Tuesday, June 9, 2015

Dispatches From the Border: June 2015

Events and News From Borderlands Books

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Upcoming Events
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Rudy Rucker, JOURNALS 1990-2014 (Transreal Books, Trade Paperback, $24.95) Saturday, June 13th at 3:00 pm

Alex Bledsoe, LONG BLACK CURL (Tor, Hardcover, $25.99) Sunday, June 14th at 3:00 pm

Alyc Helms, THE DRAGONS OF HEAVEN (Angry Robot, Mass Market, $7.99) Saturday, July 11th at 3:00 pm

Wesley Chu, TIME SALVAGER (Tor, Hardcover, $25.99) and Helene Wecker THE GOLEM AND THE JINNI (Harper, Trade Paperback, $15.99) Saturday, July 18th at 3:00 pm

Robert Brockway, THE UNNOTICEABLES (Tor, Hardcover, $24.99, and Loren Rhoads, THE DANGEROUS TYPE (Nightshade Books, Trade Paperback, $15.99) Sunday, July 19th at 3:00 pm

Richard Kadrey, KILLING PRETTY (Harper Voyager, Hardcover, $25.99) Saturday, August 1st at 3:00 pm

(for more information check the end of this newsletter)

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News
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* Overheard in the store:
"Luckily, you're not going to be killing zombies with bowling balls."

* The location for World Fantasy Convention 2016 has been announced as Columbus, Ohio. http://www.worldfantasy.org/

* Classic kaiju creation Godzilla has finally not only been recognized as an official special resident of the city of Tokyo, but also as a Tourism Ambassador.  This apparently coincides with the filming of a new Godzilla movie this year: http://naplesherald.com/2015/04/09/godzilla-appointed-tokyo-resident-and-tourism-ambassador/

* The Mythopoeic Society has announced their finalists for the Mythopoeic Awards for 2015: http://www.mythsoc.org/news/2015mythopoeic-awards-finalists-announced/

* One of the most critically-acclaimed comics of recent years, "The Wicked + The Divine", has been optioned by Universal TV.  It is the story of twelve gods reincarnated every ninety years, only to die within two years.  http://sciencefiction.com/2015/06/01/the-wicked-the-divine-optioned-development-universal-tv/

* The Lambda Awards announced the winners for their 2015 literary awards, and we'd like to extend our congratulations to store friend (and sponsor!) Chaz Brenchley, whose short story collection BITTER WATERS won in the LGBT S/F/Horror category.  Check out the complete list of winners here: http://www.lambdaliterary.org/features/news/06/02/27th-annual-lambda-literary-award-winners/

* io9 brings us two great blendings of fan art.  One commenter takes tv and movie posters and redraws them to look like classic vinyl album covers: http://io9.com/preview/classic-movie-posters-redrawn-as-vintage-album-covers-1709277184  And Artist Ryan May imagines the Adventure Time characters in "Mad Max: Fury Road".  Princess Bubblegum as Furiosa is everything!: http://io9.com/the-ice-king-is-a-perfect-immortan-joe-in-adventure-tim-1709400094

* Classic fantasist Tanith Lee, winner of numerous awards and accolades including being the first woman to win the British Fantasy Award, has passed away after a long illness: http://heavy.com/entertainment/2015/05/tanith-lee-dead-dies-cause-of-death-funeral-esther-garber-husband-john-kaiine/

* Sci-Fest LA, the Los Angeles SF Play Festival, has unveiled two new awards, The Tomorrow Prize and The Roswell Award, both with cash prizes.  Check out the inaugural winners here: http://www.sci-fest.com/

* The Spectrum Awards have been announced.  See the gorgeous Gold and Silver Award winners here: http://fleskpublications.com/blog/2015/05/23/spectrum-22-awards-winners-announced/

* Voting has opened on the shortlists for the David Gemmell Awards: http://www.gemmellawards.com/

