As curator of the British Fiction Focus, I have a kind of cause—to bring word of the best genre fiction from my neck of the woods to you fine folks in yours—but sometimes, sadly, a series slips through the cracks.
Now I don’t have any inside information about how well they’re selling, but neither do I see nearly as many people talking about The Osiris Project as I believe there should be, so consider this a call to arms, all: E. J. Swift is an awesome author. She writes “proper grown-up SF,” as her fellow proper grown-up SF author Adam Roberts says; SF that is at once “stylish, memorable, beautifully written and utterly distinctive.” The failed utopia of her fiction—“a future ocean metropolis […] whose inhabitants believe they live on the last city on earth”—mightn’t be explosive in the mode of most such stories, but by gum, it’s stunning.
She just so happens to have a new book coming out, too…
Tamaruq is being touted as the conclusion of the terrifically restrained tale that started in Osiris and continued in this year’s Cataveiro:
Fleeing from her family and the elitist oppression of the Osiris government, Adelaide Rechnov has become the thing she once feared, a revolutionary.
But with the discovery of a radio signal comes the stark realization that there is life outside their small island existence. Adelaide’s worries are about to become much bigger.
Meanwhile, as rumour spreads on the mainland, many head to the lost city of Osiris with their own devious objectives. But in a world where war is king and only the most powerful survive, there can only be one victor…
Here’s another thing to be thankful for: the cover. Isn’t it lovely? Not to mention how prettily it sits alongside books one and two of The Osiris Project:
Tamaruq is to be published by Del Rey in the UK on January 29. That may only be a month and change away, however with the holidays almost upon us, consider curling up in front of the fireplace with Osiris, Cataveiro and a mug or nine of mulled wine. They mightn’t be especially commercial, but these beautiful books represent science fiction at its finest, and as an audience, we’d do well to recognise the remarkable from time to time instead of trumpeting tripe because it’s ever so slightly exciting.
Niall Alexander is an extra-curricular English teacher who reads and writes about all things weird and wonderful for The Speculative Scotsman, Strange Horizons, and Tor.com. He’s been known to tweet, twoo.
