New Procurements

It is that time again. Yes, it means the piles of new books have to be shelved before they tip over and threaten to leave a hole in my floor. This batch includes loads of review copies and pile of purchases. First up  some review copies.

Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend by Matthew Dicks eluded me at Book Expo this year so I've very glad to have gotten a review copy. Albert of Adelaide by Howard Anderson has a platypus for a protagonist. Nuff' said. Other Worlds Than These is edited by John Joseph Adams who has never disappointed me with his anthology selections. Spin the Sky is Katy Stauber sophomore effort, which I hope to dip into soon. I received two copies of The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities edited by Ann & Jeff VanderMeer so expect a giveaway at some point. Containing original stories by Ted Chiang, Garth Nix, and Alan Moore this is something I'm already thumbing through. The Hollow City by Dan Wells is his latest Thriller and this time instead of a serial killer it stars an insane man whose delusions might be realer than he imagined. Assignment in Eternity by Robert A. Heinlein is a reissue of some of the master's older works and given they're new to me I may just dip in, but I have been meaning to read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress so we'll see which wins out. The Monster Hunters is an omnibus of the first 3 books in the series of the same name by Larry Correia, which I've heard is a very good pop corn read. Elfhome by Wen Spencer is the second Tinker book.

Next bunch are my purchases with the first three bought in used shops on a trip to Philly. The first The Forerunner Foray by Andre Norton I scooped up since I LOVED Forerunner. The Gunseller by Hugh Laurie is one I keep meaning to pick-up so I finally did. The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson is one my wife and I have both wanted to get after hear very good things when it first came out. THe next two are UK releases I ordered. The first Dark Eden by Chris Beckett sounds all kinds of screwed up.

You live in Eden. You are a member of the Family, one of 532 descendants of Angela and Tommy. You shelter beneath the light and warmth of the Forest's lantern trees, hunting woollybuck and harvesting tree candy. Beyond the forest lie the treeless mountains of the Snowy Dark and a cold so bitter and a night so profound that no man has ever crossed it. The Oldest among you recount legends of a world where light came from the sky, where men and women made boats that could cross between worlds. One day, the Oldest say, they will come back for you. You live in Eden. You are a member of the Family, one of 532 descendants of two marooned explorers. You huddle, slowly starving, beneath the light and warmth of geothermal trees, confined to one barely habitable valley of a startlingly alien, sunless world. After 163 years and six generations of incestuous inbreeding, the Family is riddled with deformity and feeblemindedness. Your culture is a infantile stew of half-remembered fact and devolved ritual that stifles innovation and punishes independent thought. You are John Redlantern. You will break the laws of Eden, shatter the Family and change history. You will be the first to abandon hope, the first to abandon the old ways, the first to kill another, the first to venture in to the Dark, and the first to discover the truth about Eden.

The Broken Isles by Mark Charan Newton finishes of the Legends of the Red Sun series. I quite enjoyed City of Ruin and Nights of Villjamur so I'm eager to see how all the threads are finally connected. It will probably be my next read. I went a bit mad on comics recently. I'm still keeping up with Eric Powell's The Goon, as all of you should be with volume 11 The Deformed of Body and Devious of Mind, which explores a backwater circus and sees the Goon laying into sparkly vampires. I also picked up the first volume of Incorruptable by Mark Waid, which runs concurrently with Irredeemable that I've also been devouring. Chris Roberson's Elric: The Balance Lost volume 2 snuck up an me. It is great seeing all of Moorcock's big guns coming together.  Last, is Mike Norton's Battlepug. How could I resist a Sword & Sorcery story where the hero rides around on a gigantic pug? You can check out the webcomic here.

And because I'm behind in posting here are even more review copes with many sequels. Be My Enemy is Ian McDonald's second Enverness novel after Planesrunner. King of Thorns by Mark Lawrence is his sophmore novel. I had mixed feelings about Prince of Thorns, but I was left with enough questions that I want answers to to check this one out. I've heard more than one review who called Thieftaker by D.B. Jackson a revolutionary war era  Dresden Files. *Ears piqued* Next are a few books from 47North, which is Amazon's Sci-Fi/Fantasy imprint. The Prankster by James Polster seems like it will be a fun time travel novella and I've been itching for a new time travel story. Next is The Mongoliad: Book 2 from Stephenson, Bear, Teppo, and company. The last in the bunch is the Sci-Fi novel Containment by Christian Cantrell.

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