YouTube Action: Orbit authors reading at Alt.Fiction

A number of Orbit’s UK-based authors put in an appearance at Derby’s 2008 Alt.Fiction day back in April (see our earlier report) and we promised you some video coverage from the day.

Here then, for your amusement, edification and general entertainment, are a selection of book readings by Orbit authors Philip Palmer, Brian Ruckley, Charles Stross and Mike Carey. Admittedly, the sound quality isn’t always the best – the rooms were a bit echoey and the microphone a little small – so you may have to turn the volume up a tad. And Sam requests that you don’t say anything mean about her camera-work; tables weren’t always available and knees don’t always make the best camera-mounts…

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Orbit Links for May 16 2008

Another weekly round-up of links of interest featuring Orbit authors that we’ve found (or have been pointed in the direction of) out there on T’Internet:

If you see any online articles, reviews or interviews that feature an Orbit author, please feel free to drop us a line and let us know!

Curled Up with Marie Brennan’s ‘Midnight Never Come’

Marie Brennan - Midnight Never Come (UK)There’s a new review of Midnight Never Come [UK / US], Marie Brennan‘s new novel of Elizabethan intrigue and fae power-politics, over at Curled Up With a Good Book.

Reviewer Mervi Hamalainen was particularly taken by the variety and depth of the often chillingly cruel fae characters in the novel:

“Midnight Never Come returns the fairies to their roots: terrifying, alien, yet captivating at the same time. Queen Invidiana is cold and cruel, and every English fae is scrambling desperately to stay on her good side. The mortal pets of the fae who have been changed by their stay among the fairies are sad and frightening figures not allowed to even keep their own names.”

Read the full review over at www.curledup.com.

Jeff Somers, Rescued by Nerds

rescue me, nerd!The new blog (with the awesome name) Rescued By Nerds interviewed Jeff Somers about the star of his novels, Avery Cates:

I’ve created a character who kills people, who physically assaults people when annoyed, who has stepped over the bodies of friends in order to save himself—albeit, perhaps, regretfully. Then I went ahead and made him kind of fun and charming. It feels good on some primitive level to then smack Avery in the head with a lead pipe. It feels like the Literary Lead Pipe of Justice.

Visit the nerds for the full interview.

There’s also a new messageboard for any citizens of Old New York who aren’t feeling like themselves lately. You can find that here (at least until the SSF takes it down).

Press Release: Orbit announces plans to expand in the US and UK

Following its successful launch in the US in 2007, and a record year for the imprint in the UK, Orbit announces its intention to expand both lists. In the US, Orbit is going to double the size of the list over the next 3 years, taking its title output to 70-80 titles per year by 2011. In the UK, where Orbit is already the biggest SFF imprint, it will increase the size of the list by approximately 10% each year over the next three years. (more…)

Orbit Links for May 09 2008

Welcome to our latest quick-fire round-up of links of interest featuring Orbit authors:

If you see any online articles, reviews or interviews that feature an Orbit author, please feel free to drop us a line and let us know!

Win a signed copy of Pamela Freeman’s ‘Blood Ties’

Blood Ties by Pamela FreemanWe’ve teamed up with Chris, The Book Swede for this one: another incredibly simple-to-enter email sweepstake, with a copy of Blood Ties [UK / US] – the first part of Pamela Freeman’s Castings Trilogy – up for grabs by one lucky winner.

The book is out now in the US but won’t be be published next month in the UK. So if you’re a UK reader then this is a great chance to get your hands on an early copy… signed by the author, no less! And the Book Swede has also reviewed the novel, concluding: “Blood Ties is an excellent book, fun, clever, and well written, with distinctive characterisations, and I will definitely be looking forward to the next book in the series!”

Full entry terms and conditions are available over on the Book Swede’s blog. Good luck!

‘Midnight Never Come’: four-star SFX review

Marie Brennan - Midnight Never Come (UK)The UK’s biggest sci-fi magazine, SFX, has posted a four-star review of Midnight Never Come [UK / US], the new novel by Marie Brennan, out now from Orbit UK, and published next month by Orbit US.

The book, which is set towards the end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I of England, impressed reviewer Eddie Robson with its mix of an authentic Elizabethan atmopshere and darker, fae elements: “…firmly rooted in real history, set in a convincingly-constructed Elizabethan England, but with a secret faerie court existing beneath London. Its ruler, Invidiana, is a cruel capricious sort, whose subjects live in dread of her schemes and whims.”

Eddie also enjoyed Midnight Never Come‘s highly-intriguing plot: “…refreshingly for this genre, [it’s] a political thriller, with conspiracies, spies and shady machinations … The novel starts slowly, concentrating first on world-building and putting pieces on the board, but it keeps you hooked until the plot really kicks in.”

Midnight Never Come is out now in the UK and will be published next month in the US. To read the full review, pick up a copy of the June 2008 edition of SFX Magazine.