Category: Swords and Spaceships

An anthology of short SFF fiction by 12 Palestinian authors, who have been asked to imagine what 2048 will look like. Stories were translated to English by Raph Cormack, Mohamed Ghalaieny, Andrew Leber, Thoraya El-Rayyes, Yasmine Seale and Jonathan Wright. (IIRC this anthology was inspired by Iraq+100, which is also excellent.)

Half historical novel, half fable, this is the story of a young Palestinian woman who travels the world (sometimes while disguising herself as a boy) solving mysteries and having adventures. She may never find a home for herself, but she builds a family.

This anthology of short fiction came out of a series of science fiction workshops run by Callum Copley. (This book does ship internationally.)

This deeply unsettling novel imagines a world in which all of the Palestinians disappear all at once, leaving their Israeli neighbors confused and frightened. A traumatized Jewish journalist investigates and finds the journal of his vanished neighbor, Alaa, in which he converses with his dead grandmother.

A pregnant woman escapes from a religious compound to give birth to her twins in the woods. But cults don’t let go easily, and she’s forced to fight against that community and the outside world to defend her family–a battle that begins an uncanny metamorphosis of her body that can only be understood by facing the past.

Danso is a disillusioned scholar in the city of Bassa who wants only to escape his social and political obligations as one of the elite. He gets his wish when a skin-changing warrior named Lilong shows up wounded in his barn, claiming she’s from lands that everyone knows don’t exist and quickly dragging him into a world of magic and conspiracy.

Jessamyn Teoh is closeted, broke, and jobless, so she’s moving back to Malaysia, a country she hasn’t seen since she was a toddler, with her parents. When she starts hearing a voice in her head, at first she assumes it’s stress… but then she finds out it’s the ghost of her grandmother, who in life was the avatar of a god called the Black Water Sister. Grandma wants Jess to help her settle an old score with a local business magnate… whether she wants to or not.

A new brain implant called a Pilot is sweeping the nation, quickly going from a curiosity to a necessity to keep up with school or work. Soon all people face a choice: get a Pilot or be left behind. The new technology divides a family, setting Sophie against her parents and her brother… and then against the powerful manufacturer of the device.

Fatma is the youngest woman working for the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments, and Supernatural Entities in 1912 Cairo, and she’s already prevented the destruction of the universe once. Now she’s called on to investigate a mysterious murder, one committed by someone who claims to be the famous al-Jahiz, who pierced the veil between magical and mundane realms 40 years ago, now returned to judge the world for its societal sins.

Rose Marshall is the restless ghost of a girl murdered on her way to prom. She’s been after her killer, Bobby Cross, ever since, trying to find a way to destroy the seemingly immortal man. Now, with the destruction of the crossroads, Bobby is finally vulnerable… but Rose still isn’t going to be able to take him down by herself.

Queen Talyien of Jin-Sayeng is also know as the She-Wolf—and less flattering, the Bitch-Queen—because she exiled her husband and murdered a man the day before her coronation. But she’s also a mother who loves the son she has with the now-exiled husband, and she’ll do anything to keep him safe.

Technically Shards of Honor is the first Cordelia Vorkosigan book, but this is the one where she becomes a mom. Cordelia is basically the space opera GOAT, someone whose complete self confidence and emotional intelligence let her cut through masculinist BS like a laser cannon through butter. She is a delight in every book.

Vern is a young woman who must flee both her abusive husband and the cult he leads because she’s determined that both she and her babies should have a better life. To protect her family, she undergoes a terrifying, violent metamorphosis… and will have to face the violence in both her personal history and that of her homeland.

This entire series is set off by Essun discovering that her husband has killed their son and kidnapped their daughter, and that sets her off on a world-spanning and world-altering journey to save her surviving child–and maybe ultimately the world.

Ti-Jeanne is a new mother; her child, Baby, is so young that he doesn’t even have a proper name yet. Living in the walled-off center of an abandoned Toronto, she has to face down the crime lord who runs the place while learning to accept her relationship with the spirits from her grandmother, Gros-Jeanne.

Isabella Camhearst is a naturalist making ground-breaking discoveries and studying the dragons of the world, all while being a single mother. She even eventually brings her son along on one of her journeys of discovery.

In a world ravaged by climate change, Cee has been trapped alone on an island for three years. She doesn’t remember how she got there or who she was before, but she knows her sister Kay needs her, and so she works to build a raft from salvaged junk. In an eco-city where residents must spend a third of their time in stasis pods, Kasey has given up her sister Celia for dead after she sailed out to sea and never returned. But public pressure makes her rethink this assumption, and she begins to retrace Celia’s path.

