Contemporary Authors

• Planetfall ( novel) Roc (New York, NY), 2015
• After Atlas ( novel) Roc (New York, NY), 2016
• Between Two Thorns Angry Robot (Long Island City, NY), 2013
• Any Other Name Angry Robot (Long Island City, NY), 2013
• All Is Fair Angry Robot/Osprey (New York, NY), 2013
• A Little Knowledge Diversion Books (New York, NY), 2016

1. After atlas : a Planetfall novel LCCN 2016022507 Type of material Book Personal name Newman, Emma, 1976- author. Main title After atlas : a Planetfall novel / Emma Newman. Edition First Edition. Published/Produced New York : Roc, 2016. Description 365 pages ; 21 cm. ISBN 9780425282403 (paperback) CALL NUMBER PR6114.E949 A69 2016 CABIN BRANCH Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 2. All is fair LCCN 2013404612 Type of material Book Personal name Newman, Emma, 1976- author. Main title All is fair / Emma Newman. Published/Produced Nottingham, UK : Lace Market House ; New York, NY, USA : Angry Robot/Osprey Publishing, [2013] Description 408 pages ; 22 cm. ISBN 9780857663269 (pbk.) 0857663267 (pbk.) Shelf Location FLS2014 043437 CALL NUMBER PR6114.E949 A78 2013 OVERFLOWA5S Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms (FLS1) 3. Any other name LCCN 2013474672 Type of material Book Personal name Newman, Emma, 1976- Main title Any other name / Emma Newman. Published/Produced Nottingham, UK ; Long Island City, NY, USA : Angry Robot, A member of the Osprey Group, 2013. Description 394 pages ; 22 cm. ISBN 9780857663238 (pbk.) Shelf Location FLS2014 058243 CALL NUMBER PR6114.E949 A84 2013 OVERFLOWA5S Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms (FLS1) 4. Between two thorns LCCN 2012277256 Type of material Book Personal name Newman, Emma, 1976- Main title Between two thorns / Emma Newman. Published/Created Nottingham, UK ; Long Island City, NY : Angry Robot, c2013. Description 396 p. ; 22 cm. ISBN 9780857663207 (pbk.) 0857663208 (pbk.) 9780857663214 (ebook) Shelf Location FLS2013 000228 CALL NUMBER PR6114 .E949 B48 2013 OVERFLOWA5S Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms (FLS1) 5. A little knowledge LCCN 2016590156 Type of material Book Personal name Newman, Emma, 1976- author. Main title A little knowledge / Emma Newman. Edition First Diversion Books edition. Published/Produced New York, New York : Diversion Books, 2016. Description 359 pages ; 22 cm. ISBN 9781682302910 (pbk.) 1682302911 (pbk.) CALL NUMBER PR6114.E949 L58 2016 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms 6. Planetfall LCCN 2015016745 Type of material Book Personal name Newman, Emma, 1976- author. Main title Planetfall / Emma Newman. Published/Produced New York, New York : Roc, [2015] Description 320 pages ; 21 cm ISBN 9780425282397 (softcover) Links Cover image 9780425282397.jpg Shelf Location FLS2016 097473 CALL NUMBER PR6114.E949 P58 2015 OVERFLOWJ34 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms (FLS2)

• All Good Things - 2017 Diversion Publishing, New York
• Brother's Ruin - 2017 Tor.com, New York
• From Dark Places - 2011 eMergent Publishing, London

• Emma Newman - http://www.enewman.co.uk/about-2

  About Em’s Place

  Whether you’re here because you’re a reader of my work, a Tea and Jeopardy fan or a professional who needs information about me, welcome!

  If you need a bio, book covers or a picture of me, you can find them in the Press Pack.

  If you are here because you love my work, carry on scrolling past this next bit for something more personal. Or you can just go straight to the very silly GIF version.

  About Emma Newman
  Taken by Joby Sessions for SFX magazine
  Taken by Joby Sessions for SFX magazine
  Emma Newman writes dark short stories and science fiction and urban fantasy novels. ‘Between Two Thorns’, the first book in Emma’s Split Worlds urban fantasy series, was shortlisted for the BFS Best Novel and Best Newcomer awards. The fifth and final novel in the series “All Good Things” will be published in 2017. The Split Worlds series is published by Diversion Books.

  Emma’s first science-fiction novel, Planetfall, was published by Roc in November 2015. A second standalone novel set in the same universe, called ‘After Atlas’ is available now.

  Emma is a professional audio book narrator and also co-writes and hosts the Hugo-nominated and Alfie winning podcast ‘Tea and Jeopardy‘ which involves tea, cake, mild peril and singing chickens. Her hobbies include dressmaking and role playing games.

  Emma is represented by Jennifer Udden at the Barry Goldblatt Literary Agency.

  You can contact Emma through the contact form here, or via Twitter or Facebook.

  Hello!

  Now we’ve got that formal third-person stuff out of the way, let’s relax. Thanks for stopping by. (Sips tea and reflects upon how writing an about page is almost as socially awkward as having to introduce oneself at an inappropriate networking event). You know, this is the fourth version of my About page since I started this blog back in January 2009, and it’s still just as hard to write. Just before I wrote this, in fact, I created a GIF version because that was easier and more fun to put together!

  Perhaps you’re here because you’ve just read one of the Split Worlds books or From Dark Places, perhaps we’ve bumped into each other on Twitter or perhaps you’ve actually met me in the real world (gasp!) and wondered what I do online.

  If you’re here because you like what I write, let me point you towards my VIP list, which is especially for splendid people like you who have enjoyed one of my books and want to be the first to know about all the crazy stuff I get up to.

  When I first started this blog, it was called Post-Apocalyptic Publishing. It had a dark thunder storm in the header and really fitted where I was back in 2009; recovering from post-natal depression, trying to work out whether my writing was good enough to be published and wondering whether I would ever get there.

  Back then, ‘there’ was being published. That happened a while ago, and now I’m an audiobook narrator as well as a published author. As you can see, the site is a lot cheerier now!

  What else? Well, I drink a lot of tea and write a lot of words, usually both at the same time. The picture up at the top gives you a clue about one of my favourite hobbies (clue: it’s not marbles) and I get anxious about… well, everything really. I live in Somerset, England and have a healthy distrust of fried mushrooms. But that’s another story.

  So, make a cup of whatever comforts you, pull up a chair and catch up on the blog, there are episodes of Tea and Jeopardy for your listening pleasure and if you want me to read you something, check out the bottom of the Voice page. I’m sharing my experiences (and many, many mistakes!) as an author in a section called The Writer’s Rutter so if you’re a writer, you might find something useful there. And if you’re not sure what a rutter is anyway, here’s an explanation.

  If you’re on Twitter you can find me as @emapocalyptic or you can drop me a line through the contact form.

  Love and noodles,

  Em xx

• The Fix Magazine - http://www.thefixmagazine.com/index/emmanewman/

  QUOTE:
  Not to listen to any advice. There’s loads of advice online telling you how many words you should write every day, whether you should write every day or not, you name it – people give advice. The only person who can figure out the most productive way to write and the most satisfying way is you. It took me about three years to figure out how to work at my optimum level, how to be as productive as I am, and how to find the way that I like to write. Some people like to plot a novel before they write and some people just like to write anything that just pops into their head. There’s no right or wrong way, so my advice is find your own way.

  Author Interview: Emma Newman – ‘Between Two Thorns’
  BetweenTwoThorns-300dpiBetween Two Thorns is the first in the Split Worlds trilogy of urban fantasy novels written by Emma Newman. The author, who resides in Shepton Mallet, Somerset, spoke with The Fix ahead of the book’s launch in March to tell us more about the trilogy opener, its high profile fans, the formation of the story and why listening to no advice is good advice for aspiring writers. How would you describe Between Two Thorns to a potential new reader? There’s two versions. If I had to describe it in 140 characters, for obvious reasons, it’s urban fantasy with a dash of noir with feuding dynastic families, supernatural patrons, mad sorcerers, evil fairies and nice cups of tea. For people who have no idea what Urban Fantasy is, it’s a sub genre in which you have the normal modern world with bits of weirdness in it. In a sentence it’s like the aristocratic side of Downton Abbey with mad sorcerers and evil fairies. How did you come up with the idea for Between Two Thorns and the Split Worlds trilogy? It snuck up on me. About three years ago I woke up with the story in my head. That rarely happens I have to say, usually they don’t come to me as I wake up but it was there fully formed. It was a Friday and I needed to write a story because I was part of the Friday Flash Community online where people post a story of a thousand words or less and share links to them. The story was about a shopkeeper who had a very strange shop called The Emporium Of Things In Between And Besides. It starts when a woman comes in with a very ornate box and inside is a bell jar with a fairy inside. The woman thinks it’s a hologram and that it’s something special sent from Japan where her husband has been working. She claimed that she couldn’t find the instructions but then finds out that it’s actually a real fairy and the shopkeeper realises that his delivery boy has delivered it to the wrong address. He’s left with an unknowing innocent who’s been delivered an incredibly powerful, magical artefact and he has to decide whether he’s just going to turn her into dust or if he is going to be kind to her. Because she’s polite he decides to just wipe her recent memory and give her a fruitcake recipe and direct her out of the door. That was the story. I posted it up and later that day there were loads of comments. The people who read my work seemed to really like it so I started to write a serial. I wrote a follow up and then another story came and another and before I knew it I wrote a story set in that world every week for a good six months. I realised I was actually building the world for my next set of novels, so I started developing the ideas. Angry Robot Books will be releasing the trilogy. They have a cult following on an international scale; have you had any interaction with their fans yet? Yeah, what’s been really wonderful is that just getting a contract with Angry Robot made people and blogs I’ve been following for years suddenly notice me, which was kind of weird… and nice. When I went to the States and I was at World-Com they introduced me as one of the latest authors to be signed to Angry Robot and people were so excited because they had so much faith that they will bring out good books that they really enjoy. So that’s fantastic that they really do have a fabulous reader base who get very excited and are very supportive of everything they bring out. You had a big endorsement from a big name in the United States. Can you tell us about that? Yeah! Bill Willingham who writes a comic series called Fables, which has been running since 2002 and is hugely popular. If anyone watches Once Upon A Time or that kind of series that shows fairy tales in the real world then they’d know that he was the first person to do that in comics. He’s got a huge following and when the book was sent to him I was really nervous because he’s one of the genre authorities on urban fantasy with fairies, but he really loved it. He wrote a really beautiful letter and apologised for writing more of a fan letter, which was heavenly to read. He said, “Emma Newman has built a modern fantasy world with such élan and authority, her ideas of why and how the seemingly irrational world of fairy works should be stolen by every other writer in the field”. That was quite cute. He also said, “her characters are complex and troubled, courageous at times and foolhardy. This book of wonders is first rate.” That was fabulous. Mary Robinette, who is very popular within genre circles for writing a series which is like Jane Eyre with magic, and another Angry Robot author, Adam Christopher, who has been successful with superhero and noir mash ups have also been kind with their praise. There have been some wonderful reviews so I’m very pleased about that. What have you been doing to promote the series? Is it true that you’ve been releasing short stories as audio podcasts in the run up to the release? Yes. For a year and a day leading up to the release of Between Two Thorns I’ve been releasing a story set in the Split Worlds every week with a text and audio version. The text version is hosted on a different blog every week with 54 stories in total. That was really hard work! They were between a thousand and thirteen hundred words in length, but by the time you think of the idea and then write, edit, record, edit the recording, arrange for hosts and write the other novels alongside it it’s a lot of work. We also had some really fun launch events in Bristol and London on 7th and 8th March. Over the year we’re looking to run some live events with games, puzzles and all kind of things so people can experience it more immersively if that’s what they want. I’ve started to seed some things in the short stories that have gone out which will be picked up and run with in games. But I have to finish the novels first! What were you working on before Between Two Thorns and how did you get into writing in the first place? I started when I was four. My grandmother’s favourite story about me was when I was that age and working really hard on something at her kitchen table and when she asked what I was doing I said, “I’m writing a story, Nanna”. It probably sucked, but that’s when I started to fall in love with writing. I wrote all through my childhood and then I wrote a short story that got me into University. After that I didn’t write for ten years, it was such a massive mental block and even forgot I used to write all the time. I eventually worked myself out of the block and started writing properly when I was a teacher in London and I wrote a novel, made loads of mistakes both in the novel itself and trying to get it published, and started to write short stories again. Somebody triple dared me to enter a short story competition, so I did and I won it receiving a website design, which has since been replaced. Between Two Thorns is the 4th novel I’ve written. You mentioned that Between Two Thorns was different to what you usually write, so were these other novels of a different genre? Yeah. They were still speculative fiction but the series of novels I wrote before the Split Worlds were post apocalyptic dystopian and to be honest I feel like I’ve done that now; I wouldn’t want to write another dystopian novel. If someone was to say to me three years ago, “what are you gonna write after your current trilogy?” I wouldn’t have said it would be about fairies and the comedy of manners with massive cross-world politics and supernatural prisons, I would not have predicted it. I’m always going to write genre pieces and I had a short story collection published, again speculative fiction, which was very dark like everything I write. I think that’s always going to be the case. Which writers influence you and is it just books? I know you’re heavily into television sci-fi? I always think there’s a danger of focussing on one medium. Everything I’ve read, watched, consumed and experienced all goes into the books. I’ve been writing for so long now and so much that I would like to say I’ve got my own voice now. In terms of the writers who I have enjoyed the most – Ray Bradbury was a big influence on my short stories, then there’s Shōgun by James Clavell, which really made me fall in love with politicking between rival factions and how exciting that could be in a novel. I love John Windom as well. I wouldn’t point at any of them and say they are the reason I became a writer or the ones I most wanted to emulate. When every writer writes a novel they have bits of themselves in it, other people they know, things they’ve experienced and none of that has got anything to do with anything they’ve read. Outside of writing what else interests you? I’m a gamer, so I like playing computer games, but also role-playing games as well. I’m a real geek. I like sewing as well; I used to be a designer dressmaker. One thing I do to cope with the stress of these big events is to make clothes to wear at the event and then I get stressed about whether I’m going to finish it in time rather than the event itself. It’s a good distraction technique. Finally, what advice would you give to any aspiring writers? Not to listen to any advice. There’s loads of advice online telling you how many words you should write every day, whether you should write every day or not, you name it – people give advice. The only person who can figure out the most productive way to write and the most satisfying way is you. It took me about three years to figure out how to work at my optimum level, how to be as productive as I am, and how to find the way that I like to write. Some people like to plot a novel before they write and some people just like to write anything that just pops into their head. There’s no right or wrong way, so my advice is find your own way. Between Two Thorns is now available from book retailers both online and on the High Street with the other two titles in the trilogy being released in June and October 2013. You can find out more about Emma Newman and sign up to receive free short stories by email at www.enewman.co.uk

• SFF World - http://www.sffworld.com/2016/03/interview-with-emma-newman/

  Interview with Split Worlds Author Emma Newman

  Shellie Horst March 11, 2016 0 Comment
  In case you weren’t aware, Emma Newman’s Split Worlds Series of books has had a make-over – pampered, manicured and a whole day at the salon to deal with the designer stubble. The new look Split Worlds will be available from February 23rd from Diversion Press. Capturing the magic hiding between these pages cannot have been an easy task for the artist. Emma Newman Between-Two-Thorns-coverNaturally Between Two Thorns, Any Other Name, and All Is Fair wanted to be dressed for the August launch of the fourth book in the series, A Little Knowledge.

  One simply couldn’t be out done by the new arrival after all. Yes, these books have personality, of course they do!

  Before you all go getting the wrong idea about Emma’s Urban Fantasy series, the series features fae folk are a touch fickle (actually ‘psychotic’ is probably a better word) and an Arbiter who may well be related to Constantine or Castiel. The novels are decadently balanced against a backdrop of Georgian curiosities, our digitally dedicated lifestyles, and a broad swath of magic.

  I’m getting the impression these characters of yours had greater plans than the original three book story arc. How long did the Fae torment you until you gave in to writing the fourth book?

  They didn’t need to torment me – it was always going to be a five books series! There was just a longer gap between books 3 and 4 than I would have preferred and a change in publisher, but it feels like it’s back on track now. Back when the first editions came out, I was only contracted for the first 3, even though I knew I needed 5 books to tell the story in my head. As there was no guarantee the 4th and 5th books would be published back then, I had to give readers an emotionally satisfying conclusion for each of the main characters. I deliberately didn’t tie up all the big plots though – it would have been impossible anyway – because I was determined to finish the series one way or another. Now it’s worked out perfectly; books four and five are definitely being published so I can finish the bigger story in the way I always intended to. Phew!

  Did you always have plans for Sam to feature heavily in the story or has he charmed his way in?

