Arteess: Conflict is the first in a new science fiction series where much of the action takes place inside a game. But surviving the game is not child's play. We learn of science, betrayal, power and progress – from the perspective of innocent, but nevertheless accomplished gamers. Created as an experiment into the nature of time itself, the virtual world of Arteess exists, in the near future, as a private digital realm. A full-body virtual reality experience where the talented, the shrewd and the lucky are invited to participate in an international war zone of nomadic factions. We are introduced into the world of Arteess alongside the Shard squad, a group of friends specialising in conflict arenas. Though each member possesses unique talents, they are ultimately defined by their personalities, their own personal battles and the moral choices they make in the consequence-free virtual environment. Surrounded by sociopathic technicians, facetious pilots and a potentially insane commander, they must carve out a place for themselves while surviving the onslaught of rivals and the antics of the rest of their own faction.
The Curlew Chronicles series opens with The Magician in the Attic, a story about Alexander Roebuck, a young magician coached by a mysterious recluse called Francis Curlew. Just before his fourteenth birthday, Alex first comes to the attention of the legendary Curlew and is taken under his wing. Like any other fourteen year-old, Alex has to contend with all that family, friends, school and the local busy-bodies throw at him. If he is to realise his dream of being a renowned illusionist, he must respect the older man’s seemingly strange obsession with privacy and seclusion. He wants to learn from his mentor more than anything else, but that means hours of practice, keeping secrets from his mum and his best friend, and gaining experience in (mis)directing the attention of an audience. Alex soon persuades his form tutor to let him perform some illusions as part of the forthcoming school play. Is he ready for the audience… and are they ready for him?
Raised in the world-leading Academy of magic rather than by his absentee parents, Mitch has come to see it as his home. He’s spent more time with his friends than his family and the opinion of his maths teacher matters far more than that of his parents. His peaceful life is shattered when a devastating earthquake strikes and almost claims his little brother’s life. But this earthquake is no natural phenomenon, it’s a result of the ongoing war between Heaven and Hell. To protect the Academy, one of the teachers makes an ill-advised contract with a fallen angel, unwittingly bringing down The Twisted Curse on staff and students. Even as they struggle to rebuild the school, things begin to go wrong. The curse starts small, with truancy, incomplete assignments, and negligent teachers over-reacting to minor transgressions, but it isn’t long before the bad behaviour escalates to vandalism, rioting and attempted murder. As they succumb to the influence of the curse, Mitch’s friends drift away and his girlfriend cheats on him. When the first death comes, Mitch unites with the only other students who, like him, appear to be immune to the curse; together they are determined to find the cause of the problem and stop it.
Of all the known worlds, of all their nations and all their peoples, there is little rarer than the Helions. Each of these ancient structures is a vast, freestanding portal to other worlds; made by an unknown hand long before humanity arose. Those who control one can claim vast wealth by means of trade and movement through these portals. And on the world of Brisia, it is controlled by the nation of Reimar. Through both scheming and conflict, Reimar won out against its competitors to claim the territory in which the Helion stands. But Reimar’s rivals do not sit idle, and should widespread conflict break out between the more powerful nations, even the smaller countries have grudges to settle. Reimar’s wealth and prestige flows from trade, especially cross-world trade through the Helion. But there are signs of an imminent rebellion, especially among the younger members of more distant noble houses, and some rival nations are eager to take advantage of any internal distractions. Princess Siera du Tealdan has shown herself to be a strong and innovative military commander, while her older brother Ramiros enjoys life at the court of their father King Abarron du Tealdan. When the situation in Reimar takes a shocking turn for the worse, Siera’s military expertise is desperately needed. With no mercenaries available for hire, Siera must pull off a miracle. Having only one skyship armed with ballistae and an under-strength Royal Guard, she must fend off the rebellion, while at the same time dealing with Reimar’s old enemy Iln, that has declared an opportunistic war in order to raid and pillage across the border. If the rebels gain control of the Helion, the kingdom will suffocate. Reimar Breaking, the Prelude to the Iberan War, is the first volume in the Iberan War series.
