New Releases by Adam Roberts

YOUR COMPLETE GUIDE TO WRITING AWESOME AND AMAZING FICTION FROM ANOTHER DIMENSION. This is an authoritative and engaging introduction to writing science fiction and fantasy for the complete beginner. This book provides all the information, guidance, and advice you need to write great science fiction to captivate your readers. It will help you understand how the genre works, the big dos and don''ts - as well as giving you the inspiration and motivation you actually need to write. Written by a leading science fiction novelist and a Professor in Creative Writing at the University of London - you''ll discover how to let your creativity flow, create incredible worlds, and get your novel finished. ABOUT THE SERIES The Teach Yourself Creative Writing series helps aspiring authors tell their story. Covering a range of genres from science fiction and romantic novels, to illustrated children''s books and comedy, this series is packed with advice, exercises and tips for unlocking creativity and improving your writing. And because we know how daunting the blank page can be, we set up the Just Write online community at tyjustwrite, for budding authors and successful writers to connect and share.

Cleanness, both in the sense of a neoclassical stylistic purity and of an individual moral and political probity, was centrally important to Walter Savage Landor''s writing, both in his prose and poetry. At the same time, this commitment to purity was contaminated in a variety of eloquent and complicating uncleannesses: his own fiery temper and frequent rages; his sometimes scurrilous and sexually explicit Latin poems; and the innovative, compacted, proto-Modernist verse style of works such as his epic Gebir, as stylistically-tangled and potent a poem ever produced in the Romantic era. The present study, the first comprehensive study of Landor''s writing for nearly half a century, addresses the whole of Landor''s prodigious output over the seven decades of his writing life, in verse, prose, and drama, in English and Latin: from the brief lyrics by which (if at all) he is remembered today up to his idylls, tragedies, and epics; from his pamphlets and essays to historical novels like Pericles and Aspasia and the textual colossus of the Imaginary Conversations. ''Cleanness'' becomes the organising principle by which this heterogeneous and multivocal body of work is read. At once a survey of Landor''s output and life, a critically engaged reading of his work and an interrogation of the principles of poetry itself, Landor''s Cleanness seeks to reconfigure the map of Romantic and Victorian writing, and move Landor''s reputation at least some way in the direction of the eminence he once enjoyed: as a major writer of his time, both intensely characteristic of the nineteenth-century and startlingly relevant to the twenty-first.

Humanity Among The Stars What happens when we reach out into the vastness of space? What hope for us amongst the stars? Multi-award winning editor Jonathan Strahan brings us fourteen new tales of the future, from some of the finest science fiction writers in the field. The fourteen startling stories in this anthology feature the work of Greg Egan, Aliette de Bodard, Ian McDonald, Karl Schroeder, Pat Cadigan, Karen Lord, Ellen Klages, Adam Roberts, Linda Nagata, Hannu Rajaniemi, Kathleen Ann Goonan, Ken MacLeod, Alastair Reynolds and Peter Watts.

We know Stanislaw Lem, whether or not we consciously know that we do. He may only be recognised in the West as the author of the twice-filmed novel, Solaris, but the influence of his other work is legion. From computer games (The Sims was inspired by one of his short stories), to films (the red and blue pills of The Matrix owe much to his Futurological Congress); from the space comedies of Red Dwarf to the metaphysical satires of Douglas Adams... the presence of this masterly Polish writer can be traced far and wide. Nor was his genius confined to fiction. Lem''s essays and pseudo-essays borne out of the military industrial tensions of the Cold War have outlived their original context and speak to the most current developments in virtual reality, nanotechnology, and artificial intelligence. To celebrate his name, as well as his vision, this anthology brings together writers, critics and scientists who continue to grapple with his concerns. British and Polish novelists join screenwriters, poets, computer engineers, and artists, to celebrate and explore Lem''s legacy through short stories and essays - two literary forms that, as Lem knew well, can blend together to create something altogether new. As one of the barriers to Lem''s fame was language, this book also features specially commissioned translations: three stories never to have appeared in English before. Lem was always ahead of us. It''s time we caught up.

