SPOTLIGHT: Books of August 2008

Welcome to the August 2008 edition of Fantasy Book Critic’s monthly SPOTLIGHT which covers everything from fantasy and science fiction to horror, thrillers, YA, and more. Previous spotlights can be found HERE. While not as jam-packed as July, August is another busy month spearheaded by Stephenie Meyer’s highly anticipated conclusion to her Twilight Saga. Other notable titles include Richard K. Morgan’s first fantasy novel, “The Steel Remains”; more sequels in The Gypsy Morph, Return of the Crimson Guard, Sly Mongoose and The Diamond of Darkhold; and some exciting debuts in The Gargoyle, The Cabinet of Wonders, Pandemonium, The Little Book and The Shadow of Reichenbach Falls… (NOTE: Unless stated otherwise, all release dates are for the US. Also, Liviu C. Suciu provided valuable assistance with the August 2008 Spotlight):

“British Invasion” edited by Christopher Golden, Tim Lebbon + James A. Moore. Release Date: August 1, 2008. They invaded before, sending their best & brightest to transform popular music for all time. This time, they're focusing on words. From creeping dread to hideous humor, from quiet terror to brutal horror, from mad speculation to unspeakable truth, the twenty-one tales here represent the best that the UK has to offer. The rising stars and masters of British horror have joined together. The British Invasion has begun…
Official Christopher Golden Website
Official Tim Lebbon Website
Official James A. Moore Website
Order “British Invasion” HERE

“Superior Saturday” by Garth Nix (The Old Kingdom, The Seventh Tower). Release Date: August 1, 2008. Arthur Penhaligon has wrested five of the Keys to the Kingdom from their immortal guardians, the Trustees of the Will. But gaining the Sixth Key poses a greater challenge than any he has ever faced before. For Superior Saturday is not just one of the Trustees, she is also the oldest Denizen, and the most powerful and knowledgeable sorcerer within the house…
Official Garth Nix Website
Official Keys To The Kingdom Website
Order HERE (US) + HERE (UK-July 1, 2008)
Read An Excerpt HERE
NOTE: “Superior Saturday” is the sixth volume in Garth Nix’s gripping YA fantasy series, The Keys to the Kingdom.

“Stalking the Vampire” by Mike Resnick. Release Date: August 1, 2008. In this long-awaited sequel to Mike Resnick’s 1987 classic, Stalking the Unicorn, it is All Hallows’ Eve, and on this night when ghosts, goblins and other creatures of the night are out celebrating, detective John Justin Mallory—with the aid of the catgirl Felina, a cowardly vampire and a dragon that writes hard-boiled private eye novels—must stalk the vampire who has threatened his assistant, Winnifred, and prevent him from killing again…
Official Mike Resnick Website
Order “Stalking the Vampire” HERE
Read Fantasy Book Critic’s REVIEW of “Stalking the Vampire”
NOTE: In support of Mike Resnick’s new John Justin Mallory novel, Pyr is releasing both the 1987 classic, “Stalking the Unicorn” (reprint), and its sequel, “Stalking the Vampire”, simultaneously.

“Ghostgirl” by Tonya Hurley. Release Date: August 1, 2008. Charlotte Usher feels practically invisible at school. But after spending all summer ‘rebooting’ her look and her life, she is more than ready to turn her nonexistent status into Hawthorne High A-List. But in her eagerness to climb the Hawthorne social ladder, she lands “six feet under” instead, after accidentally choking on a gummy bear after Physics class. Now a 'can-do' spirit, Charlotte is not letting the simple fact that she’s dead stop her from attainting her goal of popularity. It just makes her more creative about her approach…
Official Tonya Hurley Website
Official Ghostgirl Website
Order “Ghostgirl” HERE

Read Reviews via The Story Siren

“Dark Whispers” by Bruce Coville. Release Date: August 1, 2008. “Dark Whispers” is a tale of two quests: Cara Diana Hunter's search for an ancient story that may unravel the secret of the long enmity between the unicorns and the delvers, leading her to the court of the centaur king; and her father's journey from mysterious India to free Cara's mother from the Rainbow Prison. This multi-stranded story will intrigue and delight the legion of fans who have been clamoring for the next tale in this beloved series…
Official Bruce Coville Website
Official The Unicorn Chronicles Website
Order “Dark Whispers” HERE
Listen to An Excerpt HERE
NOTE: “Dark Whispers” is the third volume in Bruce Coville’s YA fantasy series, The Unicorn Chronicles, following “Into the Land of the Unicorns” and “Song of the Wanderer”.

“Therapy” by Sebastian Fitzek. UK Release Date: August 1, 2008. Twelve-year-old Josy has an inexplicable illness and one day vanishes without a trace. Four years later her father, psychiatrist Viktor Larenz, has withdrawn to an isolated island to deal with the tragedy. There he meets Anna Glass. A novelist, Anna suffers from an unusual form of schizophrenia: all the characters in her books become real to her, and in her last novel she has written about a young girl with an unknown illness who has vanished without a trace…
Official Sebastian Fitzek Website
Order “Therapy” HERE
NOTE: The internationally bestselling “Therapy” was originally published in Germany in 2006.

