Ninth Step Station s01e01 by Malka Older Years of disaster and conflict have left Tokyo split between great powers. In the city of drone-enforced borders, bodymod black markets, and desperate resistance movements, US peacekeeper Emma Higashi is assigned to partner with Tokyo Metropolitan Police Detective Miyako Koreda. Together, they must race to solve a series of murders that test their relationship and threaten to overturn the balance of global power. And amid the chaos, they each need to decide what they are willing to do for peace. Ninth Step Station is written by a collaboration of authors including: Malka Older, Fran Wilde, Jacqueline Koyanagi and Curtis C. Chen. Similar to all the serials from Serialbox, this story is also released in episodes. Every episode is written by a different author. Episode one: The Faceless Body Enter Ninth Step Station. Enter a divided Tokyo. Half Japanse/American and Half taken by China. The Faceless Body starts off with a ...
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Bullet Catcher s01e01 by Joaquin Lowe Imma Moreno has no kind of life in no kind of town. Her parents are dead, her brother probably is too. When a stranger arrives, a stranger who can bend bullets to his will, she figures she has nothing to lose. So like a cobalt shadow cast in the sand, she follows him into the wastes. She's hoping to find answers, purpose, maybe even some kind of life. What she finds will change not only her life, but her whole world. Just to start things off. Bullet Catcher is the latest addition to the Serial Pub line up of serials. This serial is a western themed one, you would probably already have guessed that by its name, with hints of True Grit meets The Dark Tower. As a big SK fan i had to catch a frist glimpse of this serial. Meet Imma Moreno. Orphaned and bought to do the dirty dishes in a bar. At a young age, Imma witnessed how here house was burned down. These memories still visit her on a regular basis. Together with her brother N...
Media Alert: The Fisher of Bones In The Fisher of Bones a tiny band of prophet-led outcasts, are guided by tablets and lured by the promise land. This time, however, the tablets are incomprehensible to most believers, and the original prophet dies with no promised land in sight. His heir, a resentful daughter (named Ducky, and then Fisher), cannot deny the sudden alteration of her vision and the cacophony of otherworldly voices that descend upon her as her father dies. Faith is for others; she has duty and marching orders. Their journey is almost at an end, but now, without the Prophet, Fisher must find a way to guide them to the place they will call Home. Through blood and through sand, against the will of her own flock, against the horrors that haunt the darkness, only she can bring her people Home. The Prophet is dead. Long live the Prophetess. This serial is written by Sarah Gailey. Hugo and Campbell award finalist Gailey is an internationally-published fiction and...
The Market Arcanum by Margaret Dunlap, Bookburners #5 When a mysterious invite arrives in the mail and Father Menchu responds by whisking Sal off to Lichtenstein, the former cop is left on very new ground as she gets more than a glimpse at the broader world of magic users. Unfortunately, they are immediately confronted by a wealthy business man who is less upset about them blowing up his boat two episodes ago, as he is about them stealing his (sludge-demon releasing) book. When the three remaining Team members back in Rome suddenly find themselves under attack, Sal and Menchu are left scrambling for how to help and have to turn to the peculiar techno-cultists whose computers run on seahorses and have a pointed interest in the cop sister of their acquaintance Perry. Welcome to the Market Arcanum. A lot of things have happened over the last four episodes of Bookburners. Sal the latest addition to Team Three of the Bookburners got a lot of moneys worth. Sal went from being ...
A Sorcerer's Apprentice by Mur Lafferty, Bookburners #4 Sal and Asanti leave the rest of the Team in the lurch when they jet off to Scotland to attend the funeral of the archivist’s mentor. Something is amiss in the Dear Green Place, however, as the pair land to discover the entire city has become obsessed with a restaurant (which just happens to be owned by the deceased mentor’s only living relative). They beat the crowds to get a table, only to find the fight has just begun and they left their muscle at home. After Max Gladstone, Margaret Dunlap and Brian Francis Slattery it is up to Mur Lafftery to show her first addition to the Bookburners series with A Sorcerer's Apprentice . Having survived already three deadly encounters Sal finally has the time to do some exploring, which she preferably does in Ashanti's library. Then Sal stumbles upon a crying Ashanti who has just received news that her old mentor, Father Seamus Hunter, has passed and that the funeral is to...
Media Alert: Tremontaine. A New Serial Fiction Series by Serial box. Welcome to Tremontaine , the long awaited return to Ellen Kushner’s beloved Riverside series and the prequel to the cult-classic Swordspoint . “A Vanity Fair of aristocrats, rogues, orphans, and heroes…” - Neil Gaiman on Swordspoint This “ Fantasy of Manners ” follows the lives and intrigues of four very different characters as they maneuver the cobblestone streets and glittering ballrooms of a city that never was. Nameless, but inspired by Elizabethan London, 18th century Paris, New York in the 1980s, the setting of Tremontaine comes alive behind the colorful figures of Micah the genius; Rafe Fenton, a man of many passions; the mysterious foreign swordswoman, Ixkaab Balam; and of course: Diane, Duchess Tremontaine, a character well-met in the original series, but whose history has remained a mystery until now. When Ellen Kushner’s Swordspoint was originally released in 1987, it quickly ...
