NOVEMBER 5-18, 2014: A Chinese science fiction blockbuster translated into English by one of the world’s best new writers, a new novel from Stephen King read by actor David Morse, Amanda Palmer’s self-help advice/memoir book, an anthology series sequel to V Wars, Chaz Brentley’s collection Bitter Waters, the entire 4-book set of Tobias Buckell’s Xenowealth series, and a gorgeously packaged “Area X” omnibus of Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy headline a fantastic fortnight of new audiobooks. There’s so much “also out” that trying to list everything up here would be a nightmare, but David Drake and John Lambshead’s Into the Hinterlands and Bernard Cromwell’s Excalibur finally unabridged are certainly worth highlighting, as is Anna Katharine Green’s 1890 novel The Forsaken Inn, narrated By Gabrielle de Cuir for Skyboat. In “seen but not heard” this week: The End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck, The Absolution of Roberto Acestes Laing by Nicholas Rombes, and The Seventh Bride by T. Kingfisher, as well as The Nickronomicon, a collection by Nick Mamatas, and the Sean Wallace-edited anthology The Mammoth Book of Warriors and Wizardry. In other news, the Scholastic Audio Humble Bundle has added another handful of books to its haul with two days left to go, and I’ve added a long, long list of titles to the “coming soon” listings below, mostly in 2015. More? Sure! There’s a free Go the F* to Sleep sequel out, read by Bryan Cranston, and! Brandon Sanderson’s long-awaited follow-up to Legion is also free, read by Oliver Wyman. And if you’re looking for deals just a bit more expensive than “free” look no further than the November Whispersync Deal Roundup which still has a few more days left of usefulness. Enjoy! [And if you’re new to audiobooks, among the many ways to get started are: you can try Audible with a free audiobook or get your first 3 months at Audible for $7.49/month ; try a free 30-day trial at audiobook streaming service Audiobooks.com ; or sign up for a $12.99 monthly membership at DRM-free Downpour.com .]

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin, translated by Ken Liu (Tor Books, November 11, 2014) is the first of an announced trilogy of translated editions of this 500,000-copy-selling Chinese sf series; a Tor.com article in early May provided yet more information and yet still much more was unknown than known. Now it’s here, bearing reviews and coverage from NPR (“Cixin Liu doesn’t pose that question so much as let it play out in a sweeping drama that risks the highest stakes imaginable — and some that can barely be imagined at all. … as a science-fiction epic of the most profound kind, it’s already won.”), the NY Times (“The ‘Three-Body’ tomes chronicle a march of the human race into the universe set against the recent past, the tumultuous years of the Cultural Revolution. It is a classic science-fiction story in the style of the British master Arthur C. Clarke, whose work Mr. Liu says he grew up reading.”), the Wall Street Journal (“Aliens are invading Earth, and there are two Chinese camps: one that welcomes the alien invasion and one that wants to fight it. … ), Tor.com (“The Three-Body Problem’s setting is tremendous; its science startling; and its fiction, finally, fascinating.”), Publishers Weekly ( “Fans of hard SF will revel in this intricate and imaginative novel by one of China’s most celebrated genre writers.”), and on and on, including a newspaper in Shanghai for which I do not have the character set to reproduce a quote here.

What might have happened, if in the midst of China’s cultural revolution, an alien race had landed, fleeing the ruination of their homeworld? That’s what we’re in for, and that’s what has got so many people so very excited. In terms of the audiobook, Luke Daniels narrates for Macmillan Audio, with a sample available at OverDrive and of course the other outlets. When I first saw the audiobook listing for The Three-Body Problem I was both ecstatic — I do nearly all my “reading” in audio and really, really hoped we’d get a concurrent audio release — and also a bit flabbergasted. Don’t get me wrong: I love Daniels as a narrator, and have immensely enjoyed his work on George R.R. Martin’s Wild Cards, on Kevin Hearne’s The Iron Druid Chronicles, Scott Meyer’s Off to Be the Wizard, Jay Posey’s Three, on and on, and even though he did display an impressive, Eurasia-spanning range of accents in The Mongoliad his wasn’t the first name I would have thought of when contemplating “Chinese science fiction”. Luckily for all concerned, I am not in charge of casting any audiobooks any time soon, as Daniels once again turns in a fantastic performance, capturing the detached third person narrative with clean, accentless narration. I found it to be just a tad on the deliberate side — which is something I wouldn’t have said about his previous, brisk narrations for Brilliance Audio — but absolutely engaging. More: Liu Cixin writes about the Big Idea behind the novel; Ken Liu writes about translating the book; an excerpt is available at Tor.com. Get: [Downpour | Audible | IndieBound]

