Recent Releases in Fantasy |
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Gods and Dragons
by Kevin J. Anderson
Two continents at war: the Three Kingdoms and Ishara have been in conflict for a thousand years. But when an outside threat arises--the reawakening of a powerful ancient race that wants to remake the world--the two warring nations must somehow set aside generations of hatred to form an alliance against a far more deadly enemy.
Wake the Dragon #3
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Night angel nemesis
by Brent Weeks
After the war that cost him so much, Kylar Stern is broken and alone. He's determined not to kill again, but an impending amnesty will pardon the one murderer he can't let walk free. He promises himself this is the last time. One last hit to tie up the loose ends of his old, lost life.
But Kylar's best -- and maybe only -- friend, the High King Logan Gyre, needs him. To protect a fragile peace, Logan's new kingdom, and the king's twin sons, he needs Kylar to secure a powerful magical artifact that was unearthed during the war.
With rumors that a ka'kari may be found, adversaries both old and new are on the hunt. And if Kylar has learned anything, it's that ancient magics are better left in the hands of those he can trust.
If he does the job right, he won't need to kill at all. This isn't an assassination -- it's a heist.
But some jobs are too hard for an easy conscience, and some enemies are so powerful the only answer lies in the shadows.
The Kylar Chronicles #1
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Tress of the emerald sea
by Brandon Sanderson
The only life Tress has known on her island home in an emerald-green ocean has been a simple one, with the simple pleasures of collecting cups brought by sailors from faraway lands and listening to stories told by her friend Charlie. But when his father takes him on a voyage to find a bride and disaster strikes, Tress must stow away on a ship and seek the Sorceress of the deadly Midnight Sea. Amid the spore oceans where pirates abound, can Tress leave her simple life behind and make her own place sailing a sea where a single drop of water can mean instant death?
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Untethered sky
by Fonda Lee
Ester's family was torn apart when a manticore killed her mother and baby brother, leaving her with nothing but her father's painful silence and a single, overwhelming need to kill the monsters that took her family.
Ester's path leads her to the King's Royal Mews, where the giant rocs of legend are flown to hunt manticores by their brave and dedicated ruhkers. Paired with a fledgling roc named Zahra, Ester finds purpose and acclaim by devoting herself to a calling that demands absolute sacrifice and a creature that will never return her love. The terrifying partnership between woman and roc leads Ester not only on the empire's most dangerous manticore hunt, but on a journey of perseverance and acceptance.
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In the Lives of Puppets
by TJ Klune
In a strange little home built into the branches of a grove of trees, live three robots--fatherly inventor android Giovanni Lawson, a pleasantly sadistic nurse machine, and a small vacuum desperate for love and attention. Victor Lawson, a human, lives there too. They're a family, hidden and safe.
The day Vic salvages and repairs an unfamiliar android labeled "HAP," he learns of a shared dark past between Hap and Gio-a past spent hunting humans.
When Hap unwittingly alerts robots from Gio's former life to their whereabouts, the family is no longer hidden and safe. Gio is captured and taken back to his old laboratory in the City of Electric Dreams. So together, the rest of Vic's assembled family must journey across an unforgiving and otherworldly country to rescue Gio from decommission, or worse, reprogramming.
Along the way to save Gio, amid conflicted feelings of betrayal and affection for Hap, Vic must decide for himself: Can he accept love with strings attached?
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Wings Once Cursed & Bound
by Piper J. Drake
Peeraphan Rahttana lives her life in Seattle, unaware of the complicated magical world spinning just beyond the shadows and mist...until a violent clash outside her dance rehearsal has her literally whisked off her feet. Her darkly brooding rescuer, vampire Bennett Andrews, claims to represent a secret organization dedicated to locating objects of myth and magic, tucking them safely away where they can do no harm--but he's too late to save Peeraphan from a deadly curse.
Yet Peeraphan isn't what she seems. Wings unbound, she's a Thai bird princess of legend...and while the curse won't kill her outright, it's only a matter of time. Determined, Bennett sweeps Peeraphan deeper into a supernatural world far beyond anything she ever imagined in a desperate bid to find a solution...and an explanation for the powers even she doesn't know how to define.
