Release Week: 26 March 2024
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Release Week: 26 March 2024
Posted on 2024-03-26 at 12:00 by Samuel Montgomery-Blinn
FEATURED PICK:
- The Angel of Indian Lake: The Indian Lake Trilogy, Book 3 by Stephen Graham Jonesm read by Isabella Star LaBlanc, Barbara Crampton, Angela Goethals, Andrew J. Robinson, and the author for Simon and Schuster -- "The final installment in the most lauded trilogy in the history of horror novels picks up four years after Don’t Fear the Reaper as Jade returns to Proofrock, Idaho, to build a life after the years of sacrifice—only to find the Lake Witch is waiting."
FICTION PICKS:
Bunyan and Henry; Or, the Beautiful Destiny: A Novel By: Mark Cecil, read by Tanis Parenteau, Ari Fliakos, and JD Jackson for Random House -- "A large-hearted reimagining of beloved all-American legends, this epic debut novel brings men of myth Paul Bunyan and John Henry alive like never before, teaming up for an adventure quest with deeper interrogations of race, class, and industrialization."
The Emperor and the Endless Palace By: Justinian Huang, read by Dylan J. Locke, Will Dao, and Telly Leung for Harlequin -- "In the year 4 BCE, an ambitious courtier is called upon to seduce the young emperor—but quickly discovers they are both ruled by blood, sex and intrigue. In 1740, a lonely innkeeper agrees to help a mysterious visitor procure a rare medicine, only to unleash an otherworldly terror instead. And in present-day Los Angeles, a college student meets a beautiful stranger and cannot shake the feeling they’ve met before."
Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon, read by the author for Random House -- "On the island of Sicily amid the Peloponnesian War, the Syracusans have figured out what to do with the surviving Athenians who had the gall to invade their city: they’ve herded the sorry prisoners of war into a rock quarry and left them to rot. Looking for a way to pass the time, Lampo and Gelon, two unemployed potters with a soft spot for poetry and drink, head down into the quarry to feed the Athenians if, and only if, they can manage a few choice lines from their great playwright Euripides. Before long, the two mates hatch a plan to direct a full-blown production of Medea. After all, you can hate the people but love their art. But as opening night approaches, what started as a lark quickly sets in motion a series of extraordinary events, and our wayward heroes begin to realize that staging a play can be as dangerous as fighting a war, with all sorts of risks to life, limb, and friendship."
Monsters We Have Made: A Novel By: Lindsay Starck, read by Patricia Santomasso for Random House -- "Thirteen years ago, Sylvia Gray's young daughter, Faye, attacked her babysitter in order to impress the Kingman, a monster she and her best friend had encountered on the Internet. When the now twenty-three-year-old Faye goes missing, leaving her toddler behind, Sylvia launches a search that propels her back into the past and back into the Kingman's orbit. With the help of her estranged husband and a sister she hasn't spoken to in years, Sylvia draws dangerously closer not only to Faye, but also to the truth about the monster that once inspired her. Will Sylvia be able to reach her daughter before history repeats itself? Or will it be Sylvia, this time, who loses her grip on reality and succumbs to the dark powers of this monstrous fiction?"
Tomorrow's Children By: Daniel Polansky, read by Peter Berkrot for Podium -- A solid get for Podium, a new novel by Polansky, out from Angry Robot: "Tomorrow, the funk descends on Manhattan, a noxious cloud that separates the island from the rest of the world and mutates the population. Some generations on, the surviving population exists amid the rubble of modernity, wearing our cast-off clothing, worshipping celebrities as dim gods, and using emojis in place of written language. The Island exists in a state of uneasy peace, with each neighborhood an independent fiefdom, protecting itself with scrap metal spears and Molotov cocktails. But something new has come to the Island, the first tourist in centuries, and this uneasy equilibrium is about to shatter."
