With sinister echoes of 1984 and Brave New World, this original novel features a near-future city where medical science invents a single-dose pill for eradicating many common genetic defects . . .
Read a sample
So I have written before about how I love the Simon Morden trilogy that has started hitting shelves. Samuil Petrovitch is my favorite kind of snarling sarcastic anti-hero, and a genius rocket scientist to boot. My kind of guy. And I especially love Orbit for letting me be a bit daring with the cover design and rock these really graphic optical illusion covers.
So what you don’t know is that the initial design was even crazier. I wanted to hide the cover text IN the optical illusions. Slight legibility problem, I admit, for a teeny book cover…but FABULOUS for a poster. And since I know you guys love these how-to videos, I screen-captured my process so you too can make your own Editable-Text Optical Illusion Poster…and melt the retinas of all your friends. After the jump you can even download the Illustrator file I used, and add your own text. Read the rest of this entry »
You can learn to make your own in our How-To video, or you can win your own! Just sign up below and you’ll be entered to win one of ten “Mind the Gap” posters.
Niklaus Manuel Deutsch is an artist all but forgotten in the modern age. I’m not claiming this is some great travesty, for his work, while quite good, is not necessarily outstanding, nor was he particularly prolific. In fact, Manuel abandoned painting and etching in the last decade of his life to focus on poetry, play writing, and one of the trickiest arts of all, politics. Had he stuck with one or two disciplines perhaps he might have produced a single work that endured through the ages, as opposed to creating many worthy but unexceptional pieces that have been swept away in the great flood of history, occasionally bobbing to the surface in this coffee table book or that academic tome on plays of the Swiss Renaissance. Of course, that’s simple conjecture–it’s entirely possible that had Manuel lived an extra thirty years and painted every single day of every single one of them he may never have produced anything more memorable than what we already have of his work. It is possible, uncharitable an observation as it is to make about any artist, that the man was simply not a genius, not a savant, that he was as good an artist as he ever could have been. Read the rest of this entry »
There has been plenty of wow-ing (a technical term we use round these parts) about this glorious visual for Michael Cobley’s next book – The Ascendant Stars. Illustrator Steve Stone and designer Peter Cotton have done us proud with this one and the content is no less exciting I promise you!
This is the culmination of an SF trilogy packed with invention and adventure and you can check out extracts from Seeds of Earth (book 1, UK | ANZ) and The Orphaned Worlds(book 2, UK | ANZ) with more to come in due course on book 3, published in November. Can’t wait. If you can’t wait either, keep an eye on Mike’s website too for hints, tips and updates.
Behold the new artwork for the upcoming Kingdoms of Dust - Amanda Downum’s rich and exotic fantasy adventure featuring necromancer-spy Isyllt Iskaldur.
Larry Rostant has done us proud yet again with his luxurious imagery, which we feel perfectly suits Amanda’s lush and atmospheric writing style. And the visual sums up the epic setting for this book: think fiery red deserts, swirling sandstorms and ruined cities . . .
It’s the perfect addition to the gorgeous artwork for the rest of the Necromancer Chronicles series (see all the covers together below). And the joy is that, since these books can be read as stand-alones, you can pick up whichever book most appeals to you first . . . A difficult choice indeed! Larry Rostant: we truly heart you. And tons of thanks must also go to our very talented UK designer Peter Cotton, who put all of these covers together. Read the rest of this entry »
I hate to see a good series of covers come to a close, but I can’t be too sad because Avery Cates is finishing with a bang…or, more accurately, with SILVER INK. This is a case where the cover jpeg just doesn’t do the image justice, because there’s just no way to show you the metallic silver hotness this cover will convey in print. Just trust me.
The Final Evolution by Jeff Somers is the 5th Avery Cates book and if you have been enjoying the series so far you certainly won’t be disappointed. If you haven’t been reading the series yet — I understand, there are some readers out there that can’t stand being tortured by open-ended series and will only read series as a set — now is the time to get started!
Here’s a fresh new cover launch for everyone this gloomy Monday. For your viewing pleasure, I give you GERMLINE by T. C. McCarthy. It’s a story about a journalist in the vein of Hunter S. Thompson who is embedded with a group of US soldiers in a near-future war. It’s a fabulous look at what a war in the future could be like, but the perspective of the character we see it all thru keeps it really grounded and human. It reminded me simultaneously of The Forever War by Joe Haldeman, Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein, and the Transmetropolitan comics written by Warren Ellis. The author has experience in the CIA and works in biotechnology, so the books are amazingly well-informed, and plausible.
What’s also cool is we just finished the cover for Book 2 (no, I can’t show you yet) and the story is awesome. This is definitely going to be a series to keep up with. Each book is going to be told from the perspective of a different person in the war.
Anyway, back to the art! Steve Stone did the photoillustration and I just love the tone and texture. It definitely says military, definitely says future-but-not-too-far, and it really captures that there’s more going on under the surface here. I love the textures Steve worked in.
Well, as you can tell from the infrequency of the postings from the Art Dept since the holidays, it’s been craaaaaazy busy here. Our Fall/Winter 2012 covers are due in 3 weeks, and we’re killing ourselves bringing you the coolest artists and designs we can. We also have a couple new features in the pipeline which we’ll be talking more about after the evil 2/18 deadline, so hang with us. Meanwhile, we are going to finish posting the rest of the Spring/Summer 2011 Covers for your viewing pleasure, starting with one of my fave series…
Here you go folks, Heartless, the fourth Alexia Tarabotti/Soulless book by Gair Carriger. I love this series, and I am really digging the covers too – who wouldn’t, when I get to work with such fun material as the photos Steampunk icon Donna Ricci keeps sending me? The photographer this round was Pixie Vision Productions.
I tried to find a good British castle as a stand-in for the pack headquarters, and I think the cool heavy stonework here does the job – I can totally picture Alexia going up and down those steps to visit with the werewolves camped out on the back lawn…and whipping some military discipline into them!
After the jump is a teaser, and I’ve tried to take out as many spoilers as I could, but still, if you haven’t read the previous books (Soulless, Changeless, and Blameless) then BE WARNED, SPOILER ALERT. Read the rest of this entry »
Hot news – Orbit has acquired three new Dresden Files books by Jim Butcher! This means we’ll be able to bring you even more of the inimitable Harry Dresden P.I., the only wizard in the Chicago phonebook.
The ever-popular Dresden Files are getting even better with every new adventure. So if you love urban fantasy or crime noir, and haven’t tried these yet, what are you waiting for?!
The first of the new books will be published in Summer 2012, but in the meantime we have a bumper crop of Dresden Files coming up. We start with Changes in paperback in March, beautifully arrayed in our brand new Dresden Files cover style. This combines Chris McGrath’s great illustration with designer Peter Cotton’s design and layout. Then in April we have Side Jobs (Dresden Files short stories), followed in May by our fabulous-looking Dresden Files reissueswith new cover designs. Then to really add to the treat pile, we have Ghost Storyin hardback in the summer.
Hope you’ve got some reading time set aside, you know it’s worth it!
We’ve now received the shiny new cover flat for Tim Lebbon’sEcho City from our production department, so there was much excitement on the Orbit bench. It’s always seems so much more real and nearly-there than when you just print it on regular paper, but here’s the next best thing here on the interweb …
I think Lee Gibbon’s illustration is terrifically atmospheric and designer Peter Cotton has done a great job putting this together for us. It really portrays the desolate feel of a city stranded in a hosile desert, its dwellers believing there is no other life in their world – until a stranger arrives from across the toxic wastes …
Steven Erikson had this to say about this darkly fantastical novel — so look out for it in July if you’re after something to read on the beach. Or maybe not the beach, if you’ve a particularly vivid imagination:
Brilliantly conceived and exquisitely well written by one of the genre’s most original and inventive writers. Tim Lebbon is one of the few fantasy authors whose new works I eagerly antcipate’ Steven Erikson
- - April 26th, 2011
inimitable Harry Dresden P.I., the only wizard in the Chicago phonebook.
