Donald Maass Literary Agency

Shelf Awareness: Discover: Adam Christopher’s novel mixes science fiction and noir mystery, as the world’s only robot assassin searches for a missing person in 1960s Los Angeles. Christopher notes that he was inspired to write this novel when considering what it might be like to read an unknown science-fiction epic from Raymond Chandler, and that inspiration shows. Made to Kill evolves over the course of the story from science fiction to a noir-style mystery and back again, never missing a beat […]

Publishers Weekly: Bennett’s astonishingly good sequel to 2014’s City of Stairs makes a riveting and often heartbreaking case against war. […] Bennett continues his theme of the influence of imperialism on what appears to be a very similar world to ours (albeit one in which gods helped shape the geopolitics), seamlessly melding spycraft and mythology. Turyin, a physically and emotionally wounded warrior who both loathes battle and excels at it, serves as a fascinating character to shoulder the book’s heavy burden of […]

School Library Journal: It’s the start of the spring semester at Opportunity High School in Opportunity, AL, and the school day is progressing as normal—until one revenge-minded student brings violence to this sleepy, close-knit community. This novel takes place over the course of 54 tense minutes, as four main characters (all of whom also conveniently have siblings affected by the shooting) narrate their harrowing experiences and consider their relationships with the shooter. Nijkamp populates Opportunity High School with a diverse representation […]

Booklist: In a novel that works both as stand-alone and sequel, Bennett returns to the same postapocalyptic fantasy world he created to much critical and reader acclaim in City of Stairs (2014), but this time, the setting is a ruined city where the ruling god is dead and lawlessness abounds. The retired General Mulaghesh is forced back into the fray in the city of Voortyashtan, so named for defeated god Voortya, who had promised her army of supporters a glorious afterlife […]

RT Book Reviews: The third book in the Matchmaking Babies series opens with Lord Warrick asking Lady Caroline Trelawney Dowling for help in refining his manners in order to find a wife and provide an heir. Lady Caroline finds that she enjoys spending time with Lord Warrick. For reasons of her own, Lady Caroline has chosen not to marry. But will Lord Warrick and the two abandoned children she has been taking care of make her change her mind? Brown’s latest […]

i09: Newman does a fantastic job…incredibly well-realized world-building, showing a realistic (semi) post-scarcity society on another world…Newman has a real gift for depicting people’s capacity for naivete and viciousness, and how the two things often go together. Planetfall will ultimately mess with your head. It draws you in with such a well-realized world that by the time you start to realize that its main character isn’t quite who you thought she was, you’re already fully inhabiting her skin. (The device […]

RT Book Reviews: Nijkamp’s emotional, powerful debut fictionalizes an all-too-frequent occurrence in today’s world. Her strong storytelling pulls readers into a school shooting, leaving them amongst the gunman’s victims in Opportunity High’s auditorium. Read RT’s full review of This is Where It Ends here.

Congratulations to the DMLA authors on Barnes & Noble’s Best Science Fiction & Fantasy of 2015 List! The Traitor Baru Cormorant, by Seth Dickinson Planetfall, by Emma Newman Vision in Silver, by Anne Bishop Karen Memory, by Elizabeth Bear The Aeronaut’s Windlass, by Jim Butcher

Congratulations to Elizabeth Bear on Karen Memory being included in Library Journal‘s Best Books of 2015!

Congratulations to DMLA clients nominated for a 2015 Goodreads Choice Award! Best Science Fiction: Star Wars: Aftermath – Chuck Wendig Best Fantasy: Vision in Silver – Anne Bishop The Aeronaut’s Windlass – Jim Butcher Best Horror: The Border – Robert McCammon