Release Week: 16 July 2024
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Release Week: 16 July 2024
Posted on 2024-07-16 at 12:00 by Samuel Montgomery-Blinn
PICKS:
The Bright Sword: A Novel of King Arthur by Lev Grossman, read by Nicholas Guy Smith for Penguin -- The bestselling author of The Magicians makes his triumphant return to adult fiction: "A gifted young knight named Collum arrives at Camelot to compete for a spot on the Round Table, only to find that he’s too late. The king died two weeks ago at the Battle of Camlann, leaving no heir, and only a handful of the knights of the Round Table survive. They aren’t the heroes of legend, like Lancelot or Gawain. They’re the oddballs of the Round Table, from the edges of the stories, like Sir Palomides, the Saracen Knight, and Sir Dagonet, Arthur’s fool, who was knighted as a joke. They’re joined by Nimue, who was Merlin’s apprentice until she turned on him and buried him under a hill. Together this ragtag fellowship will set out to rebuild Camelot in a world that has lost its balance."
I Was a Teenage Slasher By: Stephen Graham Jones, read by Michael Crouch for Simon and Schuster -- "1989, Lamesa, Texas. A small west Texas town driven by oil and cotton—and a place where everyone knows everyone else’s business. So it goes for Tolly Driver, a good kid with more potential than application, seventeen, and about to be cursed to kill for revenge."
The Lost Story: A Novel By: Meg Shaffer, read by Jorjeana Marie for Random House -- "As boys, best friends Jeremy Cox and Rafe Howell went missing in a vast West Virginia state forest, only to mysteriously reappear six months later with no explanation for where they’d gone or how they’d survived. Fifteen years after their miraculous homecoming, Rafe is a reclusive artist who still bears scars inside and out but has no memory of what happened during those months. Meanwhile, Jeremy has become a famed missing persons’ investigator. With his uncanny abilities, he is the one person who can help vet tech Emilie Wendell find her sister, who vanished in the very same forest as Rafe and Jeremy. Jeremy alone knows the fantastical truth about the disappearances, for while the rest of the world was searching for them, the two missing boys were in a magical realm filled with impossible beauty and terrible danger. He believes it is there that they will find Emilie’s sister."
The West Passage By: Jared Pechaček, read by Steve West for Macmillan -- "When the Guardian of the West Passage died in her bed, the women of Grey Tower fed her to the crows and went back to their chores. No successor was named as Guardian, no one took up the fallen blade; the West Passage went unguarded. Now, snow blankets Grey in the height of summer. Rats erupt from beneath the earth, fleeing that which comes. Crops fail. Hunger looms. And none stand ready to face the Beast, stirring beneath the poisoned soil."
The Melancholy of Untold History: A Novel By: Minsoo Kang, read by Keong Sim for Harper -- "Famous for his dispelling of the national myth, the Historian understands the power of narrative. He has inspired another young professor to search for her own truths, while trying to understand the way fiction creates fact and how sometimes the past can only be understood by filling in holes with a new narrative. Which is exactly what he needs when his wife passes away to parse meaning out of a world that no longer makes sense. Together the protégé and the Historian find comfort in each other. Yet they know their time together is fleeting, as time usually is. Only the gods have an abundance of time, and yet—the two discover—even that might not be so clear cut. Part of their homeland’s myth tells of four gods who squabbled and argued and destroyed and rebuilt time and again. Or did they?"
The Spice Gate By: Prashanth Srivatsa, read by Deepti Gupta for Harper -- "Relics of a mysterious god, the Spice Gates connect the eight far-flung kingdoms, each separated by a distinct spice and only accessible by those born with a special mark. This is not a caste of distinction, though, but one of subjugation: Spice Carriers suffer the lashes of their masters, the weight of the spices they bear on their backs, and the jolting pain of the Gates themselves. Amir is one such Spice Carrier, and he dreams of escaping his fate of being a mule for the rich who gorge themselves on spices like the addicted gluttons they are. More important than relieving his own pain, though, is saving his family, especially his brother, born like him with the unfortunate spice mark that designates him for a life of servitude. But while Amir makes his plans for freedom, something stirs in the inhospitable spaces between the kingdoms. Fate has designs of its own for Amir, and he soon finds himself drawn into a conspiracy that could disrupt the delicate dynamics of the kingdoms forever."
Trinity: A Novel By: Tom DeLonge and A.J. Hartley, read by Kyle Snyder for Tantor -- "It's 1962, in Trinity, Nevada, a small town on the edge of the desert, home to a military base serving the nuclear testing grounds. Van Lopez and his brother Andy have enough to do keeping their truck running and the local criminal gang happy to be concerned about nuclear tests. Van has dreams, or-he's not sure what to call them-that he cannot explain or forget, but when he sees mysterious lights in the sky, he struggles to make sense of what now feel like his earliest memories. On the day of the atomic test, the nuclear blast brings down something over Trinity that wasn't supposed to be there-something not of this world. Now Van is running for his life, pursued by a murderous Soviet agent and government forces bent on keeping all he has seen from getting out."
BACKLIST WATCH:
Pawn of Prophecy: The Belgariad, Book 1 By: David Eddings (1982), read by Brian Wiggins for Tantor -- "Long ago, so the Storyteller claimed, the evil God Torak sought dominion and drove men and Gods to war. But Belgarath the Sorcerer led men to reclaim the Orb that protected men of the West. So long as it lay at Riva, the prophecy went, men would be safe. But that was only a story, and Garion did not believe in magic dooms, even though the dark man without a shadow had haunted him for years. Brought up on a quiet farm by his Aunt Pol, how could he know that the Apostate planned to wake dread Torak, or that he would be led on a quest of unparalleled magic and danger by those he loved—but did not know?"
Cold Welcome: Vatta's Peace, Book 1 By: Elizabeth Moon (2017), read by Carrie Coello for Tantor -- "Summoned to the home planet of her family's business empire, space-fleet commander Kylara Vatta is told to expect a hero's welcome. But instead, she is thrown into danger unlike any other she has faced and finds herself isolated, unable to communicate with the outside world, commanding a motley group of unfamiliar troops, and struggling day by day to survive in a deadly environment with sabotaged gear."
SERIES WATCH:
Descent: The Palladium Wars, Book 4 By: Marko Kloos, read by Seth Podowitz for Brilliance -- "A nationalist uprising triggers an interstellar wrest for control."
The Black Bird Oracle: All Souls, Book 5 By: Deborah Harkness, read by Jennifer Ikeda for Random House -- "Diana Bishop journeys to the darkest places within herself—and her family history."
WTF WATCH:
- Why Cheese? By: Ellen Mint, read by Genevieve Jones -- "Violette Reely walks into her great uncle’s abandoned cheese shop then promptly runs back out. You would too if you discovered a secret basement hiding beneath a trapdoor. One second, there’s nothing down there but cheese wheels in an old chest, the next four naked men are chasing her out the door. Refusing to give up the million-dollar property to her wild imagination, Violette returns the next day. Despite the place being ransacked, she’s certain she made up those mysterious men who vanished inside a locked store. Then, as the sun sets, cheeses lying on piles of discarded clothing roll across the floor until they poof into the four men from last night. Men who transform into cheese."
(in progress)