Infinite Dysmorphia, edited by Kate Coe and Pete Sutton

Release date: May 31, 2018

Subgenre: Science fiction anthology, Biopunk, Cyberpunk

About Infinite Dysmorphia:

 

~Infinite Dysmorphia~

An anthology of science fiction and speculative stories exploring how science and technology could change what it means to be human. Bio implants, cybernetics, genetic modification, age reversal, robotics and technology...what is the human experience of undergoing these procedures, and what is the advance of technology going to bring?
What does the future hold in store for those who are pushing the definition of humanity?

Ren Warom -- David Boop -- Isha Crowe -- Dolly Garland -- Thomas J. Spargo -- Elizabeth Hosang -- Ron Wingrove -- Sean Grigsby -- Courtney M. Privett -- Steve Cotterill -- Anne Nicholls -- David Sarsfield -- Frances Kay -- Alec McQuay

 

Excerpt:

 

Secrets of Flesh and Steel by Ren Warom

They stand in the shadow of construction to eat their food. For E4, it's almost a religion. It reminds her of what she is. The bodies, the raw materials, hacked up in the Cutting Rooms, go on to the Separation Rooms, where they are stripped and catalogued into their component parts: muscle, bone, sinew, viscera, eyes, brain matter, skin, hair. These parts are purified and reduced to their cellular matter in the Preparation Rooms. And then they come here. To be remade.

There is no such thing as death. Every part of every Batch member who ends will find its way into the bodies of a new Batch. Recycled. Retrofitted with custom intelligence. Race memories. Made fully grown and sparked to life with minute machine parts to begin work immediately.

There is no such thing as birth here. Or growing up.

E4 remembers the day she was made. The confusion upon waking. The terror. The stench. There are parts of her even now that suffer confusion and fear, that seem to work in opposition, as though the memories of past Batches have seeped through her consciousness at the cellular level. Perhaps the horror of waking, the sharing of consciousness between thousand of cells, has become part of Race Memory in this fashion. How this can be she does not know.

Cells die and regenerate. In effect, those cells she had from other Batches, all those cells that comprised her when she was first made, are gone, replaced by cells uniquely hers. Or are they? Race Memory tells her what humanity once was, and she is not that. She is what her eyes, and her experience, tell her now. A thing. A flesh machine. No more alive than the machines of steel that made her.

Watching the elegant dance of those machines, sewing sinew to muscle, coiling intestines into stomach cavities, building hearts that begin to pump even before the chest is sealed thanks to their component machine parts, the metal inside the flesh; E4 cannot believe what she strives to on the bridge each morning, that humanity has survived somewhere as it was before. How can that be possible, when it was so easily reduced to this? It's impossible.

Half-hearted, she nibbles at her protein bar and the weight of the hand curled against her forearm presses into her skin. The sensation re-vitalises her, bringing a little warmth to ease the chill in her heart. This is her rebellion. Her way of creating change where nothing is new. Her way of holding on to hope when hope is gone.

 

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About Kate Coe:

Kate Coe is an editor, book reviewer and writer of fiction & fantasy. She writes the sparkpunk GreenSky series and blogs at writingandcoe.co.uk. In real life she's a typesetter and fills her spare time in between writing with web design, gaming, geeky cross-stitch and DIY (which may or may not involve destroying things). She also reads far fewer books that she would like to, but possibly more than she really has time for.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Google+

 

About Peter Sutton:

Pete Sutton has a not so secret lair in the wilds of Fishponds, Bristol and dreams up stories, many of which are about magpies. He’s had stuff published, online and in book form, including a short story collection called A Tiding of Magpies (Shortlisted for the British Fantasy Award 2017) and the novel Sick City Syndrome. He wrote all about Fishponds for the Naked Guide to Bristol and has made more money from non-fiction than he has from fiction and wonders if that means the gods of publishing are trying to tell him something. Pete is a member of the North Bristol Writers.

You can find him all over social media or worrying about events he’s organised at the Bristol Festival of Literature, Bristol HorrorCon and BristolCon.

