#Tordotcom

[torpublishinggroup]

This advertisement is for The Dead Cat Tail Assassins, a new novella from Nebula and Alex Award–winning author P. Djèlí Clark, featuring HIGH body count with LOW page count. 

WHAT’S IT ABOUT

Undead hired killers, soul-binding contracts, sharp knives, hidden identities, and sweet, sweet vengeance. This is just a snippet of what’s in store for readers in this action-packed fantasy novella. 

Eveen the Eviscerator is a skilled, powerful assassin who is sarcastic, flippant, full of quips, and with a penchant for dark humor. What’s not to love? She’s also nice with a blade, and one of the best at what she’s contracted to do. 

Ready for magic, monsters, and fantastic beasts? Then The Dead Cat Tail Assassins is your jam. 

[frontlinebicepsoftheninth]

every time i see poor @torbooks try to post anything on any platform this meme is all i can think of

[chillyweirdoinacoffin]

2023: Day # 151

[carvingclown]

BOTY BOTY BOTY BOTY BOTY

I mean it, this is my favorite book of the year. And maybe one of my favorites ever. It's one thing to be fresh, another thing to be weird, and something else entirely to be exceptional; The West Passage is all three. Come for the giant monster women, stay for the honey.

[99percentprocrastination]

[jpechacek]

that’s four starred reviews for my little book!

[agentpeggycartering]

Happy Belated Valentine's day, tumblr! Have some chaotic valentines, inspired by the wonderfully chaotic queer pirates in Running Close to the Wind by Alexandra Rowland, which comes out this June! Check out a sneak peek here.

HUGE shoutout to @starful02 for the wondeful fanart of Avra, Tev, and Julian, as well as for a few of the puns. And shoutout to Danielle, Hobbit, and Sawfish for their help with puns and ideas for the cards, and everyone else who was hyping me up in the Chants and the Wide World Discord. (You can join us here if you're curious about the book!)

[sambanshee]

manifesting alecto the ninth cover release tomorrow

[cristinabencina]

I illustrated a cover for Freya Marske's book, Cinder House, published by tordotcom. I was tasked with combining a woman and a house together with a ghostly environment. Thanks Christine for the opportunity!

Follow Cristina Bencina and the rest of her work on instagram!

[eggcatsreads]

Thank you so much Tor for this ARC of ʙʀɪɢʜᴛᴇʀ ᴛʜᴀɴ ꜱᴄᴀʟᴇ, ꜱᴡɪꜰᴛᴇʀ ᴛʜᴀɴ ꜰʟᴀᴍᴇ​ by Neon Yang!

A queer fantasy novella centering around a dragon slayer and a dragon queen? Is there anything more specifically tailored to my tastes? I doubt it. And that cover is gorgeous!

I’m so excited to dedicate some time reading this, and feel extremely lucky to have won one of these copies! (Now, I don't feel so bad for my rejected Netgalley request, lol!) I even brought it with me to work because I was so excited to dig into this!

Relasing on May 6th, I can already tell this is going to be absolutely worth it!

[torpublishinggroup]

This advertisement is for The Dead Cat Tail Assassins, a new novella from Nebula and Alex Award–winning author P. Djèlí Clark, featuring HIGH body count with LOW page count. 

WHAT’S IT ABOUT

Undead hired killers, soul-binding contracts, sharp knives, hidden identities, and sweet, sweet vengeance. This is just a snippet of what’s in store for readers in this action-packed fantasy novella. 

Eveen the Eviscerator is a skilled, powerful assassin who is sarcastic, flippant, full of quips, and with a penchant for dark humor. What’s not to love? She’s also nice with a blade, and one of the best at what she’s contracted to do. 

Ready for magic, monsters, and fantastic beasts? Then The Dead Cat Tail Assassins is your jam. 

[frontlinebicepsoftheninth]

TOR IS GIVING ME A HEART ATTACK WITH THESE EMAIL NOTIFICATIONS

[meridianriver]

Back at it again in Krispy Kreme with a dumb sketch of Avra Helvaçi from Alexandra Rowland’s upcoming novel, Running Close to the Wind!

If you’re a fan of Our Flag Means Death, queer fantasy, pirates, shenanigans, or protagonists who are a hot mess that you can’t help but love, this is the book for you!

Running Close to the Wind releases on June 11th, but you can read an excerpt here!

[elliepassmore]

Brighter Than Scale, Swifter Than Flame review

4.5/5 stars Recommended if you like: epic fantasy, dragons, sapphic romance, quests

Big thanks to Tordotcom, Netgalley, and the author for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Despite this being less than 200 pages, it had the feel of an epic fantasy novel. I really liked how Yang chose to narrate the story. The beginning and ending were told in a distance 3rd person narration, as if we were being told a mythical tale from long ago. The bulk of the novel is from the limited 3rd person and focuses on Yeva. We get to see part of her childhood and what led to her becoming the Masked Guildknight.

I liked getting to see a couple of different cultures in this book and the way each of them seemed to think of dragons. Yeva is a child when she first comes across a dragon, and at the time it seems mostly like a pest, albeit one to have a healthy fear of. As a guildknight in a different country, dragons are seen solely as threats, something that needs to be dealt with for the good of the people. Then, in Quanbao, dragons are revered and it is a sad thing that there are now so few of them.

Yeva definitely comes into the situation in Quanbao with a certain way of thinking. While she recognizes that Quanbao has very different customs regarding dragons than the Sun Empire does, she still has the set of beliefs regarding dragons that she grew up with. Part of her journey in this book is learning to expand beyond just one understanding of the creatures. Related to this, I feel like getting to know some of the people in Quanbao that her mother knew also allows her to open up new ways of understanding her childhood and who she is as a person.

The couple things that did take this rating down from 5 stars for me was 1) the twist felt pretty obvious from the get-go. I'm not sure whether this was intentional or not, but if it was, I don't think it really worked in this case. 2) The ending felt very quick and had a deus ex machina feel to it. I would've liked to see, at the very least, more emotional tension between some of the characters prior to the conclusion. Things just felt very clean. And 3), though this is perhaps the most minor of them all, people kept using the wrong term for Lady Sookhee. She is the reigning monarch, therefore she goes by majesty, not highness, and no one, not even her own court, seems to realize that.

[jpechacek]

apropos of nothing* I’ll be doing an AMA on the r/fantasy subreddit this Thursday, 7/18 starting around 10 eastern!

*except my new book The West Passage, out today from tordotcom in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook. but other than that, no reason whatsoever

[ashpommesnow]

"Drowned," said the last of the fairies. "All drowned."

🌲the greenhollow tarot🌱

5. the hierophant

servitude, captivity, tradition, convention, commitment