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Bershad can not die… When he was caught trying to assassinate a fellow noble, Flawless Bershad received a death sentence: fight monsters and die serving the kingdom. He’s the most successful dragon slayer in history, but marked as a doomed man, Bershad stands apart from the world.
That is about to change. The man who sentenced Bershad has just given him an out. Kill a king and walk free forever. However, Bershad could care less about the fates of kings and kingdoms, until he discovers he may be the only person able to save every creature in Terra.
Happy Tuesday, shipmates! It’s Alex with some new releases to check out for the week, as well as a helping of SFF news! I had a heck of a good weekend and I hope you did too–and part of my A+ Saturday was seeing the ridiculous action funtimes that are Hobbs and Shaw. Basically, I agree with everything in this review. (And it’s got a massively fun cameo in it that I guess is a spoiler? But at least no one’s yelled at me on Twitter for mentioning it.) Also, baking season is coming.
New Releases
The Dragon Republic by R.F. Kuang – Sequel of The Poppy War. Warrior and shaman Rin is on the run; addicted to opium and haunted by the atrocities she’s committed, she refuses to die until she has revenge on the Empress. Her best chance may be to join up with the Dragon Warlord, who wants to unseat the Empress and create a republic.
First Cosmic Velocity by Zach Powers – A blending of fact and fiction about the Cold War Soviet space program, a sham that depends on the use of twins to hide the fact that no one it has launched into space has returned successfully to Earth.
Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge: A Crash of Fate by Zoraida Córdova – Jules and Izzy were best friends as children on Batuu. After being separated for years, Izzy returns to Batuu while delivering a mysterious package and runs into Jules again. The two find themselves on the run, dodging danger and sorting out their feelings for each other.
The Gossamer Mage by Julie E. Czerneda – The Deathless Goddess extracts a terrible price for the use of the magic for which she is the only source. Determined to end the certain death waiting for magic users, the greatest mage vows to destroy the goddess–but he doesn’t have the full story.
Cry Pilot by Joel Dane – Earth is at war with a mysterious enemy armed with rogue bio-weapons. Maseo Kaytu volunteers for a suicide mission as a ‘cry pilot’ and finds himself bonding with his platoon of misfits.
News and Views
N.K. Jemisin’s The Broken Earth Trilogy is going to be a tabletop RPG!
Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are going to do a horror-comedy series about ghost hunters for Amazon Prime.
A succinct and hilarious thread that explains who all the cats in the Cats trailer are.
The showrunner for WandaVision pushed for a diverse writer’s room and got a lot of what she wanted.
Leslie Jones livetweeted Avengers: Endgame.
The Alamo Drafthouse will have clown-only screenings of It: Chapter Two. And Stephen King added a totally new scene to that movie, BTW.
A new adaptation of The Man Who Fell to Earth is coming to TV, from the Star Trek: Discovery team.
Someone watched all of the Fast and Furious movies in 4 days and shared the collected wisdom.
Baking bread with ancient Egyption yeast.
A weird and fascinating story about an infectious cancer found in dogs.
Jason Momoa and Dwayne Johnson have joined the ‘Protect Mauna Kea’ protests.
See you, space pirates. You can find all of the books recommended in this newsletter on a handy Goodreads shelf. If you’d like to know more about my secret plans to dominate the seas and skies, you can catch me over at my personal site.