''Highly engaging and fascinating... this thought-provoking collection reminded me why I used to like science fiction so much... Eventually, one hopes, science fiction will regain its rightful place - as once again stranger than science.'' - The Guardian, 20 Dec 09. ''All hit, no miss... thought-provoking at worst, and stunning at best... shows that science can inspire anyone and everyone.'' – New Scientist, 5 Dec 09. ''Inspiring'' – THE, 19 Nov 09. ''A diamond of compression.'' – Financial Times, 20 Dec 09. When It Changed is an attempt to put authors and scientists back in touch with each other, to re-introduce research ideas with literary concerns, and to re-forge the alloy that once made SF great. Composed collaboratively – through a series of visits and conversations between leading authors and practicing scientists – it offers fictionalised glimpses into the far corners of current research fields, be they in nanotechnology, invertebrate physiology, particle physics, or software archaeology. From Planck''s Length (the smallest indivisible distance) to Plankton (potential saviours of the Earth''s ecosystem), from virtual encounters between Witgenstein and Turing, to future civilisations torn asunder by different readings of the Standard Model, together these stories represent a literary ''experiment'' in the true sense of the word, and endeavour to isolate a whole new strain of the SF bug. * * Featuring Sara Maitland''s ''Moss Witch'' - Runner Up in the BBC National Short Story Prize 2009.* *

Here, collected together for the first time in eBook (because quite frankly, who would want to carry all of these around as actual books? Imagine the scorn on the bus!) are seven of Adam Roberts'' superb parodies of popular culture. From the Soddit and his not-a-shameless-cash-in journey to the cavern of Smug the dragon - during which he finds a ring, which may well feature in later books and/or films - to the dragon with a girl tattoo (look, it was very popular at the time, OK?), here you will find lovingly crafted, affectionate (well, sometimes) takes on some of the most loved - or at least financially successful - "works of art" of our time. Contains THE SODDIT, DOCTOR WHOM, THE DRAGON WITH THE GIRL TATTOO, THE McATRIX DERIDED, STAR WARPED, THE SELLAMILLION and THE VA DINCI COD.

Riddles are threaded through The Hobbit , and are key to Tolkien''s creative imagination. The Riddles of The Hobbit situates this novel and the rest of Tolkien''s writing in the context of Old English riddling culture, and more modern day examples; it sets out to solve the many riddles of the novel in original and often surprising ways.

In contrast to the common perception that the United Nations is, or should become, a system of collective security, this paper advances the proposition that the UN Security Council embodies a necessarily selective approach. Analysis of its record since 1945 suggests that the Council cannot address all security threats effectively. The reasons for this include not only the veto power of the five permanent members, but also the selectivity of all UN member states: their unwillingness to provide forces for peacekeeping or other purposes except on a case-by-case basis, and their reluctance to involve the Council in certain conflicts to which they are parties, or which they perceive as distant, complex and resistant to outside involvement. The Council’s selectivity is generally seen as a problem, even a threat to its legitimacy. Yet selectivity, which is rooted in prudence and in the UN Charter itself, has some virtues. Acknowledging the necessary limitations within which the Security Council operates, this paper evaluates the Council’s achievements in tackling the problem of war since 1945. In doing so, it sheds light on the division of labour among the Council, regional security bodies and states, and offers a pioneering contribution to public and governmental understanding of the UN’s past, present and future roles.

Gathered together for the first time from a major publisher - a collection of short stories by Adam Roberts. Unique twisted visions from the edges and the centre of the SF genres. Stories that carry Adam Roberts'' trademark elegance of style and restless enquiry of the genre he loves so much. Acclaimed stories, some that have appeared in magazines, some in anthologies, some appearing for the first time. Stories to make you think, to make you laugh, to make you wonder, to make you uneasy. Stories that ask questions, stories that sow mysteries. But always stories that entertain.

My name is Bingo Grabbins. It''s possible you know the basics: that I live in a hole, in the ground, not a nasty wet hole etc etc. A while ago I had a series of adventures, with a group of twelve doughty dwarfs. Sadly they''re all dead now; but let''s look on the bright side! I''m still alive. Since the events of The Soddit (worth a read you know) I have given up adventuring as - to speak frankly - a mug''s game. Instead I''ve devoted myself to the writing of my various books. But the time has now come for me to write my own autobiography. It''s been growing on me for a while, like moss. This is the story of me after the famous story about me. It is the story of my other stories. It is in NO WAY related to The Hobbit. I don''t even know what a Hobbit is.

