To Bargain with Mortals

Included in NPR’s Favorite Sci-Fi And Fantasy Books Of The Past Decade (2011-2021)A Nebula Award WinnerA Ignyte Award WinnerA Compton Crook Award for Best New Novel WinnerA Locus First Novel Award WinnerA RUSA Reading List: Fantasy WinnerA Hugo Award FinalistA World Fantasy Award FinalistA NEIBA Book Award FinalistA Mythopoeic Award FinalistA Dragon Award FinalistA Best of 2021 Pick in SFF for AmazonA Best of 2021 Pick in SFF for Kobo. Nebula, Locus, and Alex Award-winner P. Djèlí Clark goes full-length for the first time in his dazzling debut novel. This trade paperback edition contains new-to-print content!. Cairo, 1912: Though Fatma el-Sha’arawi is the youngest woman working for the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, she’s certainly not a rookie, especially after preventing the destruction of the universe last summer.. So when someone murders a secret brotherhood dedicated to one of the most famous men in history, al-Jahiz, Agent Fatma is called onto the case. Al-Jahiz transformed the world forty years ago when he opened up the veil between the magical and mundane realms, before vanishing into the unknown. This murderer claims to be al-Jahiz, returned to condemn the modern age for its social oppressions. His dangerous magical abilities instigate unrest in the streets of Cairo that threaten to spill over onto the global stage.. Alongside her Ministry colleagues and a familiar person from her past, Agent Fatma must unravel the mystery behind this imposter to restore peace to the city―or face the possibility he could be exactly who he seems…. Novellas by P. Djèlí ClarkThe Black God's DrumsThe Haunting of Tram Car 015Ring Shout. The Dead Djinn Universe contains stories set primarily in Clark's fantasy alternate Cairo, and can be enjoyed in any order.

Master of Djinn, A (Dead Djinn Universe, 1)

Winner: 2018 Hugo Award for Best NovellaWinner: 2018 Nebula Award for Best NovellaWinner: 2018 Alex AwardWinner: 2018 Locus AwardOne of the Verge's Best Books of 2017A New York Times and USA Today BestsellerA murderous android discovers itself in All Systems Red, a tense science fiction adventure by Martha Wells that interrogates the roots of consciousness through Artificial Intelligence."As a heartless killing machine, I was a complete failure."In a corporate-dominated spacefaring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. Exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids, for their own safety.But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn’t a primary concern.On a distant planet, a team of scientists are conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied ‘droid ― a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked its own governor module, and refers to itself (though never out loud) as “Murderbot.” Scornful of humans, all it really wants is to be left alone long enough to figure out who it is.But when a neighboring mission goes dark, it's up to the scientists and their Murderbot to get to the truth.

All Systems Red: The Murderbot Diaries (The Murderbot Diaries, 1)

A stormsinger and pirate hunter join forces against a deathless pirate lord in this swashbuckling Jacobean adventure on the high-seas. Launching the Winter Sea series, full of magic, betrayal, redemption and fearsome women, for readers of Adrienne Young, R. J. Barker and Naomi Novik.. Mary Firth is a Stormsinger: a woman whose voice can still hurricanes and shatter armadas. Faced with servitude to pirate lord Silvanus Lirr, Mary offers her skills to his arch-rival in exchange for protection - and, more importantly, his help sending Lirr to a watery grave. But her new ally has a vendetta of his own, and Mary's dreams are dark and full of ghistings, spectral creatures who inhabit the ancient forests of her homeland and the figureheads of ships.. Samuel Rosser is a disgraced naval officer serving aboard The Hart, an infamous privateer commissioned to bring Lirr to justice. He will stop at nothing to capture Lirr, restore his good name and reclaim the only thing that stands between himself and madness: a talisman stolen by Mary.. Finally, driven into the eternal ice at the limits of their world, Mary and Samuel must choose their loyalties and battle forces older and more powerful than the pirates who would make them slaves.. Come sail the Winter Sea, for action-packed, high-stakes adventures, rich characterisation and epic plots full of intrigue and betrayal.

The Winter Sea - Dark Water Daughter (Winter Sea, 1)

An International Bestseller!Winner of the 2022 Romantic Novel Award in Fantasy!Locus Award Finalist!An Indie Next pick and LibraryReads pick―with four starred reviews!A Best of 2021 Pick for NPR | Amazon | Kobo | Barnes & Noble | Book RiotRed, White & Royal Blue meets Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell in debut author Freya Marske’s A Marvellous Light, featuring an Edwardian England full of magic, contracts, and conspiracies.. Robin Blyth has more than enough bother in his life. He’s struggling to be a good older brother, a responsible employer, and the harried baronet of a seat gutted by his late parents’ excesses. When an administrative mistake sees him named the civil service liaison to a hidden magical society, he discovers what’s been operating beneath the unextraordinary reality he’s always known.. Now Robin must contend with the beauty and danger of magic, an excruciating deadly curse, and the alarming visions of the future that come with it―not to mention Edwin Courcey, his cold and prickly counterpart in the magical bureaucracy, who clearly wishes Robin were anyone and anywhere else.. Robin’s predecessor has disappeared, and the mystery of what happened to him reveals unsettling truths about the very oldest stories they’ve been told about the land they live on and what binds it. Thrown together and facing unexpected dangers, Robin and Edwin discover a plot that threatens every magician in the British Isles―and a secret that more than one person has already died to keep.. The Last Binding Trilogy:A Marvellous LightA Restless TruthA Power Unbound

A Marvellous Light

FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK • Two top women gladiators fight for their freedom within a depraved private prison system not so far-removed from America’s own in this explosive, hotly-anticipated debut novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Friday Black • LONGLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE. “Like Orwell’s 1984 and Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Adjei-Brenyah’s book presents a dystopian vision so…illuminating that it should permanently shift our understanding of who we are and what we’re capable of doing.” —The Washington Post. “This book will change you!...A masterpiece.” —Jenna Bush Hager, The Today Show’s #ReadWithJenna. She felt their eyes, all those executioners…. Loretta Thurwar and Hamara “Hurricane Staxxx” Stacker are the stars of Chain-Gang All-Stars, the cornerstone of CAPE, or Criminal Action Penal Entertainment, a highly-popular, highly-controversial, profit-raising program in America’s increasingly dominant private prison industry. It’s the return of the gladiators and prisoners are competing for the ultimate prize: their freedom.. In CAPE, prisoners travel as Links in Chain-Gangs, competing in death-matches for packed arenas with righteous protestors at the gates. Thurwar and Staxxx, both teammates and lovers, are the fan favorites. And if all goes well, Thurwar will be free in just a few matches, a fact she carries as heavily as her lethal hammer. As she prepares to leave her fellow Links, she considers how she might help preserve their humanity, in defiance of these so-called games, but CAPE’s corporate owners will stop at nothing to protect their status quo and the obstacles they lay in Thurwar’s path have devastating consequences. . Moving from the Links in the field to the protestors to the CAPE employees and beyond, Chain-Gang All-Stars is a kaleidoscopic, excoriating look at the American prison system’s unholy alliance of systemic racism, unchecked capitalism, and mass incarceration, and a clear-eyed reckoning with what freedom in this country really means from a “new and necessary American voice” (Tommy Orange, The New York Times Book Review).

Chain Gang All Stars: A Novel

From highly acclaimed, bestselling author Ava Reid comes a gothic horror retelling of The Juniper Tree, set in another time and place within the world of The Wolf and the Woodsman, where a young witch seeks to discover her identity and escape the domination of her abusive wizard father, perfect for fans of Shirley Jackson and Catherynne M. Valente.A gruesome curse. A city in upheaval. A monster with unquenchable appetites. Marlinchen and her two sisters live with their wizard father in a city shifting from magic to industry. As Oblya’s last true witches, she and her sisters are little more than a tourist trap as they treat their clients with archaic remedies and beguile them with nostalgic charm. Marlinchen spends her days divining secrets in exchange for rubles and trying to placate her tyrannical, xenophobic father, who keeps his daughters sequestered from the outside world. But at night, Marlinchen and her sisters sneak out to enjoy the city’s amenities and revel in its thrills, particularly the recently established ballet theater, where Marlinchen meets a dancer who quickly captures her heart.As Marlinchen’s late-night trysts grow more fervent and frequent, so does the threat of her father’s rage and magic. And while Oblya flourishes with culture and bustles with enterprise, a monster lurks in its midst, borne of intolerance and resentment and suffused with old-world power. Caught between history and progress and blood and desire, Marlinchen must draw upon her own magic to keep her city safe and find her place within it.