* The SFWA elections have occurred and new officers include Cat Rambo as the new president and M.C.A. Hogarth as vice-president.  Check out the full list of new officials here: http://www.sfwa.org/2015/05/2015-sfwa-election-results/

* Leonard Nimoy's son Adam Nimoy has started a Kickstarter campaign with the goal of funding a documentary called "For The Love of Spock", which will trace the history of the iconic character.  Zachary Quinto has agreed to narrate the film.  http://www.blastr.com/2015-6-3/leonard-nimoys-son-wants-you-help-fund-his-spock-documentary

* In sadder Star Trek news, Nichelle Nichols, who played the transcendent  Lt. Uhura in the original series, along with many other film and television roles, has been hospitalized following a stroke.  There hasn't been any official news on her condition yet: http://sciencefiction.com/2015/06/04/star-trek-star-nichelle-nichols-hospitalized-stroke/

* Josh Trank, the director of the new "Fantastic Four" film, talks about the anger from fans for casting African-American actor Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm:  http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/herocomplex/la-et-hc-josh-trank-simon-kinberg-fantastic-four-casting-controversy-story.html

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From The Office
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Suspending Disbelief in Video Games

by Alan Beatts

I'm not, by any stretch of the imagination, an avid player of video games.  However, I do enjoy some of them quite a lot.  They serve the dual purpose of entertaining me while also engaging me enough that I forget about the external world for a bit.  About five years ago, a friend gave me a game console for Christmas and, since then, I've played several quite good games from beginning to end.  I've also tried out a number that I started, got a bit of the way in, and then put aside because they didn't suit me.  That's a process that I do with novels as well. However, it's interesting that in video games the split between "this is fun, I'm going to finish it" and "nope, this isn't for me" is close to 50/50, whereas novels run closer to 85/15.

Perhaps part of the reason for that difference is that I have pretty specific tastes in video games.  Playing virtual football or golf has even less appeal to me than playing the actual sports (for which the appeal to me is already close enough to zero that you'll need several decimal places to make the distinction).  Likewise virtual dating games or other games that simulate social interactions don't interest me.  And, while games that simulate pseudo-natural processes in accelerated time (for example Civilization or SimCity) interest me in an ant-farm sort of way, I don't really like playing god.

Consequently, what appeals to me are role-playing games, shooting games and, most of all, the child of the two, generally called open-world games (for example Skyrim and Mass Effect). Since reading serves the same purpose for me as video games (entertainment and an escape from the outside world - although video games have an advantage in exercising my twitch reflex), in the last few years, I've started thinking about the similarities and differences between the two art forms.  The idea that both genre novels and the sort of video games I enjoy are both art forms is not something that I think needs much defense or explanation but, just in case, please consider that: they both require creating a structured narrative with plot, settings, and characters that will engage the reader / player for a prolonged period of time. Even games outside of my particular interest qualify as art forms, albeit for a different set of reasons.

When I consider the current state of the art in video games as part of the spectrum of story-telling entertainment, including prose fiction, illustrated narratives (i.e. comic books), film, epic poetry, and so forth, it strikes me that it is far from the eventual potential of the medium. Which is not to say that the medium doesn't have considerable merits now, but only to say that, even within the limitations of current technology, the medium is perhaps at a spot in its evolution equivalent to comic books in the 1970s.  And, like comics in the 1970s, video games are great fun and the product of some very talented people who are doing excellent work.

In the 80s and in the 90s nothing substantial changed about how comics were created compared to the 60s and 70s.  Mainstream comics in general were still four-color printed on poor quality paper (unless they were black and white).  However, what did change in the late 20th century was the skill and range of the story-telling.  With that change, comics took a huge step forward in terms of quality and came much closer to realizing their full potential as an entertainment and storytelling medium.

With that change, comics became the most recent in a series of artistic mediums that have moved from being a curiosity, to mere entertainment aiming to clear a pretty low bar, to a narrative art form that expresses the full range of human stories.  Television, motion pictures, and radio broadcasts all followed a similar route, each with their own unique twists and turns granted, but the overall path has been the same.

