2011 is going to be an exciting year for me, especially on the family-life front. My wife and I are going to meet our son in a few weeks. He is expected to be born late in January, however he is going to be our first baby and as they say, the first ones can be quite late so we're readying ourselves for the beginning of February.
Undoubtedly, our lives will change, hopefully mostly for good. In the very beginning, this may mean some less reading time for me and also more diversity in my reading materials. I've been already reading about babies and what to expect. I think the main subjects of some of my books in 2011 will be about raising a child.
2011 will also bring us some exciting books:
The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie
Hardcover: 512 pages
Publisher: Gollancz (27 Jan 2011)
ISBN-10: 0575083832
ISBN-13: 978-0575083837
They say Black Dow’s killed more men than winter, and clawed his way to the throne of the North up a hill of skulls. The King of the Union, ever a jealous neighbour, is not about to stand smiling by while he claws his way any higher. The orders have been given and the armies are toiling through the northern mud. Thousands of men are converging on a forgotten ring of stones, on a worthless hill, in an unimportant valley, and they’ve brought a lot of sharpened metal with them.
Bremer dan Gorst, disgraced master swordsman, has sworn to reclaim his stolen honour on the battlefield. Obsessed with redemption and addicted to violence, he’s far past caring how much blood gets spilled in the attempt. Even if it’s his own.
Prince Calder isn’t interested in honour, and still less in getting himself killed. All he wants is power, and he’ll tell any lie, use any trick, and betray any friend to get it. Just as long as he doesn’t have to fight for it himself.
Curnden Craw, the last honest man in the North, has gained nothing from a life of warfare but swollen knees and frayed nerves. He hardly even cares who wins any more, he just wants to do the right thing. But can he even tell what that is with the world burning down around him?
Over three bloody days of battle, the fate of the North will be decided. But with both sides riddled by intrigues, follies, feuds and petty jealousies, it is unlikely to be the noblest hearts, or even the strongest arms that prevail...
Three men. One battle. No Heroes.
The Crippled God by Steven Erikson
Hardcover: 509 pages
Publisher: Bantam Press
(21 Feb 2011)
ISBN-10: 0593046358
ISBN-13: 978-0593046357
Savaged by the K'Chain Nah'Ruk, the Bonehunters march for Kolanse, where waits an unknown fate. Tormented by questions, the army totters on the edge of mutiny, but Adjunct Tavore will not relent. One final act remains, if it is in her power, if she can hold her army together, if the shaky allegiances she has forged can survive all that is to come. A woman with no gifts of magic, deemed plain, unprepossessing, displaying nothing to instill loyalty or confidence, Tavore Paran of House Paran means to challenge the gods -- if her own troops don't kill her first.
Awaiting Tavore and her allies are the Forkrul Assail, the final arbiters of humanity. Drawing upon an alien power terrible in its magnitude, they seek to cleanse the world, to annihilate every human, every civilization, in order to begin anew. They welcome the coming conflagration of slaughter, for it shall be of their own devising, and it pleases them to know that, in the midst of the enemies gathering against them, there shall be betrayal. In the realm of Kurald Galain, home to the long lost city of Kharkanas, a mass of refugees stand upon the First Shore. Commanded by Yedan Derryg, the Watch, they await the breaching of Lightfall, and the coming of the Tiste Liosan. This is a war they cannot win, and they will die in the name of an empty city and a queen with no subjects.
Elsewhere, the three Elder Gods, Kilmandaros, Errastas and Sechul Lath, work to shatter the chains binding Korabas, the Otataral Dragon, and release her from her eternal prison. Once freed, she will be a force of utter devastation, and against her no mortal can stand. At the Gates of Starvald Demelain, the Azath House sealing the portal is dying. Soon will come the Eleint, and once more, there will be dragons in the world. And so, in a far away land and beneath indifferent skies, the final cataclysmic chapter in the extraordinary 'Malazan Book of the Fallen' begins.
The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss
Hardcover: 1008 pages
Publisher: Gollancz
(1 Mar 2011)
ISBN-10: 0575081414
ISBN-13: 978-0575081413
Sequel to the extraordinary The Name Of The Wind, The Wise Man's Fear is the second instalment of this superb fantasy trilogy from Patrick Rothfuss. Picking up the tale of Kvothe Kingkiller once again, we follow him into exile, into political intrigue, courtship, adventure, love and magic . . . and further along the path that has turned Kvothe, the mightiest magician of his age, a legend in his own time, into Kote, the unassuming pub landlord. Packed with as much magic, adventure and home-grown drama as The Name Of The Wind, this is a sequel in every way the equal to its predecessor and a must-read for all fantasy fans. Readable, engaging and gripping The Wise Man's Fear is the biggest and the best new fantasy novel out there.
The Inheritance by Robin Hobb
Hardcover
Publisher: Harper Voyager
(31 Mar 2011)
ISBN-10: 0007273770
ISBN-13: 978-0007273775
A collection of novellas and stories from one of the most critically acclaimed authors in the fantasy genre, Robin Hobb. Including work written under her pseudonym, Megan Lindholm.