“Billy Bones: A Tale from the Secrets Closet” by Christopher Lincoln & Avi Ofer. Release Date: August 1, 2008. Billy and his skeleton parents live in the Secrets Closet, where they're in charge of filing all the secrets and lies of the unscrupulous Biglum family. Then Billy meets Millicent, Sir Biglum's recently orphaned niece. Together, Billy and Millicent encounter ghosts and other uncanny creatures as they explore each other's worlds and uncover the biggest secret of all: Billy was once a Biglum…

Official Christopher Lincoln Website
Official Avi Ofer Website
Order “Billy Bones” HERE (US) + HERE (UK-April 2008)
Read Reviews via The Book Bag

“Filter House” by Nisi Shawl. Release Date: August 1, 2008. Aqueduct Press is pleased to announce the release of Filter House, the first collection of Nisi Shawl’s short fiction. Featuring an introduction by Nebula Award-winner Eileen Gunn (Stable Strategies), the collection's fourteen tales (eleven reprints / three unpublished) offer a haunting montage that works its magic subtly on the reader's subconscious. As Karen Joy Fowler says, “This lovely collection will take you, like a magic carpet, to some strange and wonderful places.”
Official Nisi Shawl Website
Order “Filter House” HERE
Read Reviews HERE

“Breaking Dawn” by Stephenie Meyer. Release Date: August 2, 2008. “Twilight” tempted the imagination. “New Moon” made readers thirsty for more. “Eclipse” turned the saga into a worldwide phenomenon. And now, the book that everyone has been waiting for, “Breaking Dawn”, the fourth and final entry in Stephenie Meyer’s (The Host) number one bestselling The Twilight Saga, will take your breath away as questions will be answered and the fate of Bella Swan and Edward Cullen will be revealed…
Official Stephenie Meyer Website
Official The Twilight Saga Website

Order “Breaking Dawn” HERE
Read a Preview HERE
Watch An Interview with Stephenie Meyer HERE

“Leather Maiden” by Joe R. Lansdale. Release Date: August 5, 2008. A masterly new thriller from the Edgar, British Fantasy, American Horror and six-time Bram Stoker Award–winning writer who has “a folklorist’s eye for telling detail and a front-porch raconteur’s sense of pace” (The New York Times Book Review), Leather Maiden is a brash amalgam of suspense, raw humor, and mystery that unfolds in the vividly rendered shadowy lowlands of eastern Texas. It’s country noir as only Joe Lansdale (The Bottoms) can do it…
Official Joe R. Lansdale Website
Order “Leather Maiden” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“City at the End of Time” by Greg Bear. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Multiple Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author Greg Bear (Darwin’s Radio, Moving Mars) is one of science fiction’s most accomplished writers. Bold scientific speculation, riveting plots, and a fierce humanism reflected in characters who dare to dream of better worlds distinguish his work. Now Bear has written a mind-bendingly epic novel that may well be his masterpiece. Do you dream of a city at the end of time?
Official Greg Bear Website
Official City at the End of Time Website
Order “City at the End of Time” HERE (US) + HERE (UK)
Read An Excerpt HERE

“The Gargoyle” by Andrew Davidson. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Marianne Engle is a beautiful sculptress of gargoyles who appears in the burn unit one day and tells the narrator of this mesmerizing tale that they were lovers in medieval times, when she was a scribe and he was a mercenary. Is she simply mad? Or is she truly the angel of mercy who will save him from his suicidal despair? The Gargoyle is an extraordinary debut novel of love that survives the fires of hell and transcends the boundaries of time…
Official The Gargoyle Website
Order “The Gargoyle” HERE (US) + HERE (UK)
Read An Excerpt HERE

“Marsbound” by Joe Haldeman. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Winner of five Hugos, five Nebulas, a John W. Campbell, a James Tiptree, Jr. and a World Fantasy Award, Joe Haldeman (The Forever War, Forever Peace, The Accidental Time Machine) “delivers cutting-edge technological speculation and irresistibly compelling reading” (Booklist). Now in “Marsbound”, Joe sends readers on an epic voyage to humanity’s newest frontier on a familiar nearby planet. But the frontier is not new to everyone…
Official Joe Haldeman Website
Order “Marsbound” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Darque Reviews

“The Last Theorem” by Arthur C. Clarke & Frederik Pohl. Release Date: August 5, 2008. The historic collaboration between Frederik Pohl and his fellow founding father of the genre, Arthur C. Clarke, is both a momentous literary event and a fittingly grand farewell from the late, great visionary author. It is also a gripping intellectual thriller in which humanity, facing extermination from all-but-omnipotent aliens, the Grand Galactics, must overcome differences of politics and religion and come together . . . or perish…
Official Frederik Pohl Website
Order “The Last Theorem” HERE
Read An Extract HERE

“Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show” edited by Edmund R. Schubert & Orson Scott Card. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Bestselling writer Orson Scott Card (Ender’s Game, The Tales of Alvin Maker) founded the online magazine Intergalactic Medicine Show in 2006. It has been a big success, drawing submissions from well-known science fiction and fantasy writers, as well as fostering some amazing new talents. This collection contains some of the best of those stories from the past year…
Official Orson Scott Card Website
Official Intergalactic Medicine Show Website
Official Edmund R. Schubert Website
Order “Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show” HERE
NOTE: Collection includes fiction from David Farber, Tim Pratt, and David Lubar among others, as well as four new Ender’s Game universe stories by Card himself.