Juniper & Thorn: A Novel

Two warriors shepherd an ancient god across a broken land to end the tyrannical reign of a royal family in this epic fantasy from the author of The Vanished Birds.. “A beguiling fantasy not to be missed.”—Evelyn Skye, New York Times bestselling author of The Crown’s Game. WINNER OF THE IAFA CRAWFORD AWARD • SHORTLISTED FOR THE URSULA K. LE GUIN AWARD • SHORTLISTED FOR THE BRITISH FANTASY AWARD • SHORTLISTED FOR THE IGNYTE AWARD. ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Oprah Daily, Vulture, Polygon, She Reads, Gizmodo, Kirkus Reviews, The Quill to Live. The people suffer under the centuries-long rule of the Moon Throne. The royal family—the despotic emperor and his monstrous sons, the Three Terrors—hold the countryside in their choking grip. They bleed the land and oppress the citizens with the frightful powers they inherited from the god locked under their palace.. But that god cannot be contained forever.. With the aid of Jun, a guard broken by his guilt-stricken past, and Keema, an outcast fighting for his future, the god escapes from her royal captivity and flees from her own children, the triplet Terrors who would drag her back to her unholy prison. And so it is that she embarks with her young companions on a five-day pilgrimage in search of freedom—and a way to end the Moon Throne forever. The journey ahead will be more dangerous than any of them could have imagined.. Both a sweeping adventure story and an intimate exploration of identity, legacy, and belonging, The Spear Cuts Through Water is an ambitious and profound saga that will transport and transform you—and is like nothing you’ve ever read before.

The Spear Cuts Through Water: A Novel

A woman on the run…Grace came to Longtooth, Alaska looking for a safe place to hide. All she wanted was to keep her head down, do her job, and enjoy the peace and quiet. But there’s no peace to be found once she meets Longtooth’s cantankerous bush pilot. Caleb Kinoyit is surly and rude and mean. He’s also, unfortunately, the most attractive man Grace has ever met. And as the long, Alaskan winter nights stretch on, she finds herself warming to his rough charm just as much as she's falling for the beauty of her new home.. A town with a secret…There’s something different about Longtooth—something the locals won’t talk about with outsiders. And Grace is definitely an outsider. But when her dangerous past finally tracks her down, Longtooth can’t keep its secrets from her any longer, and the revelation upends the world as she knows it. The only truth she can be sure of are her feelings for Caleb. But will that be enough to save her, or will she have to sacrifice herself to save the ones she loves?

Cold Hearted

"Gorgeous prose, delicious magic." - V.E. SchwabYALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults SelectionKids' Indie Next PickAmazon Best BookA scrappy maid must outsmart both palace nobles and Low Gods in a new YA fantasy by Margaret Owen, author of the Merciful Crow series.. Once upon a time, there was a horrible girl.... Vanja Schmidt knows that no gift is freely given, not even a mother’s love―and she’s on the hook for one hell of a debt. Vanja, the adopted goddaughter of Death and Fortune, was Princess Gisele's dutiful servant up until a year ago. That was when Vanja’s otherworldly mothers demanded a terrible price for their care, and Vanja decided to steal her future back… by stealing Gisele’s life for herself.. The real Gisele is left a penniless nobody while Vanja uses an enchanted string of pearls to take her place. Now, Vanja leads a lonely but lucrative double life as princess and jewel thief, charming nobility while emptying their coffers to fund her great escape. Then, one heist away from freedom, Vanja crosses the wrong god and is cursed to an untimely end: turning into jewels, stone by stone, for her greed.. Vanja has just two weeks to figure out how to break her curse and make her getaway. And with a feral guardian half-god, Gisele’s sinister fiancé, and an overeager junior detective on Vanja’s tail, she’ll have to pull the biggest grift yet to save her own life.. Margaret Owen, author of The Merciful Crow series, crafts a delightfully irreverent retelling of “The Goose Girl” about stolen lives, thorny truths, and the wicked girls at the heart of both.

