Jennifer Jackson – Literary Agent

Shattered Pillars by Elizabeth Bear

Bear’s astonishing world building is in full swing here, and she builds the arcs of her two major characters into what hopes to be a brilliant whole in the forthcoming final book. Temur and Samarkar still search for Edene, captured by the leader of the Uthman cult, who are bent on sowing war in the lands of the Celadon Highway. Edene, escaped, travels under the deadly sky of a vanished empire. The wizards’ city is besieged, a sickness felling the population. Tsering is at the heart of studying it, and she is a tremendous force despite never having developed the wizard’s power. Temur and Samarkar’s journey, under the skies of many people, is epic. But Bear maintains the nuance she is so capable of, in the way characters interact with and respond to new places, not quite subverting genre but pointing out how much more it should be. This is a novel with no padding: everything is necessary and linked, and the politics that run through the various empires are rooted solidly in believable human motivation. — Booklist

Written in Red by Anne Bishop

Bishop has always been a storyteller whose world-building is second to none, but she really outdoes herself with her brand new series featuring a re-imagined Earth where humans are most definitely not at the top of the food chain. All of the myriad characters in this tale, whether protagonists or minor players, are mesmerizing and beg for further exploration. At times brutally realistic, there is also an air of sweetness in this novel that focuses on a young woman’s fight for freedom. Awe-inspiring and absolutely not to be missed! –Romantic Times, 4 1/2 Stars, Top Pick Gold!

Shattered Pillars by Elizabeth Bear

Edene, having been kidnapped and fought her way free, must now raise an army for her betrothed, Temur, and find her way back to him. Meanwhile, Temur is attempting to wrangle his way through political intrigue and plague to reunite with Edene, reclaim his birthright from his uncle and discover the truth behind the magics that are engulfing his lands. Former princess Samarkar is faithful and steadfast, throwing all her influence — and not insignificant skill — behind Temur.

Shattered Pillars is the remarkable continuation of the first in the series, Range of Ghosts. Bear’s prose continues to weave itself effortlessly throughout the novel, with a detailed substance that does not hinder the action of the novel. The characters are full blooded and rich, shaped by their environment, and also by the challenges and casualties of it. Not recommended as a stand-alone; start with Range of Ghosts but then definitely pick up Shattered Pillars! — Romantic Times, 4 1/2 Stars, Top Pick!

Written in Red by Anne Bishop

For her latest dark fantasy series, Bishop (Twilight’s Dawn, 2011, etc.) invents an entire Earth-like world, Namid, populated by a fascinating array of supernatural Others—and the humans who are their prey.

On the continent of Thaisia, humans are tolerated for their technical and inventive talents, but they tread very carefully, knowing that if they transgress, they’ll be lunch for shape-shifting wolves, raptors, bears, vampires or worse. Into the northeastern city of Lakeside, in the middle of winter, staggers Meg Corbyn, freezing, friendless and desperate. A cassandra sangue, or blood prophet, Meg Corbyn sees the future when her skin is cut—for her, the result can be agony or ecstasy. She and a number of like young women were slaves of the Controller, whose rich clients pay well for their visions. Naive but resourceful Meg escaped and now seeks refuge in the Lakeside Courtyard, the business district operated by the Others. Against his wolfish instincts—Meg is human, but doesn’t smell like prey—Simon Wolfgard hires her as Human Liaison, a job that entails running the local delivery office. And Meg proves adept at looking after Sam, Simon’s orphaned nephew, so traumatized by his mother’s death that he’s locked in wolf form. Simon has other problems too: pushy Asia Crane, secretly a spy for the mysterious Bigwig; disturbing and unaccountable reports from out west of humans and Others running berserk and slaughtering both each other and their own kind; and the human police, who have been instructed to urgently locate someone who looks very much like Meg Corbyn.

It all adds up to a stunningly original yarn, deeply imagined, beautifully articulated and set forth in clean, limpid, sensual prose. A must for fans desperate to move beyond boilerplate urban fantasy. –Kirkus, Starred Review

Shattered Pillars by Elizabeth Bear

Second entry of a complex and beautifully rendered historical-fantasy trilogy (after Range of Ghosts, 2012).

Prime mover in all the churning plots and intrigues here is ambitious necromancer and blood-sorcerer al-Sepehr, head of the Nameless assassin cult. He has arranged to install usurper Qori Buqa as ruler of the nomad horse-warrior Khaganate Empire, although he failed to kill Temur, the true heir and Qori Buqa’s nephew. Having captured Edene, Temur’s woman, al-Sepehr conveyed her to his remote, impregnable fortress, Ala-Din. Resourceful Edene, however, stole a mysteriously powerful green ring and escaped—though Temur doesn’t yet know this. Edene flees to Erem, capital of a long-extinct empire whose magic was feared by all, where now heavily pregnant, she’s declared queen by the nonhuman ghuls because of the ring. Hoping to rally the horse-clans to his cause, Temur sets off with his companions, Samarkar the wizard and Hrahima, a huge human-tiger Cho-tse warrior, to rescue Edene. Al-Sepehr sends his daughter and agent, Saadet—she carries in her head the mind of her slain brother, Shahruz, previously slain by Temur—to beguile and bamboozle Qori Buqa, his supposed ally. Meanwhile, al-Sepehr studies the magic of Erem, forcing slave-women to read aloud from books of magic so powerful that the mere act of reading them causes blindness. And the Rasan Empire, riven by internal politics and treachery, suffers a lethal plague whence tiny demons hatch in the lungs of its victims. All this is less tightly woven than the first volume, and in one or two places, Bear forgoes logic for furious action and writes herself into a corner. Still, these are minor blemishes amid the meticulously detailed cultural and geographic backdrop. A compelling follow-up that no fan of Book 1 will want to miss. –Kirkus, Starred Review