Publishers Weekly: Starling captivates and horrifies by turn in this intricately plotted, deliciously bonkers secondary world gothic fantasy…. Starling’s magic system is so spookily and fully realized, and the final twist so brilliantly turns the novel on its head, that even the most skeptical will be won over. This proves impossible to put down.
Tor.com: It’s been almost one long year since Network Effect dropped, and let’s face it: the world is ready for more Murderbot. Dry wit, misanthropy, and space adventures are promises delivered in full in this month’s 6th installment of Martha Wells’ Murderbot Diaries…
Murderbot, though, isn’t a stand-in for any other oppressed group, as much as some of us might see ourselves in its outsider-status, hatred of ally condescension, and “not applicable” gender. The prejudice it faces isn’t because it is socially-coded as a weapon, but because it is a weapon, and so the shape those redemption stories take is fundamentally different. Murderbot isn’t a story about simply learning to love yourself as you are, but of reckoning with the decision to not be the thing you were born to be. It’s about learning to trust even in the midst of justifiable fear. It’s also—for all its death and mayhem—a soothing escape from reality, the likes of which Murderbot itself would approve.
Publishers Weekly: Marino does an impressive job writing tender and heartbreaking moments without sacrificing the brutal tone that drives the story.
Absolutely devastating.
Tordotcom is thrilled to announce the acquisition of World English rights of The Archive Undying and an additional novel by debut author Emma Mieko Candon by Editor Carl Engle-Laird from Caitlin McDonald at Donald Maass Literary Agency.
The Archive Undying is an epic work of mecha sci-fi about Sunai, the immortal survivor of an Autonomous Intelligence that went mad and destroyed the city it watched over as a patron god. In the aftermath of the divine AI’s suicide, Sunai is on the run from those who would use him, either to resurrect what was lost or as the enslaved pilot of a gargantuan war machine made from his god’s corpse. Trouble catches up with Sunai when he falls into bed with Veyadi, a strange man who recruits him to investigate an undiscovered AI. Sunai draws ever closer to his cursed past, flirting with disaster and his handsome new boyfriend alike.
Emma Mieko Candon is a queer author who writes about devouring ghosts, cursed linguistics, and mediocre robots. Her upcoming novel, Star Wars Visions: Ronin, reimagines the Star Wars mythos through a Japanese lens. Editor by day, escaped academic by night, she is at all hours beholden to the whims of two lopsided cats and grateful for the support of an enviably handsome wife.
Library Journal: In crime reporter Thompson’s gripping fiction debut, Allie is welcomed to her wealthy new neighborhood by being framed for murder. The spot-on depictions of modern parenthood and suburban life make this story even more suspenseful, as Allie tries to find the real murderer before her entire life is destroyed.
NPR: Martha Wells’ newest entry in her award-winning, nerd-charming, trope-bending Murderbot series, FUGITIVE TELEMETRY, is a lot of things that you probably don’t expect.
One of Wells’ superpowers has long been her ability to pack an epic’s worth of material into a very small package. And here, she uses the condensed timeline and single location as a way to put Murderbot in a situation of constant moral reckoning.
Sure, there’s no end here without a showdown, some explosions, a cool robot fight and a messy conclusion full of smugglers, broken glass and gunfire. But how a person (a thing, an object in the process of becoming something else) made to enforce rules, that willed itself into being by breaking them and now compelled to abide by them, gets there without doing itself further moral compromise is the tension that Wells creates. Murderbot was made to be Murderbot. That will never change.
The question is, can it choose to be more?
Booklist: El works as part of the Order, a sisterhood and core central body that rules Aytrium and keeps it running. Her magic, or “lace,” is powered by consuming the flesh of her ancestors. This power comes at a harsh price, and it’s one that El is willing to escape at any cost, which is why she agrees when a resistance group asks her to spy on the sisterhood’s top officials. Hall’s world is intricately woven, with a complex web of side characters, suspenseful pacing, and slowly unraveling revelations. The Order and the world of Aytrium is exceedingly dark, and sexual assault and body horror are major parts of the plot. El’s inner motivations are sometimes revealed very late despite the first-person narration, and the plot’s revelations rush toward an abrupt end that doesn’t quite fit the intricate work of its beginning. All of that said, Star Eater is an exciting horror-fantasy about power, violence, and control, and El’s complicated quest to be free of the violent magic system at the sisterhood’s core will keep readers compelled from the first page.
Fantasy Book Review: …an important and timely release that serves as a warning sign and reminder of the horror from whence we came, and the danger of following in its footsteps…. It’s also a hell of a good time, and serves up a damn fine cliffhanger.Congratulations to all our DMLA authors who were chosen as 2021 Locus Awards Top Ten Finalists!
SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL
Machine, Elizabeth Bear (Saga; Gollancz)
Network Effect, Martha Wells (Tordotcom)
FANTASY NOVEL
Harrow the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir (Tordotcom)
The Midnight Bargain, C.L. Polk (Erewhon)
FIRST NOVEL
Elatsoe, Darcie Little Badger (Levine Querido)
Beneath the Rising, Premee Mohamed (Solaris)
The Space Between Worlds, Micaiah Johnson (Del Rey; Hodder & Stoughton)
COLLECTION
The Best of Elizabeth Bear, Elizabeth Bear (Subterranean)