Little Thieves (Little Thieves, 1)

A Darker Shade of Magic, from #1 New York Times bestselling author V.E. Schwab. Kell is one of the last Antari―magicians with a rare, coveted ability to travel between parallel Londons; Red, Grey, White, and, once upon a time, Black. . Kell was raised in Arnes―Red London―and officially serves the Maresh Empire as an ambassador, traveling between the frequent bloody regime changes in White London and the court of George III in the dullest of Londons, the one without any magic left to see.. Unofficially, Kell is a smuggler, servicing people willing to pay for even the smallest glimpses of a world they'll never see. It's a defiant hobby with dangerous consequences, which Kell is now seeing firsthand.. After an exchange goes awry, Kell escapes to Grey London and runs into Delilah Bard, a cut-purse with lofty aspirations. She first robs him, then saves him from a deadly enemy, and finally forces Kell to spirit her to another world for a proper adventure.. Now perilous magic is afoot, and treachery lurks at every turn. To save all of the worlds, they'll first need to stay alive.. "A Darker Shade of Magic has all the hallmarks of a classic work of fantasy. Schwab has given us a gem of a tale...This is a book to treasure."―Deborah Harkeness, New York Times bestselling author of the All Souls trilogy. Shades of Magic series1. A Darker Shade of Magic2. A Gathering of Shadows3. A Conjuring of Light

A Darker Shade of Magic: A Novel (Shades of Magic, 1)

"Lush, engrossing, and full of mystery and dark magic," The Mask of Mirrors is the unmissable start to the Rook & Rose trilogy, a dazzling fantasy adventure by Marie Brennan and Alyc Helms, writing together as M. A. Carrick. (BookPage). FORTUNE FAVORS THE BOLD. MAGIC FAVORS THE LIARS.. Ren is a liar and a thief, a pattern-reader and a daughter of no clan. Raised in the slums of Nadežra, she fled that world to save her sister. Now, she has returned with one goal: to trick her way into a noble house, securing her fortune and her sister’s future.. But in the city of dreams, her masquerade is just one of many. Enigmatic crime lord Derossi Vargo, stony captain of the guard Grey Serrado, dashing heir Leato Traementis, and the legendary vigilante known as the Rook all have secrets that could unravel her own.. And as corrupt nightmare magic begins to weave its way through the city of dreams, the poisonous feuds of its aristocrats and the shadowy dangers of its impoverished underbelly become tangled—with Ren at their heart.. Praise for the Rook & Rose trilogy:. "Immersive…a feast to savor slowly." —BuzzFeed. "For those who like their revenge plots served with the intrigue of The Goblin Emperor, the colonial conflict of The City of Brass, the panache of Swordspoint, and the richly detailed settings of Guy Gavriel Kay."—Booklist (starred review). "Utterly captivating." —Shannon Chakraborty, author of The City of Brass. "This novel will catch hold of your dreams and keep you from sleeping." —Mary Robinette Kowal, author of The Calculating Stars. "Wonderfully immersive—I was unable to put it down." —Andrea Stewart, author of The Bone Shard Daughter. "Exactly the fantasy adventure novel you're craving." —Tasha Suri, author of The Jasmine Throne.

The Mask of Mirrors (Rook & Rose, 1)

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Emma

I like to talk about books. A lot. Fantasy books, science fiction books, romance books, sad books, fun books, bleak books, silly books, short stories, novellas, novels, and intimidatingly hefty tomes. If you also like to talk entirely too much about books, you've come to the right place. Make yourself at home! 