FREE/BARGAIN — Science Fiction & Fantasy

[ZodWallop]

Cross posting from horror as Barker's novels are more often than not dark fantasies.

The Great and Secret Show by Clive Barker is $1.99 at Amazon, B&N and Kobo US. In general, I prefer Barker's short stories to his novels. But Weaveworld and The Great and Secret Show are two that I remember enjoying the most.

From master storyteller Clive Barker, comes this intricately woven and meticulously constructed epic where past and future meet.

In the little town of Palomo Grove, two great armies are amassing; forces shaped from the hearts and souls of America. In this New York Times bestseller, Barker unveils one of the most ambitious imaginative landscapes in modern fiction, creating a new vocabulary for the age-old battle between good and evil.

The Art, the greatest power known to humankind, is the focus of struggle between the evil spirit, Jaff, and a force for light, Fletcher. Jaffe hopes to tap into The Art's power while Fletcher wants to prevent it from being tainted. The conflict between the two men spills into the real world in a decades-long feud, distorting reality and affecting the entire human race.

Carrying its readers from the first stirring of consciousness to a vision of the end of the world, The Great and Secret Show is a breathtaking journey in the company of a master storyteller.

[salty-horse]

Furious Heaven by Kate Elliott is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon.com)
This is the chonky sequel to Unconquerable Sun, a gender-bent Alexander the Great in space. The series isn't complete yet.

Kobo has the full price ($16), but I've successfully asked for a price match refund and got it.

EDIT: Kobo's price has now been updated to $3.

[salty-horse]

Red Team Blues by Cory Doctorow is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
New novel, and a sequel (new mystery) is coming out soon.

Martin Hench is 67 years old, single, and successful in a career stretching back to the beginnings of Silicon Valley. He lives and roams California in a very comfortable fully-furnished touring bus, The Unsalted Hash, that he bought years ago from a fading rock star. He knows his way around good food and fine drink. He likes intelligent women, and they like him back often enough.

Martin is a—contain your excitement—self-employed forensic accountant, a veteran of the long guerilla war between people who want to hide money, and people who want to find it. He knows computer hardware and software alike, including the ins and outs of high-end databases and the kinds of spreadsheets that are designed to conceal rather than reveal. He’s as comfortable with social media as people a quarter his age, and he’s a world-level expert on the kind of international money-laundering and shell-company chicanery used by Fortune 500 companies, mid-divorce billionaires, and international drug gangs alike. He also knows the Valley like the back of his hand, all the secret histories of charismatic company founders and Sand Hill Road VCs. Because he was there at all the beginnings. He’s not famous, except to the people who matter. He’s made some pretty powerful people happy in his time, and he’s been paid pretty well. It’s been a good life.

Now he’s been roped into a job that’s more dangerous than anything he’s ever agreed to before—and it will take every ounce of his skill to get out alive.

[Aleron Ives]

Based on the description, how does that qualify as science fiction or fantasy?

[lkmiller]

Near future setting? It is from Tor Books and listed in the Science Fiction category at the Kobo and Amazon links.

Another bit of the description:

....a grabby next-Tuesday thriller about cryptocurrency shenanigans that will awaken you to how the world really works.

[Aleron Ives]

Yeah, I'm not sure why it's in the SF category on Kobo and Amazon, as it sounds more like a thriller, but I suppose we can't really control how they categorise their books.

[Manabi]

I believe most of his writing is science fiction, so publishers and stores may be assuming his books will be sf. It could also be because most of his fans are sf readers, so categorizing non-sf books as sf makes sure they see them and (hopefully) buy them.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by lkmiller

Near future setting? It is from Tor Books and listed in the Science Fiction category at the Kobo and Amazon links.

Another bit of the description:

Ah, if the setting is even the tiniest bit in the future, it is a bit of a fantasy that any one 67 years old has a career stretching back to "the beginnings of Silicon Valley".

[salty-horse]

It's probably more accurately described as a near future techno-thriller. It can be broadly categorized as SF.
One reviewer says:

What this isn’t, and what one might expect considering the author’s body of work (and that it’s published by Tor Books) is science fiction. This isn’t set in even a relatively near future. It’s now. Crypto and blockchain may not currently be in exactly the same state that they are in this story, but otherwise, it’s just now.

So maybe it's speculating a bit of where we could have been now, if technology/hype/economy went a slightly different direction a year ago.

[ratinox]

Originally Posted by Manabi

I believe most of his writing is science fiction, so publishers and stores may be assuming his books will be sf. It could also be because most of his fans are sf readers, so categorizing non-sf books as sf makes sure they see them and (hopefully) buy them.

This.
It's like Neal Stephenson's "Reamde": a nerdy techno-thriller but still displayed in the SF&F section because of the author.

[Tarana]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

Ah, if the setting is even the tiniest bit in the future, it is a bit of a fantasy that any one 67 years old has a career stretching back to "the beginnings of Silicon Valley".

Not completely fantasy. There were several tech companies in what later became known as Silicon Valley back in the 1950s. Shockley Semiconductor in 1955. HP (to my surprise) started in 1939. My Mom said Dad frequently flew to that area back in the early 60s as part of his work for Honeywell working for NASA. But, a 67 year career is a bit of a stretch for anybody given you'd have to be actively working until your late 80s.

[salty-horse]

Originally Posted by Tarana

a 67 year career is a bit of a stretch for anybody given you'd have to be actively working until your late 80s.

The character is 67 years old.
Here's another description of him from the audiobook Kickstarter:

Marty Hench Knows Where Silicon Valley's Bodies Are Buried.

The hero of Red Team Blues is Marty Hench, a hard-charging forensic accountant, a gentleman of a certain age who's spent the past 40 years unwinding every finance scam in Silicon Valley.

That's been his home since he fell in love with spreadsheets in the early 1980s, flunked out of MIT, and realized that while everyone else wanted to use spreadsheets to hide money, he could use them to find it.

Marty's seen it all, and, frankly, he's done well enough to retire. "Forensic accountant" may not sound like a high-stress job, but when you're unpicking the lies of money-laundering international criminals, the stakes are high - even deadly.

Marty's winding down his engagements and making plans to take his big, ungainly tour-bus on a victory lap around America, enjoying a life of leisure. But then he gets a call from an old friend, Danny Lazar, a security pioneer who's been in the game since "crypto" meant "cryptography." Now Danny's built himself a cryptocurrency, and it's going great, worth more than a billion dollars! There's only one problem: Danny built himself a backdoor, and now the keys to that backdoor have gone missing.

Marty's got one last job: find those keys - and stay alive as he finds himself between two international crime syndicates, shadowy three-letter agencies, and the fixers who sit between them.

[Manabi]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

The character is 67 years old.
Here's another description of him from the audiobook Kickstarter:

So the "a career stretching back to the beginnings of Silicon Valley" is complete nonsense. It only stretches back to the 1980s, and Silicon Valley was already humming along at that point.

Sounds like whoever wrote the blurb for the eBook thinks Silicon Valley started in the 80s.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by Manabi

So the "a career stretching back to the beginnings of Silicon Valley" is complete nonsense. It only stretches back to the 1980s, and Silicon Valley was already humming along at that point.

Sounds like whoever wrote the blurb for the eBook thinks Silicon Valley started in the 80s.

That was my exact reaction except that I decided to allow for an author speculating on the existance of a toddler professional forensic accountant.

[kyrilson]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

Ah, if the setting is even the tiniest bit in the future, it is a bit of a fantasy that any one 67 years old has a career stretching back to "the beginnings of Silicon Valley".

Silicon Valley started around 1953. That’s 70 years ago. So yes, he could definitely be there since the beginning.


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