Website | Twitter | Author Central | BristolCon | Bristol Festival of Literature

 

Terra Nullius, edited by Kate Coe and Ellen Crosháin

Release date: May 31, 2018

Subgenre: Science fiction anthology, Space colonisation

About Terra Nullius:

 

Terra Nullius by Kate Coe and Ellen Crosháin (eds)
 

Land belonging to no-one. An anthology of speculative fiction that explores the colonisation of our Solar System and far beyond, where pioneers carve out a new existence under other stars. New worlds and new challenges bring out rich stories filled with alien races and strange technology, but against this backdrop there’s the many facets of human emotion as colonists struggle to make a new home.
This is human life on the final frontier.

Thomas J. Spargo -- Jessica Rydill -- K.N. Johnson -- Jessica Reisman -- Jonathan Oliver -- Will MacMillan Jones -- E. M. Eastick -- John Bayliss -- Gregor Hartmann -- G. H. Finn -- Matthew Pedersen -- Steven Poore -- Jill Hand

 

Excerpt:

 

Terra Incognita by Jessica Rydill

“Do you ever get the feeling you’re being watched, Bill?” said Marian.

“All the time, Ma’am.”

“That’s because something is watching you.” She snorted. “It was bad enough when Mr Darwin went to explore the Galapagos Islands. There’s always something watching you. Or someone. When Columbus found the New World, he encountered the Taino Indians. Where are they now, Bill? Hm?”

“I don’t know, Ma’am. I didn’t know Columbus met any Indians.”

“Gone. Massacred. Or died of European diseases. There are traces of them in the local population. But no Taino Indians any more. Gone like the poor old Dodo.”

“What are you saying, Ma’am?”

“It’s terra incognita, Bill; but that doesn’t mean it’s uninhabited. When our illustrious forebears arrived somewhere with good, or bad, intentions, they brought with them the benefits of civilisation, like disease, slavery and religion. So though I am a representative of Her Majesty, I try to tread lightly.”

“I wish I could go home, Ma’am.”

“So do I. A cup of tea would be splendid,” said Marian.

They had found their way into a ravine, one with a waterfall. Spirals of steam escaped from the ground, suggesting the presence of geysers and probably more volcanic activity. Marian wiped her brow on her sleeve. It was like walking through a cup of tea, never mind drinking one. She wondered why on earth (ha!) she had volunteered for this mission beyond the bounds of her home planet. Perhaps because the other alternatives, such as nursing during the Crimean war, or going to work as a missionary in Darkest Africa, had not appealed to her spirit.

Women were supposed to marry, like her sister Laura, or if they didn’t to devote themselves to a life of good works. Or to stay at home with their aging parents. Well, Florence Nightingale herself had done none of those things! But Marian had developed a taste for adventure during the affair of The Woman in White, so ably chronicled by Walter Hartright and herself, though she could not claim credit for the whole work. And not long after she had become embroiled in a less well-known matter, and Laura and Mr Hartright had married and retired to the country.

Perhaps that was the moment when things had changed. The existence of other worlds had been demonstrated, and a way of travelling to them discovered, never suspected in the days of Isaac Newton, or even by astronomer William Herschel and his sister, Caroline. One did not travel to the stars in a balloon or dirigible; or fired to the moon in a space cannon, as imagined by Monsieur Jules Verne. Instead, one sailed on inner seas, travelling between dimensions to reach other planets; and a world like Cressula, halfway across the universe, could turn out to be closer than the Moon or Mars.

 

Amazon.com | Amazon UK | B&N

 

About Kate Coe:

Kate Coe is an editor, book reviewer and writer of fiction & fantasy. She writes the sparkpunk GreenSky series and blogs at writingandcoe.co.uk. In real life she's a typesetter and fills her spare time in between writing with web design, gaming, geeky cross-stitch and DIY (which may or may not involve destroying things). She also reads far fewer books that she would like to, but possibly more than she really has time for.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Google+

 

About Ellen Crosháin:

Ellen Crosháin grew up in Northern Ireland but despite the fact she has a proper Irish Mammy hailing from Dublin and a Northern Irish father, her accent is so slight, it can only be caught in snatches. She says it makes her work as a spy much easier as no one actually knows where she’s from.

Her love for story telling was cultivated by both her parents as they would spend hours most days reading to her and her three younger siblings. She would spend hours herself entertaining them on the long trips they had to take when her father joined the army and they moved from place to place. She doesn’t remember a time when she wasn’t writing or telling stories. She always has a notepad on her and takes every opportunity to scribble down an idea or work on a chapter.

In her non-writing life, she is a teacher of English, a job she absolutely adores. She lives in Wales, land of dragons, with her husband and her hoard of loyal guinea pig minions.