Do I think that there will be a video game that will be the Maus, the Hill Street Blues, or the Citizen Kane of that particular medium?  Yeah, I do.  I have no idea of the who, what, or when of it but I think it will happen.  But I do think I know one of the things that game producers, designers, and writers need to do better if video games are going to achieve that: suspension of disbelief.

Among the folks who play video games at Borderlands, "Get a goat!" is a standing joke and short-hand comment about video games.  It comes from irritation with a game in which, to be able to carry more than one weapon, you have to "make" a holster.  And, to make that holster you need to find, kill, and skin a goat.  Within the context of this game there are a variety of animals that you can hunt and kill - deer, sharks, pigs, and even (no, I'm not joking) cassowaries.  And yet, within this whole zoo full of critters, it must be a goat, and only a goat, if you want to make a holster.

This is not, to say the least, a convincing simulation of the reality that we understand.

Of course, neither are video games (especially not that one).  And so, "Get a goat!" has become short-hand for elements within games that don't make sense (or, worst case, entire games that are so full of things that don't make sense that they're unplayable, at least for some of us).

Like much fiction and almost all genre fiction, video games are not meant to be 100% accurate representations of reality.  If they were they wouldn't be entertaining.  On the other hand, and also like genre fiction, having as much connection with reality as possible while still maintaining the entertainment is the goal, because that allows the reader or player to become immersed in the story without getting jerked out of it by foolishness like, "Get a goat!"

One of the constantly improving elements of video games is the quality of the graphics.  Some of the best video games strive very hard to include graphics that are equal in quality to some of the best animation currently existent.  And, I'm sure, if creators could achieve photo-realistic graphics, they would do it in a heart-beat.  The apparent goal is to get closer and closer to "realistic" graphics.  Likewise the importance of using talented people to record the dialog for games is a given.  People like Max von Sydow, Ellen Page, Gary Oldman, Liam Neeson, and Michelle Rodriguez have all been hired to provide voice talent for video games.

So why so much concern with making a game look and sound like reality, but so much less concern with making the game seem like reality?

An old joke about lawyers is that part of their training involves swallowing camels and balking at fleas.  To enjoy great genre novels, we don't need an attorney's ability to accept the impossible while protesting the mildly distasteful, but we still tend to be very practiced at swallowing camels --

"One day, a computer programmer comes into work on the Lunar prison colony to discover that the main computer has become a self-aware artificial intelligence."  Sure, been waiting for that to happen.

Or, "A man wakes up in a mental hospital without his memory.  As it returns, he discovers that almost all of reality (including our world) is just a shadow cast by the only "real" kingdom, of which he is one of nine princes."  Not a problem.

Maybe even; "One little guy inherits a ring of ultimate power that must be destroyed to save the world."  I'm straining a bit here, but OK.

In all those cases we've just been asked to swallow one camel, right at the beginning of the story.  The revolution that follows the awakening of that AI is based on Western history, and the weapons derive from quite simple physics.  The prince's travels through parallel worlds follow a clear and consistent set of rules, so much so that the whole story is structured much like a mystery novel.  And even that little guy with the ring exists in a world that has such a mythical depth that we cannot help but believe in it.

We willingly suspend our disbelief in the fantastic elements of stories because we really, deeply want to believe.  We want to believe so much that we'll swallow that first camel and we might even swallow a couple more in the course of the story.  But our appetite isn't unlimited and fleas fill us up just as much as a camel.

Each time something happens in a story that strains our suspension of disbelief, we pull away a tiny bit.  If it happens too often, we stop believing or, to put it another way, the mental muscles that we use to suspend our disbelief get tired out.  The problem with many video games is that they ask us to swallow camels too often and, perhaps worse, they feed us a constant diet of fleas.