Her world may have changed overnight, but Peeraphan knows one thing for certain: she can't go back to living as a human anymore. Not when she's felt what it's like to fly with Bennett by her side. She's determined to keep her wings and her freedom...and defy anyone who would try to take them from her again.
What would you save if the world you knew disappeared and you could open your eyes to what exists just beyond?
Mythwoven #1
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The Year's Best African Speculative Fiction 2021
by Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki
The world's first ever "year's best" anthology of African speculative fiction. Edited by Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki, The Year's Best African Speculative Fiction collects twenty-nine stories by twenty-five writers, which the press describes as "some of the most exciting voices, old and new, from Africa and the diaspora, published in the 2020 year."
The anthology includes stories from Somto O. Ihezue, Pemi Aguda, Russell Nichols, Tamara Jerée, Tlotlo Tsamaase, Sheree Renée Thomas, Tobias S. Buckell, Inegbenoise O. Osagie, Tobi Ogundiran, Chinelo Onwualu, Moustapha Mbacké Diop, Marian Denise Moore, Michelle Mellon, C.L. Clark, Eugen Bacon, Craig Laurence Gidney, Makena Onjerika, T.L. Huchu, Yvette Lisa Ndlovu, Derek Lubangakene, Suyi Davies Okungbowa, Shingai Njeri Kagunda, WC Dunlap, ZZ Claybourne, and Dilman Dila. As Ekpeki notes, the announcement also includes a list of twenty-one additional notable stories from 2020--an excellent further reading list once you've finished the book.
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Twice cursed : an anthology
by Marie O'Regan
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR
Take a trip to a terrifying carnival and uncover the secrets within, solve a mysterious puzzle box and await your reward, join a traveling circus and witness the strangest ventriloquist act you've ever seen.
In this follow-up to the bestselling Cursed: An Anthology, you'll unearth curses old and new. From a very different take on Snow White, to a new interpretation of The Red Shoes, the best in fantasy spin straw into gold, and invite you into the labyrinth.
Just don't forget to leave your trail of breadcrumbs...
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The bone shard war
by Andrea Stewart
Lin Sukai has won her first victory as Emperor, but the future of the Phoenix Empire hangs in the balance - and Lin is dangerously short of allies.
As her own governors plot treason, the Shardless Few renew hostilities. Worse still, Lin discovers her old nemesis Nisong has joined forces with the rogue Alanga, Ragan. Both seek her death.
Yet hope lies in history. Legend tells of seven mythic swords, forged in centuries past. If Lin can find them before her enemies, she may yet be able to turn the tide.
If she fails, the Sukai dynasty - and the entire empire - will fall.
Drowning Empire #3
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Damsel
by Evelyn Skye
A price must be paid.
Elodie never dreamed of a lavish palace or a handsome prince. As she grew up in the famine-stricken realm of Inophe, her deepest wish was to help her people survive each winter. So when a representative from a rich, reclusive kingdom offers her family enough wealth to save Inophe in exchange for Elodie's hand in marriage, she accepts without hesitation. Swept away to the glistening kingdom of Aurea, Elodie is quickly taken in by the beauty of the realm--and of her betrothed, Prince Henry.
But as Elodie undertakes the rituals to become an Aurean princess, doubts prick at her mind as cracks in the kingdom's perfect veneer begin to show: A young woman who appears and vanishes from the castle tower. A parade of torches weaving through the mountains. Markings left behind in a mysterious V. Too late, she discovers that Aurea's prosperity has been purchased at a heavy cost--each harvest season, the kingdom sacrifices its princesses to a hungry dragon. And Elodie is the next sacrifice.
This ancient arrangement has persisted for centuries, leading hundreds of women to their deaths. But the women who came before Elodie did not go quietly. Their blood pulses with power and memory, and their experiences hold the key to Elodie's survival. Forced to fight for her life, this damsel must use her wits to defeat a dragon, uncover Aurea's past, and save not only herself but the future of her new kingdom as well.