  That was always part of the plan. Sam is the everyman who stumbles into the fantastical elements of the book, and in the initial parts of the story, I wanted him to help guide the reader through the weird intersections between the Fae-touched Nether and the real world of Mundanus. But I always knew that he would Any-Other-Name-coverevolve past that – he had to, to be plausible! I knew he would get more deeply involved, but the form of that did change as I wrote more of the series.

  Split Worlds has a fabulous following of readers, and I understand you’ve decided to go head to head with anxiety to hold a live action event. Can you tell us a little more about it? Oh, and just to be clear, is it in Bath or Aquae Sulis?

  It is rather nerve wracking but yes, there is going to be a Live Action Roleplaying event in Bath on May 7th at the Guildhall. The game is centred around a masked ball which is the last ball of the season held in Aquae Sulis (the magical reflection of Bath in the Nether). It’s set between the third and fourth books.

  There’s a day of activities leading up to the ball for the players to get everyone relaxed and comfortable playing characters in the Split Worlds. We sold out of the RPG tickets in about 9 days and there are over 70 players, so I was thrilled with the response. There are still non-RPG tickets left, which are ideal for fans of the books who want to enjoy the dressing up and spectacle of the ball without the pressure of roleplaying.

  My hope is that players will feel totally immersed in the world and get a taste of life as one of the Fae-touched. I’m running it with the help of a very experienced GM and I have roleplayed for years and GMed live games too, so between us and the talented crew my co-GM is putting together – and the gorgeous Georgian venue – I have high hopes that it will be a spectacular event.

  I don’t doubt it will be, and anyone wanting to attend this illustrious gathering can find out more about the Split Worlds Live Action Roleplay Event here.

  tea_and_jeopardy_podcastAs well as writing enough short stories to fill a library and being extra-ordinarily polite, you are also one part of the Tea and Jeopardy Podcast featuring a literary guest list that would put any fairy queen’s to shame. With all that is going on, does it get a little creatively crazy in your house at times?

  It really, really does! Since the new year I’ve written a novel (120k words), edited that and am waiting for edits back, have edited my next sci-fi book that’s coming out in November, done lots of planning and character creation for the Split Worlds LARP, put together several Tea and Jeopardy episodes, started a new Split Worlds short story podcast, recorded an audio book in a studio (and am starting another tomorrow), relaunched the first 3 Split Worlds novels, had a novelette published (‘The Unkindest Cut’ in the Monstrous Little Voices anthology published by Abaddon Books) and started researching my next novel. Blimey… no wonder I am tired. It’s a crazy time at the moment, but I wouldn’t change it for the world.

  No wonder you need tea! WAIT! The Victoria sponge has been poisoned, and for once the butler has had the good mind to warn you All-is-Fair-coverprior to serving it to your guest. Therefore, if you could invite any fictional villain to tea, who would be your victim, and why?

  Hrmmm, that’s a tricky one, as there are very few people I would be able to poison without dreadful guilt. Saying that, I would gladly do that to Crome, the Mayor of London in Mortal Engines, by Philip Reeve. And Kilgrave from Jessica Jones would be offered a couple of slices too! The reason why is the same for both of them: they cause pain and suffering to others and are horribly selfish.

  Finally, though I am not quite sure where you find the time to do it all, can you tell us what can we look forward to reading from you in the future?

  The fourth Split Worlds novel, A Little Knowledge, will be released on August 2nd of this year and then in November, my next science-fiction novel will be published by Roc. It’s called After Atlas and is another stand-alone, set in the same universe as Planetfall, taking place on Earth forty years after the Pathfinder left.

  Thank you for finding time to talk with us, Emma, I’m fairly certain the tea around here is safe so catch your breath before you start your next project!

  If you’d like to hear more from the Split Worlds Universe you can check out Emma’s Split World Podcasts here. However the wisest of you will head on over to the Split Worlds site to pre-order the fourth book in her series, A Little Knowledge. Do it now before the Fae get any malicious ideas. A Little Knowledge by Emma Newman

  *****

  Interview by Shellie Horst – SFFWorld.com © 2016

QUOTE:
Urban fantasy enthusiasts
might enjoy this novella, but several elements feel too familiar.

8/12/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
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Print Marked Items
Brother's Ruin: Industrial Magic, Book I
Publishers Weekly.
264.4 (Jan. 23, 2017): p61.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Brother's Ruin: Industrial Magic, Book I
Emma Newman.Tor.com, $2.99 e-book (160p) ISBN 978-0-7653-9395-1
Newman (After Atlas) takes a romp through the underbelly of a magical Victorian England in this flawed alternate
history novella. Charlotte Gunn, an adept illustrator who wields an impressive type of magic, has grown up in a debtridden
family. She conspires to give her brother a chance to impress the Royal Society of the Esoteric Arts, though her
magical abilities far outstrip his. When she uncovers a nefarious plot, she must use all of her resources to protect
herself and her family. Newman reworks the familiar idea of magical schools, breathing some new life into the premise
by exploring the darker corners of London and their murky morality (mirrored by Charlotte's willingness to bend and
break the many rules restricting women of her era). However, some of the stylistic choices seem forced, and many of
the descriptive passages are quite convoluted, distracting from an otherwise interesting plot. Urban fantasy enthusiasts
might enjoy this novella, but several elements feel too familiar. Agent: Jennifer Udden, Barry Goldblatt Literary. (Mar.)
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
"Brother's Ruin: Industrial Magic, Book I." Publishers Weekly, 23 Jan. 2017, p. 61+. General OneFile,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA479714181&it=r&asid=09cfccc136f9a34113838a902226e452.
Accessed 12 Aug. 2017.
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QUOTE:
Gripping and sorrowful, this imaginative story is a satisfying return to Newman's
future of greed and hope.
After Atlas
Publishers Weekly.
263.43 (Oct. 24, 2016): p60.
COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
* After Atlas
Emma Newman. Roc, $15 trade paper (384p) ISBN 978-0-425-28240-3
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
In this richly written companion novel to Planetfall, Newman returns to the Earth that the interstellar explorers in the
first book left behind. Carlos Moreno's mother was selected to leave Earth on the legendary star cruiser Atlas. Carlos
was not only abandoned by her but neglected by his father and betrayed by an idealistic cult leader. After being
captured by the corporate government and sold under a contract that amounts to slavery, he works as an investigator
and eventually is forced to solve the murder of the man he holds responsible for his plight. Despite his grief and anger,
Moreno's training compels him to leave no stone unturned, even when he reveals secrets that might destroy any chance
he has of ever being free again. Newman again portrays a world of luxury bought with pain and suffering, built on lies
and sustained by powerful individuals who exploit the ignorance of the masses. Both new and returning readers will be
drawn into this tale of those who suffered the loss of loved ones who put the Atlas mission ahead of their own families,
never to be heard from again. With details like diamonds, the gumshoe adventure reveals the destruction of those left
behind when Atlas left Earth seeking God. Peril and despair seep into the fabric of society until every avenue of escape
leads only to a new kind of danger. Gripping and sorrowful, this imaginative story is a satisfying return to Newman's
future of greed and hope. (Nov.)
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
"After Atlas." Publishers Weekly, 24 Oct. 2016, p. 60. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA468771813&it=r&asid=d38cfda12fe4fe417df0b8d194a2b14d.
Accessed 12 Aug. 2017.
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QUOTE:
This heartbreaking adventure is a tragedy of science and faith.
Planetfall
Publishers Weekly.
262.40 (Oct. 5, 2015): p39.
COPYRIGHT 2015 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
* Planetfall
Emma Newman. Roc, $15 trade paper (336p) ISBN 978-0-425-28239-7
This heartbreaking adventure is a tragedy of science and faith. Renata "Ren" Ghali followed her lover, Lee Suh-Mi, on
a voyage to the stars with 1,000 other colonists. They found a new world, but Suh-Mi went into the alien structure
known as God's City, and she never came back. In the 22 years since, Ren has contented herself with her work as a
technician. She lives at the foot of God's City and seeks balance between her secret torments and the colony's needs.
That delicate collection of compromises is shattered by the arrival of Suh-Mi's grandson, whose existence could reveal
the web of lies that has held the colony together. Newman (The Split Worlds) begins with the high stakes of a new
colony and raises the risk to every human life as events unfold. She carefully manages her pacing until events make
each revelation as inevitable as it is destructive. The unfurling of God's City's reason for summoning the interstellar
travelers is heightened by the illogic and desperation that threatens the colonists from the start. Ren is obsessed with
repairing every broken object. The first thing God's City breaks is promises, leaving Ren responsible for solving a
mystery that has only borne regret and death as its alien fruit. Agent: Jennifer Udden, Donald Maass Literary. (Nov.)
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
"Planetfall." Publishers Weekly, 5 Oct. 2015, p. 39. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA431617338&it=r&asid=40c6de07710e248288d1c7bab77442f3.
Accessed 12 Aug. 2017.
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QUOTE
triumphant merger of Victorian values
with modern magic; her fantastical romp through another world takes on class and gender dynamics
Science fiction/fantasy
Megan M. McArdle and Kristi Chadwick
Library Journal.
141.13 (Aug. 1, 2016): p67.
COPYRIGHT 2016 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution
permitted.
http://www.libraryjournal.com/
Full Text:
STORIES OF FAMILIES and family dysfunction seem like literary fiction territory. Yet despite trappings of spaceships
and magical creatures, speculative fiction still strives to tell human stories, and family--the one you're born into, the
one you make, or the one you choose--drives many sf/fantasy novels.
Difficult family dynamics are at the heart of K.B. Wagers's Behind the Throne, as heroine Hail resumes her
responsibilities at home that she rejected years before. Cloudbound is a return to Fran Wilde's hugely inventive world
of bone towers and residents who strap on wings and take flight, but hero Nat's dilemmas hinge on threats to his loved
ones. When one must leave family behind in order to escape a dangerous cult, as Nell does in Faith Hunter's Blood of
the Earth, it does not mean they are forgotten.
If you have ever wished your relatives were a little less up in your business, you'll laugh at protagonist Briddey
Flannigan's clan in Connie Willis's Crosstalk. And finally, two sisters rely on their bond as they are ordered into service
in a war against an alien threat in J. Patrick Black's Ninth City Burning.--MM
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CHECK THESE OUT
Anderson, Gillian & Jeff Rovin. The Sound of Seas. Simon451: S. & S. (EarthEnd Saga, Bk. 3). Sept. 2016. 277p.
ISBN 9781476776590. $25; ebk. ISBN 9781476776613. SF
The secret of the Gaalderkhani tiles has been uncovered: these ancient computers not only retain memories about the
past, they also contain a destructive force. When Caidin O'Hara, having inhabited the body of a Gaalderkhani woman,
returns to her own body and time, she finds that her son had been accidently thrust back in time also. As she works on
using the tiles' power to retrieve her son, the modern descendants of the Gaalderkhani are still searching--and killing.
Running from Antarctica to New York City to another planet, the race to save a child--and Earth--reaches its climactic
conclusion. VERDICT The final volume in Anderson and Rovin's dramatic trilogy about ghosts and alien technology
(A Vision of Fire; A Dream of Ice) neatly ties the loose plot threads together in ways that will satisfy paranormal
fantasy and sf readers alike. [See Prepub Alert, 4/1/16.]--KC
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Black, J. Patrick. Ninth City Burning. Ace: Berkley. Sept. 2016.496p. ISBN 9781101991442. $27.; ebk. ISBN
9781101991459. SF
Generations after Earth has been attacked by an unknown alien force, the world is a different place. Most cities were
instantly destroyed by the invaders using an element known as "thelemity," and human survival depends on a few who
can wield this power as well. In the intervening centuries, those who use thelemity are sought and put into military
service. But while the surviving cities lead the ongoing war efforts, the rural settlements resent being employed as a
supply source of resources and soldiers. Two young sisters from the unincorporated wild country are dragged into the
conflict. This intriguing debut falters under the weight of too many first-person points of view, some with dialog that is
awkward in its efforts to replicate teenspeak. VERDICT While the melding of sf aliens and a reality-altering magic are
unusual, thelemity seems too much like plot device superglue. [See Eric Norton's "Genre Spotlight" feature, p. 24ff--
Ed.]--MM
Bledsoe, Alex. Chapel of Ease. Tor. (Tufa, Bk. 4). Sept. 2016.320p. ISBN 9780765376565. $27.99; ebk. ISBN
9781466851429. FANTASY
Dancer and actor Matt Johanssen is thrilled when he gets the lead in an exciting, new off-Broadway show called
Chapel of Ease. Playwright Ray Parrish based the musical on stories from his insular Tennessee community. The play
involves information that Ray always refused to divulge, about something buried in the chapel. Sadly, Ray dies on
opening night, and Matt agrees to return his ashes to his family. He wants a chance to see where Ray grew up and
maybe uncover the chapel's secret. Bledsoe's latest series outing (after Long Black Curl) cleverly uses outsider Matt to
explore the community of the Tufa, people who have lived in their valley long before even the Native Americans. The
novel reads like two very different (although complementary) stories, with the first third giving an intimate look at the
theater scene before the action moves to Tennessee. VERDICT A same-sex romance between Matt and Ray's
childhood friend C.C. adds emotional weight to another great entry in this series, which is always effectively subtle in
how it employs the supernatural, with music central to the magic of the Tufa.--MM
Brailler, Max. Highway to Hell: Can You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse? Gallery. Aug. 2016.400p. ISBN
9781476765679. pap. $16; ebk. ISBN 9781476770376. HORROR
Your name is Jimmy El Camino. After several military tours and a lot of drunken spats, you have been sitting in a
prison cell for over five years. When released, you are told that the world has gone to hell--the zombie apocalypse has
arrived. Forced into a mission--survival or suicide, you're not sure--you must travel from New York to San Francisco in
a 1967 El Camino to try to save the world from extinction. Facing zombies, mad scientists, and cannibals may seem
crazy, but choices need to be made. And you will make these decisions in this action-packed, choose-your-ownadventure
(CYOA) story. Can you survive the zombie apocalypse? VERDICT Those who remember CYOA from
childhood will find a new level of fun and fright with this apocalyptic tale of zombies and cross-country attacks.--KC
Estep, Jennifer. Unraveled. Pocket: Gallery (Elemental Assassins, Bk. 15). Aug. 2016. 400p. ISBN 9781501142215.
pap. $7.99; ebk. ISBN 9781501142260. FANTASY
Gin Blanco, a talented cook, owner of a barbecue joint, and an assassin extraordinaire known as the Spider, also serves
as the queen of the city of Ashland's underworld. Discovering that a secret society called the Circle may be actually
running the show from behind the scenes, and that her mother may have been involved, Gin searches for answers that
are not forthcoming. When her foster brother Finnegan Lane inherits an Old West theme park and hotel resort called
Bullet Pointe, the siblings decide to get away for a few days and check out Finn's new property. Cowboy shoot-outs
and saloons may seem silly at first, but then the mystery of missing jewels and the appearance of Circle assassins turn
their vacation into a wild and deadly confrontation. VERDICT Estep's most recent series outing (after Bitter Bite)
brings fresh revelations and fierce action. Gin's continued search for the truth about her mother's past and her own
struggle to survive enemies make each book a distinct journey.--KC
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Hunter, Faith. Blood of the Earth. Roc: NAL. (Soulwood, Bk. 1). Aug. 2016. 384p. ISBN 9780451473301. pap. $7.99;
ebk. ISBN 9780698184480. FANTASY
When Nell Nicholson Ingram met skin-walker Jane Yellowrock, she had been exiled by the cult she was raised in,
God's Cloud of Glory. Nell has power, and her connection to the forest that surrounds her Soulwood Farm protects her.
After Jane refers her to PsyLED, a federal agency that polices paranormals, Nell gets drawn into the investigation of an
antiparanormal terrorist group called Human Speakers of Truth. Joining this PsyLED team will bring Nell back into the
world--one full of strangers and possible friends, and the Blood Master of Nashville. When the Master's vassal is
kidnapped, Nell and her team are forced to go deep into the heart of the very cult Nell fears. VERDICT Hunter
introduces a new heroine with ties to her "Skinwalker" series that will please fans of those books. Plenty of action,
magic, and fascinating characters, both familiar and new, create another terrific urban fantasy from an established
author.--KC
Jordan, JD. Calamity. Heliosphere. Sept. 2016. 304p. ISBN 9781937868475. pap. $16.99. FANTASY
Long before the legendary Calamity Jane rode with Wild Bill Hickok, she was 15-year-old Martha Jane Canary, whose
life was turned upside down when her boss and friends were murdered, and she was nearly raped but saved by an
otherworldly gunslinger, the Green Man, who is looking for a way home. Accompanying him in his quest for another
spaceship, Jane learns more about the Wild West and the machinations of villainous men, the Grays--creatures who
work against the Greens. As Jane's desire for revenge is tested by her growing bond with the Green Man, she must face
her own personal demons. VERDICT This first novel adds a fresh sf twist to a coming-of-age tale of a Wild West
legend. Told from Calamity Jane's point of view, this gritty story blends the right amount of hard trials and humor,
giving readers a revitalized perspective on a familiar folklore heroine.--KC
Mamatas, Nick. I Am Providence. Night Shade. Aug. 2016. 256p. ISBN 9781597808354. pap. $15.99; ebk. ISBN
9781597805834. HORROR
Novelist Panos Panossian is attending the annual Summer Tentacular horror convention in Providence, RI, when he is
murdered and his face sliced off. That doesn't keep him, however, from being one of the narrators of this satirical salute
to horror master H.P. Lovecraft. The other is first-time attendee Colleen Danzig, who had been rooming with Panossian
to save money; after his death, she begins investigating her fellow attendees. Could one of these barely socialized, zinepublishing,
Cthulhu-obsessed fans be a killer? While a knowledge of Lovecraft and his work might heighten enjoyment
of this novel, any familiarity with rabid fandom will do. The men (and a few women) who show up for the small
convention may be easy to mock, but horror writer Mamatas (The Last Weekend) does so with an insider's
understanding. Having Panossian's disintegrating consciousness tell half the tale draws out the suspense of the murder
mystery, but it's Colleen's chapters that more effectively move the story along. VERDICT The reveal of the killer takes
a while, but anyone who has ever skirted the world of obsessive devotees will find a lot to enjoy in this funny homage
to horror and its leading practitioner.--MM
Neill, Chloe. The Sight. NAL. (Devil's Isle, Bk. 2). Aug. 2016. 352p. ISBN 9780451473356. pap. $15; ebk. ISBN
9780698184534. FANTASY
Claire Connolly didn't plan on becoming a bounty hunter in training, but working with Liam Quinn was a better option
than being condemned as a paranormal Sensitive to Devil's Isle. Liam kept her secret, however, and together they saved
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New Orleans. Now, Claire struggles daily with the fear that she could be outed, or worse, be overcome by the magic
and transform into a wraith. Seven years after the Paranormal War, New Orleans residents are still dealing with the
aftermath, and the rise of a new cult that believes that all Paras should be destroyed. With danger looming from this
new group, and secrets being exposed, Claire attempts to fight the organization's rise and combat her own inner power.
VERDICT Neill's sequel to The Veil continues to prove her adept at world-building and nonstop action. Claire's
honesty and straightforward attitude make her a great character for a harrowing time.--KC
Newman, Emma. A Little Knowledge. Diversion. (Split Worlds, Bk. 4). Aug. 2016. 360p. ISBN 9781682302910. pap.
$14.99; ebk. ISBN 9781682302903. fantasy
Within the Nether, the mirror world that lies between the human Mundanus and the Fae Exilium, is the city of
Londinium. Within a 19th-century English social structure, Will and Cathy, now the Duke and Duchess of Londinium,
struggle to rule. However, their views on how they implement their authority diverge. Will is still bound to old values
by his overbearing family and patron, Lord Iris. Cathy, on the other hand, continues to draw from her time in
Mundanus and wants to vault over 200 years of court tradition and give women equal footing. But with Fae patrons
still holding power, family dynasties can't be taken down quickly. While Will and Cathy work together despite their
differences, the pressure becomes too overwhelming, and one will make a decision that will change their future.
VERDICT Newman's return to the "Split Worlds" series (after All Is Fair) is a triumphant merger of Victorian values
with modern magic; her fantastical romp through another world takes on class and gender dynamics.--KC
* Roberson, Chris. Firewalk. Night Shade. Oct. 2016. 304p. ISBN 9781597808798. $24.99. HORROR
Five years ago, FBI agent Isabel Lefevre helped close the serial murder case involving a sword-wielding maniac named
Nicholas Fuller in the West Coast city of Recondito. Patrick Tevake, her colleague from that task force who is now
working vice, tells her it isn't over, after finding a link between Nicholas's victims and a new street drug known as
"ink." Before his death, Nicholas had raved about a supernatural threat he was trying to stop, which Izzy and Patrick
dismissed as the symptoms of mental illness, but as they investigate, it becomes clear to them that the killer was right.
Izzy's heritage as the granddaughter of a New Orleans voodoo practitioner and Patrick's Polynesian background both
come into play in this gripping supernatural thriller from the cocreator of the comic iZombie, leaving them more open
to seeing the occult roots of the crime. VERDICT While this series launch would appeal to any thriller fan, the terrific
pacing and detailed police work mixed with supernatural elements means that Roberson's novel will serve well horror
and urban fantasy fans alike. [See Eric Norton's "Genre Spotlight" feature, p. 24ff--Ed.]--MM
Shawl, Nisi. Everfair. Tor. Sept. 2016. 384p. ISBN 9780765338051. $26.99; ebk. ISBN 9781466837843. FANTASY
In the late 19th century, the African colony of the Congo was Belgium's stronghold on the continent--one ruled with a
cruel grip as native peoples were tortured and enslaved to produce the rubber valued in Europe. This first novel
reimagines a refuge carved out of the Belgian Congo through the efforts of a group of Fabian Society reformers. The
Fabians, alongside missionaries and local tribal leaders, build the community Everfair and invent steam-powered tools
and airships that help them remain independent. As the world marches on and Europe's African colonies get drawn into
World War I, Everfair will find it harder than ever to survive. VERDICT Fitting loosely under the banner of steampunk,
this captivating look at a lesser-known corner of history includes a large cast of characters, which might make it harder
for readers to form an emotional bond with any one protagonist in particular, but this is an important addition to the
alternate history canon from the James A. Tiptree Award-winning Shawl, best known for her short stories. [See Eric
Norton's "Genre Spotlight" feature, p. 24ff.--Ed.]--MM
Wilde, Fran. Cloudbound. Tor. (Bone Universe, Bk. 2). Sept. 2016. 400p. ISBN 9780765377852. $25.99; ebk. ISBN
9781466858213. FANTASY
After the City's ruling Singers were thrown out of power at the end of Wilde's awardwinning debut, Updraft, the
Towers are still reeling from the sudden power vacuum. Kirit is one of the few Singers not captured or dead, thanks to
her efforts to expose the secrets of the Spire. Her best friend Nat is now a junior councilor for the Densira Tower,
owing to powerful councilor Doran Grigrit's mentorship. The two are flying around the broken Spire looking for
remnants of the codex that the Singers had guarded when they uncover a dark conspiracy that threatens the entire City.
Having the narrative weight carried by Nat rather than Kirit in this outing is a risk, as Nat's character is not as
intrinsically exciting. Still, Wilde illustrates his struggles between doing what's right and the path to power that he
seeks to travel. VERDICT What makes this a must-read are the further explorations of Wilde's City of Towers and the
residents who soar the skies between them. Those who have always wondered what was beneath the clouds will finally
get their answer.--MM
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* Willis, Connie. Crosstalk. Del Rey: Ballantine. Oct. 2016. 512p. ISBN 9780345540676. $28; ebk. ISBN
9780345540683. SF
Would you undergo brain surgery if it meant a deeper emotional connection with your lover? When Trent, Briddey
Flannigan's boyfriend, asks her to get an EED--a procedure to open emotional pathways between two people--she
agrees, despite her family's disapproval. While Briddey is used to her Irish American relatives meddling in all aspects
of her life, she is surprised when coworker C.B. Schwartz tries to stop her from getting the EED as well. The operation
does not go as planned, leaving Briddey telepathically joined to C.B. instead of emotionally bonded to Trent. Willis,
SFWA Grand Master and Hugo Award winner for her time-travel duology, Blackout and All Clear, returns to the lighter
romantic comedy she did so well in To Say Nothing of the Dog. Still, that is not to say that there isn't some scalpelsharp
skewering of cell-phone addiction and our obsession with being connected. While Briddey's family initially
comes across as over the top, Willis makes it work as the story builds steam. VERDICT A fun, romantic near-future
romp from a sf master. [See Eric Norton's "Genre Spotlight" feature, p. 24ff.--Ed.]--MM
COLLECTIONS & ANTHOLOGIES
Strangers Among Us: Tales of the Underdogs and Outcasts. Laksa. (Anthology: Speculative Fiction). Aug. 2016.368p.
ed. by Susan Forest & Lucas K. Law. ISBN 9780993969645. $28; pap. ISBN 9780993969607. $17.95; ebk. ISBN
9780993969614. SF
Much of speculative fiction explores how we deal with forms of an "other." Sometimes the outsider is a monster or an
alien. The 19 stories collected here tackle the idea of people who are other, even to themselves, as a result of mental
health issues. The authors, all Canadians, take different approaches, some addressing the concept straight on, some
exploring it slantwise, with characters whose differences created challenges or granted fresh insights. The excellent
opener, Kelley Armstrong's "The Culling," concocts a dark, resource-starved future in which those who are deemed too
unusual are culled from society. In Tyler Keevil's "The Weeds and the Wildness," a man in the grip of extreme paranoia
believes malevolent gardeners are stalking his neighbors. And "The Dog and the Sleepwalker" by James Alan Gardner
has a hero named "Dog" whose difference might save an entire spaceship's crew. VERDICT Mental illness is an
exciting theme for an anthology, leaving plenty of room for variety. The volume also includes an appendix of mental
health resources. [A portion of this anthology's net revenue will go to the Canadian Mental Health Association.-Ed.]--
MM
ADDITIONAL SF/FANTASY
Leo, Forrest. The Gentleman. Penguin Pr. Aug. 2016. 304p. illus. ISBN 9780399562631. $26; ebk. ISBN
9780399562648. FANTASY
Popular poet Lionel Savage has a problem. His poetry has run dry, his sister Lizzie has been kicked out of boarding
school, and he has inadvertently sold his new bride, Vivien, to the Devil (the gentleman of the title). Lionel has also
discovered that, contrary to his expectation, he both dearly loves his wife and wants her back. When his brother-in-law,
the famous adventurer Ashley Lancaster, comes to town, the two form a plan to steal back Vivien. With the help of the
unconventional Lizzie, their mysterious butler, the adventurous Ashley, and an inventor of a steam-powered flying
machine, Lionel needs only to find the entrance to Hell and save his beloved. What could go wrong? Narrating his tale
as an edited autobiography, Lionel offers shallow introspection as he talks of his exploits. The hilarious footnotes
offered by his "editor" add depth and insight to his musings. VERDICT With lively illustrations by Mahendra Singh
(The Hunting of the Snark), this debut Victorian steampunk novel is a fun romp with witty wordplay, a diverse array of
quirky characters, and a surprisingly lovely ending. [See Prepub Alert, 2/8/16.]--Jennifer Beach, Longwood Univ., Lib.
Farmville, VA
* Shaw, Ali. The Trees. Bloomsbury USA. Aug. 2016.496p. ISBN 9781632862839. $28; ebk. ISBN 9781632862846.
FANTASY
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On the night Nature decides it's had enough, Adrien Thomas is nearly skewered in his bed by trees sprouting up
through his house. All over the world, trees are killing millions and destroying everything standing in their way.
Survivors like Hannah have the skills to navigate the new world. She plans to take her son, Sebastian, and hike out to
her forester brother's home to start new lives. They invite Adrien along after he mentions that his wife, Michelle, is in
Ireland, assuming he will attempt to locate her and will be traveling in the same direction. Now he must find the
courage, heart, and fortitude for this quest. Nature isn't finished with humanity either. It's searching for something or
someone, and Adrien is one who will be tested. VERDICT Shaw (The Girl with Glass Feet) has written an exciting
apocalyptic novel that blends in elements of magic realism. Gripping and occasionally brutal, this survival story
highlights both the best and worst in humanity.--Karin Thogersen, Huntley Area P.L., IL
The Starlit Wood: New Fairy Tales. Saga: S. & S. Oct. 2016.400p. ed. by Dominik Parisien & Navah Wolfe, illus.
ISBN 9781481456128. $25.99; ebk. ISBN 9781481456142. FANTASY
In this anthology of 18 unconventional fairy-tale retellings, Little Red Riding Hood journeys on horseback across a
desert (Seanan McGuire's "In the Desert Like a Bone"), and Hansel and Gretel are modern teens tripping on
hallucinogenic wallpaper (Daryl Gregory's "Even the Crumbs Were Delicious"). The editors challenged contributors to
look at classic stories from the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen, A Thousand and One Nights, and other
traditional sources, and strip and rework them into something new and different. Hence, established sf/fantasy authors
such as Garth Nix, Catherynne M. Valente, and Marjorie M. Liu weave feminist ideas into their tales and explore
psychological and political frameworks to ignite meaningful texts. An author's note at the end of each entry offers
insights into the writer's process. VERDICT A great pick for readers looking for a fresh, diverse spin on standard fairy
tales. Students of creative writing will be also be pleased.--Briana Moore, School Library Journal
DEBUT OF THE MONTH
* Wagers, K.B. Behind the Throne. Orbit: Hachette. (Indranan War, Bk. 1). Aug. 2016. 432p. ISBN 9780316308601.
pap. $14.99; ebk. ISBN 9780316308571. SF
Hail Bristol's career as a successful smuggler is abruptly halted when trackers from the Indranan Empire storm her ship
and inform her that her empress mother is sick and her sisters have been murdered, leaving her the sole heir to the
throne. But this is a life Hail fled, and even the need to obtain justice for her siblings will not make it easy for her to
accept that she must rejoin the palace. Luckily, Hail picked up a few skills from her gun-running days that will serve
her well as a princess in a hostile court. This debut ranks among the best political sf novels in years, largely because of
the indomitable, prickly Hail. The secondary characters--from the trackers who are Hail's only allies at first, to a
conniving cousin--are fascinating as well. The matriarchal structure of the Indranan Empire leads to some interesting
gender dynamics, and the cultural influences being largely from India make for a welcome change. VERDICT This
fast-paced, twisty space opera borrows the political machinations from fantasies such as George R.R. Martin's A Game
of Thrones and Katherine Addison's The Goblin Emperor. [See Eric Norton's "Genre Spotlight" feature, p. 24ff.--Ed.]--
MM
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
SERIES LINEUP
Bradley, Marion Zimmer & Deborah J. Ross. Thunderlord. DAW. (Darkover). Aug. 2016. 416p. ISBN
9780756410544. $27; ebk. ISBN 9780698190702. FANTASY
Those who fondly remember the "Darkover" books (Stormqueen!; Hawkmistress!) set during the Ages of Chaos will
welcome this new entry, which chronicles the aftermath of a conflict between two houses that can control the weather
telepathically. Ross collaborated with Bradley on several other Darkover titles before Bradley's death in 1999, and has
written most recently The Children of Kings.--MM
Fine, Sarah. Splinter. 47North: Amazon. (Reliquary, Bk. 2). Aug. 2016.304p. ISBN 9781503936423. pap. $14.95.
FANTASY
In the wake of the events of series opener Reliquary, Mattie Carver has given up magic and plans to marry Ben. Yet her
talents as a reliquary are too valuable to some, and she will be forced to seek the help of Ben's brother, Asa.--MM
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High Stakes Tor. (Wild Cards, Bk. 23). Aug. 2016. 560p. ed. by George R.R. Martin. ISBN 9780765335623. $27.99;
ebk. ISBN 9781466824355. FANTASY
This latest collaborative novel in the "Wild Cards" series starts in Kyrgyzstan with cop Francis Black, joker Marcus
Morgan, and thief Mollie "Tesseract" Steunenberg going up against Baba Yaga Contributors this time out are David
Anthony Durham, Stephen Leigh, John Joseph Miller, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Caroline Spector, and Ian Tregillis.--
MM
Marmell, Ari. Dead to Rites. Titan. (Mick Oberon Job, Bk. 3). Aug. 2016. 336p. ISBN 9781785650970. pap. $14.95;
ebk. ISBN 9781785650987. FANTASY
The third entry (after Hallow Point) in the inventive series about a 1930s private eye who also happens to be one of the
Fae mixes supernatural investigations and Al Capone's Chicago for an irresistible combo.--MM
Megan M. McArdle is a Collection Specialist at the Library of Congress, National Library Service for the Blind and
Physically Handicapped. Kristi Chadwick is Advisor for the Massachusetts Library System. In addition to being a 2013
LJ Reviewer of the Year and 2014 Mover & Shaker, she was also a finalist judge for the 2015 LJ SELF-e Award in
Fantasy
QUOTABLE
"The Main Ballroom was only about half full, with most attendees gathering in clumps. To Colleen it looked like what
she imagined a large AA meeting would be, except instead of alcoholism the attendees had all sorts of other, subtler,
problems."--Nick Mamatas, I Am Providence
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
McArdle, Megan M., and Kristi Chadwick. "Science fiction/fantasy." Library Journal, 1 Aug. 2016, p. 67+. General
OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA459804953&it=r&asid=9fdcc4c6405d9eafbab5b4a617220b39.
Accessed 12 Aug. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A459804953
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Newman lands at Roc with 'Planetfall'
Rachel Deahl
Publishers Weekly.
261.46 (Nov. 17, 2014): p8.
COPYRIGHT 2014 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
For Ace/Roc, Penguin's science fiction imprint, Rebecca Brewer took world English rights to Emma Newman's novel
Planetfall. Jennifer Udden at the Donald Maass agency brokered the two-book deal for Newman, who was nominated
for a 2014 British Fantasy Award for her series Split Worlds (Angry Robot). Planetfall follows a woman named Ren
living in a colony on a distant planet who, Udden explained, must "unravel the colony's secrets when a mysterious
visitor arrives out of the blue."
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Deahl, Rachel
Source Citation (MLA 8
th Edition)
Deahl, Rachel. "Newman lands at Roc with 'Planetfall'." Publishers Weekly, 17 Nov. 2014, p. 8. General OneFile,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA391719269&it=r&asid=cd4e5ebbb889fda0c9201b9cf071bfba.
Accessed 12 Aug. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A391719269

"Brother's Ruin: Industrial Magic, Book I." Publishers Weekly, 23 Jan. 2017, p. 61+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA479714181&it=r. Accessed 12 Aug. 2017. "After Atlas." Publishers Weekly, 24 Oct. 2016, p. 60. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA468771813&it=r. Accessed 12 Aug. 2017. "Planetfall." Publishers Weekly, 5 Oct. 2015, p. 39. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA431617338&it=r. Accessed 12 Aug. 2017. McArdle, Megan M., and Kristi Chadwick. "Science fiction/fantasy." Library Journal, 1 Aug. 2016, p. 67+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA459804953&it=r. Accessed 12 Aug. 2017. Deahl, Rachel. "Newman lands at Roc with 'Planetfall'." Publishers Weekly, 17 Nov. 2014, p. 8. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA391719269&it=r. Accessed 12 Aug. 2017.

