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Exclusive Interview: “An Unkindness Of Ghosts” Author Rivers Solomon

 

One of the beauties of fiction is that multiple writers can start with the same premise or setting, but end up going in wildly different directions. Take Rivers Solomon’s debut novel, An Unkindness Of Ghosts (paperback, digital). Like Sage Walker’s The Man In The Tree, the recent movies Passengers and Alien Covenant, and countless other sci-fi stories, Solomon’s novel is set on a deep space ship heading to a new home. But in talking to Solomon about it, they revealed that the setting is about all their book shares with those other stories.

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Exclusive Interview: Retrograde Author Peter Cawdron

As someone who lives 2,800 miles away from his elderly mother, I know what it’s like when something bad happens and you’re too far away to help. But I can’t even imagine what it would be like if my mom were 50,000,000 miles away because I was on Mars and she was still here on Earth. Such is the premise of Peter Cawdron’s new sci-fi novel Retrograde (hardcover, digital)…well, except that it’s not about my mama.

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Exclusive Interview: Machine Learning Author Hugh Howey

While sci-fi writer Hugh Howey is best known for his novels Wool, Shift, and Sand, those three books actually began life as short fiction that he then collected into those larger tomes. Which bodes well for his new short story collection, Machine Learning: New And Collected Stories (hardcover, paperback, digital). While it has three stories that are part of the same Silo series as Wool and Shift, it also has two new stories, as well fifteen others that have never been collected in a book before, any number of which, he says, could be the beginning of a new novel.

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Exclusive Interview: After On Author Rob Reid

We’ve all felt that social media can be a bit insidious at times. Heck, there was a whole episode of South Park about it (“You Have 0 Friends” from season fourteen). But in his new sci-fi novel After On (hardcover, digital, audiobook), writer Rob Reid imagines a social network that’s not just insidious, but intelligent and independent as well.

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Exclusive Interview: “Paradox Bound” Author Peter Clines

 

After pitting superheroes against zombies in his Ex- books, and causing a transporter accident in The Fold, writer Peter Clines is taking his act on the road with Paradox Bound (hardcover, digital), his new time traveling road trip sci-fi novel. Though in talking to him about it, he admitted that it was actually inspired by someone else’s story.

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Exclusive Interview: A Red Peace Author Spencer Ellsworth

Is it still called a “scorched Earth policy” if it doesn’t happen on Earth…and involves genocide? No, of course not. But that doesn’t make it any less of an intriguing fictional construct (emphasis on “fictional”). Case in point, Spencer Ellsworth’s sci-fi novel A Red Peace (paperback, digital), the first book in his Starfire trilogy, in which the last remnants of a galactic empire do an impression of Bender from Futurama by declaring, “Kill all humans!”

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Exclusive Interview Null States Author Malka Older

Science fiction stories have a long history of injecting politics into their plots. The latest example of this is Malka Older’s new novel Null States (hardcover, digital), the second book in her Centenal Cycle after 2016’s Infomocracy (paperback, digital). Though in talking to her about both novels, it seems America’s most recent election, as well as other political events around the world, didn’t have as big an impact on her novels’ plots as you might imagine.

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Exclusive Interview: “Warcross” Author Marie Lu

 

In her Legend trilogy — which included the novels Legend, Prodigy, and Champion — writer Marie Lu imagined a dystopian future in which, among other things, “Antarctica is home to a completely gamified society.” And while she went gaming free for her next couple books — the fantasy trilogy of The Young Elites, The Rose Society, and The Midnight Star — it’s an idea that apparently stuck with her. So much so that it’s become the basis of her new novel, Warcross (hardcover, digital), the first in a new duology.

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Exclusive Interview: Acadie Author Dave Hutchinson

In Star Trek, altering a person’s genes has been illegal ever since some scientist accidentally created Khan Noonien Singh. But in talking to writer Dave Hutchinson about his new sci-fi novella Acadie (paperback, digital) — which is also set in a universe where genetically modified people are illegal — he admitted that his story wasn’t inspired by Ricardo Montalban’s most famous role.