For centuries, men have been dreaming of telepathy, the power to read and influence the minds of others. Now, all around the world, telepaths are finally starting to appear. Men and women are developing awesome powers with the potential to dramatically change society. Governments are soon starting to become aware of them, even recruiting them, while striving to keep knowledge of their abilities hidden from the general public. Academic researchers too are discovering telepaths and it isn’t long before awareness of their existence starts to spread. But non-telepaths, ordinary people, don’t want to have their minds read or controlled; the telepaths soon find themselves widely regarded with fear and hatred. Inevitably, some of them want to fight back.
The Janus Cycle can best be described as gritty, sexy, surreal, urban fantasy. Janus is a nightclub. But it’s not merely a location, it’s virtually a character in its own right. On the surface it appears to be a subcultural hub where the strange and disillusioned, who feel alienated and oppressed by society, can escape to be free from convention. Underneath that façade is a surreal space in time where the very foundations of reality can be twisted and distorted. But the special, unique, vibe of Janus is hijacked by a bandwagon of people who choose to conform to alternative lifestyles simply because it has become fashionable to be ‘different’ and this causes many of its original occupants to feel lost and disenchanted. The story unfolds through the eyes of eight narrators, each with their own perspective and their own personal journey. A story in which the nightclub itself goes on a journey. But throughout, one strange girl, briefly appears and reappears, warning the narrators that their individual journeys are going to collide in a cataclysmic event. Is she just another one of the nightclub’s denizens, a cynical mischief-maker out to create havoc or a time-traveller trying to prevent an impending disaster?
Simon, a traveller with time to kill before continuing his journey, enters an inn on the outskirts of London. Inside he meets a motley crew competing to tell tales for their own amusement. So starts Dave Weaver’s new novel, The Black Hole Bar, which has already been compared to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales and Boccaccio’s Decameron. But these raconteurs are not pilgrims, nor are they hiding from a plague – Simon is on his way by rocket to Titan, rather than on horseback to Canterbury; the tavern is the Black Hole Bar, although being high up on Level Five of Docklands Spaceport it isn’t too far from Southwark; the tales are not told by a knight, squire, nun, merchant, clerk, parson, franklin or manciple, but by a programmer, advertising copywriter, dancer, financier, customs officer, marine biologist, sports star, and port worker. Simon works in the public relations department of Me-Grade Incorporated, an international Methane gas conglomerate. He’s an industrial journalist, on his way to yet another off-world assignment, this time a three month trip to Saturn’s moon to write a promotional piece about the harvesting of the Methane lakes on that forbidding world. But Simon is a troubled man. He’s sure his wife is having an affair during his prolonged absences; he’s bored with his job; and unsure where his life is going. Simon has stumbled into what was supposed to be a closed session for the Black Hole Bar Writers’ Group, who meet once a month to take part in a short story competition; the winner’s trophy is a small chunk of meteorite simply termed ‘The Rock’. As an interesting way to spend his last Earth night and forget his troubles for a few hours, this is perfect. Simon writes stories too and he’s been looking for a set-up like this for some time. Begrudgingly they let him participate. The stories begin, and Simon starts taking the competition far more seriously than he intended. Each of the bar’s denizens tells two stories, stories that are variously strange, amusing and occasionally downright scary. The writers all have their own histories to impart, lives crossed by tragedy and drama come tumbling out one by one into the cramped little room and as they do so, we, the invisible uninvited presence at Simon’s side, learn more about the background of this future world: its wars, its governments, its strange new customs and social groupings. A world which is at the same time recognisable as our possible future but also chilling in its recent past. Not far from the spaceport the old capital of London lies deserted, abandoned first but not least in the wave of dirty bomb outrages committed by the growing fundamentalist armies who have sworn to topple the Corporate States of the Euro-zone and New America. As the night progresses personalities clash, secrets are disclosed, and friendships made. And Simon finds himself slowly but surely falling in love. But he still has a date with Titan to keep. It’s getting late, very late, and he should leave... but the competition has yet to conclude. Simon’s heart tells him to stay but his head says go, now, before it’s too late and you lose everything. How will his own tale end...?