Harlan Ellison's Greatest Hits edited by J. Michael Straczynski, read by Harlan Ellison, Grover Gardner, Hillary Huber, Tim Lounibos, Scott Brick, Steven Jay Cohen, Robert Fass, Neil Hellegers, Dion Graham, Edoardo Ballerini, Stefan Rudnicki, Angelo Di Loreto, and Luis Moreno for Blackstone -- "Harlan Ellison’s work shaped the science-fiction, fantasy, and horror genres in the twentieth century, and this collection of his best-known and most-acclaimed stories is a perfect treasury for old Ellison fans as well as listeners discovering this zany, polyphonic writer for the first time."
NON-FICTION PICK:
- There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension by Hanif Abdurraqib, read by the author for Books on Tape -- "Growing up in Columbus, Ohio, in the 1990s, Hanif Abdurraqib witnessed a golden era of basketball, one in which legends like LeBron James were forged and countless others weren’t. His lifelong love of the game leads Abdurraqib into a lyrical, historical, and emotionally rich exploration of what it means to make it, who we think deserves success, the tension between excellence and expectation, and the very notion of role models, all of which he expertly weaves together with intimate, personal storytelling."
BACKLIST PICKS:
Our Man in Havana By: Graham Greene (1958), read by Matthew Lloyd Davies for Tantor -- "MI6's man in Havana is Wormold, a former vacuum-cleaner salesman turned reluctant secret agent out of economic necessity. To keep his job, he files bogus reports based on Charles Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare and dreams up military installations from vacuum-cleaner designs. Then his stories start coming disturbingly true."
Dangerous Visions edited by Harlan Ellison (1967), read by Tim Campbell, Simon Vance, Steven Jay Cohen, Johnny Heller, Edoardo Ballerini, Ramiz Monsef, Neil Hellegers, Jim Meskimen, JD Jackson, P. J. Ochlan, Dion Graham, Natalie Naudus, Vikas Adam, and Scott Aiello for Blackstone -- "A landmark short story collection that put the more character-based New Wave science fiction on the map, Dangerous Visions won several prestigious awards and was nominated for many others. This now-classic anthology includes thirty-three stories by thirty-two award-winning authors, over half of whom have won multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards. Contributing authors include: Robert Silverberg, Frederik Pohl, Brian W. Aldiss, Philip K. Dick, Larry Niven, Fritz Leiber, Poul Anderson, Theodore Sturgeon, J.G. Ballard, Samuel R. Delany, and Ellison himself."
Fruiting Bodies and Other Fungi By: Brian Lumley (1996), read by Joshua Saxon for Crossroad Press -- "Thirteen terrifying tales from the master of horror who created the nationally bestselling Necroscope series. The title story, "Fruiting Bodies," in which a small village slowly disappears, won the British Fantasy Award."
Morning and Evening By: Jon Fosse (2000), translated by Damion Searls (2015), read by Kåre Conradi for Dreamscape -- "A child who will be named Johannes is born. An old man named Johannes dies. Between these two points, Jon Fosse gives us the details of an entire life, starkly compressed. Beginning with Johannes's father's thoughts as his wife goes into labor and ending with Johannes's own thoughts as he embarks upon a day in his life when everything is exactly the same yet totally different, Morning and Evening is a novel concerning the beautiful dream that our lives have meaning."
Bloom By: Delilah S. Dawson (2023), read by Sarah Beth Pfeifer for Tantor -- "Rosemary meets Ash at the farmers' market. Ash—precise, pretty, and practically perfect—sells bars of soap in delicate pastel colors, sprinkle-spackled cupcakes stacked on scalloped stands, beeswax candles, jelly jars of honey, and glossy green plants. Ro has never felt this way about another woman. With Ash, she wants to be her and have her in equal measure. But as her obsession with Ash consumes her, she may find she's not the one doing the devouring."