Blog | Facebook

 

 

Kristell Ink Sci-fi anthology launch in Waterstone's Oxford

Guests arriving: Sarah Higbee (in mirror, right)

It's not often three new Science Fiction and Fantasy anthologies come along at once! But on Friday night a week ago in Oxford, that was just what happened when small press Kristell Ink, part of Grimbold Books, launched three new exciting speculative fiction anthologies on an unsuspecting Oxford.

The anthologies, which we are featuring on the Showcase as new releases, are Infinite Dysmorphia, Holding on by Our Fingertips, and Terra Nullius. The paperbacks are gorgeous, with cover art by Nele Diel, a series of haunting and tantalising images.

Sammy Smith with one of the anthologies

The launch took place in the cafe at Waterstone's Oxford, hosted by Sammy Smith, author and Creative Director of Kristell Ink, and authors Joel Cornah, Kate Coe and Pete Sutton, as well as graphic artist Joshua Cornah, who draws the Grim and Bold cartoon strip.

The light and airy venue  filled up quickly. The atmosphere was lively and informal, and the event began with Sammy welcoming everyone and thanking the editors of the three anthologies, Kate Coe, Ellen Crosháin, Amanda Rutter and Pete Sutton (though sadly Ellen and Amanda could not be present). Sammy explained the genesis of the project, which had first been imagined in 2014, and how it had come to fruition through several years of hard work and preparation.

The evening continued with a series of readings by contributing authors.

Megan Leigh reading

These varied from humorous, with the world-weary hero of Will MacMillan Jones' story First Contact setting out to terra-form a new planet in a beat-up used spaceship, to heart-stopping, in Charlotte Bond's story Retreat, which conjured the horrific prospect of a woman driven to rely on her abusive ex-husband in the face of a zombie apocalypse. Megan Leigh, who co-presents feminist SFF Podcast Breaking the Glass Slipper with Charlotte and Lucy Hounsom, read the story in Charlotte's absence.

Thomas J. Spargo

Thomas J. Spargo gave a dramatic reading from his story Countdown to Deliverance, a sinister tale of space exploration in which nothing was quite as it seemed; James Everington's bleak apocalyptic tale Heatstroke Harry looked death by global warming in the face, with all the threat of societal breakdown and hell; and David Sarsfield's Point of Periphery was a melancholy and ominous account of identity and death, as a clone and his "original" tried to come to terms with dissolution, and infinite regressions removed any certainty as to what was reality. 

Kate Coe and Joel Cornah at the Kristell Ink table 

with fantastic felines Grim and Bold

In the intervals between stories, there was plenty of time to talk to others in the audience, buy books, eat and drink. There were a wide selection of books from Kristell Ink, together with fun freebies such as badges, bookmarks and keyrings.

An incredible amount of work went into the publication of the anthologies, both from Sammy and the editors, all of whom have busy life and work commitments. Kate Coe worked on all three, and told us what a pleasure it had been, though reading the final stories for Holding on by Our Fingertips had been hard, with more than one moving her to tears.

The event was well-attended, with many authors present, including Sarah Higbee, John Bayliss, Phil Sloman, Terry Grimwood and Tom Lloyd Williams, and many more.

Terry Grimwood signing a book

For me the highlights (apart from acquiring several books and some swag) were meeting Sammy and Pete for the first time, as well as fellow contributors Sarah Higbee and John Bayliss. It was great to meet in real life, and to see Kate, Joel and Joshua again. I thoroughly enjoyed the readings, and was eager to read more in order to find out what happened. Waterstone's and their cafe did us proud.

Team Grimbold:

L-R: Joshua, Pete, Joel, Kate & Sammy

Thanks to everyone involved, particularly Sammy and the folk from Grimbold Books - and also to Stephen, my husband, who drove me all the way to Oxford and back!

If you want to find out more about Kristell Ink, their publications and authors, you can visit their web-site here; and Grimbold Books have a Patreon with regular stories and comic strips about the adventures of Grim and Bold available exclusively to patrons. 

Infinite Dysmorphia, Holding on by Our Fingertips, and Terra Nullius

Infinite Dysmorphia:

An anthology of science fiction and speculative stories exploring how science and technology could change what it means to be human. Bio implants, cybernetics, genetic modification, age reversal, robotics and technology...what is the human experience of undergoing these procedures, and what is the advance of technology going to bring?

