Italian Edition of THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE Out Now!


A new Italian edition of Ian McDonald‘s THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE is now available! Published by Urania/Mondadori as MINACCIA DA FARSIDE, it’s a prequel novella to the acclaimed Luna series. Here’s the synopsis…

Preparatevi a tornare nel mondo dei Dragoni, i signori della celeberrima trilogia Luna creata dalla penna di Ian McDonald.

Regina Sud, città della famiglia Taiyang, la società è organizzata tramite “anelli”, ovvero famiglie poliamorose. E per Carid, figlia di un “matrimonio anulare”, l’arrivo di una nuova sorellastra in famiglia è una tragedia.

Sidibe non è solo bella d’aspetto e altera di carattere, ma possiede delle rarissime ali con cui incanta tutti, compresi Jair e Kobe, i fratellastri di Carid. La ragazza ha solo venti giorni di tempo prima che venga sancito ufficialmente il nuovo legame della sua famiglia allargata. E di certo non ha intenzione di restarsene con le mani in mano.

Con la scusa di un originale regalo di nozze, trascina la nuova arrivata e i due fratellastri in un’avventura… alla ricerca della prima impronta umana sulla Luna, lasciata cento anni prima nel Mare della Tranquillità dallo stivale di Neil Armstrong.

Cosa potrebbe andare storto?

Conoscendo Ian McDonald, il George R.R. Martin dello spazio, tutto…

In addition to THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE, the volume also includes translations of two short stories in the same setting: IL QUINTO DRAGONE (THE FIFTH DRAGON, originally published in 2014) and CADUTA (THE FALLS, 2015).

THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE is published in the UK and North America by Tor.com (cover above). Here’s the English-language synopsis…

Ian McDonald returns to his elegantly wound solar system of the twenty-second century, full of political intrigue and complicated families.

Remember: Lady Luna knows a thousand ways to kill you, but family is what you know. Family is what works.

Cariad Corcoran has a new sister who is everything she is not: tall, beautiful, confident. They’re unlikely allies and even unlikelier sisters, but they’re determined to find the moon’s first footprint, even if the lunar frontier is doing its best to kill them before they get there.

Urania also publishes the three Luna novels: LUNA NUOVA (NEW MOON), LUNA PIENA (WOLF MOON), and LUNA CRESCENTE (MOON RISING). An omnibus edition (or, ‘Titan Edition‘) is also available in Italy.

The Luna novels are published in the UK by Gollancz, in North America by Tor Books.

The series has also been published in Poland, Spain, Bulgaria, Germany, France, Romania, Hungary, Russia, Croatia, China, Taiwan, and Serbia. Here are the covers for NEW MOON

Short Fiction Watch: Ian McDonald in THE YEAR’S TOP HARD SCIENCE FICTION STORIES 4!


In this instalment of Short Fiction Watch, we wanted to draw your attention to the upcoming collection THE YEAR’S TOP HARD SCIENCE FICTION STORIES 4. Edited by Allan Kaster, it includes THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE by Ian McDonald!

Here’s the relevant portion of the synopsis…

An unabridged collection spotlighting the best hard science fiction stories published in 2019 by current and emerging masters of the genre, edited by Allan Kaster…

… A teenager seeks to maintain her “Captain” status among her non-traditional lunar family by leading her siblings on a dangerous trek to Neil Armstrong’s first footprint on the moon in “The Menace from Farside,” by Ian McDonald.

THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE is the prequel novella in Ian’s Luna series, and was originally published by Tor.com. Here’s the full synopsis…

Remember: Lady Luna knows a thousand ways to kill you, but family is what you know. Family is what works.

Cariad Corcoran has a new sister who is everything she is not: tall, beautiful, confident. They’re unlikely allies and even unlikelier sisters, but they’re determined to find the moon’s first footprint, even if the lunar frontier is doing its best to kill them before they get there.

The highly acclaimed Luna series is published in North America by Tor Books, in the UK by Gollancz, and is available in a growing number of translated editions around the world.

Aliette de Bodard, Ian McDonald and Lavie Tidhar on Locus’s 2019 Recommended Reading List!


A couple of weekends ago, Locus unveiled their 2019 Recommended Reading List, and we are delighted to be able to give a quick shout-out to clients Aliette de Bodard, Ian McDonald and Lavie Tidhar for being included! We also thought it would be a nice opportunity to share a bit more information about the work that was included on the list.