“The Academy” by Bentley Little. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Something strange is happening at Tyler High. The laid-back principal has become unusually strict. The janitors no longer work nights because of what they hear. The students are frightened by what they see. And things are happening on school grounds that defy rational explanation. But there is an explanation. It’s just nothing that anyone can begin to believe—or hope to survive… The Academy is the latest horror novel from the Bram Stoker Award-winning author…
Official Bentley Little Website
Order “The Academy” HERE

“Mars Life” by Ben Bova. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Jamie Waterman discovered that an intelligent race lived on Mars 65 million years ago, only to be driven into extinction by a giant meteor. Now the exploration of Mars is itself under threat of extinction, as the ultraconservative New Morality movement gains control of the U.S. government and cuts off all funding for the Mars program. Science and politics clash on two worlds as Jamie desperately tries to save the Mars program and discover who the Martians were…

Official Ben Bova Website
Order “Mars Life” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“Hell & Earth” by Elizabeth Bear. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Two queens sit on thrones in two different worlds—Elizabeth reigns over England, while Mab, rules the Faerie realm. Bound together by magic, their monarchies draw strength from each other, sustaining their regimes. But within the inner circles of royalty, are ambitious men plotting to usurp power. Bear’s latest addition to this epic tells the story of Kit Marley, Queen Elizabeth’s playwright/spy who crafts magical plays that maintain Her Majesty’s rule…
Official Elizabeth Bear Website
Order “Hell & Earth” HERE
NOTE: “Hell & Earth” is Volume II of The Stratford Man—after Ink & Steel—which itself is a sequel to “Blood & Iron” and “Whiskey & Water” in Elizabeth Bear’s The Promethean Age series.

“The Last Centurion” by John Ringo. Release Date: August 5, 2008. In the second decade of the twenty-first century, the world is struck by two catastrophes: a new mini-ice age and a plague to dwarf all previous experiences. Rising out of the disaster is the character known to history as “Bandit Six”, an American Army officer caught up in the struggle to rebuild the world and prevent the fall of his homeland. Written “blog-style”, The Last Centurion is a memoir of one possible future, a world that is a darkling mirror of our own…
Official John Ringo Website
Official The Last Centurion Website
Order “The Last Centurion” HERE
Read Excerpts HERE
Read Reviews via RedState + Say Anything

“Pirate Sun” by Karl Schroeder. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Chaison Fanning, the admiral of a fleet of warships, has been captured and imprisoned by his enemies, but is suddenly rescued and set free by a mysterious woman named Antaea. Chaison flees through the sky to his home city to confront the ruler who betrayed him. And perhaps even to regain his lovely, powerful, and subversive wife, Venera, who he has not seen since she fled with the key to the artificial sun at the center of Virga, Candesce…
Official Karl Schroeder Website
Order “Pirate Sun” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Fantasy Book Critic
NOTE: “Pirate Sun” is the third book in Karl Schroeder’s Virga science fiction series after “Sun of Suns” and “Queen of Candesce”.

“Exile and Glory” by Jerry Pournelle. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Collecting the novels “High Justice” (1972-1975) and “Exiles to Glory” (1977) by number one New York Times bestselling author, Jerry Pournelle, “Exile and Glory” tells of an Earth sinking into a morass of corruption, red tape, and failure of nerve, while a dedicated few dare to reach for the stars… Jerry has won the John W. Campbell, Prometheus and Heinlein Society Awards, and served as President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America…
Official Jerry Pournelle Website
Order “Exile and Glory” HERE
Read Excerpts HERE

“The Shadow of Reichenbach Falls” by John R. King. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Probably the most infamous story in the Sherlock Holmes canon is “The Final Problem” which relates the death of the detective at Reichenbach Falls. But what really happened that day at Reichenbach Falls and why did Holmes disappear in the aftermath? And what of the infamous Moriarty? How did a noble mathematician become the Napoleon of Crime? “The Shadow of Reichenbach Falls" provides these answers and more…
Order “The Shadow of Reichenbach Falls” HERE
Read Reviews via Bookgasm

“The Gaudi Key” by Esteban Martín & Andreu Carranza. Release Date: August 5, 2008. In the early 20th century, Barcelona, Antonio Gaudí is charged by an ancient religious brotherhood to protect a sacred object from those who seek to do evil. Almost a century later, María, the granddaughter of the apprentice to whom Gaudí passed along his secret, is charged with finding the relic before the evil forces aligning against her can unravel the true meaning of Gaudí's monuments and their mysterious legacy…
Order “The Gaudi Key” HERE

“Acheron” by Sherrilyn Kenyon. Release Date: August 5, 2008. 11,000 years ago a god was born. Cursed into the body of a human, Acheron spent a lifetime of shame. However, his human death unleashed an unspeakable horror that almost destroyed the earth. Brought back against his will, Acheron became the sole defender of mankind and has fought for our survival for centuries. Until a lone woman threatened his very existence. Now his survival—and ours—hinges on hers as old enemies reawaken and unite to kill them both…
Official Sherrilyn Kenyon Website
Official Dark-Hunter Website
Order “Acheron” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Watch the “Acheron” Book Trailer HERE

“Underground” by Kat Richardson. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Harper Blaine was your average small-time private investigator until she died—for two minutes. Now Harper is a Greywalker—walking the thin line between the living world and the paranormal realm. And she’s discovering that her new abilities are landing her all sorts of “strange” cases, such as her latest which involves homeless turning up dead and mutilated or missing, decomposing zombies, and a creature out of ancient legend…
Official Kat Richardson Website
Order “Underground” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Darque Reviews
NOTE: “Underground” is Kat Richardson’s third Greywalker novel, after “Greywalker” and “Poltergeist”.

“Omega Games” by S.L. Viehl. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Dr. Cherijo Torin faces a different kind of epidemic—a mysterious black crystal spreading like cancer throughout the galaxy. The hunt for information leads Cherijo to the planet Trellus, whose inhabitants exhibit excessive paranoia and anger, taking out their frustrations in the Omega Dome in simulated combat against battle drones. But someone is killing victims outside the arena, and Cherijo believes the black crystal infection is responsible for this horror…
Official S.L. Viehl Blog
Order “Omega Games” HERE
NOTE: “Omega Games” is the eighth volume in S.L. Viehl’s Stardoc science fiction series.