Some of the banquet of camels and fleas that video games present us is an unavoidable consequence of practical technology and design limitations.  The outdoor virtual "world" of a video game can't be truly limitless (though there have been some good jobs done of faking it). Likewise, conversations within a game are subject to sharp limitations because they must be some combination of scripted and constrained.  But other elements seem to me simply unnecessary.  And, if not unnecessary, then they could be avoided by more thoughtful writing and design.

As a case in point, I just finished a game called The Last of Us.  It is a really remarkable piece of work.  Visually I think it's the most realistic game that I've played, ever.  The voice talent is excellent and the dialog is very good.  I really enjoyed it and I think that the creators did a awe-inspiring job.

But . . . .

If you are injured, you can heal yourself with the application of, in essence, rags and rubbing alcohol.  Even if you've been shot multiple times, that solution will work.  That's a hell of a camel to swallow, but I understand that, given how games of this sort work, it's not enjoyable if you die pretty much anytime you're shot a few times.  Getting into a huge number of gunfights is part of the deal and you have to be able to recover from them (sort of like faster-than-light travel in much of SF -- don't ask how that works, just accept it).

The problem is when, half-way through the game I'm asked to believe that our hero, who has been shot more times that I can count, is laid up for weeks after a ten-foot fall and getting a piece of rebar stuck through his abdomen.  That situation yanked me right out of the story. You can't have it both ways, depending on what is convenient at the time.  Either he's the toughest thing since the Terminator or he's not.

What is frustrating is that it wasn't necessary.  Off hand I can think of two ways that the game could have been written that would produce the same result (i.e. plucky side-kick has to fend for herself) without losing my credulity.

I'd call that a camel too far and a writing failure.  The writers wanted to take the story to a specific place and did so without consideration of how that fit with what they had already asked the player to believe.

Despite the frequent gunfights, the intention of the designers of this game was to encourage a balance between direct confrontations and sneaking one's way around obstacles.  In service of that, they decided to make firearms and ammunition a very limited commodity.  Fair enough. Twenty years after the world ends due to a horrible fungal plague it will be damn hard to find ammunition or functioning firearms.

But, rather than just making ammunition hard to find, the designers set arbitrary, sharp, and ridiculously low limits on how much ammunition can be possessed at one time.  In a past profession, when I carried a pistol for real, it was quite usual for me to carry a total of 91 rounds of 9mm ammunition.  In this game the absolute limit is 24 rounds.  But, there are separate limits for each type of ammunition so you can only have 24 rounds of 9mm but you can also carry up to 18 round of shotgun ammunition.  Neither limit is affected by the amount of other ammunition or other gear your character is carrying.  This makes absolutely no sense.

In the matter of firearms, yes, they are hard to find.  In fact, firearms are so hard to find that, after a gunfight, searching the virtual "body" of the "person" who was shooting at you almost never produces a firearm of any sort and only occasionally any ammunition.  Posing the question, "What the hell was that person shooting at me with?"

I could go on in this vein but I think that you get the picture.

Again, not necessary.  There are ways I can imagine to balance the availability of ammunition and the number or toughness of the opposition to reach the same balance between sneaking and direct confrontation that the designers wanted.  Granted, I'm not much of a computer programmer but I do have a good idea of what's possible, and something like that is well within reach.

I'd call that sort of thing a family of fleas and a game-mechanics failure.  It's a consequence of accepting a standard convention about ammunition that dates, to my certain knowledge, at least as far back as 1995 and a game called Doom II.

I could write much more, both about The Last of Us and other games I've played, but the point is that these sort of writing and design choices are indicative of the state of video games now. Years ago, it was acceptable to present Batman as a well-adjusted crime-fighter with a completely clear conscience despite seeing his beloved parents murdered before his eyes.  It wasn't until 1986 that Frank Miller brought a sense of complexity and, silly though it may seem to use the word, "reality" to the character.

Likewise, in the 70s no one batted an eye at the convention that virtually all superheros were attractive, young, fit and wore tight-fitting outfits (assuming they looked human at all). Then, in 1984, John Ostrander and Timothy Truman introduced greying, scarred, 49 year-old John Gaunt in his patched clothes and worn boots.

