Upcoming Tor Books by Beloved Authors

While I enjoy discovering a “stunning debut” novel as much as the next reviewer, I also find it very exciting to anticipate new books by authors I already love. On the assumption that you ALSO find this very exciting, I’m delighted to share these four upcoming books from Tor – all by established, beloved authors!

These four are really wide-ranging in terms of genre, from an art heist in space by Molly Tanzer, to near future political suspense by Naomi Kritzer, to dreamy fantasy by Jo Walton, to blood-soaked supernatural horror by Chuck Tingle. Whatever your particular leaning in speculative subgenre, Tor has something to offer you in the coming months.

First up, And Side by Side They Wander by Molly Tanzer comes out May 19. In this novella, the world has changed. Corporations have taken over most of the world that a fungus hasn’t, and questionably benevolent aliens have removed the world’s art “for safekeeping” until the human race can be trusted with it again.  Humanity has reached the imposed benchmarks, but the aliens are not forthcoming with the art.

While the premise alone is really engaging, the the point-of-view character’s voice is also a big draw to this novella, as she  attempts to defend a LOT of questionable choices. She does PR for a shady corporation. She has a clandestine relationship with an AI who may or may not care about her. She signs on for a heist to repatriate the art of humanity, without knowing very much about the plan or her teammates. She … maybe makes some additional mistakes along the way.

There’s also a fun philosophical discussion about the value of original art, reminiscent of Walter Benjamin’s famous essay, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” If you know Benjamin already, you’ll be tickled; if you don’t, you’ll be totally fine.

Naomi Kritzer is prolific, and some of my favorite books by her are the near-future ones in which some political and technological situations have advanced plausibly, and then there are adventures. Catfishing on CatNet and  Liberty’s Daughter are both young adult examples of this subgenre that I love, so I was especially excited to realize that Obstetrix, which comes out June 9, presents a grown-up plot in this kind of setting.

In Obstretrix, abortion has been outlawed in many states, and thus our protagonist, an ob/gyn doctor who performs them, is finding it hard to get a job. She agrees to an unconventional interview with a midwife group that turns out to be a kidnapping. She is taken to the compound of a rightwing cult in the woods where she is expected to fill all the medical needs of the cult’s women.

The plot is incredibly tense and nuanced, as the doctor is constantly assessing her possibilities of escape. As she gets to know the people in the cult, she realizes the varying degrees of devotion the women and girls feel for the murderous and abusive man who leads them.

The doctor is an unmarried, middle-aged woman with a lot of empathy, and while she was definitely kinder and more functional than I would have been in this situation, her practicality feels very believable. All the characters, and the eventual denouement for the cult, are satisfying.

Also in June, Jo Walton’s Everybody’s Perfect comes out June 30. Everybody’s Perfect takes place in a misty, liminal city between worlds, that is accessible from Venice. There humans intermingle with people of other species from other worlds, whose faces look like the carnivale masks worn in Venice. Each chapter of the book is told by a different denizen of this misty city, where reality must be constantly shored up with attention and belief. Together they provide an oral history of a pivotal moment in the city’s history.

Everybody’s Perfect has now joined Among Others in my top ranking of Jo Walton’s books. It isn’t what most people mean when they talk about “cozy fantasy” but it bears the hallmarks of several different kinds of people working together and separately to prioritize kindness, and it is also incredibly inventive in its world creation in a way that kind of reminds me of Jedediah Berry’s books.

In structure, Everybody’s Perfect reminds me of the “hinged” story in Always Coming Home by Ursula K. Le Guin. Each chapter, told by a different character, wheels off from the previous, with different backgrounds, perspectives and voices adding to the overall flavor of the book and its city, while furthering the plot.

And Fabulous Bodies by Chuck Tingle comes out July 7! In it, an aspiring social media influencer who moonlights as a bodysnatcher, gets embroiled in a grisly night of gory supernatural murders.

Poppy has built her personal brand around her physical beauty, and her maximalist queer aesthetic. Her need to keep up the lush surface for her videos (and her desire to provide luxury for her kid) is expensive, so she finances her lifestyle by obtaining dead bodies for clients, no questions asked. One night, a potentially lucrative gig goes extremely wrong.

Will she, her follower count, and her beloved daughter emerge unscathed? Will she learn anything about fame and/or parenting along the way? Some of the answers are no, and some of the answers are yes!

Like Tingle’s previous horror novels, Camp Damascus, Bury Your Gays and Lucky Day, Fabulous Bodies balances truly disgusting gore in a fast moving plot with an overall hopeful message about love. If you liked those others, you’ll like this one, too!