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Crystal Rain, Ragamuffin, Sly Mongoose, and The Apocalypse Ocean By Tobias Buckell, Narrated By Robin Miles and Prentice Onayemi for Audible (Nov 11) bring new audio editions of Buckell’s Xenowealth novels, some of which replace older editions now no longer on offer, but at the very least The Apocalypse Ocean, Buckell’s Kickstarter-funded book four, was never in audio, and while I have a deep affection for the narrator of the original editions, these are fantastically well cast and performed by the immensely talented Miles and new-to-me (and to sf narration) Onayemi, providing stellar, stellar characterizations and narrations. “Long ago, so the stories say, the old-fathers came to Nanagada through a worm’s hole in the sky. Looking for a new world to call their own, they brought with them a rich mélange of cultures, religions, and dialects from a far-off planet called Earth. Mighty were the old-fathers, with the power to shape the world to their liking – but that was many generations ago, and what was once known has long been lost.” Speaking of Kickstarter, Buckell’s new campaign for a Xenowealth collection was fully funded nearly immediately, with plenty of time to check it out. And, speaking of shorts, his short story collection Mitigated Futures will be the focus of more detail next week.

Revival: A Novel by Stephen King (Scribner, Nov 11, 2014) — “A dark and electrifying novel about addiction, fanaticism, and what might exist on the other side of life.” Read by actor David Morse for Simon & Schuster Audio: “A dark and electrifying novel about addiction, fanaticism, and what might exist on the other side of life. In a small New England town, over half a century ago, a shadow falls over a small boy playing with his toy soldiers. Jamie Morton looks up to see a striking man, the new minister. Charles Jacobs, along with his beautiful wife, will transform the local church. The men and boys are all a bit in love with Mrs. Jacobs; the women and girls feel the same about Reverend Jacobs – including Jamie’s mother and beloved sister, Claire. With Jamie, the Reverend shares a deeper bond based on a secret obsession. When tragedy strikes the Jacobs family, this charismatic preacher curses God, mocks all religious belief, and is banished from the shocked town. Jamie has demons of his own. Wed to his guitar from the age of 13, he plays in bands across the country, living the nomadic lifestyle of bar-band rock and roll while fleeing from his family’s horrific loss. In his mid-30s – addicted to heroin, stranded, desperate – Jamie meets Charles Jacobs again, with profound consequences for both men. Their bond becomes a pact beyond even the Devil’s devising, and Jamie discovers that revival has many meanings. This rich and disturbing novel spans five decades on its way to the most terrifying conclusion Stephen King has ever written. It’s a masterpiece from King, in the great American tradition of Frank Norris, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Edgar Allan Poe.” More: A review in the Washington Post. Get: [Downpour | Audible | IndieBound | OverDrive]

V Wars: Blood and Fire edited by Jonathan Maberry (Blackstone Audio, Nov 18) — a follow-on to the original V Wars anthology, one of late 2012’s fantastic gems. A “shared world” anthology of linked stories in the vein of George R.R. Martin’s Wild Cards, the V Wars universe sees a virus trigger “junk DNA” which causes a global outbreak of something… vampiric. The sequel is narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir, Jamye Grant, Richard Gilliland, Roxanne Hernandez, Stephen Hoye, Sunil Malhotra, Arthur Morey, and Stefan Rudnicki. with many voices providing continuity across storylines from the first volume, and others voicing new contributors, as a few of this volume’s writers (which include Kevin J. Anderson, Scott Sigler, Larry Correia, Joe McKinney, Yvonne Navarro, Weston Ochse, James A. Moore, and Jonathan Maberry) are joining the story as well. “It’s been one year since a virus triggered junk DNA and people all over the world started changing, becoming something else, craving blood. It’s been 10 months since the word vampire stopped being something from old monster stories and Hollywood movies. It’s been six months since our world and theirs erupted into war, two since an uneasy peace was signed, and one hour since that peace was shattered. The war is here again – the vampire war.” Get: [Downpour | Audible]