While Queen Talyien has at last returned home, she does not find peace in her father’s castle. Her son has been stolen, her warlords plot rebellion, and war and invasion threaten. Worse, her father’s secrets seek to unbury themselves and ruin all of Jin-Sayeng. Will the queen flee that darkness or embrace it?

In the near future, the US has been inundated by rising waters and the surviving states divided between two megacorporations, Stellaxis Innovations and Greenleaf. One city is split between them, and thus in a constant state of civil war. Mallory lives in that city, where she streams wargames for Stellaxis and lives off tips. But when an in-game tip leads to an IRL mission for a missing girl, she finds herself in real danger that she only knows how to handle in a virtual world.

As the Princess of Crete, Ariadne grows up with the ever-present specter of her brother, the Minotaur, and the knowledge that he demands a blood sacrifice. The arrival of Theseus offers her escape, at the price of defying the gods and betraying her people and her family. But will escape become a happy ending for her–and what of the younger sister she leaves behind?

An anthology of LGBTQ+ science fiction and fantasy short fiction published during the last decade, with stories by Nalo Hopkinson, Charlie Jane Anders, Neon Yang, Amal El-Mohtar, and others.

Ryland Grace can’t remember anything; he’s been awoken millions of miles from home with only two corpses for company, in a ship that must have an important mission… if only he could recall. Ryland Grace is, even though he doesn’t know it yet, humanity’s only hope for survival.

Nominated for Best Novel – Adult. Four Native American men find themselves haunted by a deadly incident that happened in their youth–and now as adults, it threatens their families as well. Hunted by a vengeful entity, the only help for them might be the traditions they have long since left behind.

Nominated for Best Novella. Titus is a city ruled by Queen Odessa, who is also a stone mage. When General Aaliyah returns to her home in triumph, she finds not prosperity and peace, but an imbalance between ruler and ruled that she must figure out how to repair.

Nominated for Best Novel – Adult. In the wake of a civil war between Mars and Earth, humanity tries to rebuild peace. Mars sends a group of young people to live on Earth and try to rebuild bonds… but what they find there is no friends, no home, and no help but what they find in the community they struggle to build.

Nominated for Best Novel – YA. The jinn, free of their long imprisonment, are on the attack. The Nightbringer is first seeking vengeance on the humans, but he has much greater plans; his ally, Commander Keris Veturia declares herself Empress and makes her first target the Blood Shrike and what little family she has left. An apocalypse is coming for the humans, and their only hope could damn them or save them.

Nominated for Best Novel – YA. Tavia is a siren living among humans; she has no choice but to hide her powers at all times. Her best friend, Effie, is all-too-human, but has her own family problems and literal demons from her past nipping at her heels. But when a siren is murdered and Tavia accidentally reveals her powers at the worst possible moment, it’s these two best friends against the world.

Elsa Park is in the Antarctic, stationed at a neutrino observatory for her particle physics research when her childhood imaginary friend, a ghostly woman in the snow, finds her. Stalked by two family curses, one spiritual that dooms the women to repeat the lives of their folkloric ancestors, the other the medical specter of mental illness and generational trauma that runs through her immigrant family, she returns home to California to try to unravel the secrets hidden in the hand-written pages of her mother’s stories.

A mysterious new entity has begun hacking into social networks and private chats, and its aim seems to be to instigate paranoia that will flow into violence in the real world. The good news is that Steph, her new friend Nell, and the AI CheshireCat are there to stop it.

Murderbot discovers a corpse in the mall of Preservation Station and reluctantly is drawn into the investigation of the who, how, and why of a potential murder. Given that it requires a lot of talking to humans and their extremely squishy emotions, Murderbot might well end up wishing it could trade places with the body.

The paranoid, fascist, supposedly unkillable leader of Bourshkanya known as Stormhawk must die if the rebellion is to succeed. The Stormhawk’s son has a way to get an assassin close to his father, but it requires pretending complete loyalty to the regime. But in the process, it will force his protector to choose between his loyalty to the Stormhawk or his son.

Thora and Santi are two souls who have been circling each other in life after life, sometimes as friends, sometimes as lovers, sometimes as enemies, and every sort of relationship in between. But their life after life threatens to come to a final end if they can’t figure out what connects them.

