Hello, and thanks for checking out September 2023’s Monthly Roundup post. If you haven’t read one of these roundups before, here’s how it’s going to go – first up, I’ve got a quick recap on everything I posted in September (which was mostly reviews, this month), so check that out to see if you missed anything. After that, I’ll talk a bit about my September as a whole, give a quick reading update, then finish off with a roundup of the coolest SFF-related news that I spotted over the last few weeks, and a couple of final recommendations. So read on, and please do let me know if you’ve got any questions or comments.
September’s Posts
Another eight posts this month (as you can tell from the date of this one, I didn’t manage to get it written in time to publish in September), in what has been a very review-heavy few weeks – I’ve written no fewer than five full book reviews, plus a short story review and a review roundup! This wasn’t intentional, it just worked out that way.
Longshot by Rob Young – I love a good Imperial Guard novel, and this one (the fourth volume in Black Library’s ‘Astra Militarum’ series) is a cracker. A gripping boots-on-the-ground war story, this focuses on a renowned Cadian sniper sergeant who’s forced to contend with antagonism within her regiment (for not being born a Cadian), the discomfort of being held up as a hero…oh, and the small matter of deadly t’au snipers.
System Collapse by Martha Wells – have I mentioned before that I love Murderbot? Because I really do! I was delighted to get my hands on an early copy of this, the seventh instalment of The Murderbot Diaries, which I’d describe as a short novel (definitely longer than a novella, but much shorter than Network Effect was), and which follows on directly from Network Effect. It has a slightly different feel to usual, in a good way, and really seems to be setting the series up for a whole new arc – but luckily it’s also just another fantastic story in its own right!
PUBLISHER INTERVIEW: Brandon and Vince Rospond Talk Winged Hussar Publishing – I’m always interested in learning more about the world of IP fiction, so it was a real pleasure to chat to Brandon and Vince about Winged Hussar and the stories they publish. If you’ve never read anything set in the worlds of Kings of War, Infinity, DreadBall and many more, maybe this will give you the impetus to give them a go!
Shark Heart by Emily Habeck – I’m not sure I’ve ever read anything quite like this before, but I loved it. Told in unconventional, bite-sized chunks, it’s the story of a man slowly mutating into a great white shark, and his wife caring for him as he changes, each of them trying to figure out who they want to be. It’s much less weird than it sounds, with the mutation treated like any other ailment, and the end result is a story that’s both heartwarming and heartrending, full of insight and utterly compelling.
Dark Horizon by James Swallow – I took a different approach to usual when writing this review (I never normally use the publisher’s blurb/summary, but this time around I just couldn’t improve upon it!), but it was surprisingly fun. Suffice it to say I loved this pacy, action-packed contemporary thriller, and simply couldn’t put it down. This is definitely Swallow having fun indulging his love of aviation, and it works brilliantly.
Short and Sweet – September 2023 – for this month’s quick review roundup I talked about another trio of recent SFF reads, covering quite a wide range of genres. There’s Shauna Lawless’ excellent historical fantasy novel The Children of Gods and Fighting Men, Delilah S. Dawson’s Star Wars novel Inquisitor: Rise of the Red Blade, and then finally Far From the Light of Heaven by Tade Thompson, which is essentially a locked-room murder mystery in space.
QUICK REVIEW: The Regression Test by Wole Talabi – a fantastic little science fiction short story featured in The Best of World SF v2 (Talabi is Nigerian), this explores the very timely topic of AI through a human, emotional lens, focusing on family and taking a surprisingly dark turn in the end. Well worth checking out if you enjoy a bit of thoughtful, international science fiction.
SPOILER REVIEW: Kasrkin by Edoardo Albert – a slightly different Imperial Guard novel to most, this really takes its time to begin with as a squad of Kasrkin travel a vast desert in search of a crashed transport. The second half changes tack drastically, going big on the action and introducing some unusual Xenos characters. A really interesting read, with plenty to talk about – so much so that I decided to write a longer review than usual, and (possibly in a ToW first) cover some spoilers in it.
My September
So, we’re officially in Autumn now, right? I never know quite what to think about that. On the one hand, as a British person I feel almost honour-bound to complain about the absence of Summer (it’s a tradition), but on the other hand I’m actually quite ok with the temperature dropping now. We are not set up well to deal with properly hot summers, and while I don’t think this year’s was as warm as last, my flat has still got pretty warm at times! I do know that I’m going to miss the daylight though, as the evenings start to close in earlier.
It’s been another decent month in terms of writing output, despite coming down with something towards the end of the month – thankfully the only thing I hadn’t yet finished before starting to feel ill was this post. As I’m writing this I feel pretty rough indeed, but hopefully it’s just a bad cold rather than anything worse. Fingers crossed. With that in mind though, I’m going to keep this bit very short – there’s plenty more to talk about in the following sections (much of which I’d written throughout the month – phew!), so let’s jump straight into that.
Reading Update
Much like in August, I got off to a flying start in terms of reading only for things to drop off a bit towards the middle of the month (nothing to do with individual books, just how things worked out from a time perspective). That being said, I picked up the pace again later on and blitzed through quite a lot at the end of the month. All’s well that ends well, right?
