Constable-Robinson 2014

[dem bones]

Coming later in 2014 from C.R ....

Stephen Jones (ed) - Best New Horror 25th Anniversary Edition (October)

Promo blurb
For a quarter of a century, this multiple award-winning annual selection has showcased some of the very best, and most disturbing, short stories and novellas of horror and the supernatural. As always, this landmark volume features superior fiction from such masters of the genre and newcomers in contemporary horror as Michael Chislett; Daniel Mills; Thana Niveau; Reggie Oliver; Nicholas Royle; Lynda E. Rucker; Robert Shearman; Angela Slatter; Simon Strantzas; Lavie Tidhar; Simon Kurt Unsworth and Halli Villegas.

With an in-depth introduction covering the year in horror, a fascinating necrology and a unique contact directory, The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror remains the world’s leading anthology dedicated solely to presenting the very best in modern horror.[/color]

Stephen Jones (created by) - Zombie Apocalypse - Endgame (October)

Promo blurb
Human Reanimation Virus (HRV) has spread around the globe and most of the major cities have fallen or been destroyed. As a new race of intelligent zombies rise to power, the remaining pockets of human resistance make a last, desperate stand in the ruins of a world on the brink of unimaginable change.

With the final pieces of the epic puzzle falling into place, a centuries-old Endgame is revealed through a series of interconnected documents – emails, articles, reports,
diaries and eyewitness accounts – as past and future hang in the balance.

In this third and final volume of the original best-selling Zombie Apocalypse! trilogy, Thomas Moreby’s plan for world domination is finally revealed in all its mad glory, as the very fabric of time and space is ripped apart and history itself is about to be changed forever . . .

Plus ....

Simon Clark - Night Of The Triffids (Corsair, August: Originally Hodder & Stoughton, 2001)

Promo Blurb:
On the Isle of Wight, a colony of survivors wakes to a world plunged into darkness, and a
triffid attack …

An inventive and fast-moving sequel to John Wyndham’s classic novel, in which most of humanity is left blinded by killer plants. Clark’s elegant and scary tale of humanity’s fightback picks up the story twenty-five years on from narrator Bill Masen’s escape to the Isle of Wight. One morning,
the colony of survivors wakes to a world plunged into darkness. Now, the triffids have an advantage over even sighted humanity.


Ian Preece and Doug Cheeseman - The World of the Football Annual

Blurb:

Celebrating the Golden Age of the Football Annual

Christmas Day 1959. Legions of schoolboys up and down the country unwrapped the very first 'Topical Times Football Book', with Bobby Charlton smacking a leather ball out of a pillar-box red background on the cover. Though this Topical Times annual wasn't the first yearbook, it is fair to say it heralded the golden age of the Christmas football annual, and as the sixties progressed, the shelves in Woolworth's or the local newsagent began to bulge with august volumes. These annuals were educational and insightful, taking the reader into the changing rooms, the supporters' club lounges, and the manager's mind ahead of a tough season. Beautifully illustrated, and largely well written, they helped shape the football consciousness of a generation. In The World of the Football Annual Ian Preece and Doug Cheeseman have bottled the essence of these publications. With selected highlights from the heyday of the Christmas annual, it's a trip back in time to a world where Forfar Athletic and Doncaster Rovers had equal billing with Manchester United and Arsenal, where debate raged over the use of goal average, Huddersfield v Carlisle was the main game on Match of the Day, and the unveiling of Dundee's new stand was deemed worthy of a two-page spread. It's a world long gone.

[Jojo Lapin X]

Jun 22, 2014 12:36:54 GMT dem bones said:

Simon Clark - Night Of The Triffids (Corsair, August: Originally Hodder & Stoughton, 2001)

I remember nothing about this one except having read it (you will be interested to know). Simon Clark is a bit uneven, I feel. BLOOD CRAZY is great.

[dem bones]

Jun 22, 2014 13:52:18 GMT Jojo Lapin X said:

Jun 22, 2014 12:36:54 GMT dem bones said:

Simon Clark - Night Of The Triffids (Corsair, August: Originally Hodder & Stoughton, 2001)

I remember nothing about this one except having read it (you will be interested to know). Simon Clark is a bit uneven, I feel. BLOOD CRAZY is great.