• The Speculative Herald
  http://www.speculativeherald.com/2016/11/08/review-after-atlas-by-emma-newman/
  Word count: 1201

  QUOTE:
  After Atlas is a complete and nearly perfectly plotted and paced story. I grew to love the characters so much, that I would happily read more stories set in this world.
  Review: After Atlas by Emma Newman
  NOVEMBER 8, 2016
  Review: After Atlas by Emma NewmanAfter Atlas by Emma Newman
  Series: Planetfall #2
  Published by Roc on November 8 2016
  Genres: Science Fiction
  Pages: 336
  Our reviews of this author: Planetfall
  Format: ARC
  Source: Publisher
  Thanks to Roc for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

  LibraryThing button-amazon book-depository-button audible-button

  four-half-stars
  I enjoyed Planetfall last year, which I read during Sci-Fi Month 2015, but I was stunned by how much more I loved After Atlas, a “companion” novel which takes place in the same world but follows different characters and has a completely different story line. After Atlas references some events and characters from the first book, but you certainly don’t have to read it first in order to enjoy this one. In fact, if you haven’t read Planetfall, I highly recommend starting with After Atlas, simply because it’s the better book.

  After Atlas is basically a murder mystery, and nearly the entire story is focused on detective Carlos Moreno digging into the murder of high-profile cult leader Alejandro Casales. Carlos is shocked by Casales’ death, a man who was a beloved father figure to Carlos when he was a child. Taken against his will by his father to live in a cult, a secluded fortress called the Circle where all technology is banned, Carlos’ only bright memories are spending time with Alejandro, who taught him to live off the land. When the forensic team suggests the death could be a suicide, Carlos knows Alejandro’s death is much more than it appears on the surface. After all, how could a man who ruled a peaceful commune and loved life so much possibly kill himself? Carlos knows the answers are deeply buried, and it’s up to him and his Artificial Personal Assistant Tia to find the truth.

  And the timing of Casales’ death is too coincidental: it’s the fortieth anniversary of the spaceship Atlas’s departure from Earth, the ship that took his mother from Carlos when he was just a baby, and a capsule that has come back from that fateful trip is about to be opened, its secrets divulged to the public. How are all these things tied together? And how does Carlos fit into the picture? One thing’s for sure, delving into these mysteries is sure to dredge up painful moments from his past.

  I’ve always loved police procedurals, after all I’m a huge fan of Bones and Castle, and I realized after reading this book that I should read more of them, because I’m fascinated by forensic science. But forensics in Newman’s future are quite different in many ways from the realistic shows on TV. Technology is so advanced that it would be nearly impossible to not solve a crime, due to all the information that is immediately available. Carlos is connected to the internet 24/7 by a chip in his brain, a chip that grants him instant access to almost all information. Even better, his APA, who he calls Tia, can filter out whatever he isn’t interested in, file it in any way that Carlos asks her to, and send messages on his behalf instantly. It’s where our future might be headed someday, the unnerving idea that there really is no escape from the internet.

  As a detective, Carlos has access to all sorts of cool things, like being able to visit a crime scene through virtual reality technology, and because crime scenes are recorded from all angles of the room, it’s easy to go back weeks after the crime and investigate even the smallest corners of the room for evidence. Carlos pulls off some truly amazing feats of discovering clues, and even though there were times when his methods seemed almost too convenient, I just let it go because it was so much fun to read.

  And while the mystery part of the story is the main focus, I was just as enthralled by Carlos, who is one of the most complex characters I’ve had the pleasure of meeting in fiction. This guy has been through a lot in his life, and as the story progresses we get glimpses into his past that made me wonder how he has survived this long. Carlos is currently owned by a corporation called the Ministry of Justice, and by “owned” I mean he doesn’t have any freedom or personal rights. His term of service to the MOJ is fifty years, and when he makes mistakes that time is extended. As cruel as this sounds, I loved the idea, and the way Carlos handles his slavery (because that’s what it is) shows what a hard worker he is. His best friend Dee, who helped him live through a rough patch before his contract was bought by the MOJ, is precious to him because she’s one of the few people who knows exactly what he’s been through. And as bad as things sound, we discover later in the book that they could actually be much worse.

  Other characters of note: Travis, a computer hacker who is unfortunately married to an extremely cruel man named Gabor, and a gender neutral character named Naal Delaney who is of great help to Carlos during the investigation. You don’t see many gender neutral characters in fiction, and although I did struggle a bit with the author’s use of the pronouns “hir” and “ze,” it was worth it to spend time with such an interesting person.

  By the end of the book, there was still so much more I wanted to know about these characters and Newman’s fascinating world. And yet, I read the last page and was satisfied—despite the shocker of an ending. After Atlas is a complete and nearly perfectly plotted and paced story. I grew to love the characters so much, that I would happily read more stories set in this world. The ending suggests that the author might pick things up where she left us, because a whole new story has the potential to unfold from those events. But she could just as well jump around and tell more stories from other moments in time. Really, the possibilities are endless, and I for one can’t wait to see what she decides to write next.

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  four-half-stars
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  Tammy Sparks
  Books are my thing: reading them, collecting them, gazing at them, dreaming about them, talking about them! And dogs. I love dogs a lot:-) You can see more of my reviews on my blog, Books, Bones & Buffy.

• Starburst Magazine
  http://www.starburstmagazine.com/reviews/book-reviews-latest-literary-releases/16304-after-atlas
  Word count: 455

  AFTER ATLAS
  PrintE-mail WRITTEN BY ED FORTUNE

  After Atlas is the sequel of sorts to Emma Newman’s previous science fiction novel, Planetfall. By which we mean that though After Atlas is set in the same near-future dystopia as Planetfall, it’s a different story focusing on different characters.

  Those expecting an encore to the critically-acclaimed Plantefall will be both delighted and disappointed; this is a very different story, as you should expect. However, Newman’s beautiful writing style and powerful use of structure is every bit as present here as it is in the first novel. After Atlas works entirely fine as a standalone; the thrills are still as strong regardless of your experience with the author’s previous work.

  The novel is set in a world in which mankind has pretty much ran out of available resources. Governments have merged with corporate interests in such a way that they are now one and the same. The brightest and best people in the world have left; they got their heads together long ago to work out a way to leave the Earth via a ship called the Atlas, in the hope of meeting a newly discovered alien life.

  After Atlas’ main character is a chap called Carlos Moreno. His mother left to board the Atlas when he was a small boy, and his father couldn’t cope with being abandoned. These tragic circumstances lead to Carlos becoming a highly-trained detective for GovCorp. Unluckily for Carlos, the same training means that he’s indentured to the state. Things make a turn for a worse when the earth-bound leader of the group that went away into space turns up dead. Carlos is the only one truly qualified to investigate the murder, yet at the same time the person with the most emotional baggage related to the case.

  What Newman has created here is a lovely locked room mystery in which the stakes are incredibly high and the world is so very engaging. Whereas Planetfall felt liked a ragged scream in the dark at times, After Atlas feels like a more rational response to a dying Earth. Carlos’ emotional journey is rational and yet utterly gripping. This is a tale about bargaining with the untenable and finding the strength to keep going no matter what. The protagonist is a man with nothing, and yet somehow he still has something to lose. Emma Newman creates addictive page turners, and this is another fine example of that.

  Expect to see this book on various award shortlists in 2017. It’s that good.

  AFTER ATLAS / AUTHOR: EMMA NEWMAN / PUBLISHER: ROC / RELEASE DATE: NOVEMBER 8TH

• LitStack
  http://litstack.com/litstack-review-after-atlas-by-emma-newman/
  Word count: 811

  LitStack Review: After Atlas by Emma Newman

  Sharon Browning 29 November, 2016 Crime and Thriller, Mystery, Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction
  After Atlasafter-atlas
  Emma Newman
  Roc
  Release Date: November 8, 2016
  ISBN 978-0-425282-40-3

  Last year, Emma Newman’s novel, Planetfall, chronicled the aftermath of an interstellar expedition whose participants thought they had found the resting place of God. Led by the unshakable faith of the genius scientist known as the Pathfinder, a thousand people left behind their homes, their families, their lives, in order to find humankind’s place in the cosmos.

  But what of those left behind?

  After Atlas is not a sequel to Planetfall, not another installment in a linear series. Rather, it is a companion novel, a story linked to the other but along tangential lines.

  Detective Carlos “Carl” Moreno is was one of those left behind. His mother, the Pathfinder herself, disappeared into the stars, leaving her infant son and shattered husband to pick up the pieces of their lives at a religious commune established by charismatic Alejandro Casales, who had himself once been attached to the Atlas project but now eschews technology of any kind.

  Forty years later, the world is feverishly anticipating the opening of a time capsule left behind by the Atlas team; everyone is counting down the hours until the unveiling – everyone but Detective Moreno, who resents the attention anything associated with the Atlas brings to his own hermetic life. When Alejandro Casales, now an international celebrity, is found dead in a hotel room outside of London, Carl is assigned to the case due to his personal knowledge of the man and his teachings.

  What follows is a gripping tale that succeeds on many different levels. It’s a deftly written murder mystery, a fascinating – and alarming – glimpse into a distinctly possible future, and a deeply moving character study of an outwardly successful man who is in reality trapped in a kind of indentured servitude – one that is completely legal even if it exists in the shadows of society.

  All three of these levels are so seamlessly integrated that it’s easy get lost in one without even considering the others. The procedural mystery engulfs us as we watch Carl struggle with his personal demons, even as the scope of the investigation grows beyond the bounds of this world. To be so anchored in the “present” while driven by the past, to be so focused on the actions that occurred in one room on one night that yet illuminate (in terrible clarity) the sweeping effects of so many other actions put into play on so many far-reaching levels, to feel part of an extremely personal story that is yet so inextricably tied into a world changing narrative, is simply amazing.

  And yet along with these expansive themes, there are so many small touches, so many nuances, that are built into this novel – touches and nuances that do little more than keep the environment cohesive, yet make this remote world tactile, intimate, urgent. It feels utterly genuine.

  While there are many different aspects to After Atlas that are intriguing, what has gotten under my skin the deepest is author Emma Newman’s vision of the near future, when there are no longer countries but “gov-corps” ruthlessly run by combined political and commercial interests, where society has become homogenized yet feels more remote and impersonal, where technology is so ingrained – literally as well as figuratively – that surveillance and merchandizing and profiling are expected and accepted, and privilege includes strategic manipulation of that technology. Yet again, as I reader I was allowed to keep this dire future at arm’s length, as Carl’s compelling personal story deftly humanized its effects. This is a master stroke by Ms. Newman, one that works incredibly well to mute the visceral reaction we have to these potential future developments and keep them in the realm of genre fiction rather than hinting at any kind of miasmic prediction. (No less chilling, though.)

  In fact, it’s easy to see that Emma Newman is (according to her biography), a “keen role-player”. First Ren in Planetfall and now Carl in After Atlas are such well developed characters that they transcend the more fictive aspects of their respective stories – this can only be achieved by someone who can anchor any story, no matter how fantastical, with a complex yet cohesive central character. Add to that a believable (if disquieting) environment, a powerful story line, a compelling cast of supporting characters, and a realization that consequences, once set in motion, are not easily mitigated, and you have some mighty fine reading.

  And oh, yes – After Atlas is mighty fine reading, indeed.

  ~ Sharon Browning

• Fantasy Literature
  http://www.fantasyliterature.com/reviews/after-atlas/
  Word count: 1304

  After Atlas: CSI: Future World
  Readers’ average rating:
  After Atlas by Emma NewmanAfter Atlas by Emma NewmanAfter Atlas by Emma Newman
  Emma Newman’s After Atlas (2016) is the pseudo-sequel to her first sci-fi offering, Planetfall (2015). As Kat explained in her review, Planetfall is about a colony of humans who left Earth to follow Suh, an alleged prophet who received a supernatural message giving her the coordinates of an unknown distant planet where she was supposed to travel to receive instructions about God’s plans for humanity. After Atlas takes place on Earth, almost 40 years after the ship left. No word has come from the colonists, but the world awaits the opening of a time capsule left behind by the crew.
  Carmen left her husband and son Carlos on Earth after she qualified to make the trip with Suh. Carlos’ story was of tremendous human interest and much press coverage, but he grew up on the fringes of society and lived a hard childhood having been left by his mother and cared for by a father who couldn’t hold his life together.
  Carlos and his father turned to the anti-technology religious sect called The Circle where their leader, Alejandro Casales, took them in. Carlos left The Circle as a teen and was told that he could never return. Abused as a runaway, Carlos made his way to Britain where he and his only friend Dee were taken to the “Hot-House,” a work camp-like training operation that converts non-entities into valued chattel.
  Fast forward to After Atlas’ present: Carlos is all grown-up and sold into servitude to the Ministry of Justice as a highly skilled detective in Norope, the hybrid government-corporation that includes Britain and Scandinavia.
  Newman’s setting is Blade Runner-lite: crowded, overwhelmingly inundated with advertising … but less Asian, rainy, and absent of fully self-aware automatons. Carlos’ world is one flush with wearable and embedded technological advancements and an almost absolute absence of privacy:
  Planetfall by Emma Newman
  Book 1: Planetfall
  Most of the people I can see in this dingy London backstreet are talking to either projected avatars or, like me, just the voices of their Artificial Personal Assistants, delivered directly into their brains via neural implant.
  The Planetfall-connected plot of the 40th anniversary opening of the capsule is the fulcrum for After Atlas, and an agent for future sequels. This story, however, is not about alien worlds, spaceships, and off-world colonies. The bulk of the After Atlas narrative is focused on the murder of Casales, who was hanged, drawn, and quartered (stomach split, innards spilled, and all limbs and head hacked from his body). A conglomerate of sketchy organizations, including the American, European, and Noropean Gov-Corps and The Circle, want Carlos specifically assigned to the case. There were clear signs of suicide in the plethora of evidence … not including, of course, the beheading and dismemberment. Think of it as CSI: Dystopia — a future-Earth version of a crime procedure drama.
  The greatest trait of Newman’s Planetfall was her ability to craft detailed and intricate psychological analyses as part of her character’s development. (note: not all of the Fantasy Literature reviewers felt the same, though; read the FanLit review for three different perspectives.) Alejandro had been a father figure and mentor to Carlos when his own father was too mentally detached to care for him. In After Atlas, Carlos’ investigation takes a severe emotional toll, which affords Newman the opportunity to expose those skills at writing inner monologue and psychological angst.
  Newman threads her tale with essays on the intrusiveness of technology and societies’ collective ceding of individualized control to governments and corporations. Much of Carlos’ dialogue occurs with Tia, his Artificial Personal Assistant — an ersatz artificial intelligence tied to the chip embedded in his brain. Tia has more intelligence than your Apple Siri, but with the same personality.
  Existence on Earth is kind of rough going, and it’s no wonder why the original thousand colonists wanted to get off. Nourishment comes primarily from protein printers, while “real” food is cost-prohibitive to all but the wealthiest of citizens. The everyday use of 3D printing and resource-management were key elements in Newman’s original and play a thematic role in After Atlas as well. Religion is a protected right in the world of After Atlas, however it’s looked at as an unnecessary touch point of a quaint past. Carlos combines “Jesus” and “Mohammed” to create the portmanteau exclamation JeeMuh throughout the story.
  The future-tech crime-drama is interesting and entertaining, but doesn’t make for a great murder-mystery. The technological speculations are reasonable within the context of own real-world speed of change. Newman keeps the tech detail well balanced and believable while maintaining overall comprehension and pace of story.
  I didn’t predict the precise resolution, but I knew where it was going and how it would tie in with the fictional Planetfall mythology and history. While the ending of After Atlas isn’t exactly deus ex machina, there are some relatively convenient circumstances that help tie up the loose ends and set up further stories in the Planetfall world.
  I enjoyed After Atlas, but it didn’t have the power of the original and I don’t expect it to be as memorable. That said, Newman’s created a credible future society with commensurate technological advances, which provides potential in the additional planned stories in her world.
  Published November 8, 2016. Acclaimed author Emma Newman returns to the captivating universe she created in Planetfall with a stunning science fiction mystery where one man’s murder is much more than it seems… Gov-corp detective Carlos Moreno was only a baby when Atlas left Earth to seek truth among the stars. But in that moment, the course of Carlos’s entire life changed. Atlas is what took his mother away; what made his father lose hope; what led Alejandro Casales, leader of the religious cult known as the Circle, to his door. And now, on the eve of the fortieth anniversary of Atlas’s departure, it’s got something to do why Casales was found dead in his hotel room—and why Carlos is the man in charge of the investigation. To figure out who killed one of the most powerful men on Earth, Carlos is supposed to put aside his personal history. But the deeper he delves into the case, the more he realizes that escaping the past is not so easy. There’s more to Casales’s death than meets the eye, and something much more sinister to the legacy of Atlas than anyone realizes…

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  March 8th, 2017. Jason Golomb´s rating: 3 | Emma Newman | SFF Reviews | no comments |

  JASON GOLOMB, who joined us in September 2015, graduated with a degree in Communications from Boston University in 1992, and an M.B.A. from Marymount University in 2005. His passion for ice hockey led to jobs in minor league hockey in Baltimore and Fort Worth, before he returned to his home in the D.C. metro area where he worked for America Online. His next step was National Geographic, which led to an obsession with all things Inca, Aztec and Ancient Rome. But his first loves remain SciFi and Horror, balanced with a healthy dose of Historical Fiction.

