NYCC 2019: New Overwatch Book – The Hero of Numbani

UPDATE (March 5/2020): The release date has been pushed from May 5 to June 2, 2020.

UPDATE (11/19): The high-definition cover has been added to Amazon today for the first time since the BlizzCon reveal.

UPDATE (11/16): The cover of Overwatch: The Hero of Numbani was revealed at the BlizzCon 2019 panel: The Writer’s Room: Building the Worlds of Blizzard.

In 2018, I attended the New York Comic Con to visit Scholastic’s Women of AFK panel. During the Q&A, I stepped up to ask Chloe Fraboni (Scholastic, senior editor) if there were any plans to publish books based on Blizzard IPs.

Her response was a bit cryptic: “We have some new stuff going on with Blizzard that I can’t say what property it is for. But I am really excited about it.”

In the NYCC 2018 article, I did note that while she did not specify what this upcoming book property it was for, during the panel she admitted she had visited the Blizzard Entertainment campus, and met her dream developer: Jeff Kaplan, and she mentioned she was an avid Overwatch player. From the get-go, this signaled to me later that the property they were working on was Overwatch. My speculation turned out to be true. You can pre-order The Hero of Numbani now (Kindle + Paperback).

THE HERO OF NUMBANI

In the technologically advanced African city of Numbani, in the not-so-distant future, humans live in harmony with humanoid robots known as omnics. But when a terrorist tries to shatter that unity, a hero named Efi Oladele rises!

Efi has been making robots since she was little — machines to better her community and improve people’s lives. But after she witnesses Doomfist’s catastrophic attack on the city’s OR15 security bots, Efi feels the call to build something greater: a true guardian of Numbani.

While Doomfist sows discord between humans and omnics, Efi engineers an intelligent and compassionate robot, Orisa, named after the powerful spirits who guide her people. Orisa has a lot to learn before she’s ready to defeat Doomfist, but Efi has some learning to do, too, especially when it comes to building — and being a hero. With Doomfist rallying his forces, and the military powerless to stop him, can Efi mold Orisa into the hero of Numbani before it’s too late?

This action-packed novel features the fan-favorite characters Efi, Orisa, Doomfist, and Lúcio in an all-new, original story straight from the minds of the Overwatch game team and critically acclaimed author Nicky Drayden!

Publisher: Scholastic Inc.

Publication Date: May 5, 2020

Language: English

ASIN: B07YGXKGZH

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Nicky Drayden is a systems analyst, and when she’s not debugging code, she’s detangling plot lines and mixing metaphors. Her debut novel, The Prey of Gods (Harper Voyager), featured in The New York Times Best of New Science Fiction and Fantasy and The Wall Street Journal’s Summer Reading: One Expert, One Book. Drayden’s sophomore novel, Temper, is touted as an exciting blend of Afrofuturism and New Weird. Her travels to South Africa as a college student influenced both of these works, and she enjoys blurring the genre lines between mythology, science fiction, fantasy, horror, and dark humor.

Drayden learned to write novels the old fashioned way, by banging out a crappy draft during the month of November with thousands of other aspiring novelists. In between novels, she frequently dabbles in short fiction, with over 30 stories in publications such as Shimmer, Daily Science Fiction, and Space and Time Magazine.

During her stint as managing editor for The Drabblecast, she helped continue the speculative fiction podcast’s tradition of bringing strange stories to strange listeners. Once a year, she’d escape the slush trenches to work on “Women and Aliens Month” a special series featuring alien stories written by luminaries such as Lauren Beukes, Nnedi Okorafor, and Alaya Dawn Johnson.

Nicky Drayden lives and writes in Austin, Texas where being weird is highly encouraged, if not required. Her novel-length work is represented by Jennifer Jackson at the Donald Maass Literary Agency, and you can find out more about her at nickydrayden.com or catch her on twitter @nickydrayden.

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