What does the future hold in store for those who are pushing the definition of humanity? 

Stories by: Ren Warom -- David Boop -- Isha Crowe -- Dolly Garland -- Thomas J. Spargo -- Elizabeth Hosang -- Ron Wingrove -- Sean Grigsby -- Courtney M. Privett -- Steve Cotterill -- Anne Nicholls -- David Sarsfield -- Frances Kay -- Alec McQuay

Holding on by Our Fingertips:

An anthology of science fiction and speculative stories exploring the many different reactions and experiences of people during the 24 hours leading up to the end of the world. Our base instinct is to survive, but when the end is nigh, do we simply lie down and die? Or do we celebrate our life and achievements?

Love, loss, forgiveness, revenge, or just that final goodbye… 

Stories by: Gaie Sebold -- James Everington -- Sarah Higbee -- Charlotte Bond -- Kim Lakin-Smith -- Steve Carr -- Leontii Cristea -- Charlotte Strong -- Tabitha Lord -- Theo Graham -- Adrian Faulkner -- Phil Sloman -- C.A. Yates -- Ren Warom -- Terry Grimwood -- Scott Hungerford -- Courtney Privett

Terra Nullius:

Land belonging to no-one. An anthology of speculative fiction that explores the colonisation of our Solar System and far beyond, where pioneers carve out a new existence under other stars. New worlds and new challenges bring out rich stories filled with alien races and strange technology, but against this backdrop there’s the many facets of human emotion as colonists struggle to make a new home.

This is human life on the final frontier. 

Stories by: Thomas J. Spargo -- Jessica Rydill -- K.N. Johnson -- Jessica Reisman -- Jonathan Oliver -- Will MacMillan Jones -- E. M. Eastick -- John Bayliss -- Gregor Hartmann -- G. H. Finn -- Matthew Pedersen -- Steven Poore -- Jill Hand

(All photos of the event courtesy of Sammy Smith apart from the first and the sixth, which are the writer's own)

Holding On By Our Fingertips, edited by Kate Coe and Amanda Rutter

Release date: May 31, 2018

Subgenre: Apocalyptic anthology 

About Holding On By Our Fingertips:

 

Holding On By Our Fingertips

An anthology of science fiction and speculative stories exploring the many different reactions and experiences of people during the 24 hours leading up to the end of the world. Our base instinct is to survive, but when the end is nigh, do we simply lie down and die? Or do we celebrate our life and achievements?
Love, loss, forgiveness, revenge, or just that final goodbye…

Gaie Sebold -- James Everington -- Sarah Higbee -- Charlotte Bond -- Kim Lakin-Smith -- Steve Carr -- Leontii Cristea -- Charlotte Strong -- Tabitha Lord -- Theo Graham -- Adrian Faulkner -- Phil Sloman -- C.A. Yates -- Ren Warom -- Terry Grimwood -- Scott Hungerford -- Courtney Privett

 

Excerpt:

 

Heatstroke Harry by James Everington

People called him Heatstroke Harry, although whatever malady affected his head was obviously more permanent than heatstroke. But then, Harry was homeless, his only shelter from the heat his ragged clothes or a cardboard box. Maybe anyone would end up like Harry, if they’d had to live out in the shimmer and blaze of the streets all the time.

“Sure,”one of us would say—me or Clarkie or Deepak (never the woman). “But first a story, Harry. Tell us what you can see up there today.”A face, a devil, a flame-breathing dragon—you never knew, with Harry.

Harry would pause as if this time he wasn’t going to demean himself, but then sigh, his stiff clothes rustling and crackling like cinders. He’d look up with that cracked and parched face to the sky that had afflicted him so.

“The world’s ending,”he’d say, every time. “Today.”

Harry looked to the sky: his shtick, the personal touch he brought to his beggary and madness was that he claimed to be able to see the pollutants up there, see all the invisible crap the sky was bursting with. See the patterns it made, like tealeaves, and in those swirling patterns Harry claimed to be able to see the future.

It was never good news.

We’d laugh, loud and brash, at this words. A cigarette held out just out of reach. “What, again, Harry? How is the world ending this time?”

He was nothing if not predictable, Harry.

