waiting on wednesday

WAITING ON WEDNESDAY: January-March 2020 Review Copies On My Shelves

- Meg

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine (though it seems as though it’s been a while since she updated that particular blog, so if you know of the current host, if there is one, please let me know) that highlights upcoming releases that we’re impatiently waiting for. This week I’m featuring January-March 2020 review copies that I have either in physical form or digital form that I can’t wait to dive into! And now that it’s the middle of December, I need to get started on some of those January ones! The release dates are listed but are always subject to change.

  • A Beginning at the End – Mike Chen :: The tagline for this is “How Do You Start Over After the End of the World?” and I’m all for something that supposedly calls back to Station Eleven with post-apocalyptic pandemics and how society picks up the pieces and returns to normalcy after a catastrophe. Releases January 14, 2020
  • Followers – Megan Angelo :: A book about social media and what happens when good intentions go horribly wrong?? YES. Releases January 14, 2020.
  • A Queen in Hiding – Sarah Kozloff :: This is the start of a four-book fantasy series and we don’t have to wait long for the sequels! Each of the sequels will be released in subsequent months (January, February, March, and April), so I’m excited for that first off because I always hate the wait for a series I really like. This is a coming of age story with a twist, and so far the early reviews have been looking great! Releases January 21, 2020.
  • Show Them a Good Time – Nicole Flattery :: A collection of stories by a debut writer that I heard some good buzz about on Twitter, and when I saw it was available for download on Netgalley, I snapped it up! Releases January 28, 2020.
  • Things in Jars – Jess Kidd :: Victorian London, female sleuths, anatomists, fairy tales? Give me all of those things, please. Releases February 4, 2020.
  • Daughter from the Dark – Marina & Sergey Dyachenko :: I downloaded Vita Nostra last month as a Kindle deal because I keep seeing it in various places, so when I saw this on the ARC shelf at work, I grabbed it because this is also a stand-alone and seems really interesting. It’s about music and companionship with a magical twist. Releases February 11, 2020.
  • Foul is Fair – Hannah Capin :: This is described as a Macbeth retelling with hints of Kill Bill and Heathers and all of those things are right up my alley?? This came in my inbox as a one-day download from Netgalley, and I’m so excited to see what this will bring. Releases February 18, 2020.
  • The Hidden Girl and Other Stories – Ken Liu :: Anything Ken Liu writes is a gift, and this latest collection is sure to be another favorite of mine. Releases Feburary 25, 2020.
  • The Girl in White Gloves – Kerri Maher :: This is historical fiction about Grace Kelly and her life behind the scenes, and I love Hollywood stories. The cover for this is also GORGEOUS. Releases February 25, 2020.
  • Beheld – TaraShea Nesbit :: This is about the first murder in Plymouth, Massachusetts not long after the Mayflower landed in the 1600s. Some of the reviews and buzz I’ve seen have said it evokes that period very well. I love a good historical mystery, and I don’t think I’ve seen many set in this era.

Are any of these on your to-read list? What one would you read first?

Waiting on Wednesday, SFF edition!

- Meg

Oof, the last time I did a post like this was back in October! Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine (though it seems as though it’s been a while since she updated that particular blog, so if you know of the current host, if there is one, please let me know) that highlights upcoming releases that we’re impatiently waiting for. This week I’m highlighting some new/upcoming fantasy books that I can’t wait to read!

GIDEON THE NINTH – TAMSYN MUIR

Tamsyn Muir’s Gideon the Ninth “unveils a solar system of swordplay, cut-throat politics, and lesbian necromancers. Her characters leap off the page, as skillfully animated as necromantic skeletons. The result is a heart-pounding epic science fantasy.” Rebecca Roanhorse calls it the “Gothic space fantasy” she didn’t know she needed. Um. GIVE IT TO ME. September is TOO FAR AWAY. It releases September 10, 2019!

AN ILLUSION OF THIEVES – CATE GLASS

Being a sorcerer is a death sentence. But “when a plot to overthrow the Shadow Lord and incite civil war is uncovered, only Romy knows how to stop it. To do so, she’ll have to rely on newfound allies—a swordmaster, a silversmith, and her own thieving brother. And they’ll need the very thing that could condemn them all: magic.” Magic and politics and an amazing cover? Yesss. I actually preordered this one, and I’m going to read it soon! It released May 21, 2019.

THE GODS OF JADE AND SHADOW – SILVIA MORENO-GARCIA

The “Mayan god of death sends a young woman on a harrowing, life-changing journey in this dark, one-of-a-kind fairy tale inspired by Mexican folklore” and it’s set in the Jazz Age? Give me those fairy tales, and give me them set in the Jazz Age because I think it’s a perfect setting for some “modern” fairy tales. Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s The Gods of Jade and Shadow comes out July 23, 2019.

