home is the picturesque town of Ã…lesund, perched on a fjord in western Norway. One night, in the early-morning embers of a great party in the basement apartment she shares with two friends, Liv is watching TV, high on weed, and sees a python on an Australian nature show. She becomes obsessed with the idea of buying a snake as a pet. Soon Nero, the baby Burmese python, becomes the apartment's fourth roommate. As Liv bonds with Nero, she feels extremely protective, like a caring mother, and she is struck by a desire that surprises her with its intensity. Finally she is safe.

Thirteen years later, in the nearby town of Kristiansund, Mariam Lind goes on a shopping trip with her eleven-year-old daughter, Iben, who angers her mother by asking for a magazine one too many times. Mariam storms off, leaving Iben in the shop and, expecting her young daughter to find her own way home, heads off on a long calming drive. When she returns home in the evening, her husband is relieved to see her but terrified that Iben isn't also there. Detective Roe Olsvik is assigned to the case of Iben's disappearance; he has just turned sixty and is new to the Kristiansund police department. As he interrogates Mariam, he instantly suspects her—but there is much more to this case and these characters than their outer appearances would suggest.

A biting and constantly shifting tale of family secrets, rebirth, and the legacy of trauma, Reptile Memoirs is a brilliant exploration of the cold-bloodedness of humanity, and the struggle to mend broken lives and families.

 


The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: March 15th 2022

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Official Blurb: When COVID-19 sweeps through New York City, Jamie Gray is stuck as a dead-end driver for food delivery apps. That is, until Jamie makes a delivery to an old acquaintance, Tom, who works at what he calls “an animal rights organization.” Tom’s team needs a last-minute grunt to handle things on their next field visit. Jamie, eager to do anything, immediately signs on.

What Tom doesn't tell Jamie is that the animals his team cares for are not here on Earth. Not our Earth, at at least. In an alternate dimension, massive dinosaur-like creatures named Kaiju roam a warm and human-free world. They're the universe's largest and most dangerous panda and they're in trouble.

It's not just the Kaiju Preservation Society whose found their way to the alternate world. Others have, too. And their carelessness could cause millions back on our Earth to die.

 


My Volcano by John Elizabeth Stintzi

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: March 22nd 2022

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Official Blurb: On June 2, 2016, a protrusion of rock growing from the Central Park Reservoir is spotted by a jogger. Three weeks later, when it finally stops growing, it’s nearly two-and-a-half miles tall, and has been determined to be an active volcano.

As the volcano grows and then looms over New York, an eight-year-old boy in Mexico City finds himself transported 500 years into the past, where he witnesses the fall of the Aztec Empire; a Nigerian scholar in Tokyo studies a folktale about a woman of fire who descends a mountain and destroys an entire village; a white trans writer in Jersey City struggles to write a sci-fi novel about a thriving civilization on an impossible planet; a nurse tends to Syrian refugees in Greece while grappling with the trauma of living through the bombing of a hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan; a nomadic farmer in Mongolia is stung by a bee, magically transforming him into a green, thorned, flowering creature that aspires to connect every living thing into its consciousness.

With its riveting and audacious vision, My Volcano is a tapestry on fire, a distorted and cinematic new work from the fiercely talented John Elizabeth Stintzi.

 


The City of Dusk by Tara Sim

Series/Standalone: The Dark Gods #1

Release date: March 22nd 2022

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Official Blurb: This dark epic fantasy follows the heirs of four noble houses—each gifted with a divine power—as they form a tenuous alliance to keep their kingdom from descending into a realm-shattering war.

The Four Realms—Life, Death, Light, and Darkness—all converge on the city of dusk. For each realm there is a god, and for each god there is an heir.

But the gods have withdrawn their favor from the once vibrant and thriving city. And without it, all the realms are dying.

Unwilling to stand by and watch the destruction, the four heirs—Risha, a necromancer struggling to keep the peace; Angelica, an elementalist with her eyes set on the throne; Taesia, a shadow-wielding rogue with rebellion in her heart; and Nik, a soldier who struggles to see the light—will sacrifice everything to save the city.

But their defiance will cost them dearly.

 


An Elegy for Hope by Sarah Chorn

Series/Standalone: The Bloodlands #2

Release date: March 29th 2022

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Official Blurb: None Yet

 

(Cover art possibly not finalized)

Draconis by David Oliver

Series/Standalone: The Draconis Descendant Saga #1

Release date: March 2022

No GR & pre-order links yet

 

Official Blurb: Over a decade ago Jlayn Syr, cartographer, embarked on a mission to map the world on behalf of the Ursal Federation. He returned with most of his crew dead and two strange rune stones.

Stones that changed everything.

