HarperCollins have been teasing us with their new imprint for a little while now. I’ve been curious to see Angry Robot’s opening blast is going to be and well this is it:
Moxyland by Lauren Beukes (Science Fiction)
Moxyland is an ultra-smart thriller about technological progress, and the freedoms it removes. In the near future, four hip young things live in a world where your online identity is at least as important as your physical one. Getting disconnected is a punishment worse than imprisonment, but someone’s got to stand up to government inc., whatever the cost.
Slights by Kaaron Warren (Horror)
Stephanie is a killer. After an accident in which her mother dies, she has a near-death experience, and finds herself in a room full of people – everyone she’s ever pissed off. They clutch at her, scratch and tear at her. But she finds herself drawn back to this place, again and again, determined to unlock its secrets. Which means she has to die, again and again. And she starts to wonder whether other people see the same room… when they die.
Nekropolis by Tim Waggoner (Urban Fantasy)
Meet Matt Richter. Private eye. Zombie. His mean streets are the city of the dead, the shadowy realm known as Nekropolis. And in this first case, Richter must help a delectable half-vampire
named Devona recover a legendary artifact known as the Dawnstone, before it’s used to destroy Nekropolis itself. That is, if he can survive the myriad horrors that infest the city itself.
Book of Secrets by Chris Roberson (Modern Fantasy)
Reporter Spencer Finch is embroiled in the hunt for a missing book, encountering along the way cat burglars and mobsters, hackers and monks. At the same time, he’s trying to make sense of the legacy left him by his late grandfather, a chest of what appear to be magazines from the golden age of pulp fiction, and even earlier.
Following his nose, Finch gradually uncovers a mystery involving a lost Greek play, secret societies, generations of masked vigilantes… and an entire secret history of mankind.
Now for an imprint who specialises in SF, F and WTF?! I think that about covers it 
I’m most intrigued by Slights and Book of Secrets though I’m slightly concerned by the description of Slights as A Wasp Factory for the misery memoir generation. I’m really not a fan of that whole misery memoir explosion or should that be exploitation?
Apart from that a diverse and exciting start.
Now that complicated bit.
Moxyland and Slights are due out in the UK in July and Nekropolis and Book of Secrets are due in August with the rest of the world getting them in September but in a canny move the ebook editions will be available around the world at the same time as the UK physical release. Go ebooks.
You can find out more on
Let the invasion commence!
Although I like the mix of authors, part of me asks "Wait, doesn't HarperCollins also publish SF & F under the EOS imprint?"
Maybe the global reach is part of it. Although I'm always in support of new good genre material to read, (and I've liked what I've read by Roberson so far), I see this almost muddling the picture. At least in terms of Harper's genre identity.
[...] For more on the books themselves please check out an earlier post [...]
[...] Following on from the post about publishers’ websites, I wanted to start looking at some specific sites and find out what they do well… and what they do badly. First up is Angry Robot Books, an imprint of HarperCollins, which I first discovered through a news post on NextRead. [...]
And under Voyager in the UK – but I think the team is different with a different focus and maybe a more global mix/reach?
I don't think it muddles really – actually I having a smaller list should do it a lot of good – you forgot the WTF element and I think that edginess is also something that Angry Robot is about.
Most people don't look at imprints anyway. It's probably easier to promote to bookshops and buyers – I'm speculating as it's something I know anything about. Imprints are turning into brands though.