Charles Stross’ upcoming Saturn’s Children makes i09.com’s list of the Twelve Books You Should Read at the Beach This Summer. Though we say why limit yourself to the beach? It’s just as good on the train to and from the office!
Saturn’s Children is available from all good bookshops this July. You can read an advance excerpt here now.
This week’s official stats are in and we’re delighted to announce that Blood Noir [UK], the latest instalment in Laurell K. Hamilton‘s legendary Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series, has just spent its third week at the top of the UK Hardback SF/Fantasy best-seller charts, according to figures produced by Nielsen Bookdata.
Hearty congratulations to Laurell on topping the UK SF&F charts yet again and proving that, when it comes to urban fantasy, Anita Blake – the original kick-ass heroine – is still number one!
For more information on Blood Noir, visit the catalogue page of the Little, Brown website. For more on Laurell K Hamilton, visit her official homepage at www.laurellkhamilton.org.
If you’re going to BEA in Los Angeles, stop by the Orbit booth (number 1720) to pick up advance reading copies of Orcs by Stan Nicholls, and The Company, by K.J. Parker. And be sure to drop off a business card to sign up for our new bookseller enewsletter.
Pamela Freeman, the bestselling Australian author, was in the UK office on Friday and was kind enough to sign some copies of her latest book, Blood Ties.
We’re giving away 5 (yes, 5!) signed copies of Blood Ties. To enter, send your name with the subject line ‘Blood Ties’ to orbit@littlebrown.co.uk. The winners will be chosen at random on June 5th, which is when everyone else can find it in booksellers nation-wide!
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…)
With EMPRESS marching up the bestseller charts, My Book The Movie asks Karen Miller who she would cast to play Hekat, Nagarak, and others. Karen is adamant that the movie will never get made … but with a cast like this, we sure want to see it!
We’ve just this minute unveiled the brand new Orbit Facebook page.
If you’re a Facebook user, please feel free to head on over and sign up as a fan. We’ll be posting a range of regular updates, including news updates from the main website, as well as monthly cover galleries of our new releases, details of forthcoming Orbit-related events, exclusive previews and giveaways, along with anything else we can think of that’s relevant and interesting to Orbit Books fans.
If you have any suggestions for additional content you’d like to see on the page, please do drop us a line via the contact page of the Orbit site.
Following our exciting Codex Alera acquisition, we have more great Jim Butcher news. This week Small Favour hits a fantastic (yet very much grounded in reality) No.2 spot in the New York Times bestsellers chart!
In the UK’s Nielsen BookScan listings, Small Favour is also showing a great third week in the top 10, on the SFF hardback bestsellers chart. Oh, and there’s yet another listing to report, a bullish No.1 at Publisher’s Weekly. All good to see, and I’ll certainly be getting out my special inspecting-monocle to scrutinise next week’s charts …
We’re thrilled to announce the acquisition of Jim Butcher’s Codex Alera sequence in a major four book deal.
Jim Butcher is the bestselling and critically-acclaimed author of the Dresden Files series, featuring wizard-detective, Harry Dresden, which has sold over 150,000 copies for Orbit and was recently televised by the SciFi Channel.
The Codex Alera is a series of epic fantasy novels set in a world where courage and ingenuity may yet triumph over magic and power. For a thousand years, the people of Alera have united against the aggressive races that inhabit the world, using their unique bond with the furies – elementals of earth, air, fire, water, and metal. But now, Gaius Sextus, First Lord of Alera, grows old and lacks an heir. Ambitious Lords manoeuvre to place their Houses in positions of power, and a war of succession looms on the horizon.
Far from city politics in the Calderon Valley, young Tavi struggles with his lack of furycrafting. At fifteen, he has no wind fury to help him fly, no fire fury to light his lamps. Yet as the Alerans’ most savage enemy – the Marat – return to the Valley, his world will change. Caught in a storm of deadly wind furies, Tavi saves the life of a runaway slave. But Amara is actually a spy, seeking intelligence on possible Marat traitors to the Crown. And when the Valley erupts into chaos – when rebels war with loyalists and furies clash with furies – Amara will find Tavi invaluable. His talents will outweigh any fury-born power – and could even turn the tides of war.
Orbit commissioning editor Bella Pagan said, ‘We are really delighted to be publishing Jim Butcher’s fabulous Codex Alera sequence. After the huge popularity of Jim’s ongoing Dresden Files series, it is exciting to have a new direction to offer fans. With its fast pace, fine world-building and compulsive plot twists, this more traditional fantasy series will also attract an army of new enthusiasts.’
The Codex Alera series will start with Furies of Calderon, to be published by Orbit in summer 2009.
And speaking of polls, you can vote for your favourite SF and Fantasy authors of all time over at SFX. There’s no suggested list, though we could think of a few (or many!) Orbit authors that fit the bill…
