FREE/BARGAIN — Science Fiction & Fantasy

[sufue]

A couple of folks up above have mentioned Django Wexler, so here's a freebie prequel short story, set in the Shadow Campaigns world, that I noticed on the way to other things. Free at Kindle UK, that is, but oddly enough, not at Kindle US.

The Penitent Damned
Kindle US (for price check): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EVHGUAW
Kindle UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B010U6GATI

Spoiler:

From the author of The Thousand Names, The Shadow Throne and The Price of Valour comes a prequel short story set in the world of the Shadow Campaigns.

Also contains an extract of The Thousand Names, Book One of The Shadow Campaigns.

Alex is a master thief, with dark magic to give her an edge. When she goes up against Duke Orlanko's Concordat secret police, though, she may have taken on more than she bargained for...

[ottdmk]

Thanks to tch65721 for mentioning the Brooks Humble Bundle, which otherwise I might have missed.

Been a fan of Brooks for most of my life... The Sword of Shannara is the book that got me hooked on fantasy fiction. I've been slowly converting my library to digital over the past few years, and Bundles like this work so well for that purpose. I didn't actually own any ebook copies of Brooks' novels before now; all my copies were paperbacks.

Just wish they hadn't done the stupid thing of including the Heritage of Shannara collection when all the individual novels were in there. Oh well... still a fantastic deal.

[salty-horse]

Year’s Best Canadian Fantasy and Science Fiction: Volume One is $2 on Amazon.com
Contents

The Best of All Possible Worlds by Karen Lord is $5 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
First in a series. There are 3 books already. Standalone stories, but should be read in order.

A proud and reserved alien society finds its homeland destroyed in an unprovoked act of aggression, leaving the survivors no choice but to reach out to the indigenous humanoids of their adopted world, to whom they are distantly related. They wish to preserve their cherished way of life but discover that to protect their culture, they may have to change it forever.

Now a man and a woman from opposite sides of these clashing societies must work together to save this vanishing race—and end up uncovering ancient mysteries with far-reaching ramifications. As their mission hangs in the balance, these unlikely partners—one cool and cerebral, the other fiery and impulsive—may find in each other their own destinies . . . and a force that transcends all.

Includes two bonus short stories

[salty-horse]

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is $1 on Amazon.com

She felt their eyes, all those executioners…

Loretta Thurwar and Hamara “Hurricane Staxxx” Stacker are the stars of the 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 com*peting for the ultimate prize: their freedom.

In CAPE, prisoners travel as Links in Chain-Gangs, competing in death matches before packed arenas with righteous protestors at the gates. Thur*war 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, Thurwar considers how she might help preserve their humanity, in defiance of these so-called games. But CAPE’s corporate own*ers 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 alli*ance of systemic racism, unchecked capitalism, and mass incarceration, and a clear-eyed reckoning with what freedom in this country really means.

[tch65721]

Humble Bumble The Kingkiller Chronicle series by Patrick Rothfuss.
Five items for $12. Four books and one audiobook. OR
One book (The Name of the Wind) for a buck.

https://www.humblebundle.com/books/p...w-books-books?

[salty-horse]

Alien Clay by Adrian Tchaikovsky is £1 in the UK (Kobo, Amazon)
Newish release.

They travelled into the unknown and left themselves behind . . .

Professor Arton Daghdev has always wanted to study alien life in person. But when his political activism sees him exiled to the planet Kiln, condemned to work under an unfamiliar sky until he dies, his idealistic wish becomes a terrible reality.

Kiln boasts a ravenous, chaotic ecosystem. Its monstrous alien life means Arton will risk death on a daily basis – if the camp’s oppressive regime doesn’t kill him first. But, if he survives, Kiln’s lost civilization holds a wondrous, terrible secret. It will redefine life and intelligence as he knows it – and might just set him free.

[salty-horse]

Originally Posted by tch65721

Four books

That's two novels and two novellas.

[lkmiller]

Originally Posted by salty-horse

That's two novels and two novellas.

That's an incomplete trilogy and 2 related novellas (which came out after the release of book 2 in 2011.)

[Patrick Rothfuss Humble Bundle]

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by tch65721

Humble Bumble The Kingkiller Chronicle series by Patrick Rothfuss.
Five items for $12. Four books and one audiobook. OR
One book (The Name of the Wind) for a buck.

https://www.humblebundle.com/books/p...w-books-books?

This one is not US based. It also works in the UK. However, Patrick Rothfuss is another George RR Martin as he's may never finish the series. The last novel was released in March 2011. He's had plenty of time to finish the series.

[Dr. Drib]

Where's the love?

[Patrick Rothfuss Humble Bundle]

[lkmiller]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

Where's the love?

[Patrick Rothfuss Humble Bundle]

Wherever that third book is?