“It’s the time of false hope,” he might say. “In a few hours time it will all be over. All of this, gone. All of you, dead. A meteor…”

“A meteor throwing up ash and blocking out the sun? You did this one last week, Harry!”We constantly interrupted him, when he ended the world, as if trying to exert control over what he was saying, despite its obvious nonsense.

“No, not ash. It’s only a small meteor, relatively speaking. It will kill a few thousand in Tianjin, that’s all; it’s not big enough to cause much damage. But even though we know that, there’s a prototype AI in China which won’t. And it controls all their nukes…”

I didn’t realise it at the time, but every apocalypse Harry constructed fell from the sky. Meteorites, nukes, space plagues, gamma rays…As if when he looked to the sky he really could see the damage we’d done to it and was envisaging its revenge. Each time, I’d try to gaze into that pitiless blue as long as Harry could, but after a few seconds I’d have to look away, eyes too dry for tears.

Harry kept looking.

“The failsafes don’t trigger and the AI will interpret it as an attack from America and fire back before anyone can switch it off…”

And the world would be over in an instant. Boom, again.

 

Amazon.com | Amazon UK | B&N

 

About Kate Coe:

Kate Coe is an editor, book reviewer and writer of fiction & fantasy. She writes the sparkpunk GreenSky series and blogs at writingandcoe.co.uk. In real life she's a typesetter and fills her spare time in between writing with web design, gaming, geeky cross-stitch and DIY (which may or may not involve destroying things). She also reads far fewer books that she would like to, but possibly more than she really has time for.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Google+

 

 

About Amanda Rutter:

 

Amanda Rutter was previously trained and worked for over a decade as an accountant. She eventually became an editor with Angry Robot and helped authors to their Strange Chemistry imprint. Since then, she has become a freelance editor through her company AR Editorial Solutions, Wise Ink, and BubbleCow. She also writes for the Tor.com blog when she has time.

 

 

 

Interview with Kate Coe, author of Desert Sands and Silence

Today the Speculative Fiction Showcase have great pleasure in interviewing Kate Coe, whose new release, Desert Sands and Silence, we featured on May 5th.

Tell us a bit about the world of Green Skies.
It’s a world of magic and technology; I wanted to explore a place where technology was the interloper, and where inventors were the ones breaking the mould - but also a place where those inventors were using everything to hand, and that included magic! I settled on a vaguely Renaissance-era technology, so there’s clockwork, rudimentary electricity, flying machines...but you have to be a Mage to fly, the electricity is harvested from lightning, and the clockwork runs the wagons! And within that, I wanted to explore the political tensions between countries, but also the people caught in the middle of those tensions, and the stories of how simple choices and events could change wider movements.
It’s also been described as “Studio Ghibli” and “delightful”, which I think it is; the world has darker edges, but it’s meant to be a lighter read, and a story that leaves you feeling a little bit more hopeful.

Desert Sands and Silence is your sixth book in the series. Where does it stand in relation to its predecessors?
The first three books in the GreenSky series are a trilogy; every book after that is stand-alone, although they are also linear, so the events follow on from each other. As I was writing the first three, I knew that I wanted to explore more of the characters that don’t make it front-and-centre; I wanted to know what they did next, where they went, who they met. I also wanted to know how the events of the first book would continue playing out, and how the spread of electricity (spark) and flying technology would change the world - and so the two collided, and I got to write stories about some of the characters we’ve already met in the first three going out into the world, following the changes and small revolutions that spread from the events of the first few books.

How does writing a novella differ from writing a full length novel, if at all?
I’m primarily a novella writer because I’m a character writer; I much prefer exploring how people react to events and the small moments between them than looking at big, world-shaking plots; and I’ve found that a novella is pretty much the perfect length to just follow one person’s story. I’ve personally found that I need to plot a novel better than I plot novellas - I need more interwoven events and a longer timeframe, whereas for a novella I can mostly get away with winging the plot! It’s definitely been an education for me to jump between novellas to novels, but it’s definitely worth trying both as a writer.

Do you have any favourite characters, or people whose story arc you want to explore further?
Toru is my absolute favourite; he’s a pain in the butt, invades every scene he possibly can, fell in love most inconveniently when I didn’t plan for him to, and I absolutely adore him.
I was lucky with the novellas in that I have gotten to explore most of the story arcs that I wanted to - I picked up most of the characters from the first three books and introduced a lot of new ones, and I loved being able to tie the wider world and characters into the specific stories (for example, in Book 9 the main character meets the main characters from Book 4 as part of her journey) - so I get to catch up and see how people have progressed even if I’m focusing on someone else’s story.