The evolution of video games as a story-telling medium is a long way from the end.  Improving technology continues to make possible that which was beyond reach five years ago.  But, like adding color to film, improving technology is just mechanics and mechanics isn't what makes a story compelling.  What makes a story work is the writing.  The process of pulling the reader (or, in this case, player) so far into the imagined world that they forget that it isn't real.  Video games have not yet had their Tolkien or Lucas, LeGuin or Bradbury.  But I think they will and I'm looking forward to it.

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Best Sellers
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Borderlands Best-Selling Titles for May, 2015

Hardcovers
1. SEVENEVES by Neal Stephenson
2. VOYAGE OF THE BASILISK by Marie Brennan
3. OF NOBLE FAMILY by Mary Robinette Kowal
4. THE WATER KNIFE by Paolo Bacigalupi
5. UPROOTED by Naomi Novik
6. A CROWN FOR COLD SILVER by Alex Marshall
7. HALF THE WORLD by Joe Abercrombie
8. THE GIRL IN THE ROAD by Monica Byrne
9. PRUDENCE by Gail Carriger
10. WHAT IF? by Randall Monroe

Mass Market Paperbacks
1. NEXUS by Ramez Naam
2. CRUX by Razem Naam
3. THE GOBLIN EMPEROR by Katherine Addison
4. THE HERCULES TEXT by Jack McDevitt
5. REPUBLIC OF THIEVES by Scott Lynch
6. THE THREE by Sarah Lotz
7. POCKET APOCALYPSE by Seanan McGuire
8. MORT by Terry Pratchett
9. SKIN GAME by Jim Butcher
10. DARK HEIR by Faith Hunter

Trade Paperbacks
1. THE GIRL WITH ALL THE GIFTS by M.R. Carey
2. A NATURAL HISTORY OF DRAGONS by Marie Brennan
3. APEX by Razem Naam
4. SILVERWOOD by Betsy Streeter
5. ANCILLARY JUSTICE by Ann Leckie

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Book Club Information
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The QSF&F Book Club will meet on Sunday, June 14th, at 5 pm to discuss THE FIRST FIFTEEN LIVES OF HARRY AUGUST by Claire North. The book for the next month will be HOW TO LIVE SAFELY IN A SCIENCE FICTIONAL UNIVERSE by Charles Yu. Please contact the group leader, Christopher Rodriguez, at cobalt555@earthlink.net, for more information.

The Science Fiction and Fantasy Book Club will meet on Sunday, June 21st, at 6 pm to discuss CONTACT by Carl Sagan. The book for the following month will be FOUNDATION by Isaac Asimov. Please contact bookclub@borderlands-books.com for more information.

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Upcoming Event Details
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Rudy Rucker, JOURNALS 1990-2014 (Transreal Books, Trade Paperback, $24.95) Saturday, June 13th at 3:00 pm - We are so happy to host local author and artist, brilliant mathematician and mad genius, Rudy Rucker!  Rudy will be showing off his newest book and also leading a "guided tour" of his current art show. You don't want to miss this one!

