The first round of fall catalogs are starting to arrive, here's what looks interesting from Bantam Dell (including the Dial and Spectra imprints):

The Archivist's Story by Travis Holland. A debut novel from Holland, set in Moscow, 1939. Pavel Dubrov is an archivist who is sent to authenticate an anonymous story confiscated from a political prisoner in Lubyanka prison. The writer turns out to be Isaac Babel who will spend his last days writing with all works to go to Dubrov, who will ultimately be ordered to destroy them. Dubrov makes a decision, "he will save the last stories of the writer he worships, whatever the cost."

So what you have here is great historical fiction about a very real place and time that is largely overlooked in fiction and it is about the power of written words over all else.

I am so going to read this book.

Logorrhea, edited by John Klima. There has been buzz about this on the SF blogs for awhile - it's a collection of stories based on winning spelling bee words since 1925. Contributors include Hal Duncan (that actually scares me a bit!), Tim Pratt, Jay Lake, Liz Hand, etc. This could be a lot of smart and innovative fun and might just make it as a crossover for teen readers. I love how the SFF crowd does such interesting anthologies - there's nothing like them anywhere else in fiction.

The Bestiary by Nicholas Christopher. Okay, Christopher is one of my all time favorite writers, especially his wonderful novel A Trip to the Stars. He isn't SFF exactly - but definitely surreal (maybe a bit like Liz Hand?). In this outing Xeno Atlas takes his childhood interest in animals and uses it to fuel a quest for the "Caravan Bestiary" - the medieval text containing the animals not granted passage on Noah's Ark. His quest takes him all over the world (and there are ancient libraries!) but "it is only by riddling out his own family secrets that Xeno can hope to glean what he is looking for."

Check out Stars if you are curious about this title - it will show you what kind of unique writer Christopher is.

Baltimore, or The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire by Mike Mignola and Christopher Golden. Major points for the title alone! This is a great match up of two amazing writers. Golden's name should be familiar to anyone, but I was most recently captivated by the rerelease of his Peter Pan story, Straight on Til Morning. Mignola is the creator/writer/artist of Hellboy - enough said on how awesome he is. Baltimore is an illustrated novel, told in flashbacks about how Lord Henry Baltimore found himself a vampire on the battlefields of WWI. "Both a chilling tale of the paranormal and an allegory for the nature of war...", this book was clearly written exactly for someone like me. WWI and Mignola and Golden? Oh, I really hope it lives up to its promise!

One for Sorrow by Christopher Barzak. First, for all of you at Justine's blog wondering about the beheaded teen girls on covers everywhere - Barzak's book gives us a floating beheaded teen boy! (Who decided this was the way to do book covers is what I want to know.) The story centers around 16 year old Adam who is struggling to cope with a recently paralyzed mother. When one of his classmates is murdered he goes to the site where the body is discovered (shades of River Phoenix and Wil Wheaton) and "discovers Jamie Marks was a boy just like him, a boy no one paid attention to - a boy almost no on will truly miss. And for the first time, Adam feels he has a purpose. Now, more than ever, Jamie needs a friend."

This definitely sounds like YA crossover to me and Karen Joy Fowler calls it "the most haunting ghost story I've ever read."

Finally, End of the World Blues by Jon Courtenay Grimwood. What sells me here is the combination of "psychologically complex sci-fi meets heart-stopping crime thriller". Kit Nouveau is in the middle of getting robbed at gunpoint when he is saved by "a pale girl in a red cloak who appears out of nowhere." Niji has just stolen 15 million and killed a man but hasn't graduated from high school yet. Who she is, what she wants and how this all comes together is up in the air but I'm willing to go along for the ride. Could be a nice hard boiled mystery for curious teen readers and if I found that, I just might faint or something from sheer joy.
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