Editor's Note So if everything goes well, The Update should surpass 400,000 page views this week. I will do my usual State of Blog post so we can all see how far The Update has grown. To help spur us on to this milestone I got a slate of new posts planned I think you will enjoy.
In other news I plan to record the first episode of Voices from Alternia this coming Saturday. If everything goes well we should have the show published early July.
And now the news...
Successio Launched!
Friend of The Update Alison Morton celebrated the release of her new novel Successio, the third book in her Roma Nova trilogy, last week. You can check out the description and book trailer on last week's New Releases.
Well Alison has of course been busy promoting Successio all over the place. She was in London for the launch day and has been guest posting at other author's sites including David Ebsworth and Joanne Philips. Tomorrow she will be at Tunbridge Wells Library in Kent if you are in the area and want to meet the author. Alison has even promised to send a guest post my way so expect an article from her in the near future.
If you want to read Successio before purchasing it, you can check out three excerpts on her blog (I, II and III). And thanks to whoever bought the entire trilogy by clicking through our Amazon banner!
Gaie Sebold steampunk sequel commissioned by Solaris
It has been announced that Jonathan Oliver, commissioning editor of Solaris Books, has commissioned Sparrow Falling, a sequel to steampunk novel Shanghai Sparrow by Gaie Sebold. The novel will be delivered in December 2014, for a summer 2015 publication. The agent was John Jarrold, and the deal was for UK/US rights.
Here is the description of Sparrow Falling from the press release:
Between the activities of her school for young ladies and her connections with the Folk, Eveline Duchen is somewhat busy. She finds herself between a rock and a hard place when she is recognised as being a wanted felon and her friend Lin is put into peril by the leader of the Chinese Folk, the Dragon. She must use her native cunning and ingenuity as never before to find a way out…
If you have read Shanghai Sparrow, why not send us your review for a chance to be published on The Update?
Video Gallery
We start this weeks Video Gallery with literary smack down between Edgar Allen Poe and Stephen King:
And we end it with a lesson in why time travel in films is rarely scientific:
Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. Check out his short fiction. 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.
Editor's Note Still having trouble reaching my goal of five articles a week. My job has been extremely busy this week as my firm has just brought on some highly successful real estate attorneys and clearing them through conflicts has been a nightmare. What I really need is a contributing blogger. Someone who can submit articles on a regular basis to help fill in the gaps. But how do I encourage someone to volunteer for such a role?
Well...I actually have a small budget to pay for a staff writer. I am thinking either a flat rate per article or a few cents per word deal. Nothing in concrete yet, but if you are interested, shoot me an email at ahwupdate at gmail dot com. Since I am creating a position out of thin air here, I am willing to consider any and all proposals as long as they meet the subject matter of the blog.
And now the news...
Coming Soon: The Enceladus Crisis by Michael J. Martinez
Friend of The Update, Michael J. Martinez, was in the news a lot last week. Although his next book The Enceladus Crisis (sequel to The Daedalus Incident) does not come out until May, already review copies are being sent to the usual SF sites. For those who don't know about The Enceladus Crisis, here is the description from Amazon:
Two dimensions collided on the rust-red deserts of Mars—and are destined to become entangled once more in this sequel to the critically acclaimed The Daedalus Incident.
Lieutenant Commander Shaila Jain has been given the assignment of her dreams: the first manned mission to Saturn. But there’s competition and complications when she arrives aboard the survey ship Armstrong. The Chinese are vying for control of the critical moon Titan, and the moon Enceladus may harbor secrets deep under its icy crust. And back on Earth, Project DAEDALUS now seeks to defend against other dimensional incursions. But there are other players interested in opening the door between worlds . . . and they’re getting impatient.
For Thomas Weatherby, it’s been nineteen years since he was second lieutenant aboard HMS Daedalus. Now captain of the seventy-four-gun Fortitude, Weatherby helps destroy the French fleet at the Nile and must chase an escaped French ship from Egypt to Saturn, home of the enigmatic and increasingly unstable aliens who call themselves the Xan. Meanwhile, in Egypt, alchemist Andrew Finch has ingratiated himself with Napoleon’s forces . . . and finds the true, horrible reason why the French invaded Egypt in the first place.
The thrilling follow-up to The Daedalus Incident, The Enceladus Crisis continues Martinez’s Daedalus series with a combination of mystery, intrigue, and high adventure spanning two amazing dimensions.
Paul Weimer of SF Signal said in his early review of the novel that it "manages to improve on the first in significant ways but doesn't quite leap to the next quantum level." Still he did give it 4 out 5 stars, so I will take that as a recommendation. Those wishing to learn more about Michael can check out his interview over at the Functional Nerds and, for those aspiring authors out there, check out his original query letter to Michael's agent to find out what a successful query letter looks like.