Again I’ll keep this section short, so let’s just take the usual look at the month’s reading in numbers:
- I read 14 books in September, taking me to 109 for the year in total. Not bad!
- If you checked my Goodreads however, you’d see that my reading challenge only says 108. That’s because one of this month’s books was an early draft of a close friend’s novel, which obviously isn’t on Goodreads! I’m still counting it though, even if Goodreads isn’t.
- The format breakdown this month was: 7 physical books, 3 ebooks and 3 audiobooks, plus my friend’s novel – which was technically an ebook.
- I started the month off strong in terms of the ‘to review’/’for fun’ balance, but it ended up as 6 to review (in some form or another), 7 for fun, plus my friend’s book (for feedback).
Cool SFF Book News
After a couple of months of not spotting all that much in the way of SFF book news, this time around I’ve got loads to talk about! So much that I’ve split this section (back) up, starting with straight-up news and moving on to cover reveals.
Technically this was announced in August, but it snuck in on the 31st after I’d published last month’s roundup, and it’s far too cool not to mention! Aconyte already publish loads of brilliant cosmic horror books in the Arkham Horror IP, but now they’re teaming up with Chaosium Inc. to release novels set in the Regency Cthulhu and Cthulhu by Gaslight settings, which Marc Gascoigne described as “Bridgerton with extra tentacles and Sherlock Holmes facing off against shoggoths”. That sounds amazing! The first novel, Secrets & Sacrifices by Cath Lauria, is due in April 2024, with more to follow.
You might have seen me talking about the British Fantasy Awards over the last couple of months, as I was on the jury for one of the awards. The ceremony happened at Fantasycon in Birmingham (on the 16th), as part of which it was revealed that we had chosen Hiron Ennes to win the Best Newcomer award, for his debut novel Leech (published by Tordotcom in the US and Tor UK over here). I loved Leech when I first read it last year, and I had a blast revisiting it for my jury duty this year. There were two books on the shortlist that I absolutely loved and would have been delighted to see win, and this was one of them, so I’m very happy with the end result. If you’re interested, you can check out all of the nominees and winners for this year’s awards here.
Ok so this isn’t exactly SFF news but it’s still interesting book news. I’ve been a big fan of Richard Strachan’s Black Library fiction for a few years now, and I couldn’t have been happier to hear that his first original fiction novel – Hound Point – has been acquired by Raven Books (an imprint of Bloomsbury), for publication in 2025 (plus “a second unnamed historical novel”). That seems a long way away, but I’m sure it’s going to be worth the wait. Here’s the synopsis:
“Hound Point, inspired by a legend dating back to the days of the Crusades, opens in Scotland in the last terrible months of the First World War, in a grand house now requisitioned by the government as an emergency hospital.
“Widowed Esther, a volunteer nurse, encounters a patient troubled by a mysterious injury he gained in battle and a young man who soon becomes dangerously obsessed with the dark history of the house he has inherited nearby.”
Black Library News
There was an unusual amount of genuinely interesting BL-related news in September, all delivered via Warhammer Community as usual, so I’ve included it all here in a dedicated BL section for anyone who’s keen to check it out.
Another announcement that landed on the 31st August was for the latest Black Library ‘Reader’s Choice’ vote, which is an annual opportunity for BL readers to have their say on which two novels (one 40k, one old-school Warhammer) will be reprinted in paperback for the following year’s BL Celebration. It’s a cool idea, but I always feel it’s let down a bit by BL’s insistence on including loads of books which are part of series – in this case six of the 10 options are the first books in their respective series, while another is in fact the third book in its series! They’re not going to reprint the rest of the series, so it doesn’t really make sense to just do one! Ah well. I voted for Lord of the Night and Riders of the Dead.
Next, Warhammer Community announced (and revealed the cover for) Sea of Souls by Chris Wraight, book 7 in BL’s ongoing Dawn of Fire series. There was also confirmation that this series will run to 9 books, with the last two “coming soon” (whatever that means – the DoF release schedule has been weird!), which is good to know – BL did mention 9 books being the total when the series was first announced, but then never mentioned that number again until now. I like this cover – I think it’s one of the better covers in the DoF series, especially compared to the first few – and it’s always good to see another Chris Wraight book on the horizon.
Then it was the turn of Age of Sigmar with the announcment of (and cover reveal for) Blacktalon by Liane Merciel. I’ve enjoyed several of Liane’s AoS short stories so it’s great to see her getting the chance to contribute a full-length novel now – and let’s face it, a BL novel written by a woman is still a frustratingly rare occurrence. I had to check, as I’ve not been keeping up with this part of the lore, but as it turns out there are quite a few Blacktalons short stories now, the last couple of which are (like this novel) branded with the logo to match the Blacktalon animation on Warhammer+. So if you watched the animation, or you’re generally a Stormcast fan, keep an eye out for this coming soon(ish).