“Harmony” by C.F. Bentley. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Long ago, the world of Harmony—and its close-knit colony planets—isolated itself from the rest of the universe. But with the human-based Confederate Star System fleet hard-pressed to stand against ever-increasing attacks by the alien Marillon Empire, the Harmonic Empire cannot be left alone. Yet invasion is far from the only threat the planet faces, and in this time of crisis, one young woman might prove Harmony's best hope—or the catalyst for total collapse…
Order “Harmony” HERE
Read Reviews via Darque Reviews

“Storm Born” by Richelle Mead (Georgina Kincaid). Release Date: August 5, 2008. Eugenie Markham is a powerful shaman who does a brisk trade banishing spirits and fey who cross into the mortal world. In her most recent case, however, Eugenie comes face to face with a startling prophecy—one that uncovers dark secrets about her past and claims that Eugenie's first-born will threaten the future of the world as she knows it. Now Eugenie is a hot target for every demon and Otherworldy who either want her knocked up or dead…
Official Richelle Mead Website
Order “Storm Born” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“Gale Force” by Rachel Caine. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Weather Warden Joanne Baldwin is on vacation when her Djinn lover, David, asks Joanne to marry him. She’s thrilled to say yes, even if some others may be less than happy about it. Unfortunately, Joanne’s pre-marital bliss is ended by a devastating earthquake in Florida. And she can’t ask David and his kind for assistance. Because the cause of the quake is unlike anything Joanne has ever encountered—and a power even the Djinn cannot perceive…
Official Rachel Caine Website
Order “Gale Force” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Darque Reviews
NOTE: “Gale Force” is the seventh book in Rachel Caine’s Weather Warden urban fantasy series.

“The Cabinet of Wonders” by Marie Rutkoski. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Petra Kronos has a simple, happy life. But it’s never been ordinary. She has a pet tin spider named Astrophil who gives her advice. Her best friend can trap lightning inside a glass sphere. And her father in faraway Prague is able to move metal with his mind. But Petra’s life is forever changed when the prince steals her father’s eyes. Why? Petra doesn’t know, but she’s determined to go to Prague and steal back her father’s eyes no matter what…
Official Marie Rutkoski Website
Order “The Cabinet of Wonders” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Otherwhere Book Reviews

“The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard” by Eddie Campbell (From Hell, Bacchus, The Fate of the Artist) and Dan Best. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Step right up, Ladies and Gentlemen, for a glorious spectacle of graphic literature beyond your wildest imaginings, in which young Etienne discovers that replacing his uncle as the Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard, world-renowned acrobat and head of a circus troupe, is every bit as difficult as it appears to be, especially when his happiness is in question...
Official Eddie Campbell Blog
Order “The Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard” HERE
Read Reviews via ComicMix + Comics Waiting Room
Read Interviews via Newsarama + Publishers Weekly

“Necking” by Chris Salvatore. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Gia Felice is the premier book publicist to the underworld which sometimes can suck—literally. Especially if you’re human and have the hots for impressible Johnny and his sly half smile that shows just a little fang. Now Gia’s agreed to help Belladonna Nightshade, a New York Times bestselling vampire author, find the supernatural killing machine who changed Bella centuries ago…if he doesn’t find Gia first. Who knew publicity was such a deadly business?
Official Chris Salvatore Website
Order “Necking” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Scooper Speaks

“The Viper of Portello” by James C. Glass. Release Date: August 5, 2008. Soldier, strategist and assassin, Eduardo Cabral harbors two souls—one dark & deadly, the other loving & creative. After a war ending in betrayal, Eduardo flees to a peaceful, artistic life on another planet. But war and its aftermath will not go away. There is revolution on his home world and it is Culebra, the Viper, who must decide between innocence & guilt, while searching for a love he has never had, and a world where Eduardo can find peace…
Official James C. Glass Website
Order “The Viper of Portello” HERE
Read Reviews via Fantasy & Sci-fi Lovin’ Book Reviews

“The Steel Remains” by Richard K. Morgan. UK Release Date: August 7, 2008. As rumors of ghosts and demons spread throughout the Empire, three veterans of the War against the Scaled Folk—Ringil Eskiath, Egar the Dragonbane and Archeth—are about to meet a new, even more terrifying enemy and fight again for a world that owes them everything and has given them nothing… Thus begins a new fantasy saga from the author of Altered Carbon and the Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning Black Man/Thirteen…
Official Richard K. Morgan Website
Order “The Steel Remains” HERE
Read Reviews via Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review, Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist, SFFWorld + The Book Swede

“The Night Sessions” by Ken MacLeod. UK Release Date: August 7, 2008. After the Middle East wars and the rising sea levels, came the Great Rejection and the Second Enlightenment which separated religion from politics. In this enlightened age there's no persecution, but the millions who still believe and worship are a mistrusted minority. Now someone is killing them. At first, suspicion falls on militant atheists, but it soon becomes evident that something old has risen from the ashes. Old and very, very dangerous...
Official Ken MacLeod Blog
Order “The Night Sessions” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via SFFWorld

“The Everlasting” by Tim Lebbon. UK Release Date: August 11, 2008. Thirty years ago, Scott's grandfather slaughtered his best friend and then committed suicide. Now the spirit of the murdered man has returned, seeking the ancient volume that can return him to life—forever. Pursued by this savage spirit and accompanied by a strange woman who claims to be immortal, Scott must do the impossible and find the book that may have driven his grandfather to murder and destroy it before its secrets can be revealed…
Official Tim Lebbon Website
Order “The Everlasting” HERE
Read An Extract HERE
Read Reviews via Horror Reader

