Release Week: 25 June 2024
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Release Week: 25 June 2024
Posted on 2024-06-25 at 12:00 by Samuel Montgomery-Blinn
NEW FICTION:
All the Colors of the Dark By: Chris Whitaker, read by Edoardo Ballerini for Random House -- "1975 is a time of change in America. The Vietnam War is ending. Muhammad Ali is fighting Joe Frazier. And in the small town of Monta Clare, Missouri, girls are disappearing. When the daughter of a wealthy family is targeted, the most unlikely hero emerges—Patch, a local boy, who saves the girl, and, in doing so, leaves heartache in his wake. Patch and those who love him soon discover that the line between triumph and tragedy has never been finer. And that their search for answers will lead them to truths that could mean losing one another."
Bear: A Novel By: Julia Phillips, read by Sophie Amoss for Random House -- "Sam and Elena dream of another life. On the island off the coast of Washington where they were born and raised, they and their mother struggle to survive. Sam works on the ferry that delivers wealthy mainlanders to their vacation homes while Elena bartends at the local golf club, but even together they can’t earn enough to get by, stirring their frustration about the limits that shape their existence. Then one night on the boat, Sam spots a bear swimming the dark waters of the channel. Where is it going? What does it want? When the bear turns up by their home, Sam, terrified, is more convinced than ever that it’s time to leave the island. But Elena responds differently to the massive beast. Enchanted by its presence, she throws into doubt the desire to escape and puts their long-held dream in danger."
Hombrecito: A Novel By: Santiago Jose Sanchez, read by André Santana for Penguin -- "A queer coming-of-age story about a young immigrant’s complex relationships with his mother and his motherland."
Honey: A Novel By: Isabel Banta, read by Brittany Pressley for Macmillan -- "A coming-of-age story that follows the meteoric rise of singer Amber Young as she navigates fame in the late-90s and early-2000s era of pop music superstardom."
Moral Injuries: A Novel By: Christie Watson, read by Miranda Raison for Harper -- "An electrifying, high-stakes literary thriller following three best friends since medical school and the twenty-five-year-old secret that now threatens to shatter their lives."
NEW SCI-FI, FANTASY, and HORROR:
Bitter Waters By: Vivian Shaw, read by Catrin Walker-Booth for Orbit -- "A witty, charming standalone novella starring Greta Helsing, doctor to the undead, who must get to the bottom of a mystery involving a newly turned child vampire."
You're Safe Here By: Leslie Stephens, read by Carlotta Brentan for Simon and Schuster -- "Wellness, motherhood, and technology converge in a near future California, as three women’s seemingly innocuous decisions have further-reaching consequences than any of them could imagine in this timely, clever, and white-knuckled thriller."
Incidents Around the House: A Novel By: Josh Malerman, read by Delanie Nicole Gill for Random House -- "To eight-year-old Bela, her family is her world. There’s Mommy, Daddo, and Grandma Ruth. But there is also Other Mommy, a malevolent entity who asks her every day: “Can I go inside your heart?” When horrifying incidents around the house signal that Other Mommy is growing tired of asking Bela the question over and over, Bela understands that unless she says yes, her family will soon pay."
Secrets of Rose Briar Hall By: Kelsey James, read by Sofia Willingham for HighBridge -- "1908, Long Island: For Millie Turner, the young and beautiful wife of a powerful New York stockbroker, Rose Briar Hall—a gleaming edifice of white marble on the North Shore—is more than a home. Every lavish detail speaks of Charles Turner's status and wealth, and its stylish interior is testament to Millie's sophistication. All that's left is to prove her worthiness to be his bride. What better way than to throw a grand party for New York's social elite? After painstaking planning, the night of the event arrives and all is perfection—until Millie wakes to a cold, eerily quiet house, and a gray cloud where her memory should be. Can it be true that she has been in and out of consciousness for weeks, ever since the party took a terrifying turn? Millie recalls nothing. But her friends have shunned her, and it soon becomes clear that if she can't find out what really happened that night, much more than her reputation will be at risk."
Foul Days: The Witch's Compendium of Monsters, Book 1 By: Genoveva Dimova, read by Zura Johnson for Macmillan -- "As a witch in the walled city of Chernograd, Kosara has plenty of practice treating lycanthrope bites, bargaining with kikimoras, and slaying bloodsucking upirs. There’s only one monster she can’t defeat: her ex, the Zmey, known as the Tsar of Monsters. She’s defied him one too many times and now he’s hunting her. Betrayed by someone close to her, Kosara’s only choice is to trade her shadow—the source of her powers—for a quick escape."
Outrider By: Mark Wales, read by Arthur L. Wood for Macmillan Australia -- "In the wake of a global conflict, foreign forces occupy part of Australia, quashing all but a few pockets of local resistance. The tense stalemate ends in 2034, when Jack Dunne reignites the war. Dunne is an Outrider, one of the last elite special operations soldiers in the Resistance. As the enemy prepare to eliminate the freedom fighters once and for all, he is tasked with his final mission. If Dunne and his eleven-year-old son achieve the impossible, and survive, they'll secure their future across the border in Free Australia. But the road to victory will be bloody."
The Hunter's Gambit By: Ciel Pierlot, read by Mia Barron for Recorded Books -- "Vampires have always fascinated Kazan Korvic, so much so that she’s made it her life’s work to craft weapons designed solely to kill them. But when she is attacked and captured by an entire clan, Kazan’s fascination turns ferocious. In their Citadel, Kazan is forced to attend the Vampire Court where she must act as their Queen. She is told that she will be waited-and-doted upon, until the end of her reign in three days’ time. Then, an extravagant and lavish feast will be held … where the vampires will consume her."