Had vault taken to fouling up the internet four-five years earlier, there would be far more Simon Clark, Bernard Taylor and Chris Fowler content than there has been to date as they were the only guys I bothered with after falling out of love with the genre. Blood Crazy is a great read, and Nailed By The Heart likewise did it for a then v. disillusioned dem. A bunch of us had the great privilege of meeting Mr. Clark at some BFS preliminary awards do or some-such nonsense a few years back, and he was absolutely lovely, more interested in yapping with pulphack about the Pink Fairies than canvassing votes. A proper star.

Another from the C-R catalogue. Not sure if this is up there with the various Driff guides, but doubtless of interest to a number of our reader:

Jen Campbell - The Bookshop Book (October)

Blurb:
Why we still love our bookshops, and why we want them to stay
New from the author of Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops, here is a book for book lovers everywhere. Jen Campbell looks at the story and current state of the world of bookselling, and celebrates extraordinary and unusual bookshops everywhere. Including a cornucopia of anecdotes
and testimonials from authors, booksellers and bibliophiles, this is a love letter to bookshops around the world.

Here's the Jen Campbell blog

[dem bones]

Perhaps that should read "all the book-stores near you are now pizza huts or betting shops" but we get the point. Mr. Jones mentioned that he was planning spin-offs from the original anthologies, and here are the first two. With Zombie Apocalypse III: Endgame due next month, a very busy season for the ravenous dead!

Mark Morris - Zombie Apocalypse! Horror Hospital [created by Stephen Jones (Robinson, 2014)

Joe Roberts

Blurb:
Inside this hospital . . . the prognosis is terminal. For Staff Nurse Cat Harris, the night shift at her hospital in south London starts off like any other . . . But she isn't expecting the four girls who were attacked by a crazed stranger in a nightclub . . . the trio of local gang members involved in a shooting incident . . . or the spread of an unknown virus that starts bringing the recently dead back to a horrible semblance of life. Soon, heavily armed troops have the hospital in lockdown, and as the disease spreads rapidly through staff, patients and members of the public, a small group of survivors battle to stay alive against an ever-increasing army of the flesh-eating 'infected'. Set during the dawning hours of the Zombie Apocalypse, this gripping and gory novel reveals more about the reanimation virus as it expands out from All Hallows Church, the secret of the swarms of insects, what horrors haunt the Medical Museum and how, behind it all, emerges the sinister figure of Thomas Moreby himself . . .

Lisa Morton - Zombie Apocalypse! Washington Deceased [created by Stephen Jones (Robinson, 2014)

Joe Roberts

Blurb:
White house down . . . and dead. Human Reanimation Virus (HRV) has spread around the world, and even America's Capitol Hill has fallen victim to the zombie plague now Thomas Moreby sits in the Oval Office. For Secret Service agent Sandra Steele, the only answer is to restore the Presidency to its rightful heir and help lead the Human Resistance from a hidden underground complex built centuries earlier beneath Washington DC. But with time running out, does the secret of creating a viable antiserum rest with the enigmatic New World Pharmaceuticals Group or a young man who claims to be immune to the virus? Filled with political manoeuvring and bloody action sequences, this chilling novel of the Zombie Apocalypse sets the scene for the human fightback as we learn more about Thomas Moreby, his Well of Seven, and the diabolical plans he set in motion more than 200 years ago . . .

[dem bones]

Vault public service announcement

NOTICE: DELAYED BOOK

I'm sure many of you have been agitating over whatever became of Ian Preece & Doug Cheeseman's The World of the Football Annual (see top of this thread)? Distress yourselves no longer! We can confirm that the book will now see publication in the autumn of this year (i.e., 2015).

Happily, everything else in Constable-Robinson's 2014 catalogues, including the randomly selected title below, is currently available.

Maxim Jakubowski (ed.) - The Mammoth Book of Erotic Romance and Domination (Robinson, 2014)

Press release blurb:

BDSM/Bondage and Dominance and Submission, recently brought to such extraordinary prominence by 50 Shades of Grey, are perennially popular erotic themes. This collection of over 40 outstanding new stories by some of the best writers of erotica and romance, including Kay Jaybee, K. D. Grace and Rachel Kramer Bussel – all shortlisted for the Erotic Writer of the Year award – Donna George Storey, Sunday Times bestseller Vina Jackson, Booker-shortlisted Matt Thorne, Portia da Costa and Kristina Lloyd.