New Releases by Brian Francis Slattery

Grace’s secret history comes to light. While all the members of Team Three have their secrets, only Grace seems willing to guard hers with fists of fury. Finally fed up with being kept in the dark, Sal takes matters into her own hands and engages in a friendly stalking operation to learn just what Grace’s deal is. A lit candle and flashbacks to 1930s China help illuminate matters—but things are never simple when magic is in play. This episode is brought to you by team-writer Max Gladstone and reveals the backstory of one of most mysterious cast members while skipping through time, place, and emotion.

Weather Alert: Tornado eating titans on the loose in Oklahoma. There might not be much upon the open, wind-swept planes of Oklahoma—but magic, like life, finds a way to thrive nevertheless. In this week’s episode the Team is literally blown away when they touch down in a tiny country town, utterly destroyed by horrifying monsters the locals call Tornado Eaters. The town is past saving but the threat remains—it will take all the Society can throw at them and even that might not be enough. Readers, and Sal, will finally get their first look at just what heat Team One is packing . . . but quickly learn that words wreak more havoc than even the most imaginative weapons. This episode is brought to you by team-writer Brian Francis Slattery who once again brings the Weird, this time to the West—but it’s not all fun and monsters in Oklahoma and the Society’s toll of life and limb is rising.

The first rule of the Market is you do not talk about the Market. 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. This episode is brought to you by team-writer Margaret Dunlap who shows us that the Society is far from the only fish in the magic-hunting sea—and certainly isn’t the biggest.

Good intentions in Glasgow lead to disastrous results. Sal and Asanti leave the rest of the Team in the lurch when they jet off to Scotland to attend the funeral of the archivists’ 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. This episode is brought to you by team-writer Mur Lafferty and explores how magic, like food, is rarely cut and dry.

Sal and Team Three travel to Madrid, through a breathing door, and into a lonely man’s weirdest dreams. 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... This episode is brought to you by team-writer Brian Francis Slattery and trips down a rabbit hole (or rather, through an apartment door) into some thoroughly New Weird territory. Fans of Vandermeer’s Southern Reach trilogy will find much to enjoy.

Detective Sally Brooks investigates an unusual robbery, and discovers that magic is real—and hungry! NYPD Detective Sal Brooks is no rookie—but even the most hardened cop would think twice when they see their brother open a book and become . . . well . . . something entirely not their brother. When her attempts to solve the case cross paths with a mysterious team led by a priest, she starts to realize that the world is far more than what is seems, and, just maybe, magic is real—and hungry. This episode is the first in a 16-part Serial, Bookburners, presented by Serial Box. From a team of writers, this collaborative effort unfolds an epic urban fantasy narrative across an entire season in weekly installments.

*** Named a Kirkus Reviews Starred Title in Their 10/01/14 Issue *** In 1968 two boys are born into a large family, both named for their grandfather, Peter Henry Hightower. One boy—Peter—grows up in Africa and ends up a journalist in Granada. The other—Petey—becomes a minor criminal, first in Cleveland and then in Kiev. In 1995, Petey runs afoul of his associates and disappears. But the criminals, bent on revenge, track down the wrong cousin, and the Peter in Granada finds himself on the run. He bounces from one family member to the next, piecing together his cousin''s involvement in international crime while learning the truth about his family''s complicated history. Along the way the original Peter Henry Hightower''s story is revealed, until it catches up with that of his children, revealing how Peter and Petey have been living in their grandfather''s shadow all along. The novel takes a look at capitalism and organized crime in the 20th century, the legend of the self-made man, and what money can do to people. Like Jeffrey Eugenides'' Middlesex, The Family Hightower stretches across both generations and continents, bearing the weight of family secrets and the inevitable personal toll they take on loved ones despite our best intentions.

From the author of the critically acclaimed literary sci-fi novels "Spaceman Blues" and "Liberation" comes an incandescent and thrilling future history dystopia in the vein of "1984" or "The Hunger Games."

From the author of the literary pulp phenomenon Spaceman Blues comes a future history cautionary tale, a heist movie in the style of a hippie novel. Liberation is a speculation on life in near-future America after the country suffers an economic cataclysm that leads to the resurgence of ghosts of its past such as the human slave trade. Our heroes are the Slick Six, a group of international criminals who set out to alleviate the worst of these conditions and put America on the road to recovery. Liberation is a story about living down the past, personally and nationally; about being able to laugh at the punch line to the long, dark joke of American history. Slattery''s prose moves seamlessly between present and past, action and memory. With Liberation, he celebrates the resilience and ingenuity of the American spirit. At the Publisher''s request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Painted in browns and grays and sparked by sudden fires, Spaceman Blues is a literary retro-pulp science-fiction-mystery-superhero novel, the debut of a true voice of the future, and a cult classic in the making. When Manuel Rodrigo de Guzmán González disappears, Wendell Apogee decides to find out where he has gone and why. But in order to figure out what happened to Manuel, Wendell must contend with parties, cockfights, and chases; an underground city whose people live in houses suspended from cavern ceilings; urban weirdos and alien assassins; immigrants, the black market, flight, riots, and religious cults. At the Publisher''s request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.