Let’s start with Aliette, who appears three times on the list! The latest novel in the Dominion of the Fallen series, THE HOUSE OF SUNDERING THORNS, is included among the best Fantasy Novels. Published by Gollancz (UK) and JABberwocky (North America), here’s the synopsis…

The great magical Houses of Paris – headed by Fallen angels and magicians – were, however temporarily, at peace with each other. Until House Harrier was levelled by a powerful explosion. Now that peace has become chaos, tearing apart old alliances and setting off a race in which each House hoards magic and resources to protect itself against another such blast.

Thuan, the Dragon head of the divided House Hawthorn, is still consolidating his power when war comes to his doorstep. Aurore -exiled from and almost beaten to death by House Harrier – sees her moment to seek power in order to protect her family, even if she must venture back to her destroyed former home to get it. And Emmanuelle finds herself alone in the middle of it all, driven to protect others, trying to piece together what has happened, andhoping – eventually – to make sense of it all.

None of them know what destroyed House Harrier, though… and when they do uncover that fiery, destructive magic then divided Houses, old enemies and estranged friends will all have to make a decision: stand together, or burn alone…

Aliette’s OF WARS, AND MEMORIES, AND STARLIGHT (Subterranean Press) is included among the best Collections, and one of the novellas within — OF BIRTHDAYS, AND FUNGUS, AND KINDNESS — is included in the recommended Novellas list! Here’s the collection’s synopsis…

A major first collection from a writer fast becoming one of the stars of the genre… Aliette de Bodard, multiple award winner and author of The Tea Master and the Detective, now brings readers fourteen dazzling tales that showcase the richly textured worldbuilding and beloved characters that have brought her so much acclaim.

Come discover the breadth and endless invention of her universes, ranging from a dark Gothic Paris devastated by a magical war; to the multiple award-winning Xuya, a far-future space opera inspired by Vietnamese culture where scholars administrate planets and sentient spaceships are part of families.

In the Nebula award and Locus award winning “Immersion”, a young girl working in a restaurant on a colonized space station crosses paths with an older woman who has cast off her own identity. In the novelette “Children of Thorns, Children of Water”, a shapeshifting dragon infiltrating a ruined mansion finds more than he’s bargained for when his partner is snatched by eerie, child-like creatures. And in the award-winning “Three Cups of Grief, by Starlight”, three very different people — a scholar, an engineer, and a spaceship — all must deal with the loss of a woman who was the cornerstone of their world.

This collection includes a never-before seen 20,000-word novella, “Of Birthdays, and Fungus, and Kindness”, set in Bodard’s alternative dark Paris.

Next up, the third novel in Ian’s Luna series, MOON RISING, is among the recommended Sci-Fi Novels. Published by Gollancz (UK) and Tor Books (North America), here’s the synopsis…

A hundred years in the future, a war wages between the Five Dragons — five families that control the Moon’s leading industrial companies. Each clan does everything in their power to claw their way to the top of the food chain — marriages of convenience, corporate espionage, kidnapping, and mass assassinations.

Through ingenious political manipulation and sheer force of will, Lucas Cortas rises from the ashes of corporate defeat and seizes control of the Moon. The only person who can stop him is a brilliant lunar lawyer, his sister, Ariel.

Witness the Dragons’ final battle for absolute sovereignty in Ian McDonald’s heart-stopping finale to the Luna trilogy.

A prequel to the Luna series, THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE, was also included on the Novella list. It’s published by Tor.com

Ian McDonald returns to his elegantly wound solar system of the twenty-second century, full of political intrigue and complicated families.

Remember: Lady Luna knows a thousand ways to kill you, but family is what you know. Family is what works.

Cariad Corcoran has a new sister who is everything she is not: tall, beautiful, confident. They’re unlikely allies and even unlikelier sisters, but they’re determined to find the moon’s first footprint, even if the lunar frontier is doing its best to kill them before they get there.

And last, but by no means least, Lavie’s novella NEW ATLANTIS is also included in the list. It was published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, May-June 2019. Here’s how Lavie described the novella, in an interview with SF Site

“New Atlantis” is a novella set in what I call the Land, a sort of post-apocalyptic utopia where the few survivors of the climate change collapse now live in harmony with their environment – but can still be kind of obsessed with the old world and its excesses! I’ve been writing stories about Mai and the Land for a while now – one of them is “The Buried Giant” in Robots vs Fairies, which is also in a bunch of the Year’s Bests anthologies, and there’s a new one, “Svalbard,” coming out as a sort of interactive/puzzle thing online soon!