“Faces of Fear” by John Saul. Release Date: August 12, 2008. New York Times bestselling author John Saul (The Blackstone Chronicles) is a master at writing novels that chill the bones, curdle the blood, and tap into our darkest fears. He creates characters so real that you’ll feel as if they’re friends or family, and throws them into situations so terrifying that you won’t be able to look away until you turn the final page. Now, in “Faces of Fear”, Saul proves that there’s a fine line between perfection and madness…
Official John Saul Website
Order “Faces of Fear” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“Bitten to Death” by Jennifer Rardin. Release Date: August 12, 2008. “Jaz Parks here. My latest mission has taken me to the ancient Greek city of Patras. But instead of soaking up its splendor, I'm here to infiltrate a Vampere Trust. Only two vamps have ever escaped the tightly bound communities and lived to tell the tale: Edward “The Raptor” Samos, the most reviled criminal mastermind in recent memory; and Vayl, the CIA's number one assassin who also happens to be my boss. This job is going to be the death of me.”
Official Jennifer Rardin Website
Order “Bitten to Death” HERE (US) + HERE (UK)
Read An Excerpt HERE
NOTE: “Bitten to Death” is the fourth Jaz Parks novel after “Once Bitten, Twice Shy”, “Another One Bites the Dust” and “Biting the Bullet”.

“The Dragon Heir” by Cinda Williams Chima. Release Date: August 12, 2008. Moral compasses spin out of control as a final battle storms through what was once a sanctuary for the gifted. With so much to lose, what will Jason Haley and Madison “Maddie” Moss be willing to fight for—and what will they sacrifice? Continuing the tale from “The Warrior Heir” and “The Wizard Heir”, it’s every man for himself in this thrilling conclusion to Cinda Williams Chima’s young adult fantasy series, the Heir Trilogy…
Official Cinda Williams Chima Website
Order “The Dragon Heir” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“13 Things That Don’t Make Sense: The Most Baffling Scientific Mysteries of Our Time” by Michael Brooks. Release Date: August 12, 2008. Spanning disciplines from biology to cosmology, chemistry to psychology to physics, Brooks thrillingly captures the excitement, messiness, and controversy of the battle over where science is headed. “In science,” he writes, “being stuck can be a sign that you are about to make a great leap forward. The things that don’t make sense are, in some ways, the only things that matter.”
Official Michael Brooks Website
Order “13 Things That Don’t Make Sense” HERE

“The Little Book” by Selden Edwards. Release Date: August 14, 2008. An irresistible triumph of the imagination more than thirty years in the making, Selden Edwards’ “The Little Book” is the extraordinary tale of forty-seven year old Wheeler Burden who suddenly finds himself in fin de siècle Vienna, the year 1897, precisely ninety-one years before his last memory and a half-century before his birth… “The Little Book” is a breathtaking love story that spans generations and is a masterpiece of unequaled storytelling…
Order “The Little Book” HERE (US) + HERE (UK)
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read An Interview HERE
Read Reviews via BCF Book Reviews

“Hespira” by Matthew Hughes. Release Date: August 15, 2008. “Hespira” is the follow-up to “Majestrum” and “The Spiral Labyrinth”, and is the third book in a loose trilogy from Night Shade Books featuring freelance detective, Henghis Hapthorn. An author of science fiction, fantasy, media tie-ins, and crime fiction, Matthew Hughes’ bibliography also includes “Fools Errant”, “Fool Me Twice”, “Black Brillion”, “The Gist Hunter and other Stories”, “Wolverine: Lifeblood”, “The Commons” and “Template”…
Official Matthew Hughes Website
Order “Hespira” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Fantasy Book Critic’s REVIEW of “Majestrum”

“Star Wars: The Force Unleashed” by Sean Williams. Release Date: August 19, 2008. For Darth Sidious—better known as Emperor Palpatine—the overthrow of the Republic is complete, but more remains to be done. Pockets of resistance must still be defeated and missing Jedi dealt with. These tasks fall to the Emperor’s ruthless enforcer, Darth Vader. In turn, Vader has groomed a lethal apprentice entrusted with a top-secret mission. But this nameless agent seeks an even greater destiny—destroying Palpatine…
Official Sean Williams Website

Official “Star Wars: The Force Unleashed” HERE
NOTE: “The Force Unleashed” is a tie-in novel to the LucasArts videogame HERE, which is coming out September 16, 2008 for the PS3, Xbox360, etc. Additionally, on August 18, 2008, Dark Horse Comics is releasing The Force Unleashed graphic novel HERE, which was written by Haden Blackman and illustrated by Brian Ching & David Ross.