• Pop Culture Beast
  http://www.popculturebeast.com/book-atlas-emma-newman/
  Word count: 378

  QUOTE:
  stealthily delivers an emotional punch at the end, making the reader care far more for characters they wouldn’t expect.
  Book: After Atlas (Emma Newman)
  JL Jamieson11.2016Book Review, Books
  After AtlasAfter Atlas
  Emma Newman

  Roc

  November 8th, 2016

  Carlos Moreno just wants to be left alone. Since his mother left on the Atlas to follow the Pathfinder all those years ago, the press has looked at him as the abandoned child. Now that the time capsule the crew buried before leaving is about to be unearthed, everyone seems to want a statement from him. This is life in After Atlas.

  Carlos was left behind on Earth by his mother, but his father seemed to want to leave reality behind when she left him there too. First he retreated within himself, then he retreated into the cult known as the Circle. When Carlos left the Circle and his father to start his own life, he was picked up by child sellers, hot house trained to be an investigator, and sold to the Noropean Ministry of Justice. When the leader of the Circle Alejandro Casales turns up dead in his jurisdiction, the MoJ sees Carlos as the most qualified to take the case.

  In solving the case, Carlos stumbles on a secret worth killing for.

  Planetfall and After Atlas
  After Atlas is set in the same world as Planetfall, and much like Planetfall it’s a tale that surprises. Emma Newman artfully crafts a tale that looks like a straightforward science fiction murder mystery and turns it into something else near the end, giving a whole new view of a different story. Also like Planetfall, it stealthily delivers an emotional punch at the end, making the reader care far more for characters they wouldn’t expect.

  PCBStars10

  JL Jamieson
  JL Jamieson is a strange book nerd who writes technical documents by day, and book news, reviews, and other assorted opinions for you by night. She is working on her own fiction, and spends time making jewelry to sell at local conventions, as well as stalking the social media accounts of all your favorite writers.

• The Middle Shelf - blog
  http://www.themiddleshelf.org/reviews/emma-newman-planetfall-after-atlas
  Word count: 599

  Emma Newman, Planetfall & After Atlas
  15/1/2017 0 Comments

  Emma Newman, Planetfall
  Emma Newman, After Atlas
  Emma Newman,
  Planetfall, Roc, 2015.
  After Atlas, Roc, 2016.

  "Why two covers?" are you asking, "You never put two covers even if it's a series." Thank you for being so observant a regular reader (or if it's the first time you come here, welcome). Planetfall and After Atlas are both set in the same universe. They are both tied by one event: a ship called Atlas leaving Earth with humans aboard. But they can both be read as stand alone novels, you could even read just one and not the other. On the other hand, reading both as a diptych will certainly illuminate the stories more...
  Planetfall.
  Colonists from Earth have arrived on a planet, looking for God under the guidance of a woman named Suh. The novel follows Ren, an engineer. She's obviously troubled by a tragedy that happened when they arrived on the planet and that she hid from the other colonists. But suddenly, Suh's grandson appears outside of the settlement.

  Planetfall has hints of 2001, but the quest of a higher power is often in the background and the mysterious tragedy that surrounds the apparently happy settlement is centre stage of this intense novel.
  After Atlas.
  Forty years after the ship Atlas has left Earth in search of God's planet, Carlos Moreno, whose mother left aboard Atlas when he was a boy, is indentured and has been working for decades as a detective for the Ministry of Justice. He's assigned to the murder of Alejandro Casales, a cult leader he knew when he was a boy.

  At first glance, the novel has all the attributes of a cyberpunk whodunnit: the main character is a troubled loner, it starts in a rainy city and moves to a chic hotel in the country where the crime happened.
  For all appearances, both novels are extremely different: while the first one is a metaphysical planet opera but above all a story about mental breakdown, the other one is a dystopian noir cyberpunk that moves from a Blade Runner like setting to Agatha Christie with more gore and virtual reality.
  The themes and tones are different too: Planetfall is raw with grief. It strikes true and is gut wrenching. After Atlas is, for most of the novel, a grim social commentary through a murder investigation and reminds at times of The Stars My Destination.
  But both have this common theme: how do you flee a life that's a sham and in which you try to hold onto appearances and find small ways to make it bearable?
  The characters are certainly a highlight of both novels: Ren, in Planetfall, is written with an amazingly true intensity. Carlos, in After Atlas, has all the appearances of the hard-boiled detective and reveals, layer by layer, his anger and his drive.

  By reading Planetfall first and then After Atlas, both endings will be even more striking and leave you wondering what will happen. But it will also make visible how both, despite such different stories and settings, are a variation on the importance of choices. Reading the diptych will make you ask for more of Newman's writing... And since she has also written a series of fantasy novels, Split Worlds, that wish can be easily fulfilled!

  The author's website.

  Update - 3 May 2017: After Atlas has been shortlisted for the 2017 Arthur C. Clarke Award. An excellent choice!

• Washington Post
  https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/best-science-fiction-fantasy-books-november-2016/2016/11/01/b3cba896-9ab9-11e6-b3c9-f662adaa0048_story.html?utm_term=.9b76a6c3fe4e
  Word count: 251

  QUOTE:
  detective novel on acid.
  Newman has crafted a novel in which the political and emotional stakes are easy to understand and enjoy.
  "After Atlas," by Emma Newman (Roc)
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  Emma Newman’s After Atlas (Roc) is a detective novel on acid. The book — a stand-alone sequel to last year’s “Planetfall” — follows Carlos Moreno, a detective with a major conflict of interest, as he investigates the murder of Alejandro Casales, a religious cult leader with major political influence in the United States. Casales helped raise Moreno after his mother abandoned him to join the Atlas, a spaceflight mission seeking a higher power. Casales’s murder is secondary to Moreno’s inner turmoil, though, as he grapples with the aftermath of years of suffering and abuse. Newman’s psychological insight is astute, but even better is her exploration of a future when people can print anything they need and have instant communication and access to information through a chip in their heads. If Newman’s first book left you hungry to know what happened to the Earth that the characters in that novel left behind, “After Atlas” has all the answers, delivered in a dreamy yet emotionally intense style. Even for those who haven’t read “Plantfall,” Newman has crafted a novel in which the political and emotional stakes are easy to understand and enjoy.

• Fantasy Book Review
  http://www.fantasybookreview.co.uk/Emma-Newman/Brothers-Ruin.html
  Word count: 524

  QUOTE:
  highly enjoyable quick read that is well written, with quality characters and an intriguing ending.
  Home > Reviews
  Brother's Ruin by Emma Newman
  Brother's Ruin book cover
  Free preview
  Rating
  7.7/10
  The Industrial Magic series should be fascinating
  I received an ARC of Brother's Ruin through NetGalley. Thank you to Emma Newman and Tor.
  Brother's Ruin is the first novel in Newman's Industrial Magic series. This is an urban fantasy story set in an alternative London circa 1850 where people who have magic within themselves become members of the Royal Society of Esoteric Arts. Civilians who have magic capabilities that are currently latent/inactive have to be handed over to the Empire before they become "wild" and they can attend one of three colleges, learning the science like details about their powers. They then use these abilities to aid the smooth running of the nation.
  This brings us to our two main characters. An intelligent young lady called Charlotte who is an artist and her brother Ben who has been suffering from poor health recently. Both can "manipulate" magic but one greatly more so than the other. My favourite character has to be the good looking, charming and mysterious teacher from the College of Fine Kinetics, Magus Hopkins.
  Brother's Ruin is not a book about the life, trials, and tribulations in a magic establishment but is regarding the process up unto that point. The tale is also about a certain problem that Charlotte and Ben's family find themselves in. Knowing what the diabolical outcome could be, they spend the story trying to fix things. These two parts of the plot do cross over. It isn't the most complex story in the world which was fine for me and I completed this in one day so I must have enjoyed it a fair bit.
  Although this is quite a short story, with the limited amount of characters, I found that they were still developed and interesting. When the tale came to a close I definitely wanted to find out more about them and the next book's adventures should be great. In a similar way, there are only two or three settings where the action takes place but for this story focused tale, that was not an underwhelming element at all.
  If Brother's Ruin is anything to go by, then the Industrial Magic series should be fascinating. I get the vibe that this book is almost an introduction to this world because when it finishes, things are set up enticingly well for the next story. I was planning to give this narrative about 7/10 until the conclusion which included an excellent reveal so it earned the extra marks! To conclude, a highly enjoyable quick read that is well written, with quality characters and an intriguing ending. The only negative aspect really is that I received this as an ARC and I have to wait longer for book two.
  This Brother's Ruin book review was written by James Tivendale
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• Kirkus
  https://www.kirkusreviews.com/features/ibrothers-ruini-emma-newman/
  Word count: 652

  Brother’s Ruin by Emma Newman
  By Ana Grilo on March 24, 2017
  1850, England. A world much like ours but with a distinct difference: magic exists and it’s regulated by the Royal Society of the Esoteric Arts. Whenever a new mage is discovered, they must be reported. They are then tested for the type of magic they are attuned to and eventually a monetary offer is made to their family. It’s an offer that can’t be refused and the new mages are then taken away to be trained to protect the country.

  Rumours abound about what happens to the mages once they join the society: that they are bound and effectively prisoners of the state. That corruption is rife within their ranks. That people can be disappeared when they join up.

  Which is why Charlotte Gunn, a burgeoning yet clearly powerful mage, has decided to keep her powers a secret. And it’s not like she is new to keeping things hidden: she is also a very talented illustrator but, given her gender and the things she is prevented from doing because of it, she hasn’t been allowed to disclose who she is. And all the money she makes goes into helping her sickly brother Ben attend university since their family’s fortune is not what it once was. Worse even, their father has taken up a loan that he can’t pay and the sharks are coming knocking, knocking on their door. The only way out is for the family to have a mage so they can make money out of the Royal Society – and their father believes that Ben is the one.

  This is my second encounter with the work of Emma Newman. The first was with Planetfall, a fantastic futurist science fiction novel that blew my mind away. Brother’s Ruin is a staggeringly different work – the genre, the setting, everything – showing the author’s fabulous eclecticism. I love that difference, even though the work here is a bit less exciting and fresh than Planetfall. It might be unfair to make that comparison, but having read a previous work, one creates a certain level of expectation, and it’s only fair that I at least disclose them here.

  Continue reading >

  Brother’s Ruin has a lot going for it. I loved Charlotte and her disposition for getting to the bottom of things and learning the truth even against all friendly – and unfriendly – advice. Her love for her family and determination to save her brother and father from ruin are remarkable. There is a little bit of saviour complex there, but the potential for growth is incredible. Just as the bits that we learn about mages and the Royal Society are too. Are the rumours true? Is the Royal Society evil? The novella ends in a fantastic note, with Charlotte being offered the chance to do something exclusively for herself, to not only truly embrace who she is (with a sign of darkness? There is definitely a side of brewing darkness there) but also use that for what she believes to be the greater good.

  This is all tantalising stuff. And perhaps this is my biggest gripe with the novella: that it feels incomplete and introductory. I guess it’s only to be expected, this being a novella and the first part of a series. But this first entry felt pain-by-numbers in the way that it showcases its familiar setting, character development, and even the romantic element, yet leaving all the cool potential to be clearly developed later.

  Maybe it’s a bit crass to complain about a work’s potential, especially when we know there is going to be more coming. But damn it, I wanted to have seen it now.

  In Booksmugglerish, a frustrated 7 out of 10.

• Pop Culture Beast
  http://www.popculturebeast.com/book-brothers-ruin-emma-newman/
  Word count: 349

  QUOTE:
  This is a gaslamp fantasy, and it works quite well. Newman always writes characters you get drawn into, and this book looks to be the start of a really good series.
  Book: Brother’s Ruin (Emma Newman)
  JL Jamieson03.2017Book Review, Books
  brothers ruinBrother’s Ruin

  Emma Newman

  Tor.com

  March 14th, 2017

  Charlotte Gunn has a secret. She has strong magical ability.

  She has to keep it quiet, or the Royal Society will come for her, and she’d have to give up her life, her engagement, and her family could be punished for hiding her.

  Except her family doesn’t know.

  Her brother finds out when her father contacts the Royal Society to have him tested, because they pay families for talented magic users, and her father has gotten indebted over his head. Her brother, Benjamin, isn’t very strongly talented. Charlotte can fix that.

  As long as she can hide nearby and do his test for him, they’ll take Benjamin and leave her alone. Since she’ll test well, they’ll pay a lot for him.

  However she ends up in over her head when she stumbles onto a conspiracy of Royal Society mages, and it’s one that could end with her father dead and her brother apprenticed to the man at the center of it all.

  This is a gaslamp fantasy, and it works quite well. Newman always writes characters you get drawn into, and this book looks to be the start of a really good series. Can’t wait for the next one.

  PCBStars8

  JL Jamieson
  JL Jamieson is a strange book nerd who writes technical documents by day, and book news, reviews, and other assorted opinions for you by night. She is working on her own fiction, and spends time making jewelry to sell at local conventions, as well as stalking the social media accounts of all your favorite writers.

• LitStack
  http://litstack.com/litstack-review-brothers-ruin-by-emma-newman/
  Word count: 748

  LitStack Review: Brother’s Ruin by Emma Newman

  Sharon Browning 19 April, 2017 Fantasy
  Brother’s Ruin
  Industrial Magic, Book #1
  Emma Newman
  Tor.com
  Release Date: March 14, 2017
  ISBN 978-0-7653-9396-8

  It’s probably not politically correct to illustrate something literary by using a television reference, but I couldn’t help but think what a wonderful TV pilot Emma Newman’s first book in her Industrial Magic series, Brother’s Ruin, would make.

  This first installment hits all the right notes. The environment of mid-1800s London is glorious in its “gaslight” detail with hansom cabs, muttonchops, crinolines and currant buns. The characters are well defined, especially Charlotte “Charlie” Gunn, a tenderhearted young woman who looks forward to marrying her fiancé and starting her own family. But Charlotte’s life isn’t as simple as it seems: her family is struggling financially, her beloved brother, Ben, suffers from an illness that has circumvented his studies at university, and her own talents as an accomplished illustrator must be marketed under an assumed name so as to not embarrass her family with such an unladylike endeavor.

  Yet this London also has a decidedly different bent, as evidenced by the Royal Society of Esoteric Arts, a powerful agency made up of magi who utilize highly specialized knowledge and mysterious elements to affect industry, commerce and the sciences, complete with a terrifying police force known as Enforcers, only tangentially answerable to the Crown. The Society retains the right to conscript individuals – willingly or not – who show an affinity for magical ability. The identification of a magically inclined person, known as a Latent, is considered to be in the best interest of the populace as undisciplined magic can flare out of control. But even though families are compensated for the loss of their loved ones (usually youngsters), training for a Latent is intense and potentially dangerous. If they survive the obligatory years of instruction, these persons, without exception, are expected to “do their upmost” for the Empire; their own personal desires – marriage, family, careers – are secondary.