WINNER OF THE BSFA AWARD FOR BEST NOVEL Jack Glass is the murderer. We know this from the start. Yet as this extraordinary novel tells the story of three murders committed by Glass the reader will be surprised to find out that it was Glass who was the killer and how he did it. And by the end of the book our sympathies for the killer are fully engaged. Riffing on the tropes of crime fiction (the country house murder, the locked room mystery) and imbued with the feel of golden age SF, JACK GLASS is another bravura performance from Roberts. Whatever games he plays with the genre, whatever questions he asks of the reader, Roberts never loses sight of the need to entertain and JACK GLASS has some wonderfully gruesome moments, is built around three gripping HowDunnits and comes with liberal doses of sly humour. Roberts invites us to have fun and tricks us into thinking about both crime and SF via a beautifully structured novel set in a society whose depiction challanges notions of crime, punishment, power and freedom. It is an extraordinary novel.

Solaris Rising 1.5 continues the exciting new series of SF anthologies from Solaris and editor Ian Whates, with an exclusive ebook! An anthology of nine short stories from some of the most exciting names in science fiction today. From both sides of the Atlantic – and further afield – these nine great writers offer you everything from a mystery about the nature of the universe to an inexplicable transmission to everyone on Earth, and from engineered giant spiders to Venetian palaces in space. So settle in, and enjoy yet more proof of the extraordinary breadth and depth of contemporary SF. Featuring Adam Roberts, Aliette de Bodard, Gareth L. Powell, Mike Resnick, Sarah Lotz, Phillip Vine, Tanith Lee, Paul Cornell, Paul di Filippo.

In a world where we have been genetically engineered so that we can photosynthesise sunlight with our hair, hunger is a thing of the past, food an indulgence. The poor grow their hair, the rich affect baldness and flaunt their wealth by still eating. But other hungers remain ... The young daughter of an affluent New York family is kidnapped. The ransom demands are refused. A year later a young woman arrives at the family home claiming to be their long lost daughter. She has changed so much, she has lived on light, can anyone be sure that she has come home? Adam Roberts'' new novel is yet another amazing melding of startling ideas and beautiful prose. Set in a New York of the future it nevertheless has echoes of a Fitzgeraldesque affluence and art-deco style. It charts his further progress as one of the most important writers of his generation.

Lizbreath Salamander is young and beautiful. Her scales have an iridescent sheen, her wings arch proudly, her breath has a tang of sulfur. And on her back a tattoo of a mythical creature: a girl. But when Lizbreath is drawn into a dark conspiracy she will have to rely on more than her beauty and her vicious claws the size of sabres ... A dragon has disappeared, one of a secretive clan. As Lizbreath delves deeper into their history she realises that these dragons will do anything to defend their secrets. Welcome to the world of The Dragon With The Girl Tattoo. A world of gloomy Nordic dragons leading lives uncannily like our own (despite their size, despite the need for extensive fireproofing of home furnishings), a world of money hoarded, a world of darkness and corruption. A world where people are the fantasy.

A long time ago in galaxy far, far away a really quite good SF film, a sort of western in space, was launched. The special effects were pretty shoddy but it did have some quite good actors in it. And Mark Hammill. A second and third film that were actually the fifth and sixth films followed and they weren''t quite so good but they were still quite fun (especially when the teddies got blasted by the Imperial stormtroopers). Then, the first, second and third films followed and they were actually fairly dreadful though by now the special effects were much better. And the actors were still better than average too. And Mark Hammill was too old to be in it plus his character hadn''t been born yet so that was OK. A Gollancz parody was inevitable. And here it is. An epic told in six chapters. An epic of good versus evil. Of dark versus light. Of hairy co-pilots and green gurus. Of bizarre hair styles, steel bras and camp robots. An epic that starts in the middle. And that''s the original!

Sprung from a prison in the centre of a star, the universe''s last criminal is employed to kill the population of a planet. It is a crime that will tear apart an interstellar utopia. Keeping ahead of detection and preparing the crime, the killer voyages to numerous worlds and hones the instincts required for murder. And wonders who is behind the contract. Roberts'' new novel is an extraordinary fusing of ideas, exotic locations, personal drama and an enquiry into the nature of crime in a society that thinks it has forgotten how to commit it.

