Category: Uncategorized
- Jenni Hill - January 27th, 2012
We wanted to tell you that we’ve posted the answers to the urban fantasy quiz we created last week to celebrate the new book in Jaye Wells’ Sabina Kane series, SILVER-TONGUED DEVIL, but while writing the blogpost we suffered something of a demonic visitation . . .
We interrupt our usual service for an announcement from Giguhl, the demon/feline sidekick of Sabina Kane, star of the urban fantasy novels by Jaye Wells.
Hello, mortals.
Giguhl, the fifth-level Mischief demon, here. You’ve probably heard of my many accomplishments as the champion of Demon Fight Club and as the coach of the seriously bad-assed Manhattan Marauder roller derby team. But did you know that in my spare time, I am also the official sidekick of an urban fantasy heroine?
Her name is Sabina Kane. She’s half-mage and half-vampire and all sorts of trouble. And without me getting her back and providing color commentary, she’d be totally lost. I get lots of letters from beings who want to follow my hoofsteps into the sidekicking business. They think it’s all glamour and making sweet love to nymphs. Little do they know that it’s actual work. Today I’m going to break down the attributes required of every awesome sidekick . . . Read the rest of this entry »
by Jenni Hill • 4 Comments • Posted in: Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Orbit US, Uncategorized
- Rose Tremlett - January 20th, 2012
We are delighted that two Orbit titles have been shortlisted for this year’s Kitschies - awards that celebrate the most ‘progressive, intelligent and entertaining works of genre literature’, run by the excellent Pornokitsch website.
Jesse Bullington’s The Enterprise of Death is a finalist for the Red Tentacle for best novel, and the cover for Simon Morden’s Equations of Life is a finalist for the Inky Tentacle for best cover. Congratulations to Jesse and our very own designer Lauren Panepinto!
To celebrate we want to give you the opportunity to read these great books and judge for yourselves. We have 10 copies of each to give away. Just fill in your details below and we’ll pick the winner in two weeks time, the day before the winners are announced at the SFX Weekender 3 Kitschies Award Ceremony (sponsored by Kraken Rum, making it even more certain to be a great event).
Please read the full terms and conditions.
cforms contact form by delicious:days
by Rose Tremlett • 3 Comments • Posted in: Art, Awards, Contests, Covers, Giveaway, News, Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Orbit US, Uncategorized
- Jenni Hill - January 20th, 2012
We released Jaye Wells’ new urban fantasy novel SILVER-TONGUED DEVIL (UK/ANZ/US) this month, and to celebrate this and the fact that there’s a lot of love on the Orbit team for all the urban fantasy heroines out there, we created a quiz to give you the chance to test your knowledge against us!
Can you guess which urban fantasy heroines uttered the quotes below? If you recognise one, comment with the number of the quote and the name of the leading lady who uttered it. Try to be the first to get them right! No googling, because that’s just cheating!
We had a lot of fun coming up with these quotes, and we hope you have fun guessing too . . .
- “I took one more thing to bed with me, a stuffed toy penguin named Sigmund. I don’t sleep with him often, just every once in a while after someone tries to kill me.”
- (“What up, peeps?”) I looked at the hairless cat for a moment. “‘What up, peeps?’ You’ve been watching MTV again, haven’t you?” (“Word.”)
- “If the Apocalypse comes, beep me.”
- “This feels a little bit like what a vampire bar would look like if it were a ride at Disney World.”
- “Another werewolf thing. Like most animals, we spent a large part of our lives engaged in the three Fs of basic survival. Feeding, fighting and… reproduction.”
- “She’s a thousand-year-old vampire who’s joined the cheerleading squad. There’s a whole different set of rules in play here.”
- “So here’s the plan. I’ll get us tickets to New Orleans, we’ll go save the world from abstract evil, and afterward we’ll hang out in the French Quarter for a couple of weeks and blow off steam.”
- “I was dragged through Hell, betrayed by my god, left in Jersey, and finished up nearly being drowned by a demon with a bad haircut.”
- “Lycans are allergic to silver. We have to get the bullets out quickly, or they end up dying on us during questioning.” (“What happens to them afterward?”) “We put the bullets back in.”
- “So in the sweltering heat of a July night, I sang a Christmas carol to a room full of fae, who had been driven out of their homelands by Christians and their cold-iron swords.”
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“But the next noise to echo through the hall was one I was pretty sure I recognized. It was the unmistakable sound of the sh*t hitting the fan.”
Clue: There are some TV heroines, some film, and some from novels, both Orbit books and non Orbit books.