Alex Bledsoe, LONG BLACK CURL (Tor, Hardcover, $25.99) Sunday, June 14th at  3:00 pm - From the publisher: "Alex Bledsoe enchanted readers with THE HUM AND THE SHIVER, a remarkable fantasy that was named one of the Best Fiction Books of 2011 by Kirkus Reviews, and its follow-up, WISP OF A THING, which drew rave reviews from critics and fans alike.  Drawing inspiration from Appalachian folklore and the haunting music of the region, Bledsoe spun the fascinating original mythology of the Tufa, a reclusive clan of mountain folk whose historical roots are cloaked in myth and controversy.  The books have gained many fans including a band who has crafted an entire album of music based on the stories and characters.  Now, he returns to the dark valleys and hollows of the Smoky Mountains in LONG BLACK CURL, a moving tale of music and magic older than the hills.  In all the time the Tufa have existed, only two have ever been exiled: Bo-Kate Wisby and her lover, Jefferson Powell.  They were cast out, stripped of their ability to make music, and cursed to never be able to find their way back to Needsville.  Their crime?  A love that crossed the boundary of the two Tufa tribes, resulting in the death of several people.  Somehow, Bo-Kate has found her way back.  She intends to take over both tribes, which means eliminating both Rockhouse Hicks and Mandalay Harris.  Bo-Kate has a secret weapon: Byron Harley, a rockabilly singer known as the 'Hillbilly Hercules' for his immense size and strength, and who has passed the last sixty years trapped in a bubble of faery time.  He's ready to take revenge on any Tufa he finds.
The only one who can stop Bo-Kate is Jefferson Powell.  Released from the curse and summoned back to Cloud County, even he isn't sure what will happen when they finally meet.  Will he fall in love with her again?  Will he join her in her quest to unite the Tufa under her rule?  Or will he have to sacrifice himself to save the people who once banished him?" We hope you'll join us to meet Alex Bledsoe and check out this fascinating new novel!

Alyc Helms, THE DRAGONS OF HEAVEN (Angry Robot, Mass Market, $7.99) Saturday, July 11th at 3:00 pm - We're delighted to welcome author Alyc Helms, who will be presenting her awesome debut novel THE DRAGONS OF HEAVEN!  Just check out this enticing synopsis from the publisher: "Missy Masters inherited more than the usual genetic cocktail from her estranged grandfather.  She also got his preternatural control of shadows and his enduring legacy as the legendary vigilante superhero, Mr Mystic. After a little work the costume fits OK, but Missy is far from experienced at fighting crime, so she journeys to China to seek the aid of Lung Huang, the ancient master who once guided her grandfather.  She becomes embroiled in the politics of Lung Huang and his siblings, the allegedly mythical nine dragon-guardians of all creation. When Lung Di -- Lung Huang's brother and mortal enemy -- raises a magical barrier that cuts off China from the rest of the world, it falls to the new Mr Mystic to prove herself by taking down the barrier.  It's a superhero novel, a pulp fantasy novel, with lashings of kung fu, immense kick-ass dragons and an unfailingly sympathetic heroine -- yes, it's another wonderful Angry Robot title."

Wesley Chu, TIME SALVAGER (Tor, Hardcover, $25.99) and Helene Wecker THE GOLEM AND THE JINNI (Harper, Trade Paperback, $15.99) Saturday, July 18th at 3:00 pm - Wesley Chu's new novel TIME SALVAGER imagines a poisoned future Earth in which time travelers mine the past for energy and resources.  But the past -- and some special people who are technically centuries dead -- may just hold the key to saving the future instead of just prolonging it.

Joining Wesley will be local author Helene Wecker, who wrote the amazing GOLEM AND THE JINNI, an almost-mythic tale of two supernatural creatures arriving (separately) in 1899 New York.  The novel was nominated for both the Nebula and The World Fantasy Award.  Don't miss this atypical pairing and fantastic author event!

Robert Brockway, THE UNNOTICEABLES (Tor, Hardcover, $24.99, and Loren Rhoads, THE DANGEROUS TYPE (Nightshade Books, Trade Paperback, $15.99) Sunday, July 19th at 3:00 pm - We are delighted to welcome these authors to the store! Robert Brockway will be showing off his extraordinary new novel THE UNNOTICEABLES.  Here's the breathless and entertaining catalog description: "There are angels, and they are not beneficent or loving.  But they do watch over us.  They watch our lives unfold, analyzing us for repeating patterns and redundancies.  When they find them, the angels simplify those patterns, they remove the redundancies, and the problem that is you gets solved.  Carey doesn’t much like that idea.  As a punk living in New York City, 1977, Carey is sick and tired of watching the strange kids with the unnoticeable faces abduct his friends.  He doesn’t care about the rumors of tarmonsters in the sewers, or unkillable psychopaths invading the punk scene -- all he wants is drink cheap beer and dispense asskickings.  Kaitlyn isn’t sure what she’s doing with her life.  She came to Hollywood in 2013 to be a stunt woman, but last night a former teen heartthrob tried to eat her, her best friend has just gone missing, and there’s an angel outside her apartment.  Whatever she plans on doing with her life, it should probably happen in the few remaining minutes she has left of it.  There are angels.  There are demons.  They are the same thing.  It’s up to Carey and Kaitlyn to stop them.  The survival of the human race is in their hands.  We are, all of us, well and truly screwed."

