Wolfhound Century by Peter Higgins

Investigator Vissarion Lom is summoned to Mirgorod, capital of the Vlast, to help investigate a series of terrorist attacks in the city. Josef Kantor, the son of a famous revolutionary, is the chief suspect and Lom is soon on his trail. But a simple manhunt turns into something more serious. An angel has fallen to the earth in the vast forest thousands of miles to the east. A devastating war between the Vlast and a grouping of island-nations to the west is coming to an end. And a spirit of the forest made manifest arrives in the city, seeking a young woman who may hold the key to the world's salvation.

Wolfhound Century has picked up a fair bit of advance buzz as a novel to watch for this year. It's easy to see why. Coming over as the result of a genetic experiment splicing the works of Chine Mieville, Ian Fleming and Robert Holdstock into a single entity, but with a few twists of the author's own invention, it's definitely a refreshing change from Generic Epic Fantasy #312. The book is set in a world where revolvers and airplanes exist alongside nature spirits and giants, a sort-of Soviet Russia that never was but where honest cops still have to get on with foiling crimes, even crimes involving alien space entities and objects of transdimensional quantum power. It's a glorious mash-up of genres and styles that works very well.

Higgins is telling a big story here, but by tightly restricting the points of view to just a few characters and by using short, sharp chapters he is able to get through the story with an enviable economy. Even better, that economy does not prevent the prose from being more ambitious than the SFF norm, with evocative flourishes and place and character undertaken in just a few deft sentences. The writing is superb and the characterisation excellent, with Lom and his nemesis Kantor both shown to be complex, damaged characters, and also both more than they initially appear.

Even more impressive is the melding together of different ideas and genres. There are SF ideas about quantum physics and alternate realities existing alongside rural fantasy notions of nature spirits and living woodlands. In the middle of this lies the alternate-Soviet tropes of secret police and investigations where the truth is subservient to perception and politics. It could be an unruly mess, but Higgins makes it work with aplomb.

Where the book not so much stumbles but falls flat on its face is the unexpectedly abrupt ending. Wolfhound Century has been advertised as having a sequel (already written and submitted, thankfully), Truth and Fear, due out in a year's time, so it was already known that this would probably not be a completely self-contained book. The problem is that at no point is it stated that Wolfhound Century is functionally incomplete as a novel. It doesn't so much climax as just stop. This isn't the first in a series, but the first chunk of a much longer single novel being published in multiple volumes. Some forewarning of this would have been appreciated. Also, given that Wolfhound Century is only 300 pages of pretty big type in length, the question arises of why this story is being published in such small chunks also arises.

Still, whilst Wolfhound Century (****) may be just the first chunk of a bigger story, it is still a finely-written and compelling story. Higgins has created an engrossing fantasy world which is a million miles away from the more played-out ends of the genre and all the better for it. The book would have simply benefited from either being held back until the entire story was complete, or a mention of its heavily serialised nature was given on the cover at some point. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

Publication date confirmed for THE REPUBLIC OF THIEVES

Gollancz has confirmed a publication date for The Republic of Thieves, the long, long-awaited third book in The Gentleman Bastard sequence. It will be published on 8 October 2013 in the USA and 10 October in the UK.

Tyrion Lannister approves this news.

Gollancz's Deputy Publishing Director, Simon Spanton, commented:

"Some of you will know about the real difficulties that gathered around this novel for Scott. I’d just like to take this opportunity to thank Scott for sticking with it. I know that he was always painfully aware of the delays and what those meant both for his publishers and his fans. So I’d also like to thank Scott’s readers for their patience and for the immense support and the profound goodwill towards Scott that they have shown during this time. It’s been a long wait but I have every faith that their patience will now be rewarded with The Republic of Thieves."

HUZZAH!

UPDATE

Scott Lynch has posted his own take on the news at Fantasy Faction. He confirms that work is already underway on Book 4 of the series, The Thorn of Emberlain, and he hopes to return to a sane production rate and not have to get Brandon Sanderson to finish the series. Lynch has also formally surrendered his 'Crown of Lateness' (which, arguably, he never had in the first place, cough cough Melanie Rawn/David Gerrold/Patrick Tilley/Diane Duane/Harlan Ellison cough).

Scott Lynch update on THE REPUBLIC OF THIEVES

Scott Lynch has posted an update on The Republic of Thieves to the Fantasy Faction website, amusingly in response to the question, "What books haven't you finished?".

The Republic of Thieves.


(I am so sorry. I simply couldn't resist. In the immortal words of my grandfather: "If you can't laugh at yourself, you're an asshole.")

Cheers,

SL

P.S. It ain't the finishing that's the issue, it's the editing and the miserable damned anxiety attacks.

P.P.S. I'm working on both as you read this.

P.P.P.S. None of this is the fault of my editors or publishers. They have been patient and steadfastly helpful during a long difficult period of my life.

Based on Gollancz's prior information (in their 2013 catalogue) that Republic would be out in the summer if Scott finished before the end of January, and given that he has not finished, we can conclude that book will now not be out in the summer. In fact, at the moment a 2013 publication at all must be doubtful. Hopefully we'll have some better news soon.

Gollancz to publish three ELITE novels

Gollancz have announced that they will be publishing three novels based on the Elite series of computer games in 2014.

The new Elite game, Elite: Dangerous (the fourth in the thirty-year-old series), recently passed its funding goal on Kickstarter, ending with more than £1.5 million raised for game development. The title is expected to be released by mid-2014. To help the game reach its goal Gollancz pledged a significant sum on Kickstarter to buy the rights to publish three novels based on the Elite universe.

Gollancz had already been in discussions with David Braben and Frontier Studios about adding the original Elite tie-in novella, The Dark Wheel, to its SF Gateway online store. The Dark Wheel is notable as it was written by the late Robert Holdstock, best-known for his Mythago Wood series of novels. The Dark Wheel was packaged with the original BBC Micro release of Elite in 1984 (I still have a copy in a box somewhere). Frontier: Elite II, released in 1992, was also accompanied by a book of short stories entitled Tales of Life on the Frontier. Whether this will be reprinted at some point is unknown (but unlikely; it was not as good as Holdstock's novella).

The three novels will be published in 2014. The identities of the potential writers have not yet been revealed.

Cover art for Christopher Priest's THE ADJACENT

Given that waits for a new Christopher Priest novel are often measured in half-decades (or, in the case of the last one, a full decade), it feels like we're being spoiled with a new book so soon after his previous one. The Adjacent will be published in June 2013 and now has some cover art:

Priest calls this the longest and most complicated book he's ever written, which coming from the author of The Affirmation and The Separation is saying something.

A LIES OF LOCKE LAMORA TV series?

The new Gollancz catalogue reveals some interesting information about Scott Lynch's Gentleman Bastard series.

For the obvious question, the catalogue reveals (on page 47) that the latest hand-in date for The Republic of Thieves (the third book in the series) is at the end of January. If Lynch can hit this date, the book will be published in July. Of course, after almost six years of getting hopes up, I wouldn't be too surprised if this date is not achieved.

More intriguingly, the press info also reveals that The Lies of Locke Lamora has been 'optioned for television'. I can find no information at all about that elsewhere online, which is odd as that kind of news is normally formally announced to the trade magazines before anywhere else.

More news as I get it.