Rosanne Rabinowitz in “Horror Without Victims”
Rosanne Rabinowitz’ story Lambeth North has been accepted for the latest Des Lewis anthology, Horror Without Victims. This is the 2013 Megazanthus Press Horror Story Anthology.
Category: Publications
“Helen’s Story” Published
Rosanne Rabinowitz’s novella, Helen’s Story is now available in a beautiful hardcover from PS Publishing.
Some readers might have met Helen in Arthur Machen’s classic novella The Great God Pan. Now she gets to tell her side of the story.
Contrary to rumours of her death, Helen Vaughan is alive and well and living in Shoreditch. Having learned a few things about painting from an ex-boyfriend, she’s stirring up the art world with a series of erotically-charged landscapes depicting the strange events of her youth.
Brought up by a man who regarded her as loathsome, shuffled between boarding schools and foster homes, young Helen only found pleasure in visits from a secret companion. She made one other close friend, a girl called Rachel who disappeared in full daylight. After that, Helen was left with her companion.
He stayed with her on travels from rural Wales to the select salons and danker corners of London, to expatriate life in Buenos Aires and beyond. But he’s kept away for several years.
As she remembers her friend, Helen lays on each stroke of paint as if it can bring Rachel back or take her to where Rachel went. She paints to summon her companion once again, and show everyone what really lurks beyond the vanishing point.
Spine-Tingling Wins for the T-Party
Fox McGeever’s story, The Inheritance Room won first prize in the Spinetinglers March short story competition. This is the third story Fox has sold that is connected to his serial fantasy fiction Parawerthan blog. You can read the winning story here.
And in the very same month, Deborah Walker won third prize with The Love Of Money, written under her horror pseudonym Kelda Crich, available to read here.
Congratulations to Fox and Deborah!
Tom Pollock Finalist in Kitschies
The Kitschies awards recognise “the year’s most progressive, intelligent, and entertaining works of genre literature published in the UK”. Tom Pollock‘s novel, The City’s Son, was a finalist for the Golden Tentacle award for Best Debut. Huge congratulations!
Hidden under the surface of everyday London is a city of monsters and miracles, where wild train spirits stampede over the tracks and glass-skinned dancers with glowing veins light the streets.
When a devastating betrayal drives her from her home, graffiti artist Beth Bradley stumbles into the secret city, where she finds Filius Viae, London’s ragged crown prince, just when he needs someone most. An ancient enemy has returned to the darkness under St Paul’s Cathedral, bent on reigniting a centuries-old war, and Beth and Fil find themselves in a desperate race through a bizarre urban wonderland, searching for a way to save the city they both love.
The City’s Son is the first book of The Skyscraper Throne: a story about family,friends and monsters, and how you can’t always tell which is which.
The City’s Son is available in hardback, paperback and ebook from all the usual places. The sequel, The Glass Republic is out in July from Jo Fletcher Books.
Francis Knight’s Debut on Most Anticipated List
Congratulations to Francis Knight! Her début novel, Fade to Black, got an honourable mention on Fantasy Faction’s top ten most anticipated fantasy books of 2013.
From the depths of a valley rises the city of Mahala. It’s a city built upwards not across–where streets are built upon streets, buildings upon buildings, A city that the Ministry rules from the sunlit summit and where the forsaken lurk in the darkness of Under.
Rojan Dizon doesn’t mind staying in the shadows, because he’s got things to hide. Things like being a pain-mage, with the forbidden power to draw magic from pain. But he can’t hide for ever.
Because when Rojan stumbles upon the secrets lurking in the depths of the Pit, the fate of Mahala will depend on him using his magic. And unlucky for Rojan – this is going to hurt.
Fade to Black is available in paperback and ebook format from all the usual places, and the sequel, Before the Fall, out this June, can be pre-ordered.