“Zoë’s Tale” by John Scalzi. Release Date: August 19, 2008. Meet Zoë Boutin Perry: Friend. Daughter. Holy icon to a race of aliens. A colonist stranded on a deadly pioneer world. A player—and a pawn—in an interstellar chess match to save the human race. Seventeen years old. Readers of John Scalzi’s bestselling Old Man’s War series have met Zoë before, but now, in this compelling standalone novel set in the same universe, Scalzi brings her front and center, to tell her tale as only she can…
Official John Scalzi Website
Order “Zoe’s Tale” HERE
Watch An Interview HERE
Read Reviews via SF Reviews.net + Technoprobing

“Sly Mongoose” by Tobias S. Buckell. Release Date: August 19, 2008. Fourteen-year-old Timas’s life is turned upside down when a strange man crash lands on the city. The newcomer is fleeing an alien intelligence intent on invading the planet Chilo and discovering the secret hidden deep inside the perpetual storm—a secret that could lead to interplanetary war. As Chilo’s citizens race against time to stop the enemy, Timas will find out what kind of man he has become in the harsh conditions of Chilo’s surface…
Official Tobias S. Buckell Website
Order “Sly Mongoose” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Adventures In Reading, Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review, Fantasy & Sci-fi Lovin’ Book Reviews, SF Reviews.net + SF Signal
NOTE: “Sly Mongoose” is a standalone novel, but is set in the same universe as Tobias S. Buckell’s “Crystal Rain” and “Ragamuffin”.

“Ill Met in the Arena” by Dave Duncan (King's Blades, The Pandemia). Release Date: August 19, 2008. In a world ruled by women who can read minds, where men possess superhuman strength and teleportation, and where a son’s future can be won in psychic gladiatorial contests, two contestants—Quirt of Mundil and Humate of Alfet—find themselves caught in an epic struggle where much more than a winner's crown at stake. For there is also atrocity, revenge, and even possibly a war. And there is also the hand of a lady…
Official Dave Duncan Website
Order “Ill Met in the Arena” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“Dark Vengeance” by Ed Greenwood. Release Date: August 19, 2008. Orivon Firefist was captured as a six-year-old child by dark elves. Fifteen years later, Orivon rose up and opposed his underworld tyrants, successfully returning to the surface world home that he thought only existed in his dreams. But the score is far from settled. Years of oppression and revelations about his former captors only fuel his rage. And the fact that their evil still permeates the underworld only intensifies his desire for a dark vengeance…
Ed Greenwood @ Wikipedia
Order “Dark Vengeance” HERE

“Man in the Dark” by Paul Auster. Release Date: August 19, 2008. Recovering from a car accident, plagued by memories he would prefer to forget, 72-year-old August Brill imagines a parallel world in which America is not at war with Iraq, but with itself… Passionate and shocking, Paul Auster’s “Man in the Dark” is a novel of our moment, a brilliant book that forces us to confront the blackness of night even as it celebrates the existence of ordinary joys in a world capable of the most grotesque violence…
Official Paul Auster Website
Order “Man in the Dark” HERE
Read Reviews via The Book Catapult

“The Age of the Conglomerates” by Thomas Nevins. Release Date: August 19, 2008. Forty years in the future, in a world where Big Brother runs amok, a powerful political party known as the Conglomerates has emerged, vowing to enforce economic martial law at any cost. But even in this cold, cruel age, the Conglomerates can only control so much… In his enthralling debut, Thomas Nevins thrillingly chronicles a brave new world where one family struggles to survive by keeping alive feelings of mercy, loyalty, and love…
Order “The Age of the Conglomerates” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review

“The Darker Mask” by Christopher Chambers + Gary Phillips. Release Date: August 19, 2008. Expanding on the concept behind Byron Preiss' Weird Heroes, GRRM’s Wild Cards series, and Michael Chabon's McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales, The Darker Mask is a collection of original prose stories recalling the derring-do of the beings we call Superheroes and the worlds they fight to save. This is the stuff of urban legends, new mythos, and extraordinary folks exploring worlds gritty, visceral, and fantastic…
Official Christopher Chambers Blog
Official Gary Phillips Website
Order “The Darker Mask” HERE
NOTE: Includes stories by Walter Mosley, L.A. Banks, Naomi Hirahara, Lorenzo Carcaterra, Tananarive Due and Stephen Barnes, Mike Gonzales, Gar Anthony Haywood, Ann Nocenti, Jerry Rodriguez, Reed Farrell Coleman, Doselle Young, Mat Johnson, Peter Spiegelman, Alexandra Sokoloff, Christopher Chambers, Gary Phillips, Victor LaValle, and Wayne Wilson.

“Yellow Moon” by Jewel Parker Rhodes (Magic City). Release Date: August 19, 2008. Echoing with the heartache and triumph of the African American experience, the soulful rhythms of jazz, and the horrors of racial oppression, Rhode’s “Yellow Moon”—part two of the New Orleans trilogy that began with “Voodoo Season” which in turn is a sequel to “Voodoo Dreams”—gives us an unforgettable heroine in sexy, vulnerable, and mysterious Marie Levant, while it powerfully evokes a city on the brink of catastrophe…
Official Jewel Parker Rhodes Website
Order “Yellow Moon” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“The Northwoods Chronicles” by Elizabeth Engstrom (Nightmare Flower, Dead On Demand). Release Date: August 20, 2008. To all appearances, White Pines Junction is just a normal small town with a lively summer fishing and tourism industry. But White Pines Junction is a town with a dark secret and those who live in the northwoods know that their community has a foot in two different worlds—one in reality and one not—and they live contentedly, for the most part, with a few murderous secrets…
Official Elizabeth Engstrom Website
Order “The Northwoods Chronicles” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“The Stress of Her Regard” by Tim Powers (Last Call, Declare). Release Date: August 22, 2008. A novel of secret histories and dark revelations, Tim Powers’ “The Stress of Her Regard” is the tale of a terrified young doctor who—after discovering his bride brutally murdered in their wedding bed and forced to flee to prove his innocence—allies with the great Romantic poets, Byron, Keats and Shelley in a desperate battle against a malignant vampire seeking her ultimate pleasure in their ravaged bodies and imperiled souls…
Official Tim Powers Website
Order “The Stress of Her Regard” HERE

NOTE: Originally published in 1989, “The Stress of Her Regard” received the World Fantasy, Mythopoeic, and Locus Awards. The book has been out of print since 1994.