THE SELLAMILLION is NOT a parody of Tolkien''s THE SILMARILLION. That would be pointless because although all Tolkien fans have a copy, only three of them have read past page 40. It is, however, a parody of all that Tolkien created as he worked on LORD OF THE RINGS. The history of the elderly days. Early missing drafts of LORD OF THE RINGS. A correspondence between the author and publisher on whether it should be a Bellybutton Stud of Doom rather than a Ring of Power. An experimental version of LOTR as if written by Dr Seuss. That sort of thing. It''ll be funny. Possibly hilarious. The author''s told us it will be. Promised even. And he did write THE SODDIT. And that was quite funny.

It is 1848 and the British Empire has grown rich exploiting Lilliputian slaves - the finesse of their working allowing unheard of feats of minature engineering; even Babbage''s computing device has been made to work. But now the French have formed a regiment of previously peaceful Brobdingnagian giants and invasion looms. In a world where humanity is both smaller and larger than it once was, love and hate loom large. Mankind discovers itself at the centre of scale. Lilliputians are twelve times smaller than us but there are those twelve times smaller than them, and twelve times smaller again and so on. And the scale of being goes up from Swift''s giants also ... Adam Roberts has written both a rip roaring 19th century adventure, a love story and a thought-provoking pre-atomic SF novel about our place in the universe.

Tighe lives on the wall. It towers above his village and falls away below it. It is vast and unforgiving and it is everything he knows. Life is hard on the wall, little more than a clinging on for dear life. And then one day Tighe falls off the wall. And falls, and falls, and falls ... Lavishly praised everywhere from Asimov''s magazine to Interzone, ON is proof positive that Adam Roberts is a new author whose potential for greatness is rapidly being realised. ON is at once a vertiginous concept novel, a coming of age saga, a picaresque journey across a changed world and an epic adventure in the very best traditions of SF.

Something fishy is going on in the world of artistic scholarship. How can there possibly be a link between the hidden cod of Leonardo Da Vinci''s paintings and the over fishing of the North Atlantic fish stocks? Could it be that Leonardo Da Vinci, the greatest genius of his age and inventor of the photocopier and mouse mat, had a chilling insight into European Union Fishing policies. Only one man can find out. Robert Hangdog, international scholar, master spy and action hero. Oh and Bezu Fish.

Adam Roberts'' new novel is a terrifying vision of a near future war - a civil war that tears the UK apart as new technologies allow the world''s first truly democratic army to take on the British army and wrest control from the powers that be. Taking advances in modern communication and the new eagerness for power from the bottom upwards, Adam Roberts has produced a novel that is at once an exciting war novel and a philosophical examination of war and democracy. It shows one of the UK''s most exciting and innovative literary voices working at the height of his powers and investing SF with literary significance that is its due.

Award nominated SF author Adam Roberts takes on Dickens in this festive zombie gorefest. Marley was dead. To begin with. The legendary Ebenezeer Scrooge sits in his house counting money. The boards that he has nailed up over the doors and the windows shudder and shake under the blows from the endless zombie hordes that crowd the streets hungering for his flesh and his miserly braaaaiiiiiinns! Just how did the happiest day of the year slip into a welter of blood, innards and shambling, ravenous undead on the snowy streets of old London town? Will the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future be able to stop the world from drowning under a top-hatted and crinolined zombie horde? It''s the Dickensian Zombie Apocalypse - God Bless us, one and all!

The Routledge Companion to Science Fiction is a comprehensive overview of the history and study of science fiction. It outlines major writers, movements, and texts in the genre, established critical approaches and areas for future study. Fifty-six entries by a team of renowned international contributors are divided into four parts which look, in turn, at: history – an integrated chronological narrative of the genre’s development theory – detailed accounts of major theoretical approaches including feminism, Marxism, psychoanalysis, cultural studies, postcolonialism, posthumanism and utopian studies issues and challenges – anticipates future directions for study in areas as diverse as science studies, music, design, environmentalism, ethics and alterity subgenres – a prismatic view of the genre, tracing themes and developments within specific subgenres. Bringing into dialogue the many perspectives on the genre The Routledge Companion to Science Fiction is essential reading for anyone interested in the history and the future of science fiction and the way it is taught and studied.