Where will the series go next?
I’m currently just finishing the tenth and final novella in the series, and I’ve got three novels planned after this; they follow the children and younger generation of the current characters, and look at what the changes made to the world have done after a generation, and how the thinking and political world is changing. I want to explore electricity, slavery, communication, the growth of flight and travel, changes in labour...the world doesn’t quite get set on fire, but it’s looking at how the technological changes begin to revolutionise a lot of lives. However, the novels are currently on the back burner due to other projects, so I’ll have to see how it all goes!

Do you have any other works in progress?
I’m currently writing an urban fantasy series; the first book is finished, the second is almost done, third and fourth are halfway through and the fifth is in the eternal planning loop! Beyond that, I’m also writing short stories in both the GreenSky and urban fantasy universe, and I usually have some sort of fanfic on the go.

You have been co-editing the forthcoming anthologies from Grimbold Books - how does that experience differ from that of writing?
The anthologies have been a brilliant mix of amazing and frustrating, and definitely a different experience from writing! I think the main difference between editing (particularly an anthology) and writing is that with editing, you’re having to deal with so many additional details and a much wider range of problems than with writing, which tends to be far more internal problems and story issues (and character problems, because characters are tricksy hobbitses.) I’ve loved being able to read so much wonderful fiction for the anthologies, but narrowing down the stories is always so hard - you’re trying to pick stories that fit the theme of the anthology and also display the widest range of talents possible, as well as picking as broad a range of ideas and settings as you can. We’ve been so lucky to have a whole bunch of brilliant writers submit, and I’m so proud of the collections we’ve pulled together - even if choosing stories, working with writers to edit and polish them, getting the formatting sorted and the whole bunch of myriad little details has been a lot of work!

Are deadlines a help or a hindrance?
A bit of both! I don’t do well with self-imposed deadlines as I know that I can break them, but external deadlines are usually good as I’m pretty organised, so will make sure I get things done.

Nanowrimo – love it, hate it or both?
I like NaNo a lot! I am definitely a break-the-rules person, though; I’ve done it for the last four years, but I see it as dedicated time for me to work on whatever is going to help me - which for the last few years has been novellas or a WIP rather than a new novel. NaNo’s community spirit is really amazing, and it’s definitely worth doing and being part of - but I’d advise doing it on your own terms.

Are there any films you are watching - Avengers or others? What about Game of Thrones?
I’m sort of sporadically into films...I’ll occasionally see things at the cinema or watch something with a friend, but I much prefer settling with a book! I’ve recently enjoyed Black Panther and Guardians of the Galaxy, haven’t even tried Game of Thrones (I didn’t get on with the books so haven’t dared try the TV series) but will happily watch Ghibli or Disney films any day.

What are you reading at the moment?
It tends to change by the day! I currently have Jeannette Ng’s Under The Pendulum Sun and Jasmine Gower’s Moonshine on the go, and I’ve just finished Artificial Condition by Martha Wells - but it will have changed by next week!

If you could go on holiday to any of the imaginary worlds you've read about, where would you go? (And where would you avoid!)
I definitely wouldn’t want to go to the Game of Thrones universe, and given the current films, I’d probably avoid the Marvel/DC universe too! I’d love to go to some of Diane Wynne Jones’ universes - Howl’s Moving Castle, Deep Secret (and The Merlin Conspiracy) or The Dark Lord of Derkholm all sound like amazing universes to just be a visitor in. Jasper Fforde’s Thursday series would also be great fun - I’d be able to visit any book I wanted!

I am unsure how to frame this question, but Oxford must be second only to London as a magical/literary destination, from the time of Lewis Carroll and Tolkien to the present day (Phillip Pullman…) What’s it all about?
I’ve only been living in Oxford for a month, but it’s a beautiful city - the buildings are stunning and I’m enjoying the open space! My commute is down the river every morning, which is fabulous. I think Oxford combines a constantly changing mindset and population in a very centred and long-term framework, and something airily philosophical and grand with a more down-to-earth practicality: there’s a huge population of geeks and passionate people, and I love the way that everything mixes. It’s a very laid-back city, but also somewhere that the magical could be real - and could be just around the next corner, or peering down from the carved spires.

