Here’s the full list of new science fiction titles heading your way in May!
Keep track of all the new SFF releases here. All title summaries are taken and/or summarized from copy provided by the publisher. Release dates are subject to change.
May 7
Red Side Story (Shades of Grey #2)— Jasper Fforde (Soho Press)
Welcome to Chromatacia, where life is strictly regulated by one’s limited color perception. Civilization has been rebuilt after an unspoken “Something that Happened” five hundred years before. Society is now color vision–segregated, everything dictated by an individual’s visual ability, and governed by the shadowy National Color in far-off Emerald City. Twenty-year-old Eddie Russett, a Red, is about to go on trial for a murder he didn’t commit, and he’s pretty certain to be sent on a one-way trip to the Green Room for execution by soporific color exposure. Meanwhile, he’s engaged in an illegal relationship with his co-defendant, a Green, the charismatic and unpredictable Jane Grey. Negotiating the narrow boundaries of the Rules within their society, they search for a loophole—some truth of their world that has been hidden from its hyper-policed citizens.
Archangels of Funk — Andrea Hairston (Tordotcom Publishing)
The Water Wars have scrambled the world. Flood refugees are on the run. Disrupters and the nostalgia militia roam the roads wreaking havoc. Invisible Darknet Lords troll the internet, solidifying their power, while Cinnamon, her three Circus-Bots, and two dogs work with a community of farmers, Motor Fairies, and Wheel-Wizards to provide housing, health care and education for flood refugees. As Cinnamon confronts threats from the Darknet Lords and the nostalgia militia, she must determine how best to honor her elders and her history while building a future for herself and her charges. It’s not going to be easy.
Beyond the Ranges — John Ringo, James Aidee (Baen)
For Jason Graham, the world ends not with a bang, not even with much of a whimper. One second, he’s sitting in a restaurant in Mobile, Alabama, chatting with a server, the next he finds himself in a strange room, rescued by mysterious alien benefactors. Seems the world did end, though how and why are something of a mystery. Now, Jason—and five hundred million other humans—are in orbit around an Earthlike world that is abundant in natural resources and totally untamed. For the newly awakened humans, this is a chance to start society with a clean slate and a bright future. For Jason, who has knocked about aimlessly in several different careers in his Earth life, it’s an opportunity to unleash his creativity and ambition and see what he can really do. But who are the alien benefactors that have contrived this second act for some of Earth’s denizens? And what do they really want?
May 21
In Our Stars — Jack Campbell (Ace)
Earth, 2180. Genetically engineered with partly alien DNA, Lieutenant Selene Genji is different from ordinary humans. And they hate her for it. Still, she’s spent her life trying to overcome society’s prejudice by serving in the Unified Fleet while Earth’s international order collapses into war. Genji is stationed on a ship in orbit when humanity’s factional extremism on the planet reaches a boiling point, and she witnesses the utter annihilation of Earth. When the massive forces unleashed by Earth’s death warp space and time to hurl her forty years into the past, Genji is given a chance to try to change the future and save Earth—starting with the alien first contact only she knows will soon occur. Earth, 2140. Lieutenant Kayl Owen’s ship is on a routine patrol when a piece of spacecraft wreckage appears out of nowhere. To his shock, there is a survivor on board: Selene Genji. Once her strange heritage is discovered, though, it becomes clear that Genji is a problem Earth Guard command wants to dispose of—quietly. After learning the horrifying truth, Owen helps her escape and joins her mission. Together, they have a chance to change the fate of an Earth doomed to die in 2180. But altering history could put Genji’s very existence in danger, and Owen wonders if a world without her is one worth saving.
Freeset (Four Cities #2) — Sarina Dahlan (Blackstone)
When calamity destroyed most of humanity, the Four Cities survived by carefully predicting and meticulously controlling everything in the survivors’ lives—even love. As part of this new normal, every four years the citizens face down Tabula Rasa, a process that wipes away their memories of each other. But nothing can be controlled completely, and love will always strive to be free. A brave handful of Dreamers, aided by Eleanor the Crone, have repeatedly managed to find each other again after Tabula Rasa, proving that the desire to connect is eternal. Scientist Aris and musician Metis, star-crossed lovers, have found each other again… along with a clue to a hidden library that could contain the memories erased by Tabula Rasa. At long last, there is a chance for a brave, free, new world—if they can escape before the next reset.
Lost Ark Dreaming — Suyi Davies Okungbowa (Tordotcom Publishing)
Off the coast of West Africa, decades after the dangerous rise of the Atlantic Ocean, the region’s survivors live inside five partially submerged, kilometers-high towers originally created as a playground for the wealthy. Now the towers’ most affluent rule from their lofty perch at the top while the rest are crammed into the dark, fetid floors below sea level. There are also those who were left for dead in the Atlantic, only to be reawakened by an ancient power, and who seek vengeance on those who offered them up to the waves. Three lives within the towers are pulled to the fore of this conflict: Yekini, an earnest, mid-level rookie analyst; Tuoyo, an undersea mechanic mourning a tremendous loss; and Ngozi, an egotistical bureaucrat from the highest levels of governance. They will need to work together if there is to be any hope of a future that is worth living—for everyone.