He asserted that he had found a strange ‘rift’ in the ocean. A gateway to another world. A world populated with strange and horrifying monsters, broken tombs and strange writings.

Now he is the leader of the Wayfarers. A mercenary troop dedicated to entering the rift and returning with new rune stones. The Ursal Federation has utilised the impossible magic of the stones to cement themselves as the foremost world power and the location of the rift is a closely guarded secret…one that many would kill for.

With forces gathering to take control of the rift, Jlayn and his adopted daughter Sesha must  embark to explore this new world once again…but with a large target on their heads the days of the Wayfarers may be numbered.


Champion Of The Fallen by M. L. Spencer

Series/Standalone: Rivenworld #2

Release date:  Late March 2022

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Unofficial Blurb (not yet finalized): Against all odds, Aramon Raythe has restored the Greater Dragon Agaroth, unlocked his powers over the aether, and defeated the Archon Kathrax, becoming the last true Champion in the World Below. But in doing so, Aram has drawn the attention of Kathrax's Archon siblings, beings of unimaginable power and evil, who will stop at nothing to realize their quest for godhood.

Aram, Markus, and their dragons will be forced to defend Skyhome against a new threat from the Archons – a magical construct of ancient and otherworldly design, sent to strike a blow to the heart of Skyhome. To defeat it, Aram will be forced to learn much more about the nature of his arcane powers. But all masters of the Ancient Paths were lost in the Sundering –and to learn their ways, Aram will be forced to seek help of an ancient enemy.


Down Among The Dead Men by Craig Schaefer

Series/Standalone: The Daniel Faust series #10

Release date: First quarter 2022

No GR or Amazon links yet

No Official Blurb Yet


Titan Hoppers by Treize

Series/Standalone: The Titan Hoppers series #1

Release date: First quarter of 2022

No GR & pre-order links yet

 

Official Blurb: Courage Iro will shatter the Gates of Power to protect his fleet.

Born talentless, Iro has all but resigned himself to a life of drudgery, watching his sister hop across to the massive space titan for supplies. But when the titan explodes and his sister is killed, Iro finds a new determination to take her place. He’s not about to let weakness prevent him.

When the fleet encounters a new titan, filled with powerful monsters, deadly traps, and mysterious cloaked figures, Iro is the first to spontaneously manifest a new talent. Now sent to a different ship, to train with others far beyond his strength, Iro will have to train twice as hard just to catch up.

To protect his fleet, and to uncover the mysteries of the titans, Iro won’t just open the Gates of Power. He’ll break them.



The Dolphin House by Audrey Schulman

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: April 5th 2022

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Official Blurb: It is 1965, and Cora, a young deaf woman, buys a one-way ticket to the island of St. Thomas, where she discovers four dolphins held in captivity as part of an experiment led by the obsessive Dr. Bloom. Drawn by a strong connection to the dolphins, Cora falls in with the scientists and discovers her need to protect the animals. 

Recognizing Cora's knack for communication, Bloom uses her for what will turn into one of the most fascinating experiments in modern science: an attempt to teach the dolphins human language by creating a home in which she and they can live together. 

As the experiment progresses, Cora forges a remarkable bond with the creatures, until her great instincts clash with the male-dominated world of science. As a terrible scandal threatens to engulf the experiment, Cora’s fight to save the dolphins becomes a battle to save herself.



The Blood Trials by N.E. Davenport

Series/Standalone: The Blood Gift Duology #1

Release date: April 5th 2022

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Official Blurb: It’s all about blood.

The blood spilled between the Republic of Mareen and the armies of the Blood Emperor long ago. The blood gifts of Mareen’s deadliest enemies. The blood that runs through the elite War Houses of Mareen, the rulers of the Tribunal dedicated to keeping the republic alive.

The blood of the former Legatus, Verne Amari, murdered.

For his granddaughter, Ikenna, the only thing steady in her life was the man who had saved Mareen. The man who had trained her in secret, not just in martial skills, but in harnessing the blood gift that coursed through her. Who trained her to keep that a secret.

But now there are too many secrets, and with her grandfather assassinated, Ikenna knows two things: that only someone on the Tribunal could have ordered his death, and that only a Praetorian Guard could have carried out that order.

Bent on revenge as much as discovering the truth, Ikenna pledges herself to the Praetorian Trials—a brutal initiation that only a quarter of the aspirants survive. She subjects herself to the racism directed against her half-Khanaian heritage and the misogyny of a society that cherishes progeny over prodigy, all while hiding a power that—if found out—would subject her to execution…or worse. Ikenna is willing to risk it all because she needs to find out who murdered her grandfather…and then she needs to kill them.