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The winter knight
by Jes Battis
The knights of the round table are alive in Vancouver, but when one winds up dead, it's clear the familiar stories have taken a left turn. Hildie, a Valkyrie and the investigator assigned to the case, wants to find the killer -- and maybe figure her life out while she's at it. On her short list of suspects is Wayne, an autistic college student and the reincarnation of Sir Gawain, who these days is just trying to survive in a world that wasn't made for him. After finding himself at the scene of the crime, Wayne is pulled deeper into his medieval family history while trying to navigate a new relationship with the dean's charming assistant, Bert -- who also happens to be a prime murder suspect. To figure out the truth, Wayne and Hildie have to connect with dangerous forces: fallen knights, tricky runesmiths, the Wyrd Sisters of Gastown. And a hungry beast that stalks Wayne's dreams.
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Engines of chaos
by R. S. Ford
Torwyn burns as Sanctan Egelrath tightens his grip on power. The Draconate Ministry has gathered its forces, determined to eradicate the Guilds, but Rosomon Hawkspur still stands in their way.
Her only hope could lay with Lancelin Jagdor, sent to gather allies in their struggle against the usurper. Can even the greatest warrior in Torwyn hope to succeed with so many adversaries determined to stop him?
Tyreta returns home with newfound strength and mysterious sorcerous abilities, only to discover it is not the land she left behind. She will have to call upon her untested powers to survive when she embarks on a mission that could turn the tide of war.
Conall, trapped in a dangerous land, has his own enemies to defeat before he can hope to escape and join the conflict that threatens his family. Even if he succeeds, he must overcome the demons that threaten from within or face damnation.
Though Rosomon is vastly outnumbered, and her family lost, she is determined to strike back against her enemies. But saving her homeland might prove an impossible task.
The Age of Uprising #2
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One for my enemy
by Olivie Blake
In modern-day Manhattan where we lay our scene, two rival witch families fight to maintain control of their respective criminal empires.
On one side of the conflict are the Antonova sisters -- each one beautiful, cunning, and ruthless -- and their mother, the elusive supplier of premium intoxicants, known only as Baba Yaga. On the other side, the influential Fedorov brothers serve their father, the crime boss known as Koschei the Deathless, whose community extortion ventures dominate the shadows of magical Manhattan.
After twelve years of tenuous co-existence, a change in one family's interests causes a rift in the existing stalemate. When bad blood brings both families to the precipice of disaster, fate intervenes with a chance encounter, and in the aftershocks of a resurrected conflict, everyone must choose a side. As each of the siblings struggles to stake their claim, fraying loyalties threaten to rot each side from the inside out.
If, that is, the enmity between empires doesn't destroy them first.
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The way home : two novellas from the world of The last unicorn
by Peter S. Beagle
The Last Unicorn is one of fantasy's most revered classics, beloved by generations of readers and with millions of copies in print. Revisiting the world of that novel, Beagle's long-awaited Hugo and Nebula-Awards-winning "Two Hearts" introduced the irrepressible Sooz on a quest to save her village from a griffin, and explored the bonds she formed with unforgettable characters like the wise and wonderful Molly Grue and Schmendrick the Magician.
In the never-before-published "Sooz," the events of "Two Hearts" are years behind its narrator, but a perilous journey lies ahead of her, in a story that is at once a tender meditation on love and loss, and a lesson in finding your true self.
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Heir of uncertain magic
by Charlie N. Holmberg
Thanks to house tamer Hulda Larkin, the mischief infesting Whimbrel House has calmed. But if Hulda's job is done, what does that mean for Merritt Fernsby, inheritor of the remote Narragansett Bay estate, who's only now coming to terms with his enchanted place in the world?
Merritt has realized his own burgeoning powers, which draw the thoughts of every plant, insect, and dog. His nights are sleepless, with an uncontrollable cacophony of voices that compel a long-overdue search into his uncanny bloodline. It's not the only puzzle uniting Merritt and his ex-housekeeper, Hulda. Her friend and former employer at the Boston Institute for the Keeping of Enchanted Rooms has disappeared. Hulda herself is up for the now-vacant position of institute director, and her rival for the role is a stranger who's suspiciously curious about Whimbrel House--and could have connections to an old foe.
As Merritt struggles to face his estranged family and Hulda dives into the institute's secrets, the two are brought intimately closer than ever into the mysteries of wizardry, chaos, and love.
