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Welcome to our latest round-up of links of interest featuring Orbit authors that we’ve spotted (or have been sent in to us) this past week:

If you see any online articles, reviews or interviews that feature an Orbit author, please feel free to drop us a line and let us know! We’ll happily name-check your website or blog with a heads-up credit in return (please remember to provide us with a link…)

Over at Jennifer Rardin’s website, she’s posted the latest in her ongoing series of blog-interviews with fellow authors.

In her latest post, Jennifer talks to fellow Orbit author Brian Ruckley - to mark the occasion of the publication of his second novel, Bloodheir [UK/US] - about the villains in his Godless World series, the main themes that run through the books, his world-building techniques, travel preferences… all sorts of things.

Read the full interview at www.jenniferrardin.com.

August 2008 sees the UK publication of Ken MacLeod’s brand new novel, The Night Sessions.

With a near(-ish) future setting that will definitely appeal to fans of both Ken’s last novel, The Execution Channel and Charles Stross’ recent Orbit title, Halting State, The Night Sessions tells the story of the apparent resurgence of anti-religious terrorism, fifteen years after ‘The Faith Wars’ (or ‘The Oil Wars’, depending on your point of view) and the Second Enlightenment that followed have radically altered the political and philosophical outlook of the world we know.

It’s packed full of Ken MacLeod trademarks: a mystery to unravel; one that’s wrapped in a slant-wise look at where the world might end up if the current tide of religious fundamentalism continues. And all laced with the sort of dry, laconic wit that regular MacLeod fans will know well and new readers will warm to immediately.

We’re publishing in hardback at £18.99, but if you’d like to get an early free sample, head on over to www.fantasybookspot.com, where you’ll find an excerpt from the first chapter: meet Edinburgh-based Detective Inspector Adam Ferguson and his leki-partner. Leki? Read it and see…

Plenty more from Ken MacLeod over at his blog: The Early Days of a Better Nation.

Brian Ruckley is over at A Dribble of Ink talking to Aidan about his new book Bloodheir:

Alright Brian, let’s get the easy question out of the way. Why should readers give a damn about your upcoming release Bloodheir?

Well I imagine those predisposed to give a damn (to whom I am, of course, inordinately grateful) already do so, and don’t need me to tell them why they should. As far as everyone else is concerned … what can I say? Although perfection remains, unsurprisingly, out of reach, I think I’m improving as a writer, bit by little bit. It’s got one or two plot developments that I really don’t believe many reasonable readers will have seen coming (plus, of course, one or two that they probably will…). And it’s got another lovely cover, just like Winterbirth did, so it’ll look grand on your bookshelf. Come to that, it’ll look great anywhere, so even if you’re only in the market for a cool-looking doorstop, it should fit the bill nicely.

Bloodheir (UK/US) is available at all good bookshops now. Check out our Facebook competition for a chance to win a free copy!

Charles Stross’ upcoming Saturn’s Children makes i09.com’s list of the Twelve Books You Should Read at the Beach This Summer. Though we say why limit yourself to the beach? It’s just as good on the train to and from the office!

Saturn’s Children is available from all good bookshops this July. You can read an advance excerpt here now.

In a few weeks’ time, the one and only Iain [M] Banks will be participating in an email QandA session, which will be conducted via the official Iain Banks website at www.iain-banks.net. We’re therefore looking for a selection of interesting, intelligent questions to put to him.

So if you’ve got a burning issue that you’d like Iain to address, or if there’s something that’s intrigued you about his recent work, or a question that’s been lurking in the back of your mind ever since you read one of his earliest novels that you’d now like to bring into the light of day, then this is your chance.

Send your best question (just one per correspondent, please), by email, to orbit@littlebrown.co.uk, with the subject line ‘Iain [M] Banks QandA Suggestion’. The deadline for submissions for this first session is July 9th. After that date, the half-dozen or so queries that - in the collective opinion of the team here at Orbit / Abacus - are the most interesting and / or intriguing will be put to Mr Banks for consideration. The resulting answers will then be posted to www.iain-banks.net in due course.

We’re hoping that this will be the first of a number of regular Q&A sessions with Iain, so don’t worry if you can’t think of something fascinating to ask him straight away; why not mull it over a bit and maybe submit it to us for the next round?

The sixth and final question in our Midnight Never Come themed prize quiz went live on Friday, on the Competition Gallery page over at www.midnightnevercome.com.