MORE BACKLIST:
The English Civil War: An Alternative History of Britain By: Timothy Venning (2015), read by Liam Gerrard for Tantor -- "With hindsight, the victory of Parliamentarian forces over the Royalists in the English Civil War may seem inevitable, but this outcome was not a foregone conclusion. Timothy Venning explores many of the turning points and discusses how they might so easily have played out differently. What if, for example, Charles I had capitalized on his victory at Edgehill by attacking London without delay? Could this have ended the war in 1642? His actual advance on the capital in 1643 failed but came close to causing a Parliamentarian collapse-how could it have succeeded, and what then?"
Ruin: A Novel of Flyfishing in Bankruptcy By: Leigh Seippel (2022), read by Andrew J. Andersen for Tantor -- "Frank is another dreamer whose life is suddenly burned to the ground. More a disillusioned literature PhD than an experienced financier, he had naively agreed to join his wife's inheritance with his own personal guarantee of a college friend's private equity partnership debt. The business implosion and subsequent bankruptcy took all their assets. Francy, an orphaned European heiress, now finds herself homeless, still married to pleasant, witty Frank-who had failed to protect them from disaster. The couple flees Manhattan to live at a desolate non-working Hudson Valley farm."
Slattery Falls By: Brennan LaFaro (2022), read by Nikolai Hill for Crossroad Press -- "Travis, Elsie, and Josh, college kids with a ghost-hunting habit, scour New England for the most interesting haunted locales. Their journey eventually leads them to Slattery Falls, a small Massachusetts town living in the shadow of the Weeks House. The former home of the town’s most sinister and feared resident sits empty. At least that’s what the citizens say. It’s all in good fun. But after navigating the strange home, they find the locals couldn’t be more wrong. And now the roles are reversed. The hunters have become the hunted. Something evil refuses to release its grip, forcing the trio into one last adventure."
Trouble Walked In By: Mike Kupari (2022), read by Derek Dysart for Tantor -- "Cassandra Blake, an employee for the Ascension Planetary Holdings Group-the largest and most powerful corporation in Nova Columbia-has gone missing. And her sister wants to know why. When questions need answering on Nova Columbia, Detective Ezekiel "Easy" Novak is the man folks turn to. But what begins as a routine missing person case quickly turns into something much bigger and more sinister, with implications that could affect the entire planet. It seems Cassandra wasn't just investigating her employer. She had uncovered a secret effort to excavate and exploit an ancient alien artifact known only as The Seraph. Soon, Easy finds himself trying to unravel a conspiracy that may implicate not only Ascension, but the highest echelons of the Terran Confederation itself."
Notes on Her Color: A Novel By: Jennifer Neal (2023, Catapult), read by Angela Sullen for Tantor -- "Gabrielle has always had a complicated relationship with her mother Tallulah, one marked by intimacy and resilience in the face of a volatile patriarch. Everything in their home has been bleached a cold white—from the cupboards filled with sheets and crockery to the food and spices Tallulah cooks with. Even Gabrielle, who inherited the ability to change the color of her skin from her mother, is told to pass into white if she doesn't want to upset her father. But this vital mother-daughter bond implodes when Tallulah is hospitalized for a mental health crisis. Separated from her mother for the first time in her life, Gabrielle must learn to control the temperamental shifts in her color on her own."
The Glass Palace By: Kathryn Trattner (2023), read by Mary Jane Wells for Podium -- "For as long as Astrid can remember, she's been betrothed to a stranger. When tragedy strikes, her husband-to-be emerges from the shadows, ready to claim her hand in marriage. Unable to resist this mysterious stranger, she is drawn into a realm of captivating magic and haunting secrets. Tyhr has lived behind a silver tiger mask for years, cursed to a dark fate and suspended in time. Astrid could be the one to break the spell, but first, he must earn her trust and break through the hard shell encircling her heart."