Update: Nemo: Heart of Ice by Alan Moore
Alan Moore has a new entry in his successful League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series. Titled Nemo: Heart of Ice, here is the description from SF Signal:
Moore revisits the world he created in The League of Extraordinary Gentleman in a new book, Nemo: Heart of Ice, which focuses on Janni Dakkar, daughter of Captain Nemo, and her trek across Antarctica to prove herself by recreating Nemo’s own Antarctic expedition. Moore draws from several sources, including H.P. Lovercraft, to create a dark and mysterious continent full of dangers and madness. As a character, Janni feels the weight of the Nemo name and legacy set squarely on her shoulders, and struggles throughout the book to come to terms with that.
Patrick Hester (of SF Signal Podcast fame) reviewed the comic for Kirkus and said "[f]ans of Moore's League will enjoy the book as an addition to the bigger universe, but for me, it fell a little flat. I wanted something more." So a disappointing review for someone like me who has read several books from the series, but I am still likely to read this one. What do you think?
Solaris commission Paul Kearney novel
Jonathan Oliver, commissioning editor of Solaris Books, has commissioned The Wolf in the Attic, a new historical fantasy novel by Paul Kearney. The novel is set in early 1930′s Oxford and features well-known fantasy authors JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis as characters. It is told from the point of view of a lonely, Greek refugee girl who one day discovers a Romany boy in her attic. The boy is a shape-shifter, and becomes her friend. The two begin to explore the world around Oxford, discovering things they never imagined existed. The girl, Anna, is obsessed by the Odyssey, and likens the Romany boy, Luca, to Odysseus. Here are the author’s thoughts:
“This story has been rattling around in my head for a long time. The genesis of it was a visit to Turkey some years ago, when I saw the magnificent ruins at Ephesus. I knew the ancient history of Asia Minor quite well, but its more recent reincarnation as Turkey was pretty much a mystery to me, so I started reading into it. The one event that really stuck in my mind during my research was the sack of Smyrna in 1922, a ghastly, shameful catastrophe that the world has completely forgotten about. The more I read about the forced exodus of the Ionian Greeks, the more I felt I wanted to say something about them. But how? I put the idea to one side.
“Then, several years later I went back to Oxford for the first time in almost two decades. The place I had known as a teenager was both similar and jarringly different to the memories I had been holding on to, and I had the oddest sense of being dislocated, ghost-like, remembering places and things that no longer existed. That powerful, stubborn mental grasp of a place that was no longer there in some respects made me think about the tenacity of memory, and the way it can mislead and deceive.
“Finally, back at home, I was simply walking the dogs along the beach, and the character of Anna came to me in a rush. All those dislocated and disparate factors seemed suddenly to mesh, and I had the heart of a story unlike any other I’ve ever tried to tell.”
The novel will be published in autumn 2015. The agent was John Jarrold, and the deal was for UK/US rights.
Map Gallery
Only two maps caught my eye last week. The first is from one of my favorite timelines on AH.com, "A Crack at Draka" by Municipal Engine. That timeline's Great War has just concluded and here is what the world looks like in 1914:
Which map did you think was the best? Let us know in the comments below.
Video Gallery
Got some good videos this week. First up, a curious gem I found through Unleash the Fanboy called Project Arbiter which has been described as a "diselpunk Captain America":
Next up is the weirdest "-punk" I have ever featured on The Update. Watch Adam and Joel from Rooster Teeth infiltrate Jazzpunk:
And now our gallery closes for the week with another episode from my new favorite alternate history channel, the Alternate History Hub, simply titled "What if the United States Lost the Revolution":
Know of any other videos alternate historians will enjoy? Let us know in the comments below.
July 17-20: The North American Science Fiction Convention (NASFiC), is held in years when the World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon) is held outside of North America. This year it will take place in Detroit, Michigan and will be known as Detcon1.
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.
So last week I posted a question on the Alternate History Online Facebook group asking the member what they thought was the one alternate novel all fans, regardless of whether they are beginners or hardcore, should read. I got a lot of responses and I had the idea of creating a list based on them. So as I narrowed it down, trying to only include the works that got the most positive mentions, when I discovered something: they were all about World War II or the American Civil War.
This disappoints me. I'm not saying that those books aren't good, only that we seem as fans (at the least the English speaking ones) to move beyond some of the stereotypes of the genre. Perhaps I am reading too much into the outcome of my informal poll, but I would like to branch out into the unexplored corners of the genre. To accomplish said goal, I am resurrecting an early idea I had when The Update was still young.
This is a call for action. I am looking for alternate history fans who are native speakers of a language other than English. I want to know more about alternate history (published or amateur) in other tongues. Danish, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Nederlands, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish and others, I don't mind. You can send me a full article or just email me some opinions/comments so I could build an article to ahwupdate at gmail dot com. Please, I want to hear from as many of you as I can.