Correctly unravelling all six cryptic clues will grant you six entries to our email sweepstake. The competition will remain open for entries until midnight (GMT) on June 30, after which the over-all winner and runners-up will be drawn at random from the correct entries received.

So, you still have a week to puzzle out the answers and make sure you’re in the running for the £250 / $500 book voucher first prize..! What are you waiting for? www.midnightnevercome.com!

[P.S. Don't forget, if you wish to gain entry to Invidiana's court, you'll need to look to the moon...]

Welcome to our weekly round-up of links of interest featuring Orbit authors that we’ve spotted elsewhere on the WWW (or have been pointed out to us) in the past seven days:

If you see any online articles, reviews or interviews that feature an Orbit author, please feel free to drop us a line and let us know! We’ll happily name-check your website or blog with a heads-up credit in return (please remember to provide us with a link…)

The Edinburgh International Book Festival recently published its 2008 events schedule, which includes appearances by Orbit authors Iain M. Banks and Ken MacLeod.

Iain will be appearing on Wednesday August 13th, from 8.00 to 9.00 p.m. in a session billed as ‘The Biggart Bailey Event’, to talk about his latest novel, Matter [UK / US]. Tickets are £9 (£7 conc.) and are on-sale as of this morning; if you head on over to tickets.edbookfest.co.uk and run a search for ‘Iain Banks’ the details should pop right up*.

Ken will be taking part in a couple of EIBF events this year: at 2.30 p.m. on Sunday 17th August he’ll be appearing at Pepper’s Theatre in a ‘Fine Fiction’ talk about his latest Orbit title, The Execution Channel [UK]. Tickets for this event are £9 (£7 conc.) as well. And at 5.30 p.m. he’ll be part of the line-up for the ‘Amnesty International Imprisoned Writers Series’ event, the tickets for which are free and available from the festival box office on the day of the event.

*The EIBF schedule website is a bit sticky at the moment, with tickets having gone on sale today, but there’s a pdf copy of the full schedule at www.edbookfest.co.uk if you’d like more information on the events and are having trouble connecting.

[Thanks to DaveH of Iain Banks fanzine 'The Banksoniain' for the heads-up.]

When Pamela Freeman was in the UK recently, we had a fascinating conversation about technology in fantasy (I felt quite awed at her knowledge!). And Pamela promised to write down some of her thoughts on the subject for our blog. So, in honour of Blood Ties (UK/US), her debut fantasy out this month, here it is:

Do you ever get the feeling that most epic fantasy is set in the same time? Olden times – vaguely pre-industrial, vaguely medieval, vaguely Dark Ages … often a bit of each. One example I read recently – a society which had tailored jackets but no socks!

So often, fantasy authors stick technologies from widely different times together as though every culture prior to the invention of the steam engine was the same. The point of history is that things change – and this includes technology.

Technology! I hear you exclaim. They didn’t have technology then!

But they did. It didn’t use electricity, but it was technology nonetheless.

(more…)

This week’s official stats are in and we’re delighted to announce that Blood Noir [UK], the latest instalment in Laurell K. Hamilton’s legendary Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series, has just spent its third week at the top of the UK Hardback SF/Fantasy best-seller charts, according to figures produced by Nielsen Bookdata.

Hearty congratulations to Laurell on topping the UK SF&F charts yet again and proving that, when it comes to urban fantasy, Anita Blake - the original kick-ass heroine - is still number one!

For more information on Blood Noir, visit the catalogue page of the Little, Brown website. For more on Laurell K Hamilton, visit her official homepage at www.laurellkhamilton.org.

The dice-of-randomness have spoken again and we’ve drawn weekly winner #2 in our Brian Ruckley Facebook competition. This week’s lucky winner is - Jan Ove B from Norway - who will be receiving a signed, personalised copy of Brian’s brand new novel, Bloodheir [UK/US] in the near future.

There are now just two more chances to win during June, folks. To be in with a shout, you’ll need to sign up as a Fan of Brian’s Winterbirth Facebook Page in time for the remaining draws at lunchtime on June 20 and 27.

Here’s another quick round-up of links of interest featuring Orbit authors that we’ve spotted (or have been pointed in the direction of) online this week:

If you see any online articles, reviews or interviews that feature an Orbit author, please feel free to drop us a line and let us know!

The third of six cryptic clues linked to the world of Marie Brennan’s Midnight Never Come [UK/US] has been revealed today, over at the Competition Gallery page of www.midnightnevercome.com.