In the world of the Dispatchers, a natural or accidental death is an endpoint; a murder pushes the do-over button and 99.99% of the time the victim comes back to life. Tony Valdez is a Dispatcher who’s been taking shadier and shadier gigs in financial tough times, and after witnessing a crime gone wrong, he finds people around him permanently dying in a way that implicates him. He has to solve the mystery of these deaths to save the lives of others–and keep himself out of trouble with the law.

Climate scientists have been forced to go underground by science-denying world governments, passing data to each other through a tentative secret network. When the data preservation cold war goes hot, the scientists must decide what they will risk to preserve the truth and the future of Earth.

During World War II, the occult forces of the Nazis are trying their best to get to Britain’s top-secret Section M, ready to deploy a terrifying array of witches, monsters, and dragons. Good thing the Brits have Squad 27, a hapless band of misfits that now includes Eddie Weatherfield, who may just win this war with the powers he’s mistakenly been given.

Hetta’s beloved Wyn has revealed he’s not human after ten years of pretending, and her family is not having it. Worse, the human queen is worried the fae might be a threat, while the fae court wants Wyn back to be the king… but if he takes the throne, he and Hetta can never marry.

Madzimure has been banished to the planet Eridania for thievery; his punishment is to mine eridanium endlessly for the benefit of a prophet named Jovian. But Madzimure has a secret–he carries another man’s consciousness and memories within him, and together they will take down Jovian.

Scientific consultant Penny Yee gets called in to deal with a gang massacre in Auckland, and she has a bad feeling that her brother might be involved. Matiu knows that chaos is coming, but at least he’s got a new car and his sister’s been too busy to get on his case. A family reunion from hell is on the horizon…

The team investigates a cluster of earthquakes with no known cause, leading them to an old World War II fortification that hides an 80-year-old mystery.

A blood feud between two gangs in 1920s Shanghai pits Juliette Cai of the Scarlet Gang against the first man she loved, who also betrayed her: Roma Montagov. There’s more at play than a grudge, however–evidence begins to pile that there are monsters in the streets, too.

Freya has outwitted the evil Master twice, but now she needs to secure all the pieces of the Armour if she wants to rescue her family–and everyone else trapped in the Golden City.

Concord is a town built to house evacuees after a nuclear meltdown. Cary can remember nothing from before the town, and she’s obsessed with finding out the truth of the meltdown and getting out of this town. Soon she ventures into the Zone and finds out a lot of people have been lying–including her own family.

Wrench is forced to reveal her Brasswitch powers to save the occupants of a runaway tram. She’s quickly recruited into the sinister Regulators and tasked with hunting down people like her.

Two witches–one imprisoned since birth, the other the daughter of the queen–make an alliance to take down a common enemy, ensuring revenge for one and survival for the other. But the chase is long and the violence intoxicating, and each will go to extreme lengths to get what she wants.

Derek is the most loyal, attentive employee that the big box store LitenVärld has ever had. But when he dares to take his first sick day, his manager questions his dedication to the job. His only shot at getting back into the good graces of management is to take a special inventory shift… with a team of four other people who look and sound eerily like him. (Full disclosure: Nino and I have the same agent.)

Delta has lived her life with a mysterious, unreadable map branded on the skin of her back. To the person who can decipher it, the map promises to lead to a paradise called Verdant, an impossible dream in the dusty wasteland they all come home. When Delta’s village is attacked by a would-be dictator, she has little doubt what he’s looking for–but it’s still up to her to rescue her family.

Determined to save her daughter Krushita from being used to secure the Burning Throne, Queen Aqreen takes her and flees across the Red Desert. But the Red Desert is famed as a place of danger even before the added fact that Aqreen’s husband is vengeful and can summon demonic legions at will. In a great game of mortals and demigods, Krushita’s growing powers may tip the balance.

Melaine has a rare gift that allows her to infuse raw magic into lodestones that she can sell for the use of other people. But keeping no magic for herself is a one way journey to an early grave, and she’s determined to make a better life. She turns to the Overlord, the mysterious ruler of their land, and finds him a husk of his former self. He’ll take her on as his apprentice–if she supplies him with lodestones.

Novel finalist. As the city of New York awakens, it embodies itself in six people instead of the more traditional one–one for each borough and one for the city itself. If the city is to survive its metaphysical birth, these people must find each other and defend the city itself from the otherworldly force that would destroy it.