In 1795 a convict ship leaves England for New South Wales in Australia. Nearing its destination, it encounters a savage storm but, miraculously, their battered ship stays afloat and limps into Sydney Harbour. Here, the convicts rebel, overpower the crew and make their escape, destroying the ship in the process. Fleeing the sinking vessel with only the clothes on their backs, the survivors struggle ashore. Among the escaped convicts, seething resentments fuel an appetite for brutal revenge against their former captors while, for their part, the crew attempts to track down and kill or recapture the escapees. However, it soon becomes apparent that both convicts and crew have more to concern them than shipwreck and a ruthless fight for survival; they have arrived in Sydney in 2017. TimeStorm is a thrilling epic adventure story of revenge, survival and honour set in a strange new world of unfamiliar technology and equally unfathomable social norms. In the literary footsteps of Hornblower, comes Lieutenant Christopher ‘Kit’ Blaney, an old-fashioned hero, a man of honour, duty and principle, dragged into the 21st century… literally. A great fan of the grand seafaring adventure fiction of CS Forester, Patrick O’Brien and Alexander Kent, and modern action thriller writers such as Lee Child, Steve Harrison combines several genres in his debut novel. The book was inspired by a replica 18th century sailing ship on Sydney Harbour and a question from Steve’s brother, Tony: “What if that was a real convict ship?” TimeStorm explores that question in a fast-paced story as a group of desperate men from the 1700s clash in modern-day Sydney. TimesStorm was Highly Commended in the 2013 Jim Hamilton Award fantasy/science fiction category of the Fellowship of Australian Writers (FAW) National Literary Awards.
Sailor to a Siren is a space opera novel with significant nods to the gangland thriller genre. When Connor and Logan Cardwain, a gangster’s lieutenants, steal a shipment of high-grade narcotics on the orders of their boss, Connor dreams of diverting the profits and setting up in business for himself. His plans encounter a hurdle in the form of Éloise Falavière, Logan’s former girlfriend, who has been hired by an interplanetary police force’s vice squad. Logan wants a family; Éloise wants to stop the drugs shipment from being sent to her home planet; Connor wants to gain independence without angering his boss. All of their plans are derailed, though, when they discover that the shipment was hiding a much deadlier secret – the prototype of a tiny superweapon powerful enough to destabilise galactic peace. Crime lords, corrupt officials and interstellar magicians soon begin pursuing them, and Connor, Logan and Éloise realise they have to identify and confront the superweapon’s smuggler in order to survive. But, when one by one their friends begin to betray them, their self-imposed mission transforms from difficult to near-impossible. Sailor to a Siren is a great debut from Zoë Sumra and establishes her as a name to watch in epic space opera. The depth of her characters, the breadth of her world-building, the ambition and longevity of her story-arcs spanning multiple generations of families, all make this a first step in what is likely to be a fascinating and enthralling universe. This is a universe that has more in common with The Galactic Milieu, Firefly or Babylon 5 than with Star Trek or Star Wars. These are stories that Zoë has been thinking about, preparing and crafting for many years; stories that deserve to be told, from a story-teller who deserves to be heard.
The Convergence Project is a covert military/governmental science project that uses prisoners on death row to explore what happens to people as they die. The experience of life flashing before your eyes just before death is a process called active retrieval where memories are being recalled and lived out again in the mind. As the amount of time before death decreases, the brain exponentially increases the speed of playback and starts looping: repeating over and over a lifetime’s worth of memories. Each playback makes the memories stronger and retains more detail. Eventually an infinite playback speed is reached forming a memory singularity called a Convergence Point, where the ‘moment’ lasts for ever and the person effectively enters an afterlife of their own making. Subjects are killed by lethal injection within an enhanced Magnetic Resonance Imaging Core, which brings on active retrieval and allows the brain activity to be imaged moments before the Convergence Point forms. The ‘near’ Convergence Points are downloaded into neutral clones who effectively decode the brain patterns back into memories. These Convergence Clones are subjected to psychoanalysis to try to gain an understanding of the death experience. The project has the added bonus of extracting information held deep in the subconscious of terrorists by using Convergence on them and then interrogating their Convergence Clone, which is recycled after use and reformed.