And now the news...
Third Gareth L. Powell Ack-Ack Macaque novel to Solaris
Jonathan Oliver, commissioning editor of Solaris Books, has acquired a third Ack-Ack Macaque novel by Gareth L. Powell. The novel will be delivered in summer 2014, for an early 2015 publication. The agent was John Jarrold, and the deal was for UK/US rights. The title is Macaque Attack.
The novel is a sequel to Ack-Ack Macaque which Solaris published in 2013 and Hive Monkey, which will appear in January 2014. Check out the description of the new novel below:
Having saved the world twice, Ack-Ack Macaque finds himself at the head of a dimension-hopping monkey army, facing an invading horde of implacable killer androids and a final reckoning with his creator, the infamous Dr. Nguyun. Meanwhile, former journalist Victoria Valois fights to save the electronic ghost of her dead husband and reclaim her stolen soul from the sands of Mars.
Gareth Powell said: “I’m absolutely delighted to be working with Solaris Books on a third monkey adventure, and this one promises to be his biggest and wildest outing yet!”
Dark Hall Press presents The Bloodline: Birth of the Vampir
A curious book came to my attention called The Bloodline: Birth of the Vampir by Shaun McGinnis and Rod Garcia and published by Dark Hall Press. Bloodline has been described as "a dark tale of innocence lost and monstrosity born." Set in 13th century Europe, the book chronicles the fall of a Transylvanian Lord (hmm...wonder who he is based on) and his people at the hands of a ruthless Archdeacon in search of the Holy Grail. Cursed and exiled from their land, the former citizens of Erdely soon find themselves in the grips of a transformation, becoming something the world has never seen before—the first vampires.
The Bloodline: Birth of the Vampir is available for purchase via Amazon and other retailers. What interested me about this book, however, is not only its historical (dark) fantasy setting, but also the possibilities of how history could be changed with the rise of a "vampire nation". Not sure if the authors will actually go that route, but for ASB fans like me, it is fun to speculate...
Update: The Daedalus Incident by Michael J. Martinez
I have talked about The Daedalus Incident before and even got a chance to interview its author, Michael J. Martinez. In case you don't know, however, here is the description from Amazon:
Mars is supposed to be dead…
Bizarre quakes are rumbling over the long-dormant tectonic plates of the planet, disrupting its trillion-dollar mining operations and driving scientists past the edges of theory and reason. However, when rocks shake off their ancient dust and begin to roll—seemingly of their own volition—carving canals as they converge to form a towering structure amid the ruddy terrain, Lt. Jain and her JSC team realize that their routine geological survey of a Martian cave system is anything but. The only clues they have stem from the emissions of a mysterious blue radiation, and a 300-year-old journal that is writing itself.
Lt. Thomas Weatherby of His Majesty’s Royal Navy is an honest 18th-century man of modest beginnings, doing his part for King and Country aboard the HMS Daedalus, a frigate sailing the high seas between continents…and the immense Void between the Known Worlds.
With the aid of his fierce captain, a drug-addled alchemist, and a servant girl witha remarkable past, Weatherby must track a great and powerful mystic, who has embarked upon a sinister quest to upset the balance of the planets—the consequences of which may reach far beyond the Solar System, threatening the very fabric of space itself.
In less than a year, Worldcon returns to London. A mere forty-nine years after Loncon 2 in 1965, Loncon 3 will take place in the ExCeL conference centre in London's Docklands, from 14-18 August 2014. Its Guests of Honour cover the fields of fiction, comics, art, criticism, publishing and fandom: Loncon 3 will celebrate the work of the late Iain M Banks, John Clute, Malcolm Edwards, Chris Foss, Jeanne Gomoll, Robin Hobb and Bryan Talbot. This is also where the 2013 Sidewise Awards will be presented.
Co-chair Alice Lawson said, "Loncon 3 will include the standard Worldcon fare, including a huge multi-track programme of panel discussions and talks, a world class art show, a huge area for dealers and exhibits, performances including dances, plays, and a masquerade, and of course the 2014 Hugo awards."
She added, "Loncon 3 will also innovate. A massive hospitality space will bring the North American party scene and the European-style fan bar together in one place. In addition, Loncon 3 will present the Retro-Hugo Awards for 1939, celebrating the science fiction of the time of the very first Worldcon, held in New York 75 years before."
Co-chair Steve Cooper said, "With twelve months to go, membership uptake for Loncon 3 is outstanding. We currently have more than double the number of members that most Worldcons have twelve month out. All indications are that Loncon 3 will be the largest Worldcon ever held outside the United States."
"The key word that I keep hearing as we plan Loncon 3 is "Awesome" - that's exactly what this convention will be!"
Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. His new story "The Enchanted Bean" can be found in Once Upon a Clockwork Tale from Echelon Press. 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.