Fair Weather by Margaret Dunlap, Bookburners #3 The Team saves on flight costs as the newest mystery happens around the corner. A tip from a local antiquarian doesn’t make it to the Team in time and they are left with a once-bookstore-now-rubble-pile, a missing magical tome, and very few clues beyond a helpful tour guide (one might even say too helpful…). Tracking the missing book to a luxury yacht, the Team gets less of the high-end boating experience and more of the demon-on-the-loose nightmare. All aboard the Fair Weather; but no smooth sailing ahead. After two very strong episodes we have come to the third episode of Bookburners where Brian Francis Slattery has given the reigns to Margaret Dunlap introducing her first addition to the Bookburners series. As with the stories of Max Gladstone, which introduced the concept of the Bookburners and that of Brian Francis Slattery, which greatly build on the story of Max Gladstone. The first story showed demonic posession and the seco...
Anywhere but Here by Brian Francis Slattery, Bookburners #2 Sal Brooks, newest member of Team Three of the Societas Librium Occultorum, is settling into her job and apartment in Rome. In this episode we meet the rest of the team and get a tour of the Black Archives (pro tip: don’t touch anything), before being whisked off on Sal’s first mission: investigate a magical disturbance in the heart of Madrid, Spain. There they find a breathing apartment door, little girls being held hostage, and some furniture that is far too alive for good taste. First days on the job are never easy… Just a quick note for those hopping onto the Bookburners bus. Bookburners is the latest writing project collaboration of Mur Lafferty, Brian Francis Slattery, Margaret Dunlap and led by Max Gladstone. The important message from the first book was that some books have teeth! Sal was a bit unofficially inaugurated in the first episode Book, Badge and Candle into the order of the Societas Librium Occult...
Media Alert: Bookburners Trailer Over the last few weeks I have featured several posts on the new concept of Serialbox. They bring something new to publishing. Turn of your TV and subscribe to the weekly episodes of Bookburners. So far I have read episodes 1 through 4 and they are pretty awesome. Bookburners is the first series published by Serialbox and follows the adventures of Sal who is recruited by an ancient organization that fights against the supernatural. Book have teeth! Some books can call forth the supernatural in terms of demonic possession and it is Sal's job amongst others to contain the damage. What I have seen so far is that the writing is top, the series is written by four different authors but the story flows naturally. Just a few days ago Serialbox released the trailer of Bookburners. A pretty cool one, make sure you watch it and tune into your kobo, kindle, smartphone or tablet and read the series! What makes this a cool concept...
Excerpt: Anywhere but Here Bookburners: Episode 2 By Brian Francis Slattery, Max Gladstone, Margaret Dunlap, and Mur Lafferty “Welcome to the Black Archives of the Societas Librorum Occultorum. Come in. The others are waiting.” Asanti guided Sal and Menchú through the towers of books, talking as she went. “The library was built in the 1400s—the architecture gives that away, don’t you think?—when the Society’s collection grew a little too large and a little t oo dangerous to have in broad daylight, or just sitting in some monastery. Take a left. No, the other left. That’s it. We are now in the only central chamber of the library. There are seven chambers radiating off of this one. Each one has a small antechamber, with the larger rooms beyond that. Just in case something gets out in the library, you understand, and we need to seal it in.” Sal glanced back at the staircase. Now it looked like a strand of DNA, ascending into the gloom until it disappeared in the middle ...
Book, Badge and Candle by Max Gladstone, Bookburners #1 Some books have teeth. Magic is real, and hungry—trapped in ancient texts and artifacts, only a few who discover it survive to fight back. Detective Sal Brooks is a survivor. Abruptly thrust into the battle between nefarious forces trying to unleash this power onto the world and those trying to stop them, she joins a Vatican-backed black-ops anti-magic squad: Team Three of the Societas Librorum Occultorum. Together they stand between humanity and magical apocalypse. Some call them Bookburners. They don’t like the label. Not that long ago I found out about a new publishing group and the idea that they are bringing starting this April. Serial Box and the first serialized fiction call Bookburners led by Max Gladstone who you all should know from his Craft Sequence series. The Bookburners series is written by multiple authors, each contributing an episode to the series. I really like this idea, as I currently try to...
Media Alert: Meet the Bookburners Team Magic is real…and some books have teeth. This September, new publisher Serial Box is bursting onto the scene and bringing the TV model of media production and delivery to the book world with Bookburners , an urban fantasy adventure following a black-ops anti-magic squad backed by the Vatican. Wandering from police procedural to New Weird and dabbling in most genres in between, Bookburners will keep you hungry for more, week after week. Written by a team of authors including Margaret Dunlap ( Eureka ), Mur Lafferty ( The Shambling Guide to New York City ) and Brian Francis Slattery ( Lost Everything ), the group is le d by rising genre star Max Gladstone ( Three Parts Dead and the Craft Sequence). While the series officially launches on September 16 th with the release of Episode 2, we have the first episode up for all to enjoy on SerialBox.com . Serial Box aims to bring book lovers everyth...
Media Alert: New Serialized Fiction from Fantasy Author Max Gladstone Bookburners —an addictive modern fantasy, in the vein of Supernatural and Buffy ―will be published by Serial Box, the newest medium for series drama. Serial Box is a new digital publishing start-up focused exclusively on original serialized fiction, delivering the episodic television model to the written word. Heralded as “Sheer enormous fun!” by Naomi Novik (Uprooted and the best-selling Temeraire series) Bookburners has also been called a “Beastly injection of 100-proof demon-battling fiction,” by Kieran Shea ( Koko Takes a Holiday ). With weekly episodes being created by Gladstone and his team, the Bookburners season will run for 16 weeks. N ominated twice for the John W. Campbell Best New Writer Award, Gladstone is the author of the Craft Sequence , tales of wizards in pinstriped suits and gods with shareholder's committees― Full Fathom Five , Three Parts Dead , Two Serpents Rise and...