  So it’s not surprising that Charlotte has been hiding her keen magical ability for years. Not only does she love George, her fiancé, and dreams about the day that they can be married and start a family, she also loves illustrating and takes great pride in her professional success, even if her brother Ben is the only person who knows the true identity of the artist Charles Baker.

  Yet when financial ruin threatens the family, uncovering a desperate ploy by Charlotte’s father and initiating another by her brother, Charlotte must act in clandestine and dangerous ways in order to ensure the family’s integrity while still maintaining her own secrets. It doesn’t help in the least that she has come to the attention of Magus Thomas Hopkins of the college of Fine Kinetics, or that he is charming and “quite simply the most handsome man Charlotte had ever seen.”

  What follows Charlotte’s initial impulsive actions is a tale of murder, manipulation, and political intrigue that may even affect the inner workings of the Society itself. At every step, Charlotte must rely on her talents, and her quick wit and intelligence, to stay one step ahead of virtually everyone. Even then, in the end she must entertain an offer that, while unconventional, risky and certainly fraught with peril, might just be one that she simply cannot refuse.

  And… scene.

  And so we have the explication out of the way, the environment sumptuously drawn, and all the characters in place to implement what promises to be an entertaining and exceptional new historical fantasy series by a master storyteller. And just as wonderfully comes the realization that not everything yet to come is a given – there are plenty of “will she or won’t she” scenarios for Charlotte to potentially cross, lots of “what if’s” that may or may not lead off into surprising directions. Even the endgame itself is not yet clear. But if Brother’s Ruin is any indication, it’s going to be an exceedingly fun ride, no matter where author Emma Newman decides to take Charlotte, and us.

  I do know one thing: no matter where this series goes, I’m going to be in it for the long run.

  ~ Sharon Browning

• Fantasy Literature
  http://www.fantasyliterature.com/reviews/planetfall/
  Word count: 2597

  Planetfall: An SF exploration of mental illness
  Readers’ average rating:
  fantasy book reviews science fiction book reviewsPlanetfall by Emma Newman science fiction book reviewsPlanetfall by Emma Newman
  Planetfall, the first science fiction offering from Emma Newman, is about a colony of humans who left Earth to follow Suh, an alleged prophet who received a supernatural message giving her the coordinates of an unknown distant planet where she was supposed to travel to receive instructions about God’s plans for humanity. Suh and her best friend Ren, a brilliant geneticist and engineer, gathered a team of like-minded believers and they landed on the planet 22 years ago. After “Planetfall,” Suh disappeared into “God’s City,” where she continues to live and send yearly messages and instructions to the rest of the colonists. All is going well until a visitor arrives and claims to be Suh’s grandson. His presence threatens the colony’s peace and it’s up to Ren, the story’s protagonist, to preserve it.
  Planetfall is the third of Newman’s five novels that I’ve read. I recently finished her SPLIT WORLDS fantasy trilogy. I didn’t like that series mostly because the plot was dull and the characters, who were really the focus of the story (rather than the plot), were unpleasant. Unfortunately, I had the same problem with Planetfall. While I thought the story raised some interesting questions about belief, tradition, and organized religion, and I thought the world the colonists created was intriguing (though not original) with its sustainable dwellings, futuristic technology, and ability to produce most of their needs with a 3D printer, none of these things was explored well enough to make it a reason to read the book.
  What is supposed to make the plot of Planetfall interesting is the mystery of what happened to the colony when it landed over two decades ago, where Suh disappeared to, the personal secrets about Ren’s mental health that she is hiding from everyone (including us), whether God really exists (and what/who God is), and what history and information is being covered up by a couple of the colonists. Newman gives us none of this information at first, but dispenses it at a trickle, keeping us wondering until the end.
  Unfortunately, I never felt invested in these mysteries because I didn’t care about the colony or any of its inhabitants. Ren, just like the protagonist of SPLIT WORLDS, is dour, sullen, and humorless. (If that’s not how Newman intended to portray her, it is what comes across with the audiobook narration read by the author herself.) At first some of the problem is that Ren is a loner and she’s hiding something about herself from us, so it’s hard to get to know or understand her. But once we find out what’s going on, she becomes even more unpleasant as Newman excessively explores every facet of Ren’s mental disorder. This has some interesting aspects, but not enough to fill the pages assigned to it. I would have rather spent some time exploring the world beyond the colony. Other characters are equally unlikeable with perhaps the exception of Kay, the colony’s doctor and Ren’s occasional lover. I think I could have liked Kay, but I didn’t see enough of her to know for sure.
  And so the story plays out with the excruciatingly slow unraveling of a mystery that I didn’t care about while the characters became less likeable the more I got to know them. At the end, I was expecting a tight finish with a mind-blowing reveal, but I thought all of the answers and revelations were disappointing. I might have appreciated Planetfall better if it had been a short story instead of a novel. As it is, I feel like I invested too much time for too little pay-off. Readers who like the characters better than I did, or who enjoy stories about melancholy and mental illness, will certainly get more out of Planetfall than I did.
  As I mentioned, I listened to the 10 hour long audio version of Planetfall which was produced by Blackstone Audio and read by the author. (Sample.) Emma Newman has an absolutely beautiful voice, but she sounds rather forlorn here. While this definitely fits Ren’s character, I’m afraid it contributed to my dislike of Ren.
  ~Kat Hooper
  Emma Newman Planetfall science fiction book reviewsI truly enjoyed Planetfall, my first Emma Newman story, and found many of the issues Kat had with the tale particularly successful in my reading. Perhaps this highlights the fact every reader brings his or her own unique perspectives, tastes and sensibilities to the “journey of the read”.
  Newman does a terrific job of building characters through dramatic tension in the plot and dialogue including spare, but strong use of flashbacks. We learn in an unobtrusive and well blended way that Renata, our lead character, was a daddy’s girl who had mommy issues. We learn early in the story, and I don’t think it’s a tremendous spoiler, that Ren lost a child when she was still very young, and she still harbors a lot of pain for having left her father in choosing to join this cross-galaxy expedition.
  As Kat points out, Ren is not the most upbeat nor optimistic of individuals. I don’t consider her unlikable, though. I was actually drawn to her inner pain, the crusty outer shell that she portrayed as a shield against her vulnerability. Maybe that’s just me and I can relate in ways, and perhaps even have some great need to ‘save’ someone myself.
  Newman’s language in Planetfall is suggestive of some secret, of some underlying mystery that’s not just on a grand scale, but something internal as well. We know also that Ren was in love with Suh, The Pathfinder, the one who’s become goddess-like to the survivors of the long interspace journey that’s now a generation past.
  Key themes include the unbalanced act of man creating godhood, and the lengths the human mind will go to deceive itself. The central plot elements include the well-worn sci-fi trope of myth creation and the curation required to keep it alive and self-sustaining. Humanity is, after all, forever searching for greater meaning…
  Religious allusions pervade, and were the driving force in the expedition in the first place. We learn that Suh inhaled a strange seed spore… only she, the ‘chosen one,’ was able to imbibe/eat and survive and thrive. She emerged from the inhalation with a unique site and vision and it was she that was the driving force of this expedition. Even through to the end sequence, the notion of the ‘chosen one’ persists and we learn that not all of this notional godhood was ballyhoo.
  Ren is a broken figure, at times nasty and reactive, but clearly vulnerable. She’s the group’s ‘visengineer,’ responsible for colony maintenance with focus on the 3D printing machines which are the lifeblood to everything they do and their absolute survival. She’s a necessity, and the colony literally would not be able to survive without her. She uses that knowledge to her own advantage… never in a vindictive or hateful way, though much of the mystery surrounding Ren herself orbits this need to be needed.
  Ren pulls discarded objects from the ‘masher’… the device used to recycle all materials and prep for reuse. Nothing is truly thrown away. She finds an imperfect pot… then an unfinished wool doll… she thinks, “…abandoned, unfinished. I’ll finish you.” Of course, she’s talking to more than just the objects she finds, but herself, the colony, and the God-like entity that pulled this colony off of Earth and onto this planet in the first place. All around her things are unfinished, broken, destroyed. Her child died young; she was unable to fix her. Her role as visengineer is the initial clue. She’s the fixer. The go-to colonist to deal with broken things. And mechanically she can fix just about anything. Except herself. And she knows it. A good third of Newman’s story delves into Ren’s psychoses which ultimate plays perhaps too large of a role relative to the length of the novel itself.
  While Newman’s ideas around smart and self-sustaining buildings and 3D printing are not unique, I thought they created a nice mystique around the setting of the story and played a subtle but important role in the series of mysteries that lie at the core of Newman’s story. I found the mysteries of the story compelling:
  What happened to the rest of the crew after the initial planetfall;
  What happened to Suh, The Pathfinder — it’s repeated that something awful occurred with the first landing party;
  What’s behind the annual ritual of the ‘seed ceremony’ that Ren calls “the central pole that keeps the circus tent up”;
  Are there any secrets of the new comer, who claims to be the grandson of Suh, The Pathfinder? There’s something odd and unique that rests just under the surface of almost every interaction with him;
  What’s hidden in the upper most levels of the God’s city;
  And what are the driving forces that keep Ren closed off tighter than a spacesuit?
  I’m torn about Planetfall’s ending. It will appeal to people in different ways: in some regards conclusive, though clearly open to interpretation. One won’t be able to help but make some analogies to Arthur C. Clarke’s Space Odyssey series, or Ridley Scott’s recent film, Prometheus. The core mysteries, however, are wrapped up rather nicely (although that’s not to say they’re all pleasant).
  ~Jason Golomb
  Planetfall by Emma Newman science fiction book reviewsI liked Planetfall slightly more than Kat did, but I had most of the same problems she listed. Ren was not a likeable character, although I did find her interesting. While the depiction of the consequences of her mental health issue were revealed with good pacing, and laid out in detail, I never quite bought the condition, partly because it seemed like Newman went with the “literary” catalyst (loss) instead of exploring other causes of this kind of impulse control issue. I think Newman’s choice will work for most people; it just didn’t quite for me. I also had lots of small questions about the nature of secrecy in the colony (Ren isn’t the only one with secrets) given the “social media” nature of intra-colony communication.
  As far as the plot went, with the entry into the colony of a newcomer who seems to be the visionary Suh’s grandson, the plot surrounding him was predictable, but I still enjoyed the details, specifically the pendants he carves for certain special people he meets.
  Still, what kept me reading and wondering was the native complex the colonists have discovered on the planet they were led to by Suh (who was, in turn, led there by someone or something else) that the colonists call The City of God. It did remind me of Arthur C. Clarke and some New Wave writers, but I liked the strangeness of it, the alien-ness of it and the questions it raised (which aren’t completely answered at the end of the book).
  My questions about The City of God, the mysterious seed, and Ren’s relation to the complex (not Suh’s, that was pretty obvious) kept me reading without question.
  ~Marion Deeds
  Published November 3, 2015. From Emma Newman, the award-nominated author of Between Two Thorns, comes a novel of how one secret withheld to protect humanity’s future might be its undoing… Renata Ghali believed in Lee Suh-Mi’s vision of a world far beyond Earth, calling to humanity. A planet promising to reveal the truth about our place in the cosmos, untainted by overpopulation, pollution, and war. Ren believed in that vision enough to give up everything to follow Suh-Mi into the unknown. More than twenty-two years have passed since Ren and the rest of the faithful braved the starry abyss and established a colony at the base of an enigmatic alien structure where Suh-Mi has since resided, alone. All that time, Ren has worked hard as the colony’s 3-D printer engineer, creating the tools necessary for human survival in an alien environment, and harboring a devastating secret. Ren continues to perpetuate the lie forming the foundation of the colony for the good of her fellow colonists, despite the personal cost. Then a stranger appears, far too young to have been part of the first planetfall, a man who bears a remarkable resemblance to Suh-Mi. The truth Ren has concealed since planetfall can no longer be hidden. And its revelation might tear the colony apart…

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  August 10th, 2016. Kat Hooper, Jason Golomb and Marion Deeds | Emma Newman | Audio, Stand-Alone | SFF Reviews | 4 comments |

  KAT HOOPER, who started this site in June 2007, earned a Ph.D. in neuroscience and psychology at Indiana University (Bloomington) and now teaches at the University of North Florida. When she reads fiction, she wants to encounter new ideas and lots of imagination. She wants to view the world in a different way. She wants to have her mind blown. She loves beautiful language and has no patience for dull prose, vapid romance, or cheesy dialogue. She prefers complex characterization, intriguing plots, and plenty of action. Favorite authors are Jack Vance, Robin Hobb, Kage Baker, William Gibson, Gene Wolfe, Richard Matheson, and C.S. Lewis.
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  JASON GOLOMB, who joined us in September 2015, graduated with a degree in Communications from Boston University in 1992, and an M.B.A. from Marymount University in 2005. His passion for ice hockey led to jobs in minor league hockey in Baltimore and Fort Worth, before he returned to his home in the D.C. metro area where he worked for America Online. His next step was National Geographic, which led to an obsession with all things Inca, Aztec and Ancient Rome. But his first loves remain SciFi and Horror, balanced with a healthy dose of Historical Fiction.
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  MARION DEEDS, with us since March 2011, is retired from a 35-year career with county government, where she met enough interesting characters and heard enough zany stories to inspire at least two trilogies’ worth of fantasy fiction. Currently she spends part of her time working at a local used bookstore. She is an aspiring writer herself and, in the 1990s, had short fiction published in small magazines like Night Terrors, Aberrations, and in the cross-genre anthology The Magic Within. On her blog Deeds & Words, she reviews many types of books and follows developments in food policy and other topics.

• Pop Culture Beast
  http://www.popculturebeast.com/book-review-planetfall-emma-newman/
  Word count: 472

  Book Review: Planetfall (Emma Newman)
  JL Jamieson10.2015Book Review, Books
  planetfall

  Planetfall

  Emma Newman

  Ace/Roc

  ISBN: 0425282392

  November 3rd, 2015

  After inhaling the spores of a mysterious plant, Lee Suh-Mi has a vision of another world where the answers to humanity’s future resides in an alien structure she calls God’s City. Renata Ghali follows her love Suh-Mi to this alien world, with a horde of colonists. An accident loses a group of colonists upon Planetfall, and Ren helps keep a dangerous secret to preserve the structure of their fledgling society.

  Twenty two years later, Ren has been working hard as the colony’s 3D printing engineer, keeping their civilization running while her own life slowly crumbles. She misses Suh, who has been gone since the initial scouting of God’s City. The colony sits at the foot of the city, waiting for Suh’s eventual return.

  What comes instead, is puzzling. A young man who looks so very much like Suh claims to come from the lost colonists. He tells the colony that when the pods went so far off course, they didn’t die in the landing, as presumed. However, he’s the only one of them left.

  The secret Ren’s been keeping for so long can’t be kept much longer. The stranger is Suh’s grandson.

  Newman unrolls the story slowly, so we get a feel for the fiercely private Ren, who shuns the company of others and flinches away from real intimacy. As things progress, we learn why she is how she is, what her and Suh’s time together looked like, and how someone we learn was so passionate about engineering and leaving Earth to find God’s City could become so reclusive and broken. We get this solid foundation of the character so that what comes later has a profound effect; revelations about how loss and lies can cause a kind of mental and emotional abscess, with Ren burying everything painful she wants to forget under a barrier of literal as well as emotional flotsam.

  When the secret comes to light, she must deal with the fallout and save herself. She must figure out what Suh couldn’t.

  Planetfall is definitely one of the best books of the year, and belongs on your Christmas buy list.

  JL Jamieson
  JL Jamieson is a strange book nerd who writes technical documents by day, and book news, reviews, and other assorted opinions for you by night. She is working on her own fiction, and spends time making jewelry to sell at local conventions, as well as stalking the social media accounts of all your favorite writers.