Last but not least, Warhammer Community revealed that Black Library will soon be publishing a(nother) new edition of Graham McNeill’s classic 40k novel Storm of Iron, this time in (regular – i.e. non-special/limited edition) hardback for the first time. They’ve even commissioned new artwork focusing on Warsmith Honsou…which is cool, and all. Personally I still prefer the original artwork (which is “way more metal” as a friend of mine said), and even the later edition – this is fine, but it feels a bit bland and safe, especially with that cartoony title treatment. Oh, and – in a move that’s bound to irritate hardcore Honsou fans – it portrays him with his fleshmetal arm, which is both a spoiler and an anachronism, as he doesn’t get that arm until long after the events of Storm of Iron! Ah well.
Cover Reveals
I spotted quite a few intriguing cover reveals in September, including one that I’m ever so slightly (ok, very much) biassed about. I’ve included them in the order I spotted them.
First up, indie author Keith W. Dickinson revealed the lovely cover for his upcoming ‘low stakes fantasy’ novella Glunda the Veg Witch, which sounds a lot of fun – I love a novella, and it particularly tickles me that this is billed as “a tale of heroism and hotpots”! I think it’s a genuinely great cover, so huge credit to designer Luisa Galstyan. Glunda is due out on the 31st October, and you can get your pre-orders in now!
You might have seen me mention before that my sister’s debut novel – The Cautious Traveller’s Guide to the Wastelands – is coming out next year, from W&N in the UK and Flatiron in the US. Well it now has a swanky UK cover, revealed this month alongside a beautiful video trailer! Have a watch of the trailer, check out the cover, and read the synopsis to get a sense of what this historical fantasy novel is all about! It’s sort of exciting and weird at the same time for me and the rest of the family to see the book start to become more real, step by step, and I’m sure it’s totally surreal for Sarah! I’m obviously delighted to see it get all this attention from the publisher, and to see such a great response from excited readers too. I’ll try not to completely spam everyone with news and pictures over the coming months…but I can’t promise anything! The book is due out in June 2024, and it’s available to pre-order now!
Adrian Tchaikovsky remains as prolific as ever, with his latest novel from Head of Zeus – House of Open Wounds – coming in December 2023. Check out that fantastic cover art – it’s the kind of artwork that keeps revealing more and more detail the closer you look! This is another book set in the same world as 2022’s City of Last Chances, although as I understand it they’re both technically standalone novels, so can be read in either order. I’ve been meaning to read the first book for ages, so maybe this will give me the nudge I need to finally pick it up!
I’ve talked before about Patrick Rothfuss’ upcoming novella The Narrow Road Between Desires, but it now has an official cover and…I rather like it. I still think that I probably won’t bother with the third novel if it ever arrives, but a standalone novella is quite tempting. Tonally this seems to jive quite nicely with the look of The Slow Regard of Silent Things, and if the book follows suit then I suspect I’ll enjoy it. This is due out from Gollancz in November 2023.
The last cover reveal I spotted was for Foul Days, the debut novel from Genoveva Dimova, which promises to draw upon her Bulgarian roots for a story full of Slavic folklore and shadow magic. It sounds great, and I absolutely love this cover art – the creepy shadows look great, and I really like the city in the background! Had this on my radar for a while, and I know we shouldn’t judge books by their covers but…this looks so cool. It’s due out from Tor Books in June 2024.
Other Recommendations
To finish off, here are a few quick recommendations for bits and pieces that have caught my interest recently.
Fiction: Fancy a murder mystery involving a lacklustre medium and her teenage spirit guide investigating a year-old death at the country home of a rich English family? Well that’s exactly what Alice Bell’s Grave Expectations offers, although as one of the characters so eloquently puts it: “This isn’t a whodunnit, it’s a…whodeadit. And a howdeadit. And a whendeadit”. Because investigating a death based solely on the appearance of a ghost proves…tricky. Thoroughly entertaining though – I had a lot of fun with this.
Non-fiction: I recently picked up Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs by Caitlin Doughty (after having listened to her Smoke Gets In Your Eyes earlier this year), and loved it. Generally speaking we don’t tend to talk about death too much, but Doughty’s writing is all about being prepared to ask questions about death, dying, dead bodies and so on. This particular book is essentially a collection of Q&As (all questions that children have asked her when she’s delivered talks in the past) on death-related topics – some disgusting, some hilarious, all of them genuinely fascinating.
Music: This year is the 25th anniversary of Infinity by Devin Townsend, his first solo album released under his own name. I’ve loved Devin’s music for ages but never really spent much time with this album, so I’m remedying that at the moment – seems like an appropriate moment! If you’re familiar with Devin’s music then you’ll know what to expect, but if not let’s just say it’s a musical melange running the gamut from blissful new-age melodies to crushing guitar riffs, and everything in between. It’s utterly crazy in places, but somehow it really works – just like Devin.
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If you’re still reading this, thanks for sticking with me! I think that’s a good point at which to end this – hopefully there’s been something interesting in there for you. If you’ve got any comments or questions, please let me know in the comments below or on social media.
In the meantime, I hope you have a great October – happy reading!
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