SEVEN BLADES IN BLACK – SAM SYKES

I’ve followed Sam for a long time on Twitter and I think he’s hilarious, and I still haven’t read any of his books. I bought The City Stained Red forever ago, but something about Seven Blades in Black is calling to me. Maybe it’s because I’m a sucker for stories told by people after the fact and I like somewhat unreliable narrators. She was “betrayed by those she trusted most, her magic torn from her and awaiting execution, Sal the Cacophony has one last tale to tell before they take her head. All she has left is her name, her story and the weapon she used to carved both.” It came out April 9, 2019!

THE HARP OF KINGS – JULIET MARILLIER

I read Marillier’s Daughter of the Forest ages ago as part of my “must read all the fairy tale retellings” (and now that I’m thinking about it, I’m due for a reread of some of those books), and I remember really falling in love with the world she created. When I saw that she was coming out with a new series about a WARRIOR BARD who needs to find and retrieve a “precious harp, an ancient symbol of kingship, which has gone mysteriously missing” AND “if the instrument is not played at the upcoming coronation, the candidate will not be accepted and the people could revolt. Faced with plotting courtiers and tight-lipped druids, an insightful storyteller, and a boorish Crown Prince, Liobhan soon realizes an Otherworld power may be meddling in the affairs of the kingdom.” As soon as I read that, I WAS LIKE SIGN ME UP.

Are any of these on your radar? What are you looking forward to reading in the upcoming months?

WAITING ON WEDNESDAY: 2019 Adult SFF

- Meg

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine (though it seems as though it’s been a while since she updated that particular blog, so if you know of the current host, if there is one, please let me know) that highlights upcoming releases that we’re impatiently waiting for. This week I’m highlighting three adult SFF books coming out in 2019 that I’m dying to read.

Kameron Hurley’s The Light Brigade is a book I’ve been waiting to read ever since it was announced. Hurley became one of my favorite authors after I read The Stars are Legion early last year, and I’ve slowly been enjoying the rest of her work. I want to read everything, but I also want to leave some left for the time in between her other works. The Light Brigade is “what soldiers fighting the war against Mars call the ones who come back…different. Grunts in the corporate corps get busted down into light to travel to and from interplanetary battlefronts. Everyone is changed by what the corps must do in order to break them down into light. Those who survive learn to stick to the mission brief—no matter what actually happens during combat” (from the blurb). A fresh recruit named Dietz’s drops are different than other’s experiences in the war and it becomes a struggle to figure out what is real and what isn’t in the midst of war.

Before the film Arrival came out in theaters, Vintage Anchor released Ted Chiang’s collection of short stories and I devoured them over the course of a few days. His stories are some of the best I have ever read, and I’m incredibly excited for Exhalation. From the blurb: “In this fantastical and elegant collection, Ted Chiang wrestles with the oldest questions on earth–What is the nature of the universe? What does it mean to be human?–and ones that no one else has even imagined. And, each in its own way, the stories prove that complex and thoughtful science fiction can rise to new heights of beauty, meaning, and compassion.” Why isn’t this in my hands yet??

A People’s Future of the United States is an anthology edited by Victor LaValle and John Joseph Adams and aside from the play on A People’s History of the United States, I’m incredibly excited for the lineup of authors included in this anthology. LaValle and Adams “asked for narratives that would challenge oppressive American myths, release us from the chokehold of our history, and give us new futures to believe in. They also asked that the stories be badass. The result is this extraordinary collection of twenty-five stories that blend the dark and the light, the dystopian and the utopian. These tales are vivid with struggle and hardship—whether it’s the othered and the oppressed, or dragonriders and covert commandos—but these characters don’t flee, they fight.” YESSSS.

Waiting on Wednesday :: SF/F Edition

- Meg

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine that highlights upcoming releases that we’re impatiently waiting for! This week, I’m going to focus on a few upcoming YA/MG science fiction and fantasy reads coming out this fall that I can’t wait to read!

Claudia Gray’s Leia, Princess of Alderaan is super high on my list for this fall’s reads because Star Wars and Princess Leia. It was just recently announced and there isn’t much out there regarding a synopsis, but I am loving this cover and I’m hoping it’s about Leia’s life on Alderaan before she’s on the Death Star at the beginning of A New Hope.

Libba Bray’s The Diviners series is one of my favorite YA series of all time. It’s a dense, well-built series that’s worth the effort to get involved in it, and the audio books are spectacular. I’ve been waiting for Before the Devil Breaks You for what seems like ages, and I’m so excited that we’ve got a title and a cover for a fall release. It combines all of my favorite things: the 1920s, supernatural horror, a slow slow slow burn romance, and, in this third one, ghosts.

Last year I read everything Leigh Bardugo wrote (except for the ebook only short stories which I’m sure I’ll get to this year), and this year she’s got two coming out that I’m super excited to read. I don’t know much about Wonder Woman, but I’m excited to read her WW novel. AND. The Language of Thorns is a collection of fairy tales from the Grisha universe!!

What are you looking forward to?