Bingtown heiresses rub shoulders in this wonderful collection with vampires and alien musicians, tramps and feral cats.
In The Homecoming, Lady Carillion Carrock and a number of other Jamaillian nobles are sailing to the Cursed Shores. Their journey is not by choice: for plotting against the Satrap, their wealth has been confiscated and they have been exiled. Until now, Carillion has done nothing but lead a life of privilege. She believes they are bound for wondrous cities, cities where ancient kings and queens dusted their skin with gold and wore jewels above their eyes. But when she is marooned by the ship’s unscrupulous captain, she will soon discover the grim reality of what survival in the Rain Wilds entails.
The Silver Lady is a would-be writer, ekeing out a dull existence by working in a Sears store. The one day a man comes in: fortyish, pleasant-looking. Nothing out of the ordinary. Except he says his name is Merlin, and he’s about to change her life.
Rosemary got involved with the wrong man. Pell is lazy, good for nothing, a bully. Her best friend Hilia knew it and so did her tom cat, Marmalade. But love is blind: Rosemary had Pell’s baby, renovated the cottage his grandfather left in his will, turned its land to good use; and then he left her for another woman. Now he’s back, and something must be done…
Sea of Ghosts by Alan Campbell
Hardcover: 500 pages
Publisher: Tor
(1 April 2011)
ISBN-10: 0230742947
ISBN-13: 978-0230742949
When the last of the Gravediggers, an elite imperial infiltration unit, are disbanded and hunted down by the emperor they once served, munitions expert Colonel Thomas Granger takes refuge in the unlikeliest of places. He becomes a jailer in Ethugra – a prison city of poison-flooded streets and gaols in which a million enemies of the empire are held captive. But when Granger takes possession of two new prisoners, he realises that he can’t escape his past so readily.
Ianthe is a young girl with an extraordinary psychic talent. A gift that makes her unique in a world held to ransom by the powerful Haurstaf – the sisterhood of telepaths who are all that stand between the Empire and the threat of the Unmer, the powerful civilization of entropic sorcerers and dragon-mounted warriors. In this war-torn land, she promises to make Granger an extremely wealthy man, if he can only keep her safe from harm.
This is what Granger is best at. But when other factions learn about Ianthe's unique ability, even Granger's skills of warfare are tested to their limits. While, Ianthe struggles to control the powers that are growing in ways no-one thought were possible. Another threat is surfacing: out there, beyond the bitter seas, an old and familiar enemy is rising – one who, if not stopped, will drown the world and all of humanity with it ...
Embassytown by China Miéville
Hardcover: 432 pages
Publisher: Macmillan
(6 May 2011)
ISBN-10: 0230750761
ISBN-13: 978-0230750760
Embassytown: a city of contradictions on the outskirts of the universe.
Avice is an immerser, a traveller on the immer, the sea of space and time below the everyday, now returned to her birth planet. Here on Arieka, humans are not the only intelligent life, and Avice has a rare bond with the natives, the enigmatic Hosts - who cannot lie.
Only a tiny cadre of unique human Ambassadors can speak Language, and connect the two communities. But an unimaginable new arrival has come to Embassytown. And when this Ambassador speaks, everything changes.
Catastrophe looms. Avice knows the only hope is for her to speak directly to the alien Hosts.
And that is impossible.
Kings of Morning by Paul Kearney
Paperback: 448 pages
Publisher: Solaris
(7 July 2011)
ISBN-10: 1907519386
ISBN-13: 978-1907519383
Paul Kearney has become one of my favourite authors. I loved the first two books,
The Ten Thousand and
Corvus, of his
The Macht trilogy and its final installment,
Kings of Morning, is definitely very high on my list in 2011.
I don't doubt that
Corvus is going to invade the Empire however I don't know what surprises the author has at the tip of his pen for us. I can't wait to meet Rictus and Corvus again.
A Dance With Dragons by George R. R. Martin
Hardcover: 704 pages
Publisher: Harper Voyager
(29 Sep 2011)
ISBN-10: 0002247399
ISBN-13: 978-0002247399
The last of the Targaryons, Daenerys Stormborn, the Unburnt, has brought the young dragons in her care to their terrifying maturity. Now the war-torn landscape of the Seven Kingdoms is threatened by destruction as vast as in the violent past. Tyrion Lannister, a dwarf with half a nose and a scar from eye to chin, has slain his father and escaped the Red Keep in King's Landing to wage war from the Free Cities beyond the narrow sea. The last war fought with dragons was a cataclysm powerful enough to shatter the Valyrian peninsula into a smoking, demon-haunted ruin half drowned by the sea. A Dance With Dragons brings to life dark magic, complex political intrigue and horrific bloodshed as events at the Wall and beyond the sea threaten the ancient land of Westeros.
