Tor.com is pleased to reveal the covers for Saga Press’ full Summer 2016 line-up! Click through for more on the sequel to Genevieve Valentine’s Persona, a new Constance Verity adventure from A. Lee Martinez, and the conclusion of Zachary Brown’s Icarus Corps trilogy, plus four novels from debut authors, and a new short fiction anthology covering the range from straight out horror to humor.
Joe Monti, editorial director Saga Press had this to say on behalf of editor Navah Wolfe, art director Michael McCartney, et al.:
It’s our fifth season at Saga Press, officially the Summer 2016 season, and it feels incredibly fast and yet almost two years in the making! We have four debut voices with Mike Brooks’ action-packed space opera, Brian Lee Durfee’s epic fantasy which gave me all the 90’s fantasy chills but with a different perspective, World Fantasy Award finalist Kat Howard’s novel of fantastic suspense, and Joe Zieja’s snarky military science fiction that falls somewhere closer to M.A.S.H. than Catch-22.
Genevieve Valentine returns with Icon, a sequel to her much praised Persona where Suyana becomes even more one of your favorite heroines. Alex Award-winner A. Lee Martinez begins a trilogy with Constance Verity that adroitly navigates the tropes of urban fantasy and pulp adventures. Fred Durbin returns with a lyrical fantasy—his first in seventeen years!—which made me think of Peter Beagle and Patricia McKillip. The enigmatic—but soon to be revealed!—Zachary Brown delivers the third book in the Icarus Corps military science fiction trilogy as colonial Earth takes the fight to Jupiter, and Jupiter is always bad news. Lastly Hugo Award winning editor John Joseph Adams, along with co-editor Douglas Cohen take you on a tour of what goes bump in the night with perhaps the greatest titled anthology ever; Reading it is like when you saw Scream for the first time.
As the great Yogi Berra (RIP) once quipped, “You can observe a lot just by watching,” so let us know what you think.
Without further ado, check out the Saga Press Summer 2016 line-up!
Dark Run by Mike Brooks
June 7, 2016
Art by John Harris
The Keiko is a ship of smugglers, soldiers of fortune and adventures, travelling Earth’s colony planets searching for the next job, and nobody talks about their past. Until now. Captain Ichabod Drift is being blackmailed. He has to deliver a special cargo to Earth at a specific time and place, and no-one can know they’re there. It’s what they call a dark run…And it may be their last.
Roses and Rot by Kat Howard
June 7, 2016
Designed in-house
Imogen has grown up reading fairy tales about mothers who die and make way for cruel stepmothers. As a child, she used to lie in bed wishing her own mother would die, because she couldn’t imagine how a stepmother might be worse. As adults, Imogen and her sister Marin have both more or less escaped their mother—Imogen as a writer and Marin as a dancer—and they’re both accepted to an elite post-grad arts program at Melete. Soon enough, though, they realize that there’s more to the school than meets the eye. Imogen might be living in a fairy tale after all, and it’s one that will pit her against her sister if she really wants to escape her past and truly succeed as an artist
Mechanical Failure by Joe Zieja
June 7, 2016
Art by Leonardo Calamati
Sergeant Rogers left the Meridan Patrol Fleet to become an entrepreneur (smuggler) and when a deal goes as bad as bad can be he finds himself in a worse position: enlisted back into the Meridan Patrol Fleet just as a coup is going on, and somehow he’s the best chance the military has of stopping it.
A Green and Ancient Light by Frederic S. Durbin
June 7, 2016
Designed in-house
[Cover not available]
Set in a world that might be our own, during a war that evokes our shared cultural memory of World War II, The Sacred Woods is the story of one summer in the life of a boy sent to stay with his grandmother, in an idyllic fishing village away from the front. Their tranquility is shattered by the crash of a bullet-riddled enemy plane, the arrival of a mysterious friend of Grandmother’s named Mr. Girandole, who knows the true story of Cinderella’s slipper, and the discovery of a riddle in the (some say haunted, others sacred) grove of ruins behind Grandmother’s house. In a setting that is at once sumptuously serene and overshadowed by the specter of war, four unlikely allies learn the values of courage and sacrifice.