Whimbrel House #2
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Arca
by G. R. Macallister
The Drought of Girls has ended, but the rift it broke open between the Queendoms is not so easily healed. Political tensions roil the senate of Paxim, where Queen Heliane vows to make her son Paulus the nation's first ruling King or die trying. Scorpican troops amass on the border of Arca, ready to attack. And within Arca itself, its young, unready queen finds her court a nest of vipers and her dreams besieged by a mysterious figure with unknown intentions.
As iron and magic clash on the battlefield and powerful women scheme behind the scenes, danger and violence abound. Can anyone stop chaos from ripping the Queendoms apart?
Five Queendoms #2
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Recently Released in Science Fiction
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Nightwatch over Windscar
by K. Eason
Iari is good at killing monsters. As a templar in the Aedis, a multi-species religious organization committed to protecting the Confederation, eliminating extra-dimensional horrors is her job. But after she helped stop separatists from sabotaging the entire Confederation, she discovered a new sort of monster: the rogue-arithmancer, political kind.
Promoted and sent north to the tundra of Windscar, Iari leads a team of templars to investigate ancient, subterranean ruins, which local legend claims are haunted, and which have mysterious connections to the dangerous arithmancy used by the wichu separatists. Iari isn't worried about ghosts. She's worried about surviving separatists and a fresh attempt to upend the Confederation.
Included in Iari's team are Char, a decommissioned battle-mecha and newly-joined templar, and Gaer, ostensible ambassador and talented arithmancer. As they delve into the ruins, they find remnants of long-ago battles, bits of broken armor and mechas--which unexpectedly reanimate and attack. It seems there is still dangerous arithmancy in Windscar--but the source isn't who Iari expected, and they're far worse than the separatists....
The Weep #2
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Camp Zero
by Michelle Min Sterling
In remote northern Canada, a team led by a visionary American architect is break-ing ground on a building project called Camp Zero, intended to be the beginning of a new way of life. A clever and determined young woman code-named Rose is offered a chance to join the Blooms, a group hired to entertain the men in camp--but her real mission is to secretly monitor the mercurial architect in charge. In return, she'll receive a home for her climate-displaced Korean immigrant mother and herself.
Rose quickly secures the trust of her target, only to discover that everyone has a hidden agenda, and nothing is as it seems.
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Some Desperate Glory
by Emily Tesh
While we live, the enemy shall fear us.
Since she was born, Kyr has trained for the day she can avenge the murder of planet Earth. Raised in the bowels of Gaea Station alongside the last scraps of humanity, she readies herself to face the Wisdom, the powerful, reality-shaping weapon that gave the majoda their victory over humanity.
They are what's left. They are what must survive. Kyr is one of the best warriors of her generation, the sword of a dead planet. When Command assigns her brother to certain death and relegates her to Nursery to bear sons until she dies trying, she knows she must take humanity's revenge into her own hands.
Alongside her brother's brilliant but seditious friend and a lonely, captive alien, Kyr escapes from everything she's known into a universe far more complicated than she was taught and far more wondrous than she could have imagined.
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The thick and the lean : a novel
by Chana Porter
In the quaint religious town of Seagate, abstaining from food brings one closer to God.
But Beatrice Bolano is hungry. She craves the forbidden: butter, flambé, marzipan. As Seagate takes increasingly extreme measures to regulate every calorie its citizens consume, Beatrice must make a choice: give up her secret passion for cooking or leave the only community she has known.
Elsewhere, Reiko Rimando has left her modest roots for a college tech scholarship in the big city. A flawless student, she is set up for success...until her school pulls her funding, leaving her to face either a mountain of debt or a humiliating return home. But Reiko is done being at the mercy of the system. She forges a third path--outside of the law.
With the guidance of a mysterious cookbook written by a kitchen maid centuries ago, Beatrice and Reiko each grasp for a life of freedom--something more easily imagined than achieved in a world dominated by catastrophic corporate greed.
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The blood gift
by N. E. Davenport
After discovering the depth of betrayal, treachery, and violence perpetrated against her by Mareen's Tribunal Council and exposing her illegal blood-gift to save her Praetorian squad, Ikenna becomes a fugitive with a colossal bounty on her head.
Yet, somehow, that's the least of her worries.
Her grandfather's longtime allies refuse to offer help, and the Blood Emperor's Warlord is tracking her. She's also struggling to control the enormous power she was granted by the Goddess of Blood Rites...and come to terms with the promises she made to get such power.
