New Releases 11/12/13

Hardcovers

Long Live the Queen by Kate Locke

Description from Amazon.

Xandra Vardan thought life would be simpler when she accepted the goblin crown and became their queen, but life has only become more complicated. Everyone -- vampires, werewolves and humans -- wants the goblins on their side, because whoever has the goblins -- wins.

Queen Victoria wants her head, Alpha wolf Vex wants her heart, and she still doesn't know the identity of the person who wanted her blood. What she does know is that a project from one of the 'secret' aristocrat labs has gotten free and she's the only one who can stop the perfect killing machine -- a sixteen year-old girl. With human zealots intent on ridding the world of anyone with plagued blood and supernatural politics taking Britain to the verge of civil war, Xandra's finding out that being queen isn't all it's cracked up to be, and if she doesn't do something fast, hers will be the shortest reign in history.

The fantastic conclusion to the series that started with the spectacular undead steampunk debut, God Save the Queen and The Queen is Dead.

Uncrashable Dakota by Andy Marino

Description from Amazon.

In 1862, Union army infantryman Samuel Dakota changed history when he spilled a bottle of pilfered moonshine in the Virginia dirt and stumbled upon the biochemical secret of flight. Not only did the Civil War come to a much quicker close, but Dakota Aeronautics was born.

Now, in Andy Marino's Uncrashable Dakota, it is 1912, and the titanic Dakota flagship embarks on its maiden flight. But shortly after the journey begins, the airship is hijacked. Fighting to save the ship, the young heir of the Dakota empire, Hollis, along with his brilliant friend Delia and his stepbrother, Rob, are plunged into the midst of a long-simmering family feud. Maybe Samuel’s final secret wasn’t just the tinkering of a madman after all. . . .

What sinister betrayals and strange discoveries await Hollis and his friends in the gilded corridors and opulent staterooms? Who can be trusted to keep the most magnificent airship the world has ever known from falling out of the sky?

New Paperbacks

Fiddlehead by Cherie Priest

Description from Amazon.

Young ex-slave Gideon Bardsley is a brilliant inventor, but the job is less glamorous than one might think, especially since the assassination attempts started. Worse yet, they're trying to destroy his greatest achievement: a calculating engine called Fiddlehead, which provides undeniable proof of something awful enough to destroy the world. Both man and machine are at risk from forces conspiring to keep the Civil War going and the money flowing.

Bardsley has no choice but to ask his patron, former president Abraham Lincoln, for help.  Lincoln retired from leading the country after an attempt on his life, but is quite interested in Bardsley’s immense data-processing capacities, confident that if people have the facts, they'll see reason and urge the government to end the war. Lincoln must keep Bardsley safe until he can finish his research, so he calls on his old private security staff to protect Gideon and his data.

Maria “Belle” Boyd was a retired Confederate spy, until she got a life-changing job offer from the Pinkerton Detective Agency. Pinkerton respects her work, despite reservations about her lingering Southern loyalties. But it’s precisely those loyalties that let her go into Confederate territory to figure out who might be targeting Bardsley. Maria is a good detective, but with spies from both camps gunning for her, can even the notorious Belle Boyd hold the greedy warhawks at bay?

Another rollicking alternate history from Cherie Priest—Fiddlehead is the fifth book in the Clockwork Century steampunk series that started with Boneshaker.

The Steam Engines Of Oz Vol 1 by Erik Hendrix and Sean Patrick O'Reilly

Description from Amazon.

Arcana Comics & SteamPunk Originals collects the first four chapters of an epic SteamPunk future set in the World of Oz. A century after the witch was killed, the Emerald City is ruled by a once-revered hero, and salvation comes from the unlikely wrench of young Victoria Wright. She comes to find out the smallest of actions can have much larger implications, and the most insignificant of us can change the world. Rediscover old friends and new heroes along the way, and learn how something that was once a gift... can turn into a curse.

New E-books

Marshal versus the Assassins by M. Harold Page

Description from Amazon.

Sir William the Marshal, legend in his own time, has promised to go on crusade, a vow made to his Young King as he lay dying. But when the Oliphant, legendary war horn of Roland, is stolen by the lethal Assassins, he’s charged with returning the relic in order to stop the very thing he’d vowed to undertake—a crusade; this one engineered by the thieves.

With his small band of trusted companions—Sir Baldwin, his tourney compatriot; Eustace, his squire; and Henrik, the giant Norseman—William sets out to take back the relic. But treachery abounds, and when William loses two of his companions, he discovers an unlikely ally—Da’ud, an Assassin himself, bent on taking the Oliphant from the heretic faction that has stolen it. The three fight their way across land, sea, and desert, only to find themselves facing an army…and the Oliphant within their grasp.

To fans, authors and publishers...

Is your story 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.

* * *

Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. His new short story "Road Trip" can be found in Forbidden Future: A Time Travel Anthology. 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.

Weekly Update #123

Editor's Note

Got some new guest posts and reviews coming up here on The Update. Meanwhile. I have reviews of Johnny Alucard, The Long Earth and The Long War coming up soon at Amazing Stories. I hope you enjoy them all.

By the way, what did you think of our new videos segment? Did you like/hate it? Keep/delete? I want to hear from you. Comment or email us at ahwupdate at gmail dot com.

And now the news...