• RT Book Reviews
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/brothers-ruin
  Word count: 401

  RT Rating:

  Genre:
  Science Fiction, Fantasy
  Published:
  March 14 2017
  Publisher:
  Tor.com
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  Amazon:
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  Barnes & Noble: Buy Now
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  BOOK REVIEWS
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  Top Picks!
  Contemporary Romance
  Historical Romance
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  RT Review Source
  RT RATINGS GUIDE
  5 GOLD: Phenomenal. In a class by itself.
  4 1/2: TOP PICK. Fantastic. A keeper.
  4: Compelling. A page-turner.
  3: Enjoyable. A pleasant read.
  2: Problematic. May struggle to finish.
  1: Severely Flawed. Pass on this one.
  BROTHER’S RUIN
  Author(s): Emma Newman
  A promising start, with an ambiguously balanced setting and a likable protagonist. The main problem is that, even knowing this is the first book in a series, not quite enough happens in this first volume. It feels like it cuts off just before the climax, and, combined with the relatively small size, it’s hard not to feel like the next volume will have most of the really fun stuff. This one does a good job of setting up the narrative and now that the pieces are in place it may wind up being a good series, but this first installment doesn’t quite get us there.
  Charlotte Gunn would be having a difficult time if she was just hiding her work as an in-demand illustrator from her family and devoted (if a bit boring) fiance. But she’s also hiding her magical powers — powers that would normally see the Royal Society of the Esoteric Arts take her away from all she knows for a lifetime of service. Now that her sickly brother Archie is attracting attention with his own, weaker powers, Charlotte has to evade the probing attentions of one of the lords of the Society even as she finds herself drawn into a magical plot that’s killing people across London. (TOR.COM, Mar., 208 pp., $14.99)

  Reviewed by:
  Ian Mathers

• RT Book Reviews
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/planetfall
  Word count: 357

  QUOTE:
  Planetfall is a strange but mesmerizing book in which almost nothing is as it seems.
  RT Rating:

  Genre:
  Science Fiction, General Science Fiction
  Published:
  November 3 2015
  Publisher:
  Ace
  BUY NOW!
  Amazon:
  Buy Now
  Barnes & Noble: Buy Now
  *This post contains affiliate links. If you click an affiliate link and purchase an item from the vendor, we receive a percentage of the profit (even if you don't buy the item we've linked to). Thank you for supporting RT Book Reviews!
  BOOK REVIEWS
  All Genres
  Top Picks!
  Contemporary Romance
  Historical Romance
  Historical Fiction
  Romantic Suspense
  Mystery/Suspense/Thriller
  Paranormal
  Fantasy
  Urban Fantasy
  Young Adult
  Inspirational
  Mainstream
  Science Fiction
  Series
  Erotica
  RT Review Source
  RT RATINGS GUIDE
  5 GOLD: Phenomenal. In a class by itself.
  4 1/2: TOP PICK. Fantastic. A keeper.
  4: Compelling. A page-turner.
  3: Enjoyable. A pleasant read.
  2: Problematic. May struggle to finish.
  1: Severely Flawed. Pass on this one.
  PLANETFALL
  Author(s): Emma Newman
  Planetfall is a strange but mesmerizing book in which almost nothing is as it seems. The protagonist is frustrating but fascinating, and the book reads at once like a character study, a mystery, a hard science-fiction tale about the survival of colonists on an alien world, and surrealist science fiction about alien life. Above all, this is a novel about the price of secrets.
  Renata Ghali is one of a group of colonists who followed charismatic leader Lee Suh-Mi to an alien world. Several ships full of more colonists are lost during the voyage. Twenty-two years later, Ren works with the colonists’ leader, Cillian Mackenzie, to keep the colony physically, politically and emotionally stable while Suh-Mi lives in seclusion in a nearby alien structure. When a survivor from one of the vanished ships appears and begs for aid, he threatens to expose Ren’s secrets and turn life in the fragile colony upside down. (ROC, Nov., 336 pp., $15.00)
  Reviewed by:
  Carrie Sessarego

• New York Times
  https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/03/books/review/the-latest-in-science-fiction-and-fantasy.html
  Word count: 394

  QUOTE:
  The climax is cathartic and transcendent
  SUNDAY BOOK REVIEW | OTHERWORLDLY

  The Latest in Science Fiction and Fantasy
  By N. K. JEMISINDEC. 28, 2015
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  By contrast, Emma Newman’s PLANETFALL (Roc, paper, $15) seems to take readers to an exciting destination from the outset: an unnamed habitable planet in a distant star system, where a human colony has formed at the foot of a biomechanoid alien structure they call God’s city. The colonists are pilgrims of a sort, led there to try to understand the city’s call by their (literally) visionary founder, Lee Suh-Mi. But since she ascended the city shortly after planetfall, no one has seen or heard from her for 22 years. Supposedly she’s been communing with God all that time.

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  If that sounds like quite a whopper to swallow, don’t worry. Newman quickly introduces us to the colony’s de facto leaders, Renata Ghali and Cillian Mackenzie, and reveals that they’re keeping some pretty big secrets. It’s an interesting choice to keep the story’s focus not on the secrets themselves, but on how they’re exposed. Ren, who is Suh-Mi’s former lover and the colony’s all-­important 3-D printing engineer, has developed a collection of dysfunctions as the toll for her silence. Brilliant yet mentally ill, completely unlikable yet poignantly human, and a woman of color besides — Ren is a rare science fiction protagonist, and Newman handles her complexities with aplomb. She doesn’t do nearly as well with the antagonists, who teeter on the line of caricature. But in the story’s tight focus on Ren, these external villains barely matter; her inner demons are the stars of the show. The climax is cathartic and transcendent enough to smooth over any flaws along the way.

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  QUOTE:
  A disappointing finish to an otherwise thoroughly digestible series, full of plot contrivances and lacking many characters and plot threads we had previously been exposed to.
  Home / Books / All Good Things by Emma Newman

  All Good Things by Emma Newman
  Posted by: Megan Leigh in Books, Reviews June 14, 2017 0 581 Views

  All Good Things is the fifth and final instalment of Emma Newman’s Split Worlds series. It is likely, by now, that you know whether or not you are on board with the style, characters, and plot, but as the final instalment of a successful series, we do have to ask: how well does she wrap it all up?
  I enjoyed this series. It is silly and incredibly easy reading. The characters are very flawed and the ‘messages’ embedded in the novels are, at times, painfully obvious and heavy-handed in their delivery. Then again, a lot can be forgiven for a yarn that is total escapism. And I forgave a lot, up to a point.
  All Good Things was a little disappointing for me for a few reasons. Over the course of the series, Newman has introduced multiple plot threads. My biggest problem with the final instalment is that many of these plot threads are dropped rather unceremoniously. Characters and politics that were central to previous books are mentioned as side notes here. While I appreciate that wrapping everything up in a neat little bow can also feel less than satisfactory, there was just too much that was almost forgotten entirely in this novel. As a result, I didn’t feel that All Good Things did justice to the Split Worlds series.
  ‘To create change, to disrupt a system of control, one must carry out radical acts. One must be prepared to destroy so that something new can be created. Those in control will never give up the power afforded to them voluntarily. It must be taken.’
  At the end of the previous book, Cathy discovers Will has been magically manipulating her and runs to Sam for protection. If she was desperate to change the Nether and its lack of human rights at the beginning of the series, she is now dangerously determined. But how far will Cathy go to see her dream come true? And at what point does a singular goal blind you to other issues?
  The worlds were never meant to be split. Long ago, the sorcerers split the worlds as a way to imprison the fae, enforcing their rule over both mundanus, Exilium, and the Nether. With the help of Bea, the powerful magic-wielder responsible for the murder of all but one sorcerer, Cathy and Sam attempt to re-join the worlds. As they worked to bring the worlds together, Will finally stands up to Lord Iris and attempts to gain power over the fae. But power always comes at a price and such decisions are never easy.
  ‘All he wanted was the purest freedom of being so powerful that no man, no Fae, could ever tell him what to do again.’
  The Split Worlds series is hardly one to take itself too seriously, embracing the fun, entertaining side of fiction. But that doesn’t excuse the lazy use of excessive coincidence. All Good Things is chock-full of undercooked resolutions and deus ex machina. Cathy wants to put an end to the Nether – she meets a powerful woman who wants to do just that *and* has the means to. Cathy has a problem with Bea’s ethics – she happens to have a handy device that will kill Bea. Will wants to find the woman Lord Iris used to be in love with – low and behold he happens to check into the hotel she is also staying in… These are just the tip of the iceberg. Perhaps if she’d hung more of a hat on it or made tongue-in-cheek references to how easy everything happened for the characters, I might have been able to get on board. But as it stands, I just groaned each time a new coincidence manifested to save the day.
  I have never been a fan of the ‘chosen one’ trope, and while Newman avoids many of the pitfalls, she still falls into a few. Cathy’s potential is a theme that runs through all of the Split Worlds books, a potential which is later defined as ‘destruction’. She is destined to be the destroyer. But of what? Her potential – or fated ‘chosen one’ – manifests in an uncanny ability to pick up sorcery. In the previous four novels, the sorcerers were built up as powerful and their magic as complex and difficult to master. And yet… Cathy picks it up without breaking a sweat. It was all just far too convenient and undermined the set-up of the magic system that had been developed in the other books.
  ‘How can the pawn abandon the game by choice and leave the board of its own volition?’
  While All Good Things is as readable as the previous entries in the series, I couldn’t help feeling like Emma Newman can do better. It felt rushed and poorly plotted out. There were simply too many balls dropped to make it a solid completion to a light-hearted series.

  Verdict: A disappointing finish to an otherwise thoroughly digestible series, full of plot contrivances and lacking many characters and plot threads we had previously been exposed to.
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  ABOUT MEGAN LEIGH

  Writer and editor of Pop Verse. Co-host of Breaking the Glass Slipper. My special interests include publishing, creative writing, and geekery

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  QUOTE:
  All Good Things is a fitting conclusion to a great series.
  Book: All Good Things (Emma Newman)
  JL Jamieson06.2017Book Review, Books
  All Good Things

  Emma Newman

  Diversion Books

  June 6th, 2017

  All Good Things is the final installation in the Split Worlds series.

  Cathy and the new Lord Iron–Sam–have banded together to keep her safe from the Irises as well as figure out how to bring Nether society into the 21st century. Women in the Nether are treated less like modern women and more like the property they effectively were in the Regency era.

  Since the fae-touched residents live in a pocket world where time isn’t a factor, generations of Nether society have gone on for hundreds of years without aging. Social change has moved correspondingly slowly.

  Sam and Cathy team up with the murderous sorceress Beatrice when she brings them a proposal that makes a lot of sense, and will change all of the Split Worlds forever.

  All Good Things is a fitting conclusion to a great series. Cathy has come into her own, and becomes far less the main character who complains about her treatment and knows nothing of how to change it–and far more the woman ready to move worlds to get things done. We also see a lot more of Sam, Max, and the gargoyle–and their own great strides in character development.

  The juxtaposition of Regency era society and modern freedoms mixed with magic make this an all around fun series to follow.

  JL Jamieson
  JL Jamieson is a strange book nerd who writes technical documents by day, and book news, reviews, and other assorted opinions for you by night. She is working on her own fiction, and spends time making jewelry to sell at local conventions, as well as stalking the social media accounts of all your favorite writers.

• Strange Horizons
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  Word count: 2693

  REVIEWS SIZE / / /
  BETWEEN TWO THORNS BY EMMA NEWMAN
  GABRIEL MURRAY
  ISSUE: 11 MARCH 2013
  Between
  Between Two Thorns is about a wayward highborn daughter forced to make her entrance into the otherworldly haute Ton after years of estrangement from her oppressive family. It's also about an urban fantasy detective, an Arbiter of the Split Worlds Treaty between the "real world" Mundanus and the Fae-touched otherworld, the Nether, investigating corruption and treason at the heart of magical law enforcement in London and Bath. It's also about a world where fairies have been exiled from human company to an unearthly prison dimension and the machinations they work on their human subjects from therein. It's also, tangentially, about the kidnapping of a Master of Ceremonies, and an average bloke from Bath who finds himself caught up in confusing supernatural matters, and quite a few other things. This is sort of the problem. In 378 pages of trade paperback, Emma Newman attempts to spin a tale of neo-Victorian fairy-touched society, arranged marriage and court intrigue, Arbiters forced to serve law and order after having their souls "displaced" magically, fickle Fae lords, and sorcerous bureaucracy, but these are more balls than the thin characterization, indecisive plot, and problematically shallow worldbuilding of Between Two Thorns can juggle at one time. The story is awkwardly paced and unsatisfyingly resolved, but more than that, it's overburdened.

  The novel's back-cover blurb is uncomfortably misleading: it implies a male protagonist, beleaguered Arbiter Max, and an urban fantasy mystery plot involving "a dislocated soul and a mad sorcerer," a witness whose "memories have been bound by magical chains only the enemy can break," and finally, an ally in the form of a "rebellious woman trying to escape her family." In fact, this "rebellious woman," Catherine Rhoeas-Papaver, is the front-and-center protagonist of the book. It's true that Max helms the book's major subplot investigating the corruption of the London Arbiters, but that's exactly what it is: a major subplot. The dislocated soul is a chipper gargoyle created from a fragment of Max's soul in a confusing and inconsequential piece of magic and the mad sorcerer little more than a bog-standard member of the supporting cast. This suspiciously cynical attempt to pass off a heroine-centric masquerade of manners as a hero-centric urban fantasy police procedural says not only that sexism sells in SFF publishing, but that Max's subplot is detached enough from and irrelevant enough to Catherine's storyline that it's possible to make the book sound like it has almost nothing at all to do with its central character.

  Aside from its clutter, so much of what's wrong with Between Two Thorns is embodied in Newman's handling of the story's protagonist, Catherine Rhoeas-Papaver. Cathy is the sort of clumsy, bookish everywoman we've come to expect from urban fantasy and YA: she's klutzy and fashion-clueless and doesn't fit in with other girls! She doesn't want to get married! She loves science fiction! Yes, unfortunately, she loves science fiction—when describing her first dates with nice but quickly sidelined mortal boyfriend Josh (mortal boyfriends never do much in this sort of book), Cathy recounts:

  Somewhere between This Island Earth and Forbidden Planet they'd started to hold hands. They kissed halfway through Journey to the Centre of the Earth and by Fantastic Voyage they were almost inseparable. He'd lovingly introduced her to Star Wars in the original film release order and she realised she loved him at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. (p. 89-90)
  This sort of authorial move is probably intended to render the protagonist endearing and relatable for the average SFF reader, but tends to come off obnoxious and pandering. (Later, Cathy describes an interdimensional portal to a baffled civilian with, "It's like Portal" (p. 300). This is neither as charming nor as descriptive as intended.) It doesn't help that if Newman means to characterize Cathy as intellectual and skeptical, it's undercut by a shocking degree of naÏveté and perplexing ignorance from a character who is presented authorially not just as an adult, but one of the most rebellious, forward-thinking adults of her society. A particularly cringeworthy example of this comes when Cathy reflects on the Peterloo massacre of 1819, a Mundanus historical event she learned about from her "radical" tutor Miss Rainer which stirred the seeds of rebellion in her against Aquae Sulis's repressive society:

  As she walked down Peter Street, Cathy thought of the women who had been in that crowd, in their beautifully white Regency dresses, cut down by Hussars who targeted them for being so outrageous as to participate in a political rally. Their world wasn't much different from the one she was being sucked back into, and yet they were brave enough to take a stand when the majority of society decried them. (p. 88)
  There's no indication anywhere in the text that we should find Cathy's views bizarrely immature and disturbingly shallow, that focusing on the "beautifully white Regency dresses" worn by victims of the famously brutal act of labor suppression in Manchester might be more forgivable from a starry-eyed twelve-year-old with no real grasp of human life or death than from a thinking, independent-minded adult. This simplified and romanticized image of the English Regency—"white Regency dresses" in place of angry workers—is a common ailment in Regency-inspired fantasy, which often draws more of its research from fabulously entertaining but conservative, nostalgic, and aristocracy-obsessed twentieth-century novelist Georgette Heyer than from any primary sources. For that matter, Cathy's assertion that the oppressive world of the Peterloo protesters "wasn't much different" from the Nether and Aquae Sulis is more than a little questionable itself. Though of course oppressed legally and socially by patriarchy's heavy hand, women's lives in Regency and even Victorian Britain were not quite as dismally powerless as Newman and indeed many other authors of historical or pseudohistorical fiction portray them. Nor is Cathy's situation reasonably analogous to those of the Peterloo protesters: Cathy is a wealthy young woman who faces serious gender-based oppression and abuse from her father, but is dressed in the mornings by speechless, largely nameless indentured servants. This comparison ignores any manner of intersectionality. One is forced to dispute Catherine Rhoeas-Papaver's assertion that her troubles are fairly comparable to those of the murdered working-class women of Manchester in 1819.