Amidst all of this, the Blood Emperor wages a full-scale invasion against Mareen and leaves a trail of decimated cities, war crimes, and untold death in his wake. As the horrors increase, Ikenna and her team realize they must assassinate the Blood Emperor and quickly end the war. But the price to do so is steep and has planet-shattering consequences.
The price to do nothing, though, is annihilation.
War has erupted. Alliances are fracturing. And Ikenna is torn between her loyalties, her desires for revenge, and the power threatening to consume her. With the world aflame, only one thing is certain: blood will be spilled.
Blood Gift Duology #2
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Red Team Blues
by Cory Doctorow
Martin Hench is 67 years old, single, and successful in a career stretching back to the beginnings of Silicon Valley. He lives and roams California in a very comfortable fully-furnished touring bus, The Unsalted Hash, that he bought years ago from a fading rock star. He knows his way around good food and fine drink. He likes intelligent women, and they like him back often enough.
Martin is a--contain your excitement--self-employed forensic accountant, a veteran of the long guerilla war between people who want to hide money, and people who want to find it. He knows computer hardware and software alike, including the ins and outs of high-end databases and the kinds of spreadsheets that are designed to conceal rather than reveal. He's as comfortable with social media as people a quarter his age, and he's a world-level expert on the kind of international money-laundering and shell-company chicanery used by Fortune 500 companies, mid-divorce billionaires, and international drug gangs alike. He also knows the Valley like the back of his hand, all the secret histories of charismatic company founders and Sand Hill Road VCs. Because he was there at all the beginnings. He's not famous, except to the people who matter. He's made some pretty powerful people happy in his time, and he's been paid pretty well. It's been a good life.
Now he's been roped into a job that's more dangerous than anything he's ever agreed to before--and it will take every ounce of his skill to get out alive.
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Ascension
by Nicholas Binge
An enormous snow-covered mountain has appeared in the Pacific Ocean. No one knows when exactly it showed up, precisely how big it might be, or how to explain its existence. When Harold Tunmore is contacted by a shadowy organization to help investigate, he has no idea what he is getting into as he and his team set out for the mountain.
The higher Harold's team ascends, the less things make sense. Time moves differently, turning minutes into hours, and hours into days. Amid the whipping cold of higher elevation, the climbers' limbs numb and memories of their lives before the mountain begin to fade. Paranoia quickly turns to violence among the crew, and slithering, ancient creatures pursue them in the snow. Still, as the dangers increase, the mystery of the mountain compels them to its peak, where they are certain they will find their answers. Have they stumbled upon the greatest scientific discovery known to man or the seeds of their own demise?
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Paradise-1
by David Wellington
Paradise-1. Earth's first deep space colony. For thousands of people, it was an opportunity for a new life. Until it went dark.x
No communication has been received from the colony for months. And it falls to Firewatch inspector Alexandra Petrova and the crew of the Artemis to investigate.
What they find is more horrifying than anything they could have imagined.
Red Space #1
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The Scourge Between Stars
by Ness Brown
As acting captain of the starship Calypso, Jacklyn Albright is responsible for keeping the last of humanity alive as they limp back to Earth from their forebears' failed colony on a distant planet.
Faced with constant threats of starvation and destruction in the treacherous minefield of interstellar space, Jacklyn's crew has reached their breaking point. As unrest begins to spread throughout the ship's Wards, a new threat emerges, picking off crew members in grim, bloody fashion.
Jacklyn and her team must hunt down the ship's unknown intruder if they have any hope of making it back to their solar system alive.
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The Ten Percent Thief
by Lavanya Lakshminarayan
Nothing has happened. Not yet, anyway. This is how all things begin.
Welcome to Apex City, formerly Bangalore, where everything is decided by the mathematically perfect Bell Curve.
With the right image, values and opinions, you can ascend to the glittering heights of the Twenty Percent - the Virtual elite - and have the world at your feet. Otherwise you risk falling to the precarious Ten Percent, and deportation to the ranks of the Analogs, with no access to electricity, running water or even humanity.
The system has no flaws. Until the elusive "Ten Percent Thief" steals a single jacaranda seed from the Virtual city and plants a revolution in the barren soil of the Analog world.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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