“Return of the Crimson Guard” by Ian C. Esslemont. UK Release Date: August 25, 2008. In this second Malazan novel from co-creator ICE, Empress Laseen of the Malazan Empire faces threats from both the Crimson Guard—a mercenary company opposed to the existence of the Empire—and insurrectionists who have lost patience with Laseen’s rule. Yet there are hints that Laseen is using the uprisings to draw out and eliminate the last survivors of her predecessor's rule, while rivalries and betrayals plague the Guard…
Official Malazan Empire Fansite
Order “Return of the Crimson Guard” HERE
Read Reviews via Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist
Read Fantasy Book Critic’s REVIEW of “Night of Knives”
Read Fantasy Book Spot’s INTERVIEW with Ian Cameron Esslemont

“The Best of Lucius Shepard” by Lucius Shepard. Release Date: August 25, 2008. Lucius Shepard writes from the darkest, truest heart of America, and he writes of it with rare passion, honesty and intelligence. The Best of Lucius Shepard is the first ever career retrospective collection from one of the finest writers of the fantastic to emerge in the United States over the past quarter century. It contains nearly 300,000 words of his best short fiction and is destined to be recognized as a true classic of the field…
Official Lucius Shepard Website
Order “The Best of Lucius Shepard” HERE

Read Reviews via Adventures In Reading

“The Gypsy Morph” by Terry Brooks. Release Date: August 26, 2008. Terry Brooks won instant acclaim with his classic novel, The Sword of Shannara. Its sequels earned Brooks legendary status. Then in The Word and the Void trilogy, he gave the genre a compelling contemporary twist. In 2006, Brooks began the Genesis of Shannara trilogy with Armageddon’s Children which united two unique worlds. The Elves of Cintra followed in 2007. Now, that trilogy comes to a shattering conclusion in The Gypsy Morph…
Official Terry Brooks Website
Order “The Gypsy Morph” HERE (US) + HERE (UK-September 4, 2008)
Find Excerpts HERE
Read Reviews via A Dribble of Ink + Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review

“The Ten Thousand” by Paul Kearney. Release Date: August 26, 2008. Vast, dominant, and prestigious, the Assurian Empire is thought to be invincible. An exile from the empire, the Great King’s brother hires a force of ten thousand elite mercenaries from a legendary race known as the Macht to take the throne by force. But when their employer is killed, The Ten Thousand find themselves abandoned. This is the story of their fight for freedom and the beginning of a brand new series by one of fantasy’s finest writers…
Official Paul Kearney Website
Order “The Ten Thousand” HERE (US) + HERE (UK)
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews HERE

“The Diamond of Darkhold” by Jeanne Duprau. Release Date: August 26, 2008. It’s been several months since Lina, Doon and the rest of their people escaped the dying city of Ember and joined the town of Sparks. Now, struggling through the harsh winter aboveground, they find a book. Torn up and missing most of its pages, it alludes to a mysterious device from before the Disaster, which they believe is still in Ember. Together, Lina & Doon must go back underground to retrieve what was lost and bring light to a dark world…

Official Jeanne Duprau Website

Order “The Diamond of Darkhold” HERE
NOTE: “The Diamond of Darkhold” is the fourth Book of Ember novel after “The City of Ember”, “The People of Sparks” and “The Prophet of Yonwood”.

“Pandemonium” by Daryl Gregory. Release Date: August 26, 2008. As a boy, Del Pierce is possessed by the Hellion, an entity whose mischief-making can be deadly. With the help of Del’s family and a caring psychiatrist, the demon was exorcised . . . or was it? Years later, the Hellion is back and clamoring to get out. Del needs an exorcism, by any means necessary, and the answers may lie in a handful of Golden Age comics, a series of demon-created paintings, and his own childhood memories…
Official Daryl Gregory Website
Order “Pandemonium” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review

“The Battle of the Hammer Worlds” by Graham Sharp Paul. Release Date: August 26, 2008. Back from tangling with the Hammer of Kraa, the most brutal tyrants in humanspace, Michael Helfort is assigned to the Federated Worlds cruiser Ishaq, which is blown apart in a horrific ambush. One of only a few survivors, Michael and company are sent to a prison camp on the Hammer’s home planet. Its payback time and the Hammers intend to throw their entire space fleet into destroying Michael Helfort and the Federated Worlds…
Order “The Battle of the Hammer Worlds” HERE
NOTE: “The Battle of the Hammer Worlds” is the second book in the Helfort’s War series following “The Battle at the Moons of Hell”.

“The Riven Kingdom” by Karen Miller. Release Date: August 26, 2008. Ethrea is an island in the centre of the most important shipping route in the world and has enjoyed peace and prosperity for 400 years. The imminent death of Ethrea's king has placed his daughter, Rhian, in a dangerous position. The church has great power in Ethrea, stating that no woman may have dominion over a man. If Rhian can take and hold the throne—can she also keep it safe from the rest of the world? An exile from Mijak may be her only hope…
Official Karen Miller Website
Order “The Riven Kingdom” HERE (US) + HERE (UK-October 2008)
Read An Extract HERE
Read Reviews via The Specusphere
NOTE: “The Riven Kingdom” is the second volume in The Godspeaker Trilogy after “Empress”.