Mareen has been at peace for a long time…

Ikenna joining the Praetorians is about to change all that.

Magic and technology converge in the first part of this stunning debut duology, where loyalty to oneself—and one’s blood—is more important than anything.


The Bladed Faith by David Dalglish

Series/Standalone: The Vagrant Gods #1

Release date: April 5th 2022

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Official Blurb: Cyrus was only twelve years old when his gods were slain, his country invaded, and his parents—the king and queen—beheaded in front of him. Held prisoner in the invader's court for years, Cyrus is suddenly given a chance to escape and claim his revenge when a mysterious group of revolutionaries comes looking for a figurehead. They need a hero to strike fear into the hearts of the imperial and to inspire and unite the people. They need someone to take up the skull mask and swords and to become the legendary "Vagrant"—an unparalleled hero and assassin of otherworldly skill. 

But all is not as it seems. Creating the illusion of a hero is the work of many, and Cyrus will soon discover the true price of his vengeance. 

 


A Sea Of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: April 5th 2022

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Official Blurb: Edwin St. Andrew is eighteen years old when he crosses the Atlantic by steamship, exiled from polite society following an ill-conceived diatribe at a dinner party. He enters the forest, spellbound by the beauty of the Canadian wilderness, and suddenly hears the notes of a violin echoing in an airship terminal—an experience that shocks him to his core. 
 
Two centuries later a famous writer named Olive Llewellyn is on a book tour. She’s traveling all over Earth, but her home is the second moon colony, a place of white stone, spired towers, and artificial beauty. Within the text of Olive’s best-selling pandemic novel lies a strange passage: a man plays his violin for change in the echoing corridor of an airship terminal as the trees of a forest rise around him. 
 
When Gaspery-Jacques Roberts, a detective in the black-skied Night City, is hired to investigate an anomaly in the North American wilderness, he uncovers a series of lives upended: The exiled son of an earl driven to madness, a writer trapped far from home as a pandemic ravages Earth, and a childhood friend from the Night City who, like Gaspery himself, has glimpsed the chance to do something extraordinary that will disrupt the timeline of the universe.

A virtuoso performance that is as human and tender as it is intellectually playful, Sea of Tranquility is a novel of time travel and metaphysics that precisely captures the reality of our current moment.
 


The Hunger Of Gods by John Gwynne

Series/Standalone: The Bloodsworn Trilogy #2

Release date: April 12th 2022

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Official Blurb: Lik-Rifa, the dragon god of legend, has been freed from her eternal prison. Now she plots a new age of blood and conquest.   
   
As Orka continues the hunt for her missing son, the Bloodsworn sweep south in a desperate race to save one of their own – and Varg takes the first steps on the path of vengeance.   
   
Elvar has sworn to fulfil her blood oath and rescue a prisoner from the clutches of Lik-Rifa and her dragonborn followers, but first she must persuade the Battle-Grim to follow her.  

Yet even the might of the Bloodsworn and Battle-Grim cannot stand alone against a dragon god.   
 
Their hope lies within the mad writings of a chained god. A book of forbidden magic with the power to raise the wolf god Ulfrir from the dead . . .and bring about a battle that will shake the foundations of the earth.



The Capsarius by S. J. A. Turney

Series/Standalone: Legion 22 #1

Release date: April 14th 2022

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Official Blurb: Titus Cervianus is no ordinary soldier. A former surgeon from the city of Ancyra, he's now a capsarius – a combat medic. Cervianus is a pragmatist, a scientist, and truly unpopular with his legion.

The Twenty Second Deiotariana have been sent to deal with uprisings and chaos in Egypt. Yet the Twenty Second is no ordinary legion either. Founded as the private royal army of one of Rome's most devoted allies, the king of Galatia, their ways are not the same as the other legions, a factor that sets them apart and causes friction with their fellow soldiers.

Marching into the unknown, Cervianus will find unexpected allies in a local cavalryman and a troublesome lunatic. Both will be of critical importance as the young medic marches into the searing sands of the south, finding forbidden temples, dark assassins, vicious crocodiles, and worst of all, the warrior queen of Kush...



Fevered Star by Rebecca Roanhorse

Series/Standalone: Between Earth and Sky #2

Release date: April 19th 2022

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Official Blurb: There are no tides more treacherous than those of the heart. —Teek saying

The great city of Tova is shattered. The sun is held within the smothering grip of the Crow God’s eclipse, but a comet that marks the death of a ruler and heralds the rise of a new order is imminent.

The Meridian: a land where magic has been codified and the worship of gods suppressed. How do you live when legends come to life, and the faith you had is rewarded?