Collection: Bitter Waters By Chaz Brenchley, with an introduction by Geoff Ryman, Narrated By Matthew Lloyd Davies for Lethe Press (Nov 14) — out in print/ebook just a little more than a week earlier, and more recently a starred review from Publishers Weekly, on the heels of a NY Times review of his novel Being Small which came out earlier this year. Here: “Winner of the August Derleth British Fantasy Award and author of over 500 short stories, Chaz Brenchley is one of the foremost storytellers of the eerie and unforgetable tale living today. In his new collection, Bitter Waters, Brenchley has assembled stories queer and weird: a man with morbidly sensitive hearing sets sail to chart dangerous rocks called the Silences; a ship’s chandler from among his shadowed stock gives an old friend a compass that guides through Hell rather than point north; a eunuch and his dwarf lover leave the Sultan’s harem to visit the baths of a city poisoned by magic; a youth who climbed the echelons of power thanks to his looks and guile finds being on the losing side of war has forced his to return to his sordid, early life.” If you haven’t heard of Brenchley yet, you may actually have: As Daniel Fox, he has published a Chinese-based fantasy series, beginning with Dragon in Chains; as Ben Macallan, an urban fantasy series beginning with Desdaemona.

Related non-fiction: The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help by Amanda Palmer, with a foreword by Brené Brown (Grand Central, Nov 11) — “Rock star, crowdfunding pioneer, and TED speaker Amanda Palmer knows all about asking. Performing as a living statue in a wedding dress, she wordlessly asked thousands of passersby for their dollars. When she became a singer, songwriter, and musician, she was not afraid to ask her audience to support her as she surfed the crowd (and slept on their couches while touring). And when she left her record label to strike out on her own, she asked her fans to support her in making an album, leading to the world’s most successful music Kickstarter.” Read by the author for Hachette Audio, it doesn’t get more authentic to the text than this. Her husband Neil Gaiman called the book’s publication the “most important publishing event in our house“, even as a pair of his own fairy tale adaptations were hitting bookstores. Cory Doctorow, writing for the New Statesman, says that “as a manifesto and a confessional of an artist uniquely suited to her time and place, it is without parallel.” Get: [Downpour | Audible | IndieBound]

Even after seeing that FSG would be bringing out a gorgeous hardcover omnibus of Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy, it wasn’t until the audiobook omnibus was upon us that I learned it would exist as well. Here, Area X presents Annihilation (read by Carolyn McCormick), Authority (read by Bronson Pinchot), and Acceptance (read by McCormick, Pinchot, and Xe Sands) in a beautiful box set. Downpour has a download edition, as well as the consumer CD and MP3-CD editions, and Blackstone Library has further editions. What else can we here at The AudioBookaneers say about these books and audiobooks? I’ve reviewed/praised Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance; Dave’s also written that “It’s as if The Company from Alien sent The Dharma Initiative into the Mountains of Madness.” Whatever format, one at a time or all at once, don’t miss these books. More: VanderMeer guest posts “Tidal Pool Rules” at My Bookish Ways; an interview by Julianna Baggott; another interview at Timeout New York; and! VanderMeer will be the subject of a reddit AMA on December 2nd. You’ve got time, just, to enter that thread without fear of spoilers…

ALSO OUT THIS WEEK:







ALSO ALSO OUT THIS WEEK:

SEEN BUT NOT HEARD:

COMING SOON:

UNDATED or 2015: