Release Week: 16 May 2023
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Release Week: 16 May 2023
Posted on 2023-05-16 at 12:00 by Samuel Montgomery-Blinn
PICKS:
Yellowface: A Novel by R. F. Kuang, read by Helen Laser for Harper -- "Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars. But Athena’s a literary darling. June Hayward is literally nobody. Who wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks. So when June witnesses Athena’s death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena’s just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers during World War I. So what if June edits Athena’s novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So what if she lets her new publisher rebrand her as Juniper Song—complete with an ambiguously ethnic author photo? Doesn’t this piece of history deserve to be told, whoever the teller? That’s what June claims, and the New York Times bestseller list seems to agree. But June can’t get away from Athena’s shadow, and emerging evidence threatens to bring June’s (stolen) success down around her. As June races to protect her secret, she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves."
Titanium Noir: A Novel by Nick Harkaway, read by Davis Brooks for Random House -- "A virtuosic mashup of Philip K. Dick and Raymond Chandler by way of Marvel—the story of a detective investigating the murder of a Titan, one of society’s most powerful, medically-enhanced elites."
The Guest: A Novel by Emma Cline, read by Carlotta Brentan for Random House -- "Summer is coming to a close on the East End of Long Island, and Alex is no longer welcome. A misstep at a dinner party, and the older man she’s been staying with dismisses her with a ride to the train station and a ticket back to the city. With few resources and a waterlogged phone, but gifted with an ability to navigate the desires of others, Alex stays on Long Island and drifts like a ghost through the hedged lanes, gated driveways, and sun-blasted dunes of a rarefied world that is, at first, closed to her. Propelled by desperation and a mutable sense of morality, she spends the week leading up to Labor Day moving from one place to the next, a cipher leaving destruction in her wake."
Blue Skies by T. C. Boyle, read by Alyssa Bresnahan for Recorded Books -- "Denied a dog, a baby, and even a faithful boyfriend, Cat decides that she needs a snake: a glistening, writhing creature that can be worn like “jewelry, living jewelry.” But when the budding social influencer finally gives in to impulse, buying a Burmese python from a local pet shop, she sets in motion a chain of increasingly dire events that culminates in one of the most memorable denouements in recent fiction, one that ensnares her entire family, from her eco-obsessed parents, Ottilie and Frank, to her frat-boy-turned-husband, Todd. But there’s more than meets the eye in this compulsive family drama. Lurking beneath the banal façade of twenty-first-century California and Florida is a caricature of materialist American society that doubles as a prophetic warning about our planet’s future."
Harold by Steven Wright, read by the author for Simon and Schuster -- "A uniquely humorous and deeply profound novel from a legendary stand-up comedian that follows the thoughts of a 1960s third grader during a single day at school."
The Enchanted Hacienda by J.C. Cervantes, read by Frankie Corzo for Harlequin -- "When Harlow Estrada is abruptly fired from her dream job and her boyfriend proves to be a jerk, her world turns upside down. She flees New York City to the one place she can always call home—the enchanted Hacienda Estrada. The Estrada family farm in Mexico houses an abundance of charmed flowers cultivated by Harlow’s mother, sisters, aunt, and cousins. By harnessing the magic in these flowers, they can heal hearts, erase memories, interpret dreams—but not Harlow. So when her mother and aunt give her a special task involving the family’s magic, she panics. How can she rise to the occasion when she is magicless? But maybe it’s not magic she’s missing, but belief in herself. When she finally embraces her unique gifts and opens her heart to a handsome stranger, she discovers she’s far more powerful than she imagined."
The Malevolent Seven by Sebastien de Castell, read by Joe Jameson for Jo Fletcher Books -- "Seven war mages with dark pasts and special powers must come together to fight an unknown enemy—but the stakes are higher than anyone can imagine . . . and someone's setting them up for a fall."
The Hawkling by Rebecca Zahabi, read by Laura Hanna and Peter Kenny for Gollancz -- "The rebels on the other side of the Shadowpass are massing, and refugees are flooding in to the city. Scared, penniless and not exactly welcome, they are desperate for the protection of the Nest, and the powerful mages who live there. But there is dissension in the Nest's ranks, and there is always someone willing to make money from the fearful. The mages believe they have a secret weapon - a captured lightborn, kept prisoner by a magical slave collar and forced to do their bidding. But Tatters and Isha, tentative friends despite their suspicion of each other's motives, know something the mages do not. The rebels are aware of the lightborn. They know how to deal with it. And they are ready for war..."
Dual Memory by Sue Burke, read by André Santana for Dreamscape -- "Antonio Moro lost everything to the Leviathan League, ruthless global pirates. Now he's alone in a city on an Arctic island fighting Freebooters with nothing but lies—and the mistaken idea that he's a spy. When things look bleak, he discovers an unusual ally. His new personal assistant program, Par Augustus, is a nascent A. I. He's also insolent, extroverted, moody, and not quite legal. Together, they forge an uneasy alliance and create a rebellion from unlikely recruits to defend the island city. The hitch? No one else can ever know. Especially the humans."
Everyday Utopia: What 2,000 Years of Wild Experiments Can Teach Us About the Good Life by Kristen R. Ghodsee, read by Lisa Flanagan for Simon and Schuster -- "A dazzling tour through 2,000 years of audacious utopian thinking and experiments, exploring better ways to arrange our daily lives, plus a globetrotting jaunt to the communities already putting these seemingly fanciful visions into practice today."
Christian Supremacy: Reckoning with the Roots of Antisemitism and Racism by Magda Teter, read by Erica Stevens Abbitt for Princeton University Press -- "A panoramic cultural and legal history that traces the roots of antisemitism and racism to early Christian theology."
SERIES WATCH:
Descendant Machine: Stars and Bones, Book 2 by Gareth L. Powell, read by Rebecca Norfolk for W.F. Howes -- "The Grand Mechanism is a machine the size of Saturn's rings that has lain dormant for all recorded history, watched over by the alien Jzat. Now, rogue elements in Jzat and human society conspire to activate it, hoping it will bring them power and opportunity."
Fractal Noise: Fractalverse, Book 2 by Christopher Paolini, read by Jennifer Hale for Macmillan -- "A new blockbuster science fiction adventure from world-wide phenomenon and #1 New York Times bestseller Christopher Paolini, set in the world of New York Times and USA Today bestseller To Sleep in a Sea of Stars."
Only the Dead: Terminal List, Book 6 by Jack Carr, read by Ray Porter for Simon and Schuster -- "Navy SEAL James Reece faces a devastating global conspiracy."
Heaven's Angels: Uplink Squadron, Book 6 by J.N. Chaney and Chris Kennedy, read by Mark Boyett for Variant Publications -- "It seemed like a good idea at the time. The allies could sneak a fleet behind enemy lines and destroy the infrastructure the Overlords were using to push them to the brink of existence. As long as the allied fleet didn’t get trapped and obliterated, everything would be great. But they got trapped and obliterated. Now, the remains of the allied fleet are on the run, with one of the largest Overlord carrier forces ever seen in pursuit."
Murphy's Lawless: A Terran Republic Novel by Charles E. Gannon (2020) with Griffin Barber, Kacey Ezell, Kevin Ikenberry, Chris Kennedy, Mike Massa, and Mark Wandrey, read by Kevin Pariseau for Blackstone -- "Major Rodger Y. Murphy should have died when his helicopter crashed off the coast of Mogadishu in November, 1993. Instead, he woke up in August, 2125, in a binary star system 152 light years from home. Without any memory of the otherworldly abductors who spirited them away in cold sleep, Murphy and 100 other “Lost Soldiers” have been retrieved and awakened by officers of the Consolidated Terran Republic. Promising to return to the 55 Tauri B system after completing a distant mission, they leave the twentieth century castaways with a daunting objective: establish a base of operations on the main world, using local allies they have yet to recruit and enemy equipment they have yet to seize."
BACKLIST WATCH:
Runtime by S.B. Divya (2016), read by Jennifer Aquino for Recorded Books -- "The Minerva Sierra Challenge is a grueling spectacle, the cyborg’s Tour de France. Rich thrill seekers with corporate sponsorships, extensive support teams, and top-of-the-line exoskeletal and internal augmentations pit themselves against the elements in a daylong race across the Sierra Nevadas. Marmeg Guinto doesn’t have funding, and she doesn’t have support. She cobbled her gear together from parts she found in rich people’s garbage and spent the money her mother wanted her to use for nursing school to enter the race. But the race is the only chance she has at a better life for herself and her younger brothers, and she’s ready to risk it all."
How to Buy a Planet: The Cleremont Conjectures, Book 1 by D.A. Holdsworth (2020), read by Paul Woodson for Tantor -- "The location: London. The date: Very, very soon. Beset by multiple crises and buried under a growing mountain of debt, the leaders of the G7 have taken the only logical decision. They've sold the planet. When Toby, a penniless student, and his two new flatmates find out one morning on TV, they're surprised to find the Earth's new alien owners are staggeringly cute and bring the promise of a debt-free future. They're just getting ready to celebrate along with the rest of the world, when a chance encounter with a mysterious professor reveals the truth. And there's a glitch: the Earth is about to be destroyed."
Punarbhava by Ashutosh Jain (2020), read by Darshan Venkatesh for Audible -- "Two brave young Indian army officers, a dreaded enemy of the gods, and a war raging across time."
INDIE WATCH:
- Divide By Zero by Christopher Charles Berg, read by Kate Reading and Michael Kramer -- "Winston doesn’t think like other people. He struggles to explain himself, and questions basic mathematics. Fearing expulsion from his graduate program, he takes a leave of absence to test a new class of computer. Nothing about this computer is normal, and Winston unleashes ambitious code to push its limits, only to discover there is a reason he struggles with people and can’t follow norms. Now, his greatest failure has him facing the truth about himself, the limits of human understanding, and the forgotten legacy of the dead laying deep somewhere in the Pacific."
MOST MISSING:
The Wind Began to Howl: An Isaiah Coleridge Story by Laird Barron (Bad Hand Books) -- "Laird Barron's acclaimed crime saga makes a triumphant return in The Wind Began to Howl, an all-new story set after the events of Worse Angels. A seemingly benign case gradually pulls mob enforcer-turned-P.I. Isaiah Coleridge into a chilling mix of music, movie magic, mayhem, and madness. This time, Coleridge's dark journey forces him to confront a brutal truth: For some who try to escape the past, there is no way out."
The Cold Light of Stars: The Icarus Code, Book 1 by Rysa Walker (Starry Night Books) -- "A chamber from an ancient civilization is uncovered deep below the surface of Mars. Science reporter Claire Echols is assigned to cover the story, but someone is determined to stop her. Is it the wealthy entrepreneur leading the ongoing terraforming effort? The mining companies desperate to protect their livelihoods? The cult leader who wants to put a stop to all scientific progress? Or is someone else so threatened by this discovery that they'll kill to keep it hidden?"
The Drama with Doomsdays: Celia Cleary, Book 2 by Scott Reintgen (Aladdin) -- "Ever since the fateful visions about Jeffrey Johnson, Celia Cleary’s prophecies have focused on smaller things like minor mishaps and everyday inconveniences. It’s finally starting to feel like she has a handle on her powers…until things take a turn for the weird. One day at school, Celia’s notebook magically fills in with a single name written over and over: Patrick. She uses the family guidebook to investigate and learns that the mysterious Patrick is connected to a Doomsday Prophecy—a vision that involves a large group of people, a point of no return, and a terrible future. The target for this particular reckoning? The entire eighth grade."