BACKLIST WATCH:
I Who Have Never Known Men By: Jacqueline Harpman (1997), read by Nikki Massoud for Echo Point -- "Deep underground, 39 women live imprisoned in a cage. Watched over by guards, the women have no memory of how they got there, no notion of time, and only a vague recollection of their lives before. As the burn of electric light merges day into night and numberless years pass, a young girl—the 40th prisoner—sits alone and outcast in the corner. Soon she will show herself to be the key to the others' escape and survival in the strange world that awaits them above ground."
Arboreality By: Rebecca Campbell (2022), read by Cynthia Farrell for Tantor -- A finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award and the winner of the 2023 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction: "A professor in pandemic isolation rescues books from the flooded and collapsing McPherson Library. A man plants fireweed on the hillside of his depopulated Vancouver Island suburb. An aspiring luthier poaches the last ancient Sitka spruce to make a violin for a child prodigy."
Avenues by Train By: Farai Mudzingwa (2023), read by Loyiso MacDonald for Recorded Books -- "When seven-year-old Jedza witnesses a tragic incident involving a train and the death of his close boyhood friend in his hometown Miner’s Drift, he is convinced that his life is haunted. Now in his mid-20s, Jedza is a down-and-out electrician, moving to Harare in the hopes that he will escape the darkness and superstitions of the small town. But living in the shadowy restless atmosphere of the Avenues with its mysterious pools of water rising under musasa trees, he is tormented by the disappearance of his sister and their early encounters with ancestral spirits, the shapeshifting power of the njuzu and a vengeful ngozi. To move forward, he must stop running away and confront the trauma of his past."
Exadelic By: Jon Evans (2023), read by Brian Hutchison for Recorded Books -- "When an unconventional offshoot of the US military trains an artificial intelligence in the dark arts that humanity calls “black magic,” it learns how to hack the fabric of reality itself. It can teleport matter. It can confer immunity to bullets. And it decides that obscure Silicon Valley middle manager Adrian Ross is the primary threat to its existence."
Tales & Stories By: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, read by Nano Nagle for Spoken Realms -- "Shelley is of course known because of her short novel Frankenstein. Still, she was always writing, and these tales and mysteries written on her extended travels show how interested she was in the strangeness of people."
SERIES WATCH:
Dead Country: The Craft Wars Series, Book 1 By: Max Gladstone, read by Janina Edwards for Tantor -- "Discover the destiny of the Craft in Dead Country, the standalone entry point to Max Gladstone's beloved fantasy epic."
The Daughters' War: Blacktongue, Book 2 By: Christopher Buehlman, read by Nikki Garcia for Macmillan -- "The goblins have killed all of our horses and most of our men. They have enslaved our cities, burned our fields, and still they wage war. Now, our daughters take up arms."
Echo of Worlds: Pandominion, Book 2 By: M. R. Carey, read by Dami Olukoya for Orbit -- "Two mighty empires are at war—and both will lose, with thousands of planets falling to the extinction event called the Scour. At least that's what the artificial intelligence known as Rupshe believes. But somewhere in the multiverse there exists a force—the Mother Mass—that could end the war in an instant, and Rupshe has assembled a team to find it."
Shadowstitch: Threadneedle, Book 2 By: Cari Thomas, read by Helen Keeley for Harper -- "Anna survived the attempt to bind her magic, but Anna and her coven aren’t free from danger yet."
Aeon Burn: Aeon, Book 2 By: Matthew Mather, read by Ray Porter for Recorded Books -- "The southern continent is literally melting under the feet of Dr. Xin Rhou as she is trapped at the South Pole, and she is perhaps the only person in the world with a full accounting of the data recorded when Aeon exploded."
The Bound Worlds: Devoured Worlds, Book 3 By: Megan E. O'Keefe, read by Ciaran Saward for Orbit -- "Worlds will collide and fates will be rewritten in the thrilling conclusion to the space opera trilogy."
Lost: Quincy Harker Demon Hunter, Book 9 By: John G. Hartness, read by James Anderson Foster for Tantor -- "Quincy Harker needs a vacation, but there's no peace to be found in the usually sleepy seaside resort of North Carolina's Outer Banks. No, there's a serial killer stalking the streets of Manteo, and there's even more to the crimes than usual. Add in a heavily warded cemetery with hints of magic long thought to have vanished from the earth, a mystery centuries in the making, and a string of horrifyingly realistic nightmares plaguing Rebecca Flynn, Harker's fiancee, and our boy isn't getting any rest or relaxation. But he is getting the one thing he's really, really good at handling—a fight."
INDIE WATCH:
- Forever X2 By: Merritt Graves, read by Jay Myers -- "In San Francisco’s pulsing neon haze, Chris Somberg, is an e-sports prodigy past his sell-by. Strung out and couch surfing after software behemoth, PraetorLogic, axed his signature game, he’s reduced to peddling his nervous system to anyone with a pulse and a credit card, doubting every life choice he’s ever made. But from the code-scarred depths, salvation emerges from PraeterLogic’s competitor, Wildcard: a high-profile gig promising to clear his debts—working on an immersive VR version of the once-cherished, genre-defining game, Neverscape."