The Bereaved: A Novel By: Julia Park Tracey (2023), read by Aven Shore for Tantor -- "In 1859, women have few rights, even to their own children. When her husband dies and her children become wards of a predator, Martha—bereaved and scared—flees their beloved country home, taking the children with her to the squalor of New York City. But as a naïve woman alone, preyed on by male employers, she soon finds herself nearly destitute. The Home for the Friendless offers free food, clothing, and schooling to New York's street kids, and Martha secures a place temporarily for her children there. When she returns for them, she discovers that the Society has indentured her two eldest out to work via the Orphan Train, and has placed her two youngest for adoption. The Society refusing to help and with the Civil War erupting around her, Martha sets out to reclaim each of them."
Memory and Desire: A Novel By: Philip Caputo (2023), read by Philip Church for Scribd -- "The newsman in Luke Blackburn shuns the spotlight when he and his old friend, now the county mayor in Key West, discover stranded Cuban refugees during a fishing outing turned tragic, but he is part of the story that goes out on the wire. When Corinne, his lover from many years ago, happens to read it and reaches out, the news she bears will disrupt his carefully orchestrated life and threatens to blow up his marriage."
TIE-IN WATCH:
Halo: Battle Born By: Cassandra Rose Clarke, read by Ryan Do, Caitlin Kelly, Lee Osorio, and Angel Pean for Simon and Schuster -- "Saskia, Dorian, Evie, and Victor aren’t exactly friends at their small high school on the middle-of-nowhere colony world of Meridian. Each has their own problems, from absent parents to supporting their family, getting into a good college to making the next hit holo-film. But those problems were nothing next to the threat now facing their world: The alien alliance known as the Covenant is laying siege to Meridian, for reasons that aren’t so easily explained."
Doctor Strange: Dimension War By: James Lovegrove, read by James Anderson Foster for Marvel -- "This creative novelization of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko’s original Doctor Strange stories sees Doctor Strange magically transform from a vain egoist to one of Earth’s greatest defenders."
INDIE WATCH:
Veiled By: Jeff Strand, read by Scott Thomas -- "The first time their eyes lock, it’s an amused and sympathetic look from Alice at the next table. She can tell Nate’s blind date is going horribly awry. The second time is a chance meeting at a grocery store. Or is it by chance? It’s a little weird, but either way, Nate and Alice hit it off immediately. He really likes her. They have great chemistry. But there’s something a little off—okay, a lot off—about her. Not just the unexplained sadness. It’s an intense desire, almost a desperation, for things to move much faster than Nate is comfortable with. Alice has an obvious secret. What’s she hiding?"
Heartwood Mage By: James Haddock, read by Daniel Wisniewski -- "When they hanged mage Baron Homburg and his family for treason, they missed one of his sons. The fourth son, ten-year-old Dale, witnessed the execution of his family, and something inside him broke. Two things happened that day: one, Dale became a borderline sociopath, and two, his mage abilities manifested at almost full strength, especially his wood or forest magic. That night he used his new wood magic to hang the earl who ordered the killing of his family. Now he has only one thing on his mind, killing all those involved in killing his family or seeing them brought to justice."
Castor & Pollux By: C.M. Rahill, read by Jacob Buckenmeyer -- "SLACK, a deadened London lawyer with sleeping problems and a mysterious past, comes alive at night. The only problem is that he can never remember what happened the night before. One morning, as he embarks on his daily routine, Slack finds the fascinating outline of a novel he must have composed in his half-asleep state. He somehow knows the secret to his enigmatic existence lays in this unwritten novel and determines to bring it to life. Slack’s reality takes a surreal turn when he encounters the novel’s protagonist, OWEN, in the flesh. Rather than back away from this extraordinary situation, Slack decides to follow Owen and see where the journey will take him."
MOST MISSING:
- The Skinless Man Counts to Five: And Other Tales of the Macabre by Paul Jessup (Underland Press) -- "There are ghosts and butterflies, serial killers and dying stars, mermaids and monsters. You will find death cults, sewer elves, the apocalypse of youthful fervor, card games that require blood sacrifices, and self-immolation as an expression of devotion. Paul Jessup’s fiction eviscerates, shatters, and slurps the marrow from the bones of the world."