[SomeSteve]

Galápagos by Kurt Vonnegut is around 3 dollars/euros at Kobo US and various Amazon sites. Strangely, there doesn't seem to be an ebook edition available at all in the UK.

https://www.amazon.com/Galapagos-Nov.../dp/B002KJA978

https://www.amazon.fr/Galapagos-Nove.../dp/B002KJA978

https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B002KJA978


https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/galapagos

[salty-horse]

Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is $1 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Short story collection.

From the start of this extraordinary debut, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah’s writing will grab you, haunt you, enrage and invigorate you. By placing ordinary characters in extraordinary situations, Adjei-Brenyah reveals the violence, injustice, and painful absurdities that Black men and women contend with every day in this country.

These stories tackle urgent instances of racism and cultural unrest, and explore the many ways we fight for humanity in an unforgiving world.

• In “The Finkelstein Five,” Adjei-Brenyah gives us an unforgettable reckoning of the brutal prejudice of our justice system.
• In “Zimmer Land,” we see a far-too-easy-to-believe imagining of racism as sport.
• “Friday Black” and “How to Sell a Jacket as Told by Ice King” show the horrors of consumerism and the toll it takes on us all.

Entirely fresh in its style and perspective, and sure to appeal to fans of Colson Whitehead, Marlon James, and George Saunders, Friday Black confronts readers with a complicated, insistent, wrenching chorus of emotions, the final note of which, remarkably, is hope.

[salty-horse]

Lake of Souls: The Collected Short Fiction by Ann Leckie is $3 in the US. (Kobo, Amazon)
A mostly-reprint collection of work dating back to 2006.
Contents

Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino is $4 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

A wise, tender novel about a woman who doesn’t feel at home on Earth.

At the moment when Voyager 1 is launched into space carrying its famous golden record, a baby of unusual perception is born to a single mother in Philadelphia. Adina Giorno is tiny and jaundiced, but she reaches for warmth and light. As a child, she recognizes that she is different: She possesses knowledge of a faraway planet. The arrival of a fax machine enables her to contact her extraterrestrial relatives, beings who have sent her to report on the oddities of Earthlings.

For years, as she moves through the world and makes a life for herself among humans, she dispatches transmissions on the terrors and surprising joys of their existence. Then, at a precarious moment, a beloved friend urges Adina to share her messages with the world. Is there a chance she is not alone?

Marie-Helene Bertino’s Beautyland is a novel of startling originality about the fragility and resilience of life on our Earth and in our universe. It is a remarkable evocation of the feeling of being in exile at home, and it introduces a gentle, unforgettable alien for our times.

[salty-horse]

The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden is $3 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Video review by SFF180

January 1918. Laura Iven was a revered field nurse until she was wounded and discharged from the medical corps, leaving behind a brother still fighting in Flanders. Now home in Halifax, Canada, Laura receives word of Freddie’s death in combat, along with his personal effects—but something doesn’t make sense. Determined to uncover the truth, Laura returns to Belgium as a volunteer at a private hospital, where she soon hears whispers about haunted trenches and a strange hotelier whose wine gives soldiers the gift of oblivion. Could Freddie have escaped the battlefield, only to fall prey to something—or someone—else?

November 1917. Freddie Iven awakens after an explosion to find himself trapped in an overturned pillbox with a wounded enemy soldier, a German by the name of Hans Winter. Against all odds, the two form an alliance and succeed in clawing their way out. Unable to bear the thought of returning to the killing fields, especially on opposite sides, they take refuge with a mysterious man who seems to have the power to make the hellscape of the trenches disappear.

As shells rain down on Flanders and ghosts move among those yet living, Laura’s and Freddie’s deepest traumas are reawakened. Now they must decide whether their world is worth salvaging—or better left behind entirely.

Braking Day by Adam Oyebanji $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)
Podcast review - SFBRP

In a future where artificial intelligence has overtaken Earth, one engineer-in-training aboard a generation ship must discover the secrets at the heart of his voyage to a distant star.

It’s been over a century since 3 generation ships escaped an Earth dominated by artificial intelligence in pursuit of a life on a distant planet orbiting Tau Ceti. Now, it’s nearly Braking Day, when the ships will begin their long-awaited descent to their new home.

Born on the lower decks of the Archimedes, Ravi Macleod is an engineer-in-training, set to be the first of his family to become an officer in the stratified hierarchy aboard the ship. While on a routine inspection, Ravi sees the impossible: a young woman floating, helmetless, out in space. And he’s the only one who can see her.

As his visions of the girl grow more frequent, Ravi is faced with a choice: secure his family’s place among the elite members of Archimedes’ crew or risk it all by pursuing the mystery of the floating girl. With the help of his cousin, Boz, and her illegally constructed AI, Ravi must investigate the source of these strange visions and uncovers the truth of the Archimedes’ departure from Earth before Braking Day arrives and changes everything about life as they know it.