Remember, correctly answering all three questions gives you a triple chance of winning the first prize of £250 / $500 of vouchers from your favourite book retailer. And with another three conundrums to come next week, that will give you a half-dozen chances to win… tell me, what could you possibly be waiting for?

Oh, and have you made your way to Invidiana’s court yet? You haven’t? Well then, perhaps you should look to the night sky..?

Over at Jackie Kessler’s blog the faerie Lune from Midnight Never Come answered questions from Jezebel, a former demon. It’s surprisingly civil, all things considered. Check it out here.

Sean says:

I’ve always conceived Astropolis as three fairly different books. Saturn Returns is a complicated psychological piece (with lots of explosions) in which Imre Bergamasc puts his mind back together and decides that he’s going to do the same thing for the galaxy. Earth Ascendant is what he tries to do with the pieces. How does one go about managing an empire that large? At what cost success? (The third book is, naturally, a car-chase.)

The time-scales in Astropolis are huge. Every now and again I’d stop myself and think, “Did really send those guys on a journey that will last fifty thousand years?” It seems so wrong, and yet so right. In order to realistically manage a galactic civilisation, with no ftl technology at all, people will have to think this way.

And they’d better have a good knowledge of Edgar Allen Poe too, if Imre’s version of the future is anything to go by.

Saturn Returns, book one of the Astropolis sequence, is out now in the UK.

You can find our more about Sean’s writing over at his official website, www.seanwilliams.com and keep up to date with the latest developments via his LiveJournal page.

Brian says:

My new book – Bloodheir – is book two in my Godless World trilogy. It’s been entertaining to write, and will hopefully be entertaining to read, in part because it tracks the rise to power of the main villain in my story, and everyone likes writing and reading about the bad guys, right?

Bloodheir is where we get to see just how much trouble my invented world might be in. The battles are bigger, the stakes are getting higher, pretty much all the characters are learning just how easily things can run out of control, and I’m afraid one or two of them are heading for an untimely end…

In other words: all good, clean, honest fun.

Bloodheir is the second volume of Brian’s epic fantasy saga The Godless World and is out now in the UK and US. You can read the whole story so far by picking up a copy of Winterbirth [UK / US] and starting your journey there.

Find out more about Brian and his writing over at his official website, www.brianruckley.com, where he also writes a regularly-updated blog.

Fiona says:

Goddess is the final ‘movement’ to the Percheron symphony. And if I continue with the orchestral reference then this is the book where the drums are rolling, the cymbals clashing and every musician is blowing, or strumming, or bowing, or banging. All the characters are on the move and we enjoy resolution to the myriad of storylines, especially who the Goddess is…

Always a high body count in my books and be assured that those that deserve it usually get their come uppance. Read it and see who survives - you may be surprised . Thanks to all who have read the story so far. Enjoy Goddess.

Goddess is out now in the UK and is, as Fiona says, the final part of the Percheron series, which began with Odalisque [UK] and continued in Emissary [UK].

You can find out more about Fiona and her work by visiting her official website: www.fionamcintosh.com.

Pamela says:

Blood Ties is the first volume of an epic fantasy about dispossession, trust, enchantment, revenge and the unreliability of history. It’s also about the Eleven Domains - created by invasion, ruled by warlords - where it is possible to foretell the future… accurately.

An unusual element in Blood Ties is that, interspersed in the larger adventure, you’ll find minor characters’ own stories, told in their own words, and will learn about daily life in the Domains, which is mixed with magic and love and sorrow and joy and death.

I hope you’ll like the book because of its characters, especially Bramble and Ash, and because the world of the Eleven Domains has more surprises in store with each turn in the Road…

Blood Ties is the first book of the Castings trilogy and is available now in the US and UK.

You can find out more about Pamela Freeman and the Castings trilogy at www.castingstrilogy.com.

We’re delighted to announce the launch of a new feature series for OrbitBooks.net - ‘In Their Own Words’ - in which we’ll be presenting a selection of short guest blog pieces by Orbit authors, introducing their brand new Orbit titles in (you guessed it) their own words.

We’ll be kicking off shortly with posts from Pamela Freeman (Blood Ties), Fiona McIntosh (Goddess), Brian Ruckley (Bloodheir) and Sean Williams (Saturn Returns).

We’re hoping that this will become a regular feature, and we invite you to leave your own feedback in the comments section of the individual articles.