“Wanderlust” by Ann Aguirre. Release Date: August 26, 2008. Sirantha Jax is a “Jumper,” a woman who possesses the unique genetic makeup needed to navigate faster-than-light ships through grimspace. Unfortunately she’s also broke and unemployed. So Jax accepts a diplomatic mission for the government—only to find herself contending with Syndicate criminals, a stormy relationship with her pilot, man-eating aliens, and her own grimspace-weakened body. She’ll be lucky just to make it to out alive…
Official Ann Aguirre Website
Order “Wanderlust” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE

“The Ghosts of Kerfol” by Deborah Noyes. Release Date: August 26, 2008. In this remarkable collection of intertwining short stories, Deborah Noyes tells us Anne de Barrigan's story through the sympathetic eyes of her servant girl. Four more tales set in the same haunted manor over the centuries, slip forward in time, peering in on a young artist, a hard-drinking party girl, a young American couple, and a deaf gardener who now tends the Kerfol estate. All these souls are haunted by the ghosts of Kerfol…
Official Deborah Noyes Website
Order “The Ghosts of Kerfol” HERE
Read Reviews via The Well-Read Child

“Rogue’s Home” by Hilari Bell. Release Date: August 26, 2008. As in “The Last Knight”, Hilari Bell's first Knight and Rogue novel, “Rogue's Home” combines the banter of a buddy story with elements of classic fantasy, medieval derring-do, and mystery. This time, Sir Michael Sevenson and his reluctant squire, Fisk, continue their knight-errantry, facing new challenges, greater dangers and . . . Fisk’s family. Magnets for trouble, you never know what is going to happen to these would-be heroes next.
Official Hilari Bell Website
Order “Rogue’s Home” HERE

“Pure Blood” by Caitlin Kittredge. Release Date: August 26, 2008. In the shadows of Nocturne City, witches lurk and demons prowl, and homicide detective Luna Wilder must keep the peace—while living life as a werewolf. Now bodies are turning up all over town, the brutal murders linked by a cryptic message: We see with empty eyes. To make matters even worse, a war is brewing between rival clans of blood witches and caster witches—a magical gang war with the power to burn Nocturne City to the ground…
Official Caitlin Kittredge Website
Order “Pure Blood” HERE
Read Reviews via Darque Reviews
Read Darque Reviews’ Interview with Caitlin Kittredge
NOTE: “Pure Blood” is the second volume in Caitlin Kittredge’s Nocture City series after “Night Life”.

“Hunter’s Prayer” by Lilith Saintcrow. Release Date: August 26, 2008. It’s another night on the Nightside… An ancient evil looms over Santa Luz. Prostitutes are showing up dead and eviscerated. And Jill Kismet—introduced in Lilith Saintcrow’s Night Shift—just might be able to get her revenge against an old enemy. There’s just one problem. Someone wants Jill dead–-again. And if they have to open up Hell itself to kill her, they will. Sometimes, even when you're Jill Kismet, you don't have a prayer...
Official Lilith Saintcrow Website
Order “Hunter’s Prayer” HERE (US) + HERE (UK-September 2008)
Read Fantasy Book Critic’s REVIEW of “Night Shift”

“Legacy” by Jeanne C. Stein. Release Date: August 26, 2008. Vampire Anna Strong has struggled to adapt to her supernatural status while clinging to the vestiges of her humanity. Now in Jeanne C. Stein’s fourth Vampire Chronicles novel, Anna must deal with her legacy. Because the sinister vampire who transformed her is dead, and Anna is entitled to his vast fortune. But a predatory werewolf comes forward, claiming the inheritance as her own—and she’ll kill to get what she wants most: blood and money…
Official Jeanne C. Stein Website
Order “Legacy” HERE

“Sucks to Be Me: The All-True Confessions of Mina Hamilton, Teen Vampire (maybe)” by Kimberly Pauley. Release Date: August 26, 2008. Being a teenager is a challenge, and high school is no piece of cake. In Kimberly Pauley’s new young adult novel, “Sucks To Be Me”, life gets really complicated when Mina Hamilton has to decide whether or not to become a vampire like her parents. Toss in a couple of cute boys, and it’s enough to drive a girl crazy—or at least make her want to drink some blood…
Official Kimberly Pauley Website
Order “Sucks to Be Me” HERE
Read An Excerpt HERE
Read Reviews via Book Review Maniac, LoveVampires + The Book Muncher

“The Source” by Michael Cordy. UK Release Date: August 28, 2008. Ambitious geologist Ross Kelly has it all: a lucrative career searching for oil across the world and Lauren, a beautiful, brilliant wife who is pregnant with their first child. But when Lauren deciphers the university's mysterious Voynich manuscript—which has confounded experts for centuries—Ross is suddenly thrust upon a desperate quest against a lethal assassin and a fanatical priest that will eventually challenge everything he ever thought about the source of life on earth…
Michael Cordy @ Wikipedia
Order “The Source” HERE

“Seeds of Change” edited by John Joseph Adams. Release Date: August 29, 2008. Imagine the moment when the present ends and the future begins. When the world we knew is no more and a brave new world is upon us. Gathering stories by nine of today’s most incisive minds, Seeds of Change confronts the pivotal issues facing our society today: racism, global warming, oil, political revolution, and technological advancement. Many serve as a call to action. How will you change with the future?
Official John Joseph Adams Website
Order “Seeds of Change” HERE
Read Reviews via Adventures In Reading

NOTE: Includes stories by Mark Budz, Tobias S. Buckell, Blake Charlton, Ted Kosmatka, Jay Lake, Ken MacLeod, Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu, Jeremiah Tolbert, and K. D. Wentworth with an introduction by John Joseph Adams.