As sea captain Xiala is swept up in the chaos and currents of change, she finds an unexpected ally in the former Priest of Knives. For the Clan Matriarchs of Tova, tense alliances form as far-flung enemies gather and the war in the heavens is reflected upon the earth.

And for Serapio and Naranpa, both now living avatars, the struggle for free will and personhood in the face of destiny rages. How will Serapio stay human when he is steeped in prophecy and surrounded by those who desire only his power? Is there a future for Naranpa in a transformed Tova without her total destruction?

 


Kaikeyi by Vaishnavi Patel

Series/Standalone: Standalone

Release date: April 26th 2022

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Official Blurb: “I was born on the full moon under an auspicious constellation, the holiest of positions—much good it did me.”

So begins Kaikeyi’s story. The only daughter of the kingdom of Kekaya, she is raised on tales about the might and benevolence of the gods: how they churned the vast ocean to obtain the nectar of immortality, how they vanquish evil and ensure the land of Bharat prospers, and how they offer powerful boons to the devout and the wise. Yet she watches as her father unceremoniously banishes her mother, listens as her own worth is reduced to how great a marriage alliance she can secure. And when she calls upon the gods for help, they never seem to hear.

Desperate for some measure of independence, she turns to the texts she once read with her mother and discovers a magic that is hers alone. With this power, Kaikeyi transforms herself from an overlooked princess into a warrior, diplomat, and most favored queen, determined to carve a better world for herself and the women around her.

But as the evil from her childhood stories threatens the cosmic order, the path she has forged clashes with the destiny the gods have chosen for her family. And Kaikeyi must decide if resistance is worth the destruction it will wreak—and what legacy she intends to leave behind.

 


The Discord of Gods by Jen Lyons

Series/Standalone: A Chorus of Dragons #5

Release date: April 26th 2022

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Official Blurb: THEIR CONFLICT COULD END THEM ALL.

Relos Var's final plans to enslave the universe are on the cusp of fruition. He believes there's only one being in existence that might be able to stop him: the demon Xaltorath.

As these two masterminds circle each other, neither is paying attention to the third player on the board, Kihrin. Unfortunately, keeping himself classified in the 'pawn' category means Kihrin must pretend to be everything the prophecies threatened he'd become: the destroyer of all, the sun eater, a mindless, remorseless plague upon the land. It also means finding an excuse to not destroy the people he loves (or any of the remaining Immortals) without arousing suspicion.

Kihrin's goals are complicated by the fact that not all of his 'act' is one. His intentions may be sincere, but he's still being forced to grapple with the aftereffects of the corrupted magic ritual that twisted both him and the dragons. Worse, he's now tied to a body that is the literal avatar of a star ― a form that is becoming increasingly, catastrophically unstable. All of which means he's running out of time.

After all, some stars fade ― but others explode.

 


The Girl and the Moon by Mark Lawrence

Series/Standalone: The Book of the Ice #3

Release date: April 26th 2022

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Official Blurb: On the planet Abeth, a narrow Corridor of green land is surrounded on all sides by ice plains where only the strong survive. Ice triber Yaz has completed a perilous journey and arrived at the Corridor, and it exceeds and overwhelms all of her expectations. Everything seems different but some constants remain: her old enemies are still two steps ahead, bent on her destruction. She makes her way to the Convent of Sweet Mercy, where nuns train young girls who show the old gifts, but like the Corridor itself the convent is packed with peril and opportunity. Yaz has much to learn from the nuns—if they don’t decide to execute her.

The fate of everyone squeezed between the Corridor’s vast walls, and ultimately the fate of those laboring to survive out on ice itself, hangs from the moon, and the battle to save the moon centers on the Ark of the Missing, buried beneath the emperor’s palace. Everyone wants Yaz to be the key that will open the Ark – the one the wise have sought for generations. But sometimes wanting isn’t enough.


The Madness Of Herakles by Matt Larkin

Series/Standalone: Tapestry Of Fate #4

Release date: Spring 2022

No GR or Amazon links yet

 

Official Blurb: Redemption lies past bloody steps …

While Pandora seeks a means to escape the crushing grasp of Fate, Herakles faces equally insurmountable odds: To assuage his guilt for the murder of his family, he must undertake impossible labors.

Across the breadth of the world he hunts for beasts that would strike dread into the bravest Titan. Again and again, he casts himself into the breach, all for the desperate hope of redemption.

But will any amount of spilled monster blood wash clean the blood of his own children?


An End to Sorrow by Michael R. Fletcher

Series/Standalone: The Obsidian Path trilogy #3

Release date: April 2022

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No GR or official blurb yet


Part II to be posted tomorrow

NOTE: Header pic courtesy of Formatoriginal & Vecteezy.

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