Categories
Swords and Spaceships

Solving Your Own Murder, Dragon Slaying, and Other New Releases

Happy Tuesday, shipmates! It’s Alex, with a selection of new releases and some fun links for you on this last Tuesday of July. I’m fresh back from a mini-vacation over the weekend, during which I visited my family, read a lot of books, ate a lot of cheese, and drank a lot of wine, so I’m feeling energized and ready to tackle the start of August. Here’s hoping you find a long weekend to get a little relaxing done out of the smokey air soon, too. Stay safe out there, space pirates, and I’ll see you on Friday!

Thing that made me laugh this week: The Two Guards

Let’s make the world a better place, together. Here’s somewhere to start: https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/ and anti-asianviolenceresources.carrd.co


New Releases

Cover of The River Has Teeth by Erica Waters

The River Has Teeth by Erica Waters

This is not the first time that girls have gone missing in the woods, but Natasha is determined that her sister will be the last. Following rumors of supposed witchcraft, she asks Della for magical help to bring her sister home. But Della has her own fears that center on the woods, ones she keeps carefully secret–she believes the beast that takes the girls might in fact be her own mother, transformed by a spell gone wrong. With little to lose, they are each other’s only hope.

Far Out: Recent Queer Science Fiction and Fantasy edited by Paula Guran

An anthology of science fiction and fantasy short stories from the last decade that includes a wide spectrum of queer identities and voices. Authors include Sam J. Miller, Amal El-Mohtar, Neon Yang, Charlie Jane Anders, and many more!

Cover of The Dying Squad by Adam Simcox

The Dying Squad by Adam Simcox

Detective Inspector Joe Lazarus thought he was going to take down a drug ring; instead, when he storms a farmhouse in Lincolnshire, he discovers his own corpse and a woman named Daisy-May who has some bad news and some good news for him. The bad news: yes, he’s dead, and she’s a spirit guide. The good news? She’s there to recruit him into the Dying Squad, a detective force of the recently dead, so at least his afterlife won’t be boring. His first mission: solve his own murder, and do it before his memories fade away to nothing.

Hold Fast Through the Fire by K.B. Wagers

The crew of Zuma’s Ghost, one of the Near-Earth Orbital Guard ships, has won the Boarding Games for their second year in a row, cementing their reputation as an absolutely unstoppable team. But in the wake of this victory, they find out their commander and their Master Chief are both retiring, so a change in dynamic is inevitable–but they get more disruption than they counted on in the form of Spacer Chae Ho-Ki, who has a dark past as a convict and an even darker secret. As the crew of Zuma’s Ghost struggles to find its equilibrium again, the Trappist colonies start a war, and the ship is directly in their sights.

Cover of the Death Song of the Dragón Chicxulub by Randy H. Garcia

Death Song of the Dragón Chicxulub by Rudy H. Garcia

La Muerta Blanca is a mysterious dragon-like ghostly creature that’s been stalking Central America since the days of the Aztecs, eating hearts and spreading terror. Now, Miguel Reilly comes to modern-day New Mexico and falls in with a shaman named Tomás, who shows him that he’s not “pure” Irish-American while trying to train this innocent nerd into a dragonslayer. Along his journey, Miguel meets a Maya med student named Maritza who has survived a brush with the spectral monster and come away with her own ambitions to slay it. Náhuatl codices lead the two to Chichén Itzá for a final, fantastical battle to slay a dragon and find themselves.

News and Views

The new Dune trailer has dropped

The Fantasy Hive does another round of 5-Star Books in 5 Words

Kate Elliott on adapting history into SFF

Interview with Chuck Wendig

Interview with Cassandra Khaw

Interview with Shelley Parker-Chan

Apex Magazine is running its 2022 fundraising Kickstarter

Haunted Objects in Women’s Weird Fiction

Season 13 trailer for Doctor Who

Wheel of Time is coming to Amazon in November

On Book Riot

2021 World Fantasy finalists announced

How rereading The Lord of the Rings helped me cope with my OCD

This month you can enter to win a $250 Barnes & Noble gift card, a Kindle Paperwhite, and a Kindle Oasis.


See you, space pirates. 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.