The Last Adventure of Constance Verity by A. Lee Martinez
June 14, 2016
Art by John Picacio
Granted a wish, at birth, by a fairy godmother named Grandmother Willow, Constance Verity has been tagged as one of the world’s great adventurers. It all began at her seventh birthday party when she defeated a giant snake. She is a master of exotic martial arts, a keen detective, and is in possession of a collection of strange artifacts, which are mostly kept in unlabeled boxes in her apartment. Constance has spent the past twenty years saving the world and she’s sick of it. She wants an office job, a boyfriend who isn’t going to get killed by who knows what, and she’s figured out the way to do it: She’s going to kill Grandmother Willow and reset her life. The problem is saving the world is Constance’s destiny. She’s really good at it, and there are forces at work to make sure she stays in the job. Then again, it’s also her destiny to have a glorious death. As always, be careful what you wish for.
Icon by Genevieve Valentine (sequel to Persona)
June 28, 2016
Designed in-house
A year ago, International Assembly delegate Suyana Sapaki barely survived an attempt on her life. Now she has everything: she’s climbing the social ranks, dating the American Face, and poised for greatness. But the secret that drives her couldn’t stay hidden forever, and as she scrambles to prop up her lies and save herself from a political scandal that could kill her, she has a new enemy: the public eye.
A year ago, Daniel Park was hoping for the story of a lifetime. He got her; he’s been following her for a year. But what do you do when you feel the person has vanished inside the shell, and dangers are building all around you? How much does Daniel dare become involved when his job is to break the story? And how far will he go for a cause that isn’t his?
Forgetting Moon by Brian Lee Durfee
July 5, 2016
Art by Richard Anderson
Welcome to the Five Isles where two young princesses of Gul Kana, Jondralyn, the older sister, renowned for her beauty, who only desires to prove her worth as a warrior, and her younger sister Tala, who has uncovered a secret that may not only destroy her family but the entire kingdom. Hawkwood, the assassin sent to kill Jondralyn who has instead fallen in love with her and trains her in his deadly art. Gault, a veteran knight who is becoming disillusioned by the crusade he is at the vanguard of just as it embarks for Gul Kana. And then Nail, the orphan boy hidden away at the edge of Gul Kana who may be the link to its salvation.
You may think you know this story, but everyone is not who they seem, nor do they fit the roles you expect. Durfee has created an epic fantasy full of hope in a world that is based on lies, through and through.
Jupiter Rising by Zachary Brown
August 9, 2016
Art by Steve Stone
In this third volume of the series, aliens have conquered the Earth, but there’s an armada coming in from the outer solar system. The Darkside Corps has fought off their attempted beachhead on the moon, and at Titan, and is now taking the fight to the Confederation amidst the titanic storms of Jupiter.
What The #@&% Is That? edited by John Joseph Adams and Douglas Cohen
August 23, 2016
Art by Mike Mignola
Covering the range from straight out horror to humor, WTF is That grew from a meme on Twitter when looking at iconic comic book artist Mike Mignola painted a monster and nobody knew what it was, but they loved it. Renowned editors John Joseph Adams and Doug Cohen then asked some of the best writers in the field to writer a monster story that included the line “WTF is that?” in their story. A feast for anyone who loves monsters. Contributing authors include: Seanan McGuire, Alan Dean Foster, Christopher Golden, Amanda Downum, Simon R. Green, Scott Sigler, Laird Barron, John Langan, Tim Pratt, Gemma Files, Nancy Holder, Jonathan Maberry, Adam-Troy Castro, Maria Davhana Headley, An Owomoyela & Rachel Swirsky, D. Thomas Minton, Desirina Boskovich, Terence Taylor, and Grady Hendrix.