Novel finalist. Piranesi lives in an infinite house filled with thousands of statues, which imprisons an ocean that sometimes floods up through rooms. The Other visits Piranesi twice a week and asks him to help him with his research, but soon Piranesi realizes there might be another person in there with him.

Novel finalist. At the eave of a solstice that coincides with a solar eclipse, the reincarnation of a god travels to the holy city in order to usurp power from the Sun priest.

Novel finalist. Harrow has been drafted by the Emperor to fight an unwinnable war–and as if that’s not bad enough, she has to cooperate with her most detested rival while her own health is failing and her mind threatens to unravel.

Novel finalist. While Elma York is on her way to Mars to begin that step of the plan, her fellow Lady Astronaut Nicole Wargin is hard at work trying to establish humanity’s first and perhaps most important colony on the Moon. The last thing Nicole needs on top of that difficult task is her husband deciding to run for president.

Novel finalist. Murderbot’s human associates have been captured. When someone else who is totally-not-a-friend desperately calls for assistance, Murderbot swings into action. Of course things get shot and blown up.

Novella finalist. With the release of Birth of a Nation in 1915, demons rose, fueled by the darkest thoughts of white people, and swelled the ranks of the KKK across the nation. Only resistance fighters are willing to take them down, with bullet, blade, and bomb, sending the demons of the Klan back to Hell.

Novella finalist. A customer goes missing in a Swedish big box store and it’s up to two minimum wage retail employees to find her in the depths of the infinite retail universe where all stores across all realities are interconnected. (Full disclosure: Nino and I have the same agent.)

Novella finalist. A Black girl with psychic abilities so powerful that she could level a city watches as her younger brother is incarcerated–and must decide what she will and won’t do about it as she watches him suffer through their connection.

Novella finalist. Esther escapes an arranged marriage by hiding in a librarian’s book wagon–a marriage to a man who was engaged to Esther’s best friend, who she was in love with, who just got executed for possession of propaganda. (Full disclosure: Sarah and I have the same agent.)

Novella finalist. In-yo, a young woman of royal birth from a defeated people is sent to make a political marriage with the emperor; she must choose her allies carefully if her people–and she–are to survive. Rabbit is a handmaiden sold into the emperor’s court, who befriends this lonely young woman… and gets far more than she bargained for.

Novella finalist. Jack has taken the body of her sister to the Moors, a place where death definitely isn’t permanent or necessarily a problem. When she returns to the School for Wayward Children, it’s clear something has gone disturbingly wrong in a way only a mad scientist can manage–and she desperately needs her friends’ help.

To save her love Arjun and her adopted home, Razia had to make a deal with her father–and now the favor she owes him has come due. She must help him secure the province of Zindh. But when her old enemy Karim engineers Arjun’s exile and forces Razia into a political marriage, she must call on all of her training as a princess, courtesan, and thief to save herself and her friends.

While Alice is recovering from her boss battle, dreams that are a vision of a dark past and darker future begin to haunt her crew, hinting that evil hasn’t been defeated in Wonderland. Soon word of a new army of Nightmares reaches Alice’s ears, but this time they’re close to home and a more immediate threat than the mortal world could have imagined.

Tina is an apparently average teenager who’s actually the keeper of an interplanetary rescue beacon. When that beacon activates, it’ll be her chance to save the galaxy–or will it? The beacon doesn’t turn her into a brilliant tactician and military captain, and she’s still just a teenager, one who isn’t prepared to be in charge of the Royal Fleet. Luckily she has friends, and a lot of determination.

The sacred magic of King Solomon survives in the hands of his descendants, who live deep in the woods of Hungary. The most gifted is Rabbi Isaac and his three daughters, each who has a different magic skill. But their peaceful life will soon be shattered by the darkness that creeps across Europe, and the Rabbi’s three daughters must make impossible choices to survive.

Danae is a tech servant in underwater Bloom City; but she’s not just herself, she’s also a grieving collective that cannot mend in a city that’s slowly imploding. With the help of her lover and an ex-mercenary, Danae makes a desperate escape and an equally dangerous journey across the Southwest of America, all the while hunted by an angry warlord and an even stranger foe called the Borrower.

The southeastern coast of the US is an abandoned wreck, torn by climate change-generated extreme storms and perpetual hurricanes. It’s known now as Stormland, but it’s not depopulated. Charleston clings grimly only, a flooded ruin where hundreds still live, ruled by cults and evil plutocrats. Into that dangerous landscape come a former serial killer and a former US Marshal, searching for answers.