Category Archives: Article

Monthly Highlights – October 2019

October has come to an end, another month packed full of excellent books to talk about, so it’s time for my latest Monthly Highlights post here on Track of Words. This month I’m going purely for books (no audio dramas or short stories this time around) as my top picks from what I’ve been reading, although I’m also going to talk a little bit about an awesome event I attended in London, for a little added variety. I’ve picked quite a mix of books, from various publishers, but all of them have really caught my imagination and I’m keen to recommend every single one of them!

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The Black Library Weekender 2019 – How to Prepare and Avoid Spoilers

The 2019 Black Library Weekender is fast approaching, and looking at the schedule there’s an impressive range of seminars lined up for the weekend, covering multiple settings and series, writing skills, audio dramas…there’s a lot of variety. With so many topics on offer, not only are there going to be some tricky decisions to make regarding which sessions to attend, but it’s not going to be easy to make sure you’re up to speed on all of the books being discussed. In this article I’m going to go through the schedule and talk a bit about how to prepare for each of the sessions – i.e. which books to try and make sure you’ve read beforehand so that you know what’s being discussed and can avoid spoilers.

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Monthly Highlights – September 2019

After last month’s bumper collection of my highlights from July and August, it’s back to a single month for the latest roundup of the best things I’ve read of late. September was a busy month for my reading schedule, so I had plenty to choose from! I spoke last month about broadening out my reading a bit, and I’ve certainly done that (including a couple of non-SF titles that I won’t cover on Track of Words), but this month all but one of my highlights have been Black Library releases – there’s been a lot of good stuff coming out of BL recently, even if their marketing hasn’t always done such a great job of publicising it.

As with last month I’ll go through each of my highlights in turn, talking a little about why I enjoyed each one so much and linking out to my reviews. If you read through to the end you’ll also see a quick section where I look ahead to some of the books (and a book-related event) that I’m particularly looking forward to in October. Without further ado, then – let’s get straight on with the highlights. I’ll start with the one non-BL book that I’ve picked out.

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Monthly Highlights – July and August 2019

It’s been a while since I’ve done a Monthly Highlights post, but I think it’s time to resurrect the concept and get back in the habit – so I’m starting off by looking back at the last two months! I’m going to pick out a few of the best books I’ve read in the second half of the year so far and talk a little about each, linking back to my reviews, then do the same thing for short stories as well. I love a good short story! I’ll quickly touch on some interesting news regarding submitting stories to Black Library, then finish with a look ahead to a few things I’m particularly looking forward to in September.

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Writing for Black Library – Summer of Writing 2019

The 2019 Black Library open submissions window has been officially confirmed – with the tagline “comrades in arms”, no less, as part of a summer of writing – and it’s running from the 26th August to the 23rd September. Check out my article Black Library Open Submissions – 2018 Recap for a look back at 2018’s open submissions window, including thoughts on some of the authors who successfully made it through, but in this article I’m going to talk a little about the guidelines for the 2019 window, and provide some useful resources for anyone interested in submitting including nterviews with some of the authors who successfully made it through and had stories published by