EDIT: It’s 26th January 2012 and we’re providing the answers to this quiz, here they are now . . . Read the rest of this entry »
by Jenni Hill • 13 Comments • Posted in: Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Orbit US, Uncategorized
- Ellen Wright - January 19th, 2012
The Mystery Writers of America announced their nominees for the 2012 Edgar Award this morning, and Robert Jackson Bennett’s The Company Man (US | UK | ANZ) will be on the ballot for ‘Best Paperback Original’!
This comes on the heels of The Company Man‘s Philip K. Dick Award nomination, and almost exactly a month before the release of Robert’s new novel, The Troupe (US | UK | ANZ). The Troupe follows 16-year-old piano prodigy George Carole and the mysterious vaudeville troupe he runs away to join, whose performances have a strange effect on their audiences. George gradually realizes the troupe is not simply touring: they are running for their lives.
by Ellen Wright • Post a Comment • Posted in: Awards, Fantasy, Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Orbit US, Uncategorized
- Jenni Hill - January 19th, 2012
Helen Lowe’s brilliant debut fantasy novel, THE HEIR OF NIGHT (UK|ANZ), comes out today in mass market paperback.
A DARK ENEMY. AN ANCIENT WAR. A NEW CHAMPION.
Young Malian is being trained to rule. Her people garrison the mountain range known as the Wall of Night against an ancient enemy, keeping a tide of shadow from the rest of their world. Malian is expected to uphold this tradition, yet she’s known little of real danger until the enemy attacks her fortress home and the Keep of Winds becomes a bloodbath.
Malian flees deep into the Old Keep – and when the danger is greatest her own hidden magic flares into life. But if she accepts its power, she must prepare to pay the price.
THE HEIR OF NIGHT by Helen Lowe is a richly told tale of strange magic, dark treachery and conflicting loyalties, set in a well realized world.”
– Robin Hobb
THE HEIR OF NIGHT is the first novel in Helen’s skillfully weaved epic fantasy series, The Wall of Night. The second volume in this series, THE GATHERING OF THE LOST, (UK|ANZ) will be released from Orbit UK on the 5th of April this year. Only three months to wait now!
by Jenni Hill • Post a Comment • Posted in: Fantasy, Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Uncategorized
- Anne Clarke - December 9th, 2011
And here it is in all its beauty – the cover for the second book in the Assassini trilogy by Jon Courtenay Grimwood. We showed you the new cover for THE FALLEN BLADE (US | UK | ANZ) earlier this week – now here, as promised, is the cover for the sequel THE OUTCAST BLADE, coming from Orbit in trade paperback in May 2012. If you haven’t read THE FALLEN BLADE yet, try the first chapter here. Enjoy!
by Anne Clarke • Post a Comment • Posted in: Art, Covers, Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Orbit US, Uncategorized
- Anna Gregson - December 9th, 2011
Hype continues to build for the movie adaptation of Orson Scott Card’s classic novel Ender’s Game. It’s due for release in 2013 and will be directed by Gavin Hood, whose previous work includes X-Men Origins: Wolverine. This is one of the most highly anticipated book-to-movie adaptations ever – and all over the interwebs fans have been getting excited that this book will finally be reaching the big screen.
Following the news that the role of Ender will be played by Asa Butterfield, star of Martin Scorsese’s Hugo, rumours are circulating about who will feature alongside him. The Hollywood Reporter announced recently that True Grit’s Hailee Steinfeld is likely to play the role of Petra, and just today we’ve heard the news that Ben Kingsley, known for movies such as Schindler’s List, Shutter Island and Species, is also in talks to star in the movie. Even Harrison Ford has been mentioned as a possible Colonel Hyrum Graff.
We here at Orbit just can’t wait to see how it turns out, and I’m sure Card’s legion of fans can’t either. But who else would you like to see starring in this movie? Personally, I’m intrigued to see who will play Valentine and Peter . . .
In the meantime, look out for our reissue of Ender’s Game the novel (UK / ANZ), released this month in a shiny new package, and with a boy on the cover who looks not too dissimilar to Asa Butterfield coincidentally . . . (we must be psychic)
by Anna Gregson • Post a Comment • Posted in: News, Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Uncategorized
author post
Artemis is the heroine of my fifth novel for Orbit Books, and she’s a lot like me in many ways. She’s a cool, sexy, superfit, ruthless, murdering bitch who loves reading books.
Okay, she’s a lot like me in ONE way. I also, um, love reading books.
I find I’m naturally attracted to characters with a hint of evil in their souls. Like Lena, or indeed Flanagan, in DEBATABLE SPACE. Or Saunders in RED CLAW. Even Sharrock in HELL SHIP is a warrior, and hence a cold blooded killer.
Some of the characters I’ve created in these books are, however, Good Guys. Version 43, for instance, in the novel called (would you credit it?) VERSION 43 is an honest cop in a dishonourable world. He may have flaws but he’s not corrupt. In fact his main flaw is that he’s not nearly corrupt enough. He is, exasperatingly, too good to be true; because he’s a cyborg and not a true human. But, as time goes by, he gets more and more human…and that makes him, in my view, easier to warm to. And he’s also very good at his job, of enforcing law and order, usually by killing people.
Artemis, though, is very much at the ultraviolet end of the spectrum of amorality. She is a one woman killing machine. But does that make her an unsympathetic character? Well, I’d argue not. Because she has reasons for what she does. Good reasons…
But she’s flawed, without a doubt. Highly flawed. Murderous – sometimes selfish – obsessive – and vengeful. I like characters with flaws; perhaps because I am myself a character with many flaws… And I believe firmly that characters who are nice and full of virtue aren’t the ones we root for when we read stories. That’s why Satan is the one we cheer on in Paradise Lost, not those wretched angels; certainly not God.
Mulling on this theme, I’ve coined the term ‘Rootability’, to refer to that special quality in a character that makes us want to root for him, or her. Tyrion Lannister (in George R. R. Martin’s Games of Thrones series) has it in abundance. Eddard Stark is far more heroic. Daenerys is more exotic, and has those wonderful dragons. But Tyrion is the evil dwarf we love to hate; he’s the underdog; he’s the smart one.
Harry Potter, for my money, DOESN’T have Rootability. He’s too powerful. He’s too nerdy. He has those glasses. I’d like those stories much more if Hermione were the heroine – the ‘little girl’ who no one takes seriously but who always wins the day. But then again I’m strange; and JK Rowling’s fans seem to like Harry’s books just the way they are. Read the rest of this entry »
by Philip Palmer •3 Comments • Categories: Guest Post, Orbit UK, Orbit US, Uncategorized • Tags:
- James Long - December 1st, 2011
After winning much critical acclaim for her Coldfire trilogy, Celia Friedman embarked on a new, epic tale of a dangerous world where to use magic is to sacrifice your own vitality . . . or that of an unwitting victim. The first novel in the Magister trilogy, FEAST OF SOULS [UK | ANZ], introduced us to Andovan, a prince suffering from a terrible disease, and Kamala, a young woman whose magical powers threaten centuries of tradition. Their fates – and those of many others – become entwined as a ancient force awakens to threaten their world. WINGS OF WRATH [UK | ANZ] continued the story, raising the stakes as the horrifying might of the Souleaters is gradually revealed.
Now, in LEGACY OF KINGS [UK | ANZ], the final confrontation is at hand. Secrets will be spilled, blood will run and magic will be unleashed. The fate of the world lies in the hands of a select few . . . but will their powers be enough to hold back the darkness?
Praise for Celia Friedman’s Magister trilogy:
Perhaps the most staggering achievement of FEAST OF SOULS is how purposeful every scene feels. There is no filler in this book — Ms. Friedman’s prose is crisp and to the point, just as every scene in this book serves as an integral part to the novel as a whole . . . FEAST OF SOULS is a fantastic, superior work of speculative fiction’ – THE BOOK SMUGGLERS
‘Friedman has her hands firmly on the reins and delivers scenes that are tightly controlled while sparkling with vitality’ – GRAEME’S FANTASY BOOK REVIEW
‘Friedman truly knows what she is doing as a storyteller, since she is following one of the great axioms: “Always leaving them wanting more.” I, for one, want more; especially after reading the last couple of exhilarating chapters’ - SFF WORLD Read the rest of this entry »
by James Long • Post a Comment • Posted in: New Titles, Orbit Australia, Orbit UK, Uncategorized
- The Orbit Team - November 18th, 2011
The second round of the Goodreads 2011 Choice Awards is still open for votes for two more days! There are lots of your favourite authors in this round: THE HEROES by Joe Abercrombie, GHOST STORY by Jim Butcher, THE ROGUE by Trudi Canavan, LEVIATHAN WAKES by James S.A. Corey, DEADLINE by Mira Grant, EAT SLAY LOVE by Jesse Petersen, RULE 34 by Charles Stross, THE MEASURE OF THE MAGIC by Terry Brooks, HOUNDED by Kevin Hearne, HEARTLESS by Gail Carriger, RIVER MARKED by Patricia Briggs, BLOOD RIGHTS by Kristen Painter, SPELLBOUND by Kelley Armstrong and THE FINAL EVOLUTION by Jeff Somers. If you voted in the first round, you need to vote again now to make sure your favourite books get through to the final.
Voting in this round closes on Sunday so get voting now!
by The Orbit Team • Post a Comment • Posted in: Orbit UK, Orbit US, Uncategorized