Joining Robert will be kick-ass local author Loren Rhoads, presenting her novel THE DANGEROUS TYPE, first volume in the "In the Wake of the Templars" trilogy.  Here's that book description: "Set in the wake of a galaxy-wide war and the destruction of a human empire, THE DANGEROUS TYPE follows the awakening of one of the galaxy's most dangerous assassins and her quest for vengeance. Entombed for twenty years, Raena has been found and released.  Thallian has been on the lam for the last fifteen years.  He's a wanted war criminal whose entire family has been hunted down and murdered for their role in the galaxy-wide genocide of the Templars.  His name is the first on Raena's list, as he's the one that enslaved her, made her his assassin, and ultimate put her in a tomb.  But Thallian is willing to risk everything--including his army of cloned sons--to capture her.  Now it's a race to see who kills whom first.  Alternatively, Gavin has spent the last twenty years trying to forget about Raena, whom he once saved and then lost to Thallian.  Raena's adopted sister, Ariel, has been running from the truth -- the one about Raena, about herself and Gavin -- and doesn't know if she'll be able to face either of them.  THE DANGEROUS TYPE is a mix of military science fiction and an adventurous space opera that grabs you from the first pages and doesn't let go. Along with a supporting cast of smugglers, black market doctors, and other ne'er-do-wells sprawled across a galaxy brimming with alien life, THE DANGEROUS TYPE is a fantastic beginning to Loren Rhoads's epic trilogy." We'll look forward to seeing you here for this dangerous duo's event!

Richard Kadrey, KILLING PRETTY (Harper Voyager, Hardcover, $25.99) Saturday, August 1st at 3:00 pm - We're always very happy to welcome Richard Kadrey back to Borderlands!  KILLING PRETTY is the seventh book is his addictive Sandman Slim series.  Here's the alluring synopsis from the publisher: "Sandman Slim investigates Death’s death in this hip, propulsive urban fantasy through a phantasmagoric LA rife with murder, mayhem, and magic.  James Stark has met his share of demons and angels, on earth and beyond.  Now, he’s come face to face with the one entity few care to meet: Death.  Someone has tried to kill Death -- ripping the heart right out of him -- or rather the body he’s inhabiting.  Death needs Sandman Slim’s help: he believes anyone who can beat Lucifer and the old gods at their own game is the only one who can solve his murder.  Stark follows a sordid trail deep into LA’s subterranean world, from vampire-infested nightclubs to talent agencies specializing in mad ghosts, from Weimar Republic mystical societies to sleazy supernatural underground fight and sex clubs. Along the way he meets a mysterious girl -- distinguished by a pair of graveyard eyes -- as badass as Slim: she happens to be the only person who ever outwitted Death.  But escaping her demise has had dire consequences for the rest of the world . . . and a few others.  For years, Slim has been fighting cosmic forces bent on destroying Heaven, Hell, and Earth.  This time, the battle is right here on the gritty streets of the City of Angels, where a very clever, very ballsy killer lies in wait."

This newsletter is distributed monthly free of charge and may be distributed without charge so long all the following information is included.

Dispatches from the Border
Editor - Na'amen Tilahun
Assistant Editor - Jude Feldman

All contents unless otherwise noted are the property of Borderlands Books, 866 Valencia St.
San Francisco CA 94110
415 824-8203
http://www.borderlands-books.com
Comments and suggestions should be directed to editor@borderlands-books.com

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