New Releases 5/14/13

Paperback

Ha'penny by Jo Walton

Description from Amazon.

Before Jo Walton won the Hugo and Nebula Awards for her stunning Among Others, she published a trilogy set in a dark alternate postwar England that had negotiated “Peace with Honor” with Nazi Germany in 1941. These novels—Farthing, Ha’penny, and Half a Crown—are connected by common threads, but can be read in any order.

In Ha’penny, England has completed its slide into fascist dicatorship. The last hopes of democracy seem extinguished. Then a bomb explodes in a London suburb.

The brilliant but compromised Inspector Carmichael of Scotland Yard is assigned the case. What he finds leads him to a conspiracy of peers and communists—of staunch King-and-Country patriots and hardened IRA gunmen—to murder the Prime Minister and his ally, Adolf Hitler.

Against a background of domestic espionage and suppression, a band of idealists blackmails an actress who holds the key to the Fuhrer's death. From the ha'penny seats in the theatre to the ha'pennys that cover dead men's eyes, the conspiracy and the investigation swirl inexorably to a stunning conclusion.

E-books

Hearts of Iron: A Foreworld SideQuest by Scott James Magner

Description from Amazon.

SideQuests are stand-alone stories or novellas that chronicle the heroes, villains, and adventures in The Foreworld Saga across numerous eras and ages. They can be read in any order with or without prior knowledge of The Foreworld Saga.

When The Italian Job meets the Knights of the Round Table, the ultimate medieval heist caper is born.

It is the summer of 1035 AD and three sons of Tancred de Hauteville are in ambivalent service to Guimar, Prince of Salerno. The three men, who have been trained by their father in the art of war since childhood, spend the sweltering afternoons practicing swordplay, trading barbs, and thinking of how many men they would need to take the prince’s poorly fortified castle for themselves.

But when a mysterious agent asks the prince for the brothers’ services in obtaining a gilded chest, eldest brother William recognizes an opportunity to strengthen the Hauteville legacy. When he assembles a crew of skilled mercenaries, loyalties are tested and truths revealed. Among the group, there is a traitor, a spy, and the carrier of a long-held secret. The trust William places in each of his men will decide the future for himself and his family.

A bold new SideQuest in the Foreworld Saga, HEARTS OF IRON shows a different side of the middle ages , but with all the deft-sword play, historical accuracy, and political intrigue you would expect from the series that brought you The Mongoliad trilogy.

To fans, authors and publishers...

Is you next alternate history work going to be published in time for the next New Releases? Contact us at ahwupdate at gmail dot com.  We are looking for works of alternate history, counterfactual history, steampunk, historical fantasy, time travel or anything that warps history beyond our understanding.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update, a blogger on Amazing Stories and a volunteer editor for Alt Hist magazine. His fiction can be found at Echelon Press, Jake's Monthly and The Were-Traveler. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.