Ian McDonald’s THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE out today!


Ian McDonald‘s latest novella is out today! Set in the same series as the author’s acclaimed Luna series, THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE is published by Tor.com in the UK and North America. Here’s the synopsis…

In The Menace from Farside, Ian McDonald returns to his elegantly wound solar system of the twenty-second century, full of political intrigue and complicated families.

Remember: Lady Luna knows a thousand ways to kill you, but family is what you know. Family is what works.

Cariad Corcoran has a new sister who is everything she is not: tall, beautiful, confident. They’re unlikely allies and even unlikelier sisters, but they’re determined to find the moon’s first footprint, even if the lunar frontier is doing its best to kill them before they get there.

The Luna series of novels is published in the UK by Gollancz, in North America by Tor Books, and is also available in an ever-growing number of translated editions.

‘Mafia-style mining families clash in a compelling fantasy that offers up all the pleasures of a cut-throat soap opera in space…That McDonald is able to spin a compelling story from this unforgiving set-up is testament to his skill as a writer… One thing Luna does exceptionally well is to puncture Old Heinlein’s assumption that a frontier society based on the primacy of the family and a disregard of conventional laws would end up like idealised smalltown America. Luna argues that any realistic future colonisation of the moon will be much more The Sopranos than The Waltons. LUNA is as gripping as it is colourful, and as colourful as it is nasty.’ — Guardian on NEW MOON

‘A Howling Good Read… No one builds a world like Ian McDonald does. Piece by piece and brick by brick. Spare, simple, elegant when he needs to be…, deep and meaty when he wants to be…, he does his work like an artisan pulling a sculpture from stone. There are no wasted moves, nothing that isn’t vital because, in the end, everything is vital. Everything matters… it is fascinating, all of it. Because McDonald has made a world that is ruthless in its consistency and living, breathing reality, and then made characters who are not just living in it, but wholly and fully of it… McDonald’s corporate war is a gorgeous thing, fought with every tool available… McDonald is able to wrap the biggest events in constellations of the smallest so that a cocktail party here, a discussion of ’80s retro fashion (all mall-hair and WHAM! T-shirts), a love story and a day at work for a guy who cleans solar panels all build and coalesce to form the background radiation of life in this unstable future. Every moment with his characters makes them precious, real and alive.’ — NPR on WOLF MOON

‘McDonald’s richly imagined Lunar culture and interplanetary poleconomy make for a superb backdrop for literally dozens of richly realized human dramas, and it’s hard to say which is more fascinating. McDonald’s wildly imaginative worldbuilding (present since his debut novel, the utterly wonderful standout OUT ON BLUE SIX) and his ability to spin out intrigues are both in full flight in this final volume.’ — Boing Boing on MOON RISING

Looking for more, shorter fiction by Ian? Tor.com also publishes Ian’s Philip K. Dick Award-nominated novella TIME WAS.

‘[E]ntrances readers with this multigenerational novella of two time-crossed lovers who can only meet for brief moments separated by several years… beautiful writing… Fans of science fiction who enjoy a dash of history and legend will savor this tender story.’ — Publishers Weekly on TIME WAS

Also, because we can’t share this news enough: Ian was recently named a European Grand Master of Science Fiction!

Next Month: Ian McDonald’s new novella, THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE!


Today, we’re very happy to share with you the cover and details for Ian McDonald‘s next book! Set in the same series as the author’s acclaimed Luna series, THE MENACE FROM FARSIDE is due to be published by Tor.com on November 12th, 2019. Here’s the synopsis…

In The Menace from Farside, Ian McDonald returns to his elegantly wound solar system of the twenty-second century, full of political intrigue and complicated families.

Remember: Lady Luna knows a thousand ways to kill you, but family is what you know. Family is what works.

Cariad Corcoran has a new sister who is everything she is not: tall, beautiful, confident. They’re unlikely allies and even unlikelier sisters, but they’re determined to find the moon’s first footprint, even if the lunar frontier is doing its best to kill them before they get there.

The Luna series of novels is published in the UK by Gollancz, in North America by Tor Books, and is also available in an ever-growing number of translated editions.

Tor.com has also published Ian’s Philip K. Dick Award-nominated novella TIME WAS.

Also, because we can’t share this news enough: Ian was recently named a European Grand Master of Science Fiction!