Russia, 1946, the Nazis recently defeated. Stalin gathers half a dozen of the top Soviet science fiction authors in a dacha in the countryside somewhere. Convinced that the defeat of America is only a few years away, and equally convinced that the Soviet Union needs a massive external threat to hold it together, to give it purpose and direction, he tells the writers: ''I want you to concoct a story about aliens poised to invade earth ... I want it to be massively detailed, and completely believable. If you need props and evidence to back it up, then we can create them. But when America is defeated, your story must be so convincing that the whole population of Soviet Russia believes in it - the population of the whole world!'' The little group of writers gets down to the task and spends months working on it. But then new orders come from Moscow: they are told to drop the project; Stalin has changed his mind; forget everything about it. So they do. They get on with their lives in their various ways; some of them survive the remainder of Stalin''s rule, the changes of the 50s and 60s. And then, in the aftermath of Chernobyl, the survivors gather again, because something strange has started to happen. The story they invented in 1946 is starting to come true ... A typically mind-blowing SF novel from one of the genre''s literary stars.

Doctor Whom, the grammatically correct TimeLord (or should that be Time Lord? Or is it Timelord?) has come to save our universe from the terror''s of sloppy syntax and bad grammar. With his intrepid assistant Lynne: hes here to correct greengrocers sign''s, popular fiction and government memos (memoes?) before inaccurate and lazy communication rips apart the very fabric of the space time continuum. Is it any wonder that the rise of global warming has coincided with the decline in the teaching of Latin in our schools? I do''nt think so. Will the Doctor save us all? or will his evil nemisises (nemisiss? nemisi?) The Dalek''s triumph and rule over a universe where no-one has any clear idea of the correct usage of semi-colons?

“A fast track to culinary bliss.”—Frank Bruni, New York Times • “A sort of Rachael Ray for young foodie urbanites.”—Boston Globe Self-taught chef and creator of the Amateur Gourmet website, Adam Roberts has written the ultimate “Kitchen 101” for anyone who’s ever wanted to enjoy the rewards of good eating without risking burning down the house! In this deliciously illuminating and hilarious new kitchen companion, Roberts has assembled a five-star lineup of some of the food world’s most eminent authorities. The result is a culinary education like no other. • Learn the “Ten Commandments of Dining Out” courtesy of Ruth Reichl, editor in chief of Gourmet magazine. • Discover why the New York Times’s Amanda Hesser urges you never to bring a grocery list to the market. • Get knife lessons from a top sous-chef at Manhattan’s famous Union Square Cafe, and much more. Packed with recipes, menu plans, shopping tips, and anecdotes, The Amateur Gourmet provides you with all the ingredients to savor the foodie lifestyle. All you need to add is a healthy appetite and a taste for adventure. Praise for The Amateur Gourmet “For anyone seeking to venture beyond toaster meals into the pleasurable world of sautéing and braising, Roberts is the perfect guide.”—Matt Lee and Ted Lee, authors of The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook “A funny little guide—thanks to Roberts’ comic timing and frequent kitchen flops—to savoring life’s flavor in pursuit of good eats.”—New York Daily News “Amateurgourmet [online] is a food-world must read, offering an intelligent and witty view of food culture. . . . Now Roberts moves to the head of the table with his new book.”—Denver Post “A delightful and compelling new voice in the food world.”—Michael Ruhlman, author of Charcuterie and The Reach of a Chef

Hector travels across America to visit his father on a ranch. He discovers that he has constructed a cult who await the impact of an asteroid. However, Hector is amazed when the section of Earth that the ranch is on suddenly breaks free from the rest of the planet during the collision. He struggles with his skepticism and acceptance of the fact that he is part of the remnants of the human race, on a splinter from the Earth.

An epic space opera of family revenge and the birth of a nation. A new breed of adventurer has slipped the bonds of gravity and begun a fresh life in orbit, free from interference by government, free from the petty concerns of earth.

Two experimental essays engaging with the science fiction concepts of ''Alien'' and ''Star''.