Babylon Steel’s Second Outing
Babylon Steel, brothel owner and swordswoman, returns early in 2013 in the second book in Gaie Sebold’s series, Dangerous Gifts. Here’s a look at the gorgeous cover by Jake Murray. Ms. Sebold talks about it and shares her thoughts on the importance of covers in general here.
The publisher, Solaris, says:
Babylon Steel runs the best brothel in Scalentine, city of portals. She’s escaped her past and it’s all going pretty well. Apart, that is, from the racial conflict and economic misery boiling up in Scalentine.
Her lover, Chief Bitternut of the City Militia, is trying to keep the lid on, while hunting a killer whose real target is a lot closer than he knows. Just as things are getting really tense, Babylon is forced to take another job. Bodyguard to Enthemmerlee Entaire: symbol of hope or object of disgust for most of her country’s population, and a prime target for assassination, along with anyone who happens to be in the way. Such as her bodyguard.
Unintentionally dragging a very annoyed government employee along in her wake, Babylon struggles to turn Enthemmerlee’s squabbling household guard from liability into security, dodge the rigid Moral Statutes of Incandress, and keep both herself and her client alive. She soon realises that the situation is far worse than she thought, her past hasn’t quite let go of her yet, and she will be driven to a choice that will have far-reaching consequences…
Dangerous Gifts is available for pre-order from amazon and Simon & Schuster.
Kate Kelly’s “Red Rock” Sold
Congratulations to Kate Kelly! Her début sci-fi novel for children 10 and up, Red Rock, will be published by Curious Fox in 2013.
Ms. Kelly is represented by the Greenhouse Literary Agency. Here’s what they say about the novel:
The world is changing. The ice is melting. But as the icecaps retreat secrets are revealed, ancient ruins that have remained hidden for a hundred thousand years.
A civilisation that wasn’t human…Fourteen year old Danni’s astronaut aunt is murdered, shot down by a sniper right in front of her eyes. As she dies she presses something into Danni’s hand and whispers: Tell no-one.
Suddenly Danni is the one in danger. The evil Morgan Pew and his organisation EMMA, The European Mars Mission Agency, will stop at nothing to get their hands on what Danni now wears around her neck. When Danni’s uncle goes missing, it has to be Morgan Pew who’s responsible.
What powers does the artefact possess? And why does Pew want it so badly? To find the answers, and her uncle, Danni must brave flooded cities, marauding bands of scavengers, and travel across a Europe changed by the rising seas.
“Fade to Black” Gets a Cover
Check out the atmospheric cover for Francis Knight‘s debut novel, Fade to Black, to be published by Orbit in February 2013.
Orbit said:
“We jumped at the chance to publish Fade to Black – because the world that Francis has created just blew us away. It’s both awe-inspiring and vertigo-inducing, and Rojan’s tale makes the story just un-damn-put-downable. Think of the murky atmosphere of Sin City, filled with the action and pace of Brent Weeks or Scott Lynch.”
You can read more about the book and its noirish world of Mahala here. And if you like what you see, it’s available for pre-order on amazon now.
“Siblings” Anthology Now Available
Hersham Horror have released Siblings, a new anthology in their PentAnth series, featuring a story from the T-Party’s Sara-Jayne Townsend.
The book features five stories on the subject of siblings with dark secrets, and “brings you five more chilling tales of horror that only goes to show that you can choose your friends, but not your family.”
Siblings will be officially launched at this year’s FantasyCon in Brighton this weekend, and the authors have a signing table there at 12 noon on Saturday 29 September. It’s also available now from amazon in kindle and paperback format.
Clarion Buys David Gullen’s Sci-Fi Novel
Huge congratulations to David Gullen! Clarion Publishing have bought his (as yet untitled) novel set in the near future. The story is a “a fantastical future-tale of greed, government, excessive shopping, nuclear war and drug-induced happy fun-times” and is packed to bursting with exciting ideas.
The press release from Clarion is available here, and you can find out more about Mr. Gullen on the Clarion author page, and on his own website.