  Cathy's also a virgin, which in and of itself should be no one's business and not really a big deal, but unfortunately Newman makes both a great deal of fuss and an uncomfortable running gag out of it; her Fae-touched father has laid a creepy and farcical curse on her that causes her clothes to put themselves back on whenever she's with a man and finds herself having "those kinds of intentions" (p. 143). She's assigned moments of incompetence as well that are a bit painful to read, such as when she's given three wishes by the mercurial fairy Lord Poppy and bungles two with bad wording and by accidentally using one of them up on her ex-boyfriend with a figurative "I wish!" exclamation that causes a beautiful woman to be irresistibly attracted to him. It's hard to imagine a male protagonist being authorially humiliated in a comparable way. At times Cathy's less Emma Woodhouse or even Bridget Jones than she is a Meg Ryan character from a forgettable '90s rom-com, complete with gendered ditziness and constant neuroses. Her breakup with her boyfriend Josh is intended to be somewhat painfully comical and is instead impossible to take seriously, given the persistent topic of her bizarre virginity curse; her rakish Aquae Sulis fiancé William Reticulata-Iris, another unwieldy plot element in the novel, treats her and her oddness with long-suffering chivalrous patience, and it's unclear to what degree Newman intends his patronizing attitude to read as sympathetic or understandable. One would hope not at all, but William's characterization is as mixed and noncommittal as the novel's ending, as he waffles between Cruel Intentions-esque roué and loyal and protective ally to Cathy.

  Newman's urban fantasy world of Nether/Mundanus has a chintzy, Vampire: The Masquerade feel to it, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The concept of feuding Fae-touched noble houses with Latin flower names (Papaver, Rosa) in a pseudo-Victorian underground magical society has its campy Anne Rice charm. The Nether, as Newman's enchanted otherworld is called, drifts perpetually in a nebulous Regency-to-Edwardian state where young noblewomen live at the mercies of arranged marriages and young men fight poorly regulated duels for their families' honor. Dueling was a controversial and highly ritualized practice in nineteenth-century Europe, of course, and differed a great deal in both dangerousness and acceptability from country to country and decade to decade, but there's no sense of real pomp and circumstance in Aquae Sulis, not much in the way of the quirkiness and eccentric ceremony that characterizes fantasies of manners like Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer's Cecy & Kate series. Characters talk with a mixture of stilted formal speech and modernisms—"Thankfully your engagement has not been damaged by your frightful behaviour," says Cathy's cruel and tyrannical father in a piece of typically passable but awkward Aquae Sulis dialogue, "and I want to keep it that way" (p. 204). The whole setting could in fact benefit from a hefty stylistic dose of Heyer or Dickens, or some genuine whimsy.

  Between Two Thorns is one of those urban fantasies brimming with uppercase buzzwords: we don't have sorcerers, we have Sorcerers who cast Charms while working for governmental Chapters that employ Arbiters to enforce the Treaty and so on and so forth. Lord Poppy is not just the fairy master of the Papaver family, he's Fae. The story is cluttered with extraneous worldbuilding like this and leans on many of the Judeo-Christian and faux-Celtic tropes that tend to haunt urban and alternate-world fantasy. Everything in the mirror world has a Latinate name, from Aquae Sulis itself to the Fae-touched families (the Papavers under Lord Poppy, the Rosas under Lady Rose, etc.) and the names of the very worlds, from the rather literal Mundanus to the fairy world one step beyond the Nether, Exilium. Latin here appears to be employed as the universal and timeless tongue of magic, as in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, instead of a language originating in the Italian peninsula. This sort of dead-language hocus-pocus can be reasonably charming if tongue-in-cheek in children's fiction, such as with Rowling, or if there's any sort of in-text historical context, but Between Two Thorns can lay claim to neither. Similarly, characters have souls which can be displaced and removed and bandied about, as is central to Max's character conceit and otherwise awkwardly irrelevant to the story and world, but there's no sense of theology in Aquae Sulis or the Nether, despite the society's ideological conservatism. Aquae Sulis has none of the confident whimsy that pulls together Failbetter Games's Fallen London or even Neil Gaiman's London Below. It's overcomplicated and difficult to explain, choked with needless detail that would be more at home in a campaign setting than a narrative.

  And then there's Max's storyline. The plot threads of Between Two Thorns are difficult to review cohesively because they aren't handled cohesively: Max and Cathy's plots run side by side and barely touch until near the end of the novel. Max is an Arbiter, a man disfigured by his own fractured soul and bound to uphold the Split Worlds Treaty: this sounds sort of interesting, or would if it had any seeming relevance beyond plot-driving MacGuffin value to the rest of the book, which is probably why it was highlighted in the back cover blurb. What this means is that he's a fairly bland cipher chasing a supernatural mystery that eventually becomes relevant to Cathy's storyline, in a technically sound but unsatisfying resolution to the plot, if one defines the plot as being the kidnapping of the Aquae Sulis Master of Ceremonies. Given that we haven't met the Master of Ceremonies and are in fact never quite certain what sort of Ceremonies he might be Master of, it's hard to invest in this. Max is a little more automatically sympathetic as the sole survivor of his slaughtered bureau, but this plotline of deadly governmental corruption is barely explored: the murders of his colleagues are heavily referenced for most of the novel, but only confirmed in its last pages. Meanwhile, Cathy's life situation remains largely unresolved: her relationship with fiancé William is marginally pleasanter, her atrocious family situation is as atrocious as ever, and nothing seems to have substantially changed for her. The characters of Between Two Thorns spend most of their time in waiting rooms, rehashing exposition, and chasing plot threads around unproductively, which has a deadly smothering effect on the novel's pacing. The book is first in a trilogy—naturally—and it doesn't much stand alone.

  Newman's mundane Bath holds no sort of candle to Ben Aaronovitch's Rivers of London (2011) or any other vivid characterizations of real cities in urban fantasy, in part ascribable to the indecisive way the narrative falters between Bath and Aquae Sulis, never really settling down in one long enough to look around, take its bearings, and introduce us to the setting. The only character of color manifests—tiredly enough—in a nameless dark-skinned female hospital doctor who treats an injured Max briefly before vanishing forever from the narrative and depositing us back in Newman's world of pallid fairies, spirited brunette heroines, and beautifully white Regency dresses. Other female characters fare rather blandly in Aquae Sulis: unfortunately, Cathy is presented as an archetypal Exceptional Woman among catty queen bees, scheming harpies, and a coquettish debutante here and there. Her most caring relative is, predictably enough, male, in the form of her brother Tom: she finds a sympathetic friend in her American sister-in-law Lucy, but Lucy is characterized as such a one-note sassy fashionable friend to our bookish, dowdy heroine that it's hard to muster much excitement about their relationship. Her mother is unfeeling and judgmental, only concerned that her daughter's bruises from her father's beatings might make her unfit for polite society. Cathy seems to live and move in a world consisting of herself and women from Central Casting. This is less glaring than it might have been, since Newman's male characters also seem to have been hired from Central Casting—"Oh, fiddlesticks and flapdoodles!" exclaims sorcerer Ekstrand to Arbiter Max in one particularly painful moment (p. 238)—but the end result is that the women of the novel are arrayed to provide foils and contrast to Cathy. No non-Cathy woman enjoys as much agency or personality as secondary characters Max and William, or even poor baffled civilian Sam.

  Frankly, Between Two Thorns suffers from the wrong kind of restraint. Allowed to shine, Aquae Sulis could have had some of the flamboyant luster of Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel's Legacy series, full of convoluted intrigue, beautiful schemers, ridiculous faux-Romance conlang, and unapologetic high camp. Between Two Thorns at its best could have been a fun, frothy romp arm in arm with Changeling: The Dreaming and The Scarlet Pimpernel, in which case the Harry Potter Latin and the dubious usage of Manchester labor history mightn't have made such a dent in its momentum as a story. The trouble is, it's just not very fun.

  Gabriel Murray (gabrieltmurray@gmail.com) lives and works in Queens, NY. He writes speculative and historical fiction and blogs at Orestes Drunk and Pylades Fasting about interactive fiction and miscellanea.

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  © Copyright 2013 Gabriel Murray
  ABOUT GABRIEL MURRAY
  Gabriel Murray lives in New York City with two cats and a pianist. His stories have appeared in GlitterShip, We See A Different Frontier: An Anthology of Postcolonial Speculative Fiction, and Ideomancer. He can be found at http://orestesdrunk.wordpress.com and @gabrieltmurray.

  A.L. Kaplan is a comic book artist currently living in Reno, Nevada, waiting for the aliens. Their work can be seen on Tumblr at: alkcomics.tumblr.com and Tapastic: tapastic.com/alkcomics.

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  QUOTE:
  Between Two Thorns is magical, exciting, and clever. It manages to conjure a world that feels completely natural but also mysterious, sometimes dangerous, sometimes funny, combining several different kinds of urban fantasy into one story, and capturing a lovely sense of modern Britishness that is reminiscent of other fantastic British fantasy.
  BETWEEN TWO THORNS BY EMMA NEWMAN
  WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 19, 2012
  Between Two Thorns by Emma Newman
  4.5
  BOOK NAME: Between Two Thorns
  AUTHOR: Emma Newman
  PUBLISHER(S): Angry Robot
  FORMATT: Paperback / Audio Book
  GENRE(S): Fantasy / Urban Fantasy
  RELEASE DATE: March 7, 2013
  Magic is closer than any of us could imagine; hidden but powerful, existing parallel to our own world. Perhaps even in your own living room, only a thin veil away.

  Between Two Thorns (cover)That’s the concept behind the Split Worlds, in which Between Two Thorns is set. Emma Newman sums up the Split Worlds perfectly as: “an urban fantasy setting with gritty noir, fantastical magic, evil faeries and people just trying to drink their tea in peace.”

  There’s a magical realm, the Nether, layered over the top of our own, a kind of in-between step separating the mundane world from the supernatural. Arbiters, a police force dedicated to controlling magic and protecting Mundanus, and much hated by those who have magic, pass between the Nether and the human world, keeping order. They have exiled the Fae lords to the realm of Exilium, but, though the Fae may be banned from involving themselves in the mundane world, but they have plenty of human servants to manipulate in the Nether. These come in the form of old, aristocratic families who are each associated with a specific Fae, their Patroon. Cathy, one of the main characters of the novel, comes from the Rhoeas-Papaver family, tied to Lord Poppy.

  These families are rich, snobby, and traditionalist, living in the Nether, maintaining a society that would seem more at home in the Regency period. It’s therefore appropriate that much of the book takes place in Bath, and in its magical counterpart in the Nether, Aquae Sulis. Cathy can’t stand the stuffiness and oppression of her world, and so she has escaped into Mundanus. Here she discovers the joy of jeans and unrestrictive clothing, video games, and endless cups of tea. She would give anything not to be dragged back to the Nether, but it is not only her furious parents and anxious brother who are searching for her – Lord Poppy is also on her trail.

  Cathy is a very likeable character and easy to relate to. What I like best about her is that she doesn’t lose sight of what she wants. Where other characters might find themselves won over by luxury, by a romanticised idea of the Regency period, or by a dashing hero-character, Cathy remains unimpressed, and I was glad she gave everyone a hard time. Even when she is helpless to change her situation, she retains a kind of calm determination and capability, constantly looking out for ways to escape or to use circumstances to her advantage.

  But Cathy is just one of the excellent main characters of the book. There’s also Max, one of the Arbiters, whose souls are dislocated from their bodies and secreted away in the cloisters of their Arbiter Chapters in order to keep them utterly focussed on their mission. Arbiters report back to their Chapters by communicating with their souls, using statues as vessels. Max is investigating the possible abduction of mortals into Exilium when his Chapter is destroyed in a mysterious attack. His link to the Chapter is severed and his soul becomes permanently trapped inside a gargoyle, which now follows him around, offering unsolicited advice like a really big, very ugly Jiminy Cricket. This leads to some brilliant scenes, and the dynamic between Max and his gargoyle-soul is perfect.

  Other characters include Sam, a bewildered mortal thrown into a sudden and unexpected magical mystery, and Will, Cathy’s betrothed, an arrogant but well meaning man who soon finds himself stuck in the middle of the Rosa family’s scheming (the thorns of the title). Quickly, the different plot threads begin to twist together: a missing dignitary, a Sorceror trying to find him, abducted mortals, scheming Fae, the attack on the chapter house, the Rosa family’s plans, Will and Cathy’s engagement, and poor Sam’s odd memory loss. And then there’s Cathy’s three wishes, forced on her by the enigmatic Lord Poppy, not to mention the Fae lord’s strange and sinister fascination with her.

  The story is well-paced, roaring forwards in Max’s sections, slowing down in Aquae Sulis as family rivalry and scheming is revealed. By the end of the story several mysteries and plot points have been resolved, and though others are left hanging for the sequel, Emma Newman has managed to keep the ending satisfying. She has also combined a lot of very different elements in one book without it ever feeling disjointed or forced. There’s a Regency feel alongside a very modern Britain, Sorcerers, ritual magic, magical objects and the Fae, different realms, a grisly detective character whose sections even have a slight noir-ish feel, and a mystery involving plotting families. The story is packed full of wonderful ideas that keep the story constantly moving.

  The world and its magic is well realised and presented beautifully; it feels completely natural and believable that magic would exist so close to the mundane, but it is also kept mysterious, allowing the magic to still feel…well, magical. In this, I thought it had a similar kind of feeling to the world of Harry Potter, or to books by Diana Wynne Jones, or to anything written by Neil Gaiman, whose style is very similar to Emma Newman’s writing in many ways. This book was not only enjoyable; it gave me a sense of delight like I haven’t found for a while in fantasy books written for adults. And there’s something about Between Two Thorns that feels so cosily British, too.

  I also have to note how much I loved the Fae, who, though they only appear briefly, were written brilliantly. I’ve always imagined faeries as being something like the Daedric Lords from the Elder Scrolls video game series: in other words, crazy as a box of frogs and operating on a wildly different form of morality. Their favourite pastime being messing with humans. The Fae of the Split Worlds were spot on in this respect.

  Between Two Thorns won’t be out until next year, but the Split Worlds have existed and have been building for quite some time now. It began as a self-publishing project to put out a short story set in the Split Worlds for a year and day while building up to the release of the first book. This caught the attention of Angry Robot Books, who are now publishing the series, beginning with the first book, Between Two Thorns. The short stories were halted while the details of the publishing contract were being sorted, but they have now resumed, and you can sign up to receive one a week by email, or you can read them online here. I’d really recommend checking some of them out.

  Between Two Thorns is magical, exciting, and clever. It manages to conjure a world that feels completely natural but also mysterious, sometimes dangerous, sometimes funny, combining several different kinds of urban fantasy into one story, and capturing a lovely sense of modern Britishness that is reminiscent of other fantastic British fantasy. I’m eagerly awaiting the sequel!

  Rating: 9.8/10 (4 votes cast)
  Between Two Thorns by Emma Newman, 9.8 out of 10 based on 4 ratings
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  Tags: Between Two Thorns, Emma Newman, fantasy, Split Worlds, urban fantasy
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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  Victoria Hooper Victoria Hooper is a writer and editor living in Nottingham, UK. She’s a huge fan of all things fantasy, science-fiction, speculative, paranormal, magical, weird, mythical, and alternate history, as well as anything Ancient Greek or Roman. She loves video games and cheesy movies, and can easily be bribed with chocolate brownies. Find her on Twitter @VickyThinks, or on her blog: http://vickyhooper.blogspot.co.uk

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  QUOTE:
  Between Two Thorns is a fun start to the series, and shows that there’s certainly more entertainment to come.
  Book: Between Two Thorns: The Split Worlds #1 (Emma Newman)
  JL Jamieson07.2016Book Review, Books
  splitworlds oneBetween Two Thorns: The Split Worlds

  Emma Newman

  Diversion Books

  Re-release February 23, 2016

  Cathy thought she’d escaped her awful family, but she was wrong. She comes from a noble family of the Fae-touched; an old segment of human society favored by the Fae, living in the space between the mundane world and the prison realm of the Fae, Exilium. That space between is called the Nether, and is untouched by time in both a literal and figurative sense. People don’t grow old there, and they behave as though it’s still far in the past. Electricity, computers, running hot water and women’s liberation aren’t a part of society life in the Nether.

  Cathy used the traditional coming of age wish that everyone got from their family’s Fae patron to go to college in Mundanus, and from there, she ditched her chaperone and lived a normal modern human life. Until Lord Poppy found her. Now she’s stuck having to come up with a wish that will impress him, and she has to go home to an engagement she doesn’t want to a man she doesn’t know. She has one chance to change her fate when she finds out her uncle the Master of Ceremonies has been abducted, and it seems another family is at the heart of it.

  This fanciful tale of the girl who just wanted to be normal is the start of the Split Worlds series, and the re-release is in preparation for the fourth book, A Little Knowledge. A Little Knowledge is out August 2nd, and we’ll be reviewing it here as well. Between Two Thorns is a fun start to the series, and shows that there’s certainly more entertainment to come. It shows itself to be the beginning to a much larger story arc, and the conspiracy it weaves makes you want to jump right into the next part of it. Which we definitely will. The books mix courtly intrigue with modern day urban fantasy, and so far has a thumbs up from me!

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  JL Jamieson
  JL Jamieson is a strange book nerd who writes technical documents by day, and book news, reviews, and other assorted opinions for you by night. She is working on her own fiction, and spends time making jewelry to sell at local conventions, as well as stalking the social media accounts of all your favorite writers.

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