Update: Fiddlehead by Cherie Priest

Cherie Priest has a new book coming out in Clockwork Century, her steampunk/alternate history universe. Called Fiddlehead, here is the description from Amazon:

Young ex-slave Gideon Bardsley is a brilliant inventor, but the job is less glamorous than one might think, especially since the assassination attempts started. Worse yet, they're trying to destroy his greatest achievement: a calculating engine called Fiddlehead, which provides undeniable proof of something awful enough to destroy the world. Both man and machine are at risk from forces conspiring to keep the Civil War going and the money flowing. 

Bardsley has no choice but to ask his patron, former president Abraham Lincoln, for help.  Lincoln retired from leading the country after an attempt on his life, but is quite interested in Bardsley’s immense data-processing capacities, confident that if people have the facts, they'll see reason and urge the government to end the war. Lincoln must keep Bardsley safe until he can finish his research, so he calls on his old private security staff to protect Gideon and his data. 

Maria “Belle” Boyd was a retired Confederate spy, until she got a life-changing job offer from the Pinkerton Detective Agency. Pinkerton respects her work, despite reservations about her lingering Southern loyalties. But it’s precisely those loyalties that let her go into Confederate territory to figure out who might be targeting Bardsley. Maria is a good detective, but with spies from both camps gunning for her, can even the notorious Belle Boyd hold the greedy warhawks at bay? 

Another rollicking alternate history from Cherie Priest—Fiddlehead is the fifth book in the Clockwork Century steampunk series that started with Boneshaker.

Don't know anything about the series? Read my review of Boneshaker and Matt Quinn's review of Clementine to learn more. You can also read an excerpt of Fiddlehead book at Tor.com and check out S&L Podcast #144 which discusses Boneshaker.

Map Gallery

Could this be a new segment? Perhaps, alternate historians do like there maps. First up, friend of The Update Daniel Bensen (American Nation-States, What if the War of the Worlds had actually happened? and What would Eurasia look like if it had been colonized and chopped up like North and South America?) showed me a map by an artist on deviantART called Alt-Reality titled "Turks and Me":

The map's POD is Turkey buying Louisiana from France instead of the United States, creating a Muslim empire in North America. A little ASB (did the Turks really convince enough people to colonize the Great Plains to prevent American western expansion) but it is pretty and there are a lot of cool maps on Alt-Reality's profile.

Still it times like this, as we make up history for fun, that there are people who are doing it for other reasons:

Gavin Menzies is claiming that this map from 1418 proves that the New World was discovered by China's Admiral Zheng He some 70 years before Columbus. Before you get excited, you might want to see this myth-busting article written by Dr. Geoff Wade.

Remember just because you saw it on the Internet, does not mean it is true.

Calendar

Oct 18-19 and 25-26: A steampunk version of The Rocky Horror Picture Show at York, PA.

Oct 26: Elgin, IL's Nightmare on Chicago Street will feature steampunk this year.

Oct 29: Book discussion with Jeff Greenfield, author of Then Everything Changed, 43* and, his new book, If Kennedy Lived at Darien, CT.

Nov 9: The Biggest Liar In All The South contest at The Steampunk and Makers Fair in Lafayette, LA.

Links to the Multiverse

Articles

Dieselpunk for beginners: Welcome to a world where the '40s never ended by Aja Romano at The Daily Dot.

Books

Alternate history book imagines look to be the new reality by Michael Machosky at Trib Live.
Author Jim Musgrave Deftly Guides The Pat O’Malley Mysteries From Historical Into Steampunk at PRWeb.
Five Great Historical Fantasy Novels by Michael Pryor at Narrative Transport.
New Alternate-History Novel 'Surrounded by Enemies: What if Kennedy Survived Dallas?' by Screenwriter Bryce Zabel is Released at Books World.com.
The October Science Fiction and Fantasy Books You Can't Afford to Miss! by Charlie Jane Anders at io9.
Read the Introduction from TALES OF THE WOLD NEWTON UNIVERSE Edited by Win Scott Eckert and Christopher Paul Carey at SF Signal.

Comics

Bill Willingham Goes Steampunk With Dynamite Characters by Dan Wickline at Bleeding Cool.

Counterfactual and Real History

Fed Up on the Prairie, and Voting on Seceding From Colorado by Cheyenne Wells at The New York Times.
The Great Library at Alexandria was destroyed by budget cuts, not fire by Annalee Newitz at io9.
Latent Counterfactuals: Norway's Sabotage of Hitler's Atomic Bomb Project by Gavriel D. Rosenfeld at Counterfactual History Review.
Mike Ditka's biggest regret by Caitlin McDevitt at Politico.
No Hitler, No Holocaust (again) Gavriel D. Rosenfeld at The Counterfactual History Review.

Games

Bored? Check Out Ironclad Tactics, A Civil War, Steampunk, Strategy Card Game by Michael McConnell at Macgasm.
Steampunk Tower available now on the App Store at Gamasutra.

Interviews

James Lovegrove at Fantasy Matters

Reviews

Bitter Seeds by Ian Tregillis at Gutenberg's Son.
Johnny Alucard by Kim Newman' at Falcata Times.

Television

Elementary 2.3: We Are Everyone at Thinking about books.

* * *

Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. His new short story "Road Trip" can be found in Forbidden Future: A Time Travel Anthology. 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.