Escape Velocity — Victor Manibo (Erewhon)
Space Habitat Altaire is the premier luxury resort in low Earth orbit, playground of the privileged and the perfect location to host reunions for the Rochford Institute. Rochford boasts only the best: the wealthiest, most promising students with the most impressive pedigrees. Complete with space walks, these lavish reunions are a prime opportunity for alumni to jockey for power with old friends and rivals—and crucially, to advance their applications to live in an exclusive Mars settlement. Earth is dying, and only the best deserve to save themselves. Aboard the Altaire for their 25th reunion, finance magnate Ava pursues the truth about her brother’s murder during their senior year, which cast a dark shadow over their time at Rochford. Laz, ambassador and political scion, hopes to finally win Ava’s heart. Sloane, collecting secrets to conceal his family’s decline, angles for a key client. And Henry, heir to a healthcare empire, creates an unorthodox opportunity to get to Mars in a last-ditch effort to outrun a childhood secret. While these erstwhile friends settle scores and rack up points, they fail to notice that other agendas are afoot at the Space Habitat Altaire, and their own futures aren’t the only ones at stake—“the best” will soon regret underestimating those they would leave behind on Earth.
The Last Murder at the End of the World — Stuart Turton (Sourcebooks)
Solve the murder to save what’s left of the world. Outside the island there is nothing: the world was destroyed by a fog that swept the planet, killing anyone it touched. On the island: it is idyllic. One hundred and twenty-two villagers and three scientists, living in peaceful harmony. The villagers are content to fish, farm and feast, to obey their nightly curfew, to do what they’re told by the scientists. Until, to the horror of the islanders, one of their beloved scientists is found brutally stabbed to death. And then they learn that the murder has triggered a lowering of the security system around the island, the only thing that was keeping the fog at bay. If the murder isn’t solved within 107 hours, the fog will smother the island—and everyone on it. But the security system has also wiped everyone’s memories of exactly what happened the night before, which means that someone on the island is a murderer—and they don’t even know it. And the clock is ticking.
May 28
NecroTek (NecroTek #1) — Jonathan Maberry (Blackstone)
Neither cosmic philosopher Lars Soren, hotshot pilot Bianca Petrescu, nor the high priestess Jessica McHugh—Lady Death herself—can say quite where in the galaxy they are. But after an experiment gone horribly wrong, one thing is clear: Asphodel Station isn’t in orbit around Jupiter any longer. Worse, the monsters that live out here—ancient eldritch beings thought only to exist in stories and nightmares—have now been alerted to Earth’s existence. Their army of Shoggoths is coming for us next. Humanity’s only hope for survival lies on the surface of the alien world of Shadderal, where a ghost named Lost, the last of an ancient race, still haunts the vast plains of the Field of Dead Birds. But hope has a cost. Lost tells Soren about ancient derelict spacecraft awaiting on Shadderal, shapeshifting machines that blend ultra-advanced technology with the dark powers of necromancy. These ships might just be nimble enough to defend mankind against the coming invasion. But there’s a catch: they can only be piloted by the dead. As human starfighters fall in battle, their spirits can be called back from death to pilot these ghost ships of a fallen race. But will this new necromantic technology—NecroTek—allow humanity to stand against the vast armies of the Shoggoths? And even if it can, is the war to save the human race worth the cost of its pilots’ immortal souls?
Ghostdrift (Finder Chronicles #4) — Suzanne Palmer (DAW)
Fergus Ferguson, professional finder, always knew his semi-voluntary exile wouldn’t last, but he isn’t expecting a friend to betray him. One of the galaxy’s most dangerous space pirates, Bas Belos, wants him, and what Belos wants, he gets. Belos needs help finding out what happened to his twin sister, who mysteriously disappeared at the edges of space years ago, and he makes Fergus an offer he can’t refuse. Mysterious disappearances and impossible answers are Fergus’ specialties. After he reluctantly joins Belos and his crew aboard the pirate ship Sidewider, he discovers that Belos is being tracked by the Alliance. Seeking to stay one step ahead of the Alliance, Fergus and Belos find themselves marooned in the middle of the Gap between spiral arms of our galaxy, dangerously near hostile alien territory, and with an Alliance ship in hot pursuit. That’s just the beginning of the complications for Fergus’ newest—and possibly last—job. The puzzle is much bigger than just Belos’s lost sister, and the question of his future, retirement or not, depends on his ability to negotiate a path between aliens, criminals, and the most powerful military force he’s ever encountered. The future of entire planets hangs in the balance, and it remains to be seen if it’s too big for one determined man and his cranky cat.