Do you belong to any fandoms – Dr Who, Star Wars, Star Trek (or many more)?
I’m not part of any particular big fandoms, but I love Studio Ghibli, My Little Pony thanks to a friend who was really into it, and The Dresden Files...beyond that, I’ll quite happily discuss Harry Potter and know the basics of most fandoms, so I can at least hold my own in a conversation - or duck when someone yells about a monster!

Amazon.com | Amazon UK

About Kate Coe:

Kate Coe is an editor, book reviewer and writer of fiction & fantasy. She writes the sparkpunk GreenSky series and blogs at writingandcoe.co.uk. In real life she's a typesetter and fills her spare time in between writing with web design, gaming, geeky cross-stitch and DIY (which may or may not involve destroying things). She also reads far fewer books that she would like to, but possibly more than she really has time for.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Google+

Desert Sands and Silence (Green Sky series, Book 6) by Kate Coe

Release date: May 4, 2018

Subgenre: Steampunk, Sparkpunk

About Desert Sands and Silence:

 

Moel is a runner, a desert inhabitant who makes her living carrying messages across the sun-baked plains, content in her silence. But when a group of engineers from Meton are caught in a rockslide, politics abruptly brings Moel into the world again, and she meets others who have been pulled back to their pasts by Ziricon’s desire to gain the power of spark without the costs.

 

Excerpt:

 

Noise awoke Moel from her slumber in the cool rock hollow. As soon as she opened her eyes, she knew that only a few hours had passed; it was still morning, although the fury of the sun made the distinctions between the times of day irrelevant. Either the sun was there, or it was not.

Voices were disturbing the silence of the desert; human chatter, not the shrieks of the vultures or foxes. Someone was coming towards the rock pillar – no, several someones. Moel heard the sand whisper under their feet, interspersed with solid thuds on the rock patches. She guessed that they were also crossing the desert, although their pace was off if they had only just got here. Why were they walking in the morning heat? They should have found somewhere to stop at dawn.

“I don't see why we couldn't have brought a Fliyer to do this,” a voice said grumpily from below. Moel, secure in her invisibility, edged closer to the entrance of her cave. The voice had a Meton accent, which meant the traveller was far from home. And what was a Fliyer?

“Scope the land.” Another voice, this one rough from thirst. Did they not have enough water?

“Pick a cave,” a third voice barked, and Moel frowned. She knew that voice: that was Ecthen, which meant that she was guiding the others. The group hadn't been in Huish, so they must have come across the desert from Belmont. What were they doing here?

The two voices fell silent and she heard them clunking around in the rock caves below her. From the sounds, there were… five? Six? And Ecthen, of course. A larger party than usually travelled this route…

“We'll start again at dusk,” Ecthen said, talking to the people in the cave. “I'll wake you.”

“I'll take a watch,” a second voice said quietly a moment later, and Moel felt the frown crease her forehead again. That was Ray. Why two guides?

“Why?” Ecthen asked, her voice getting closer. They'd stepped into the bottom of the gully below her cave, and Moel hesitated. She didn’t want to show herself, not yet.

There was silence for a moment, and then Ray said, “Ziricon.”

“What?” Ecthen demanded in a fierce whisper.

“There's been a rumour.”

“They made peace. And they wouldn't attack in Orei.”

“These people are important!” Ray shot back in the same fierce whisper. “Ziricon wants technology, we've got a group of the people who know how to use it…”

“Where did this rumour come from?” Ecthen snapped.

“Juviel told me.”

There was a long silence, and then Ecthen said, “All right. Wake me to take half the watch. At least we’ll be in Huish soon.”

Moel breathed out as she heard their footsteps retreat out of the gully. Ecthen knew of the upper cave, but if they were on watch then they wouldn't approach. She heard their footsteps whisper away, and then the desert silence returned again.

Moel returned to her cave, and went back to sleep.

 

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About Kate Coe:

Kate Coe is an editor, book reviewer and writer of fiction & fantasy. She writes the sparkpunk GreenSky series and blogs at writingandcoe.co.uk. In real life she's a typesetter and fills her spare time in between writing with web design, gaming, geeky cross-stitch and DIY (which may or may not involve destroying things). She also reads far fewer books that she would like to, but possibly more than she really has time for.

 

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Cover reveal for Salt Winds and Wandering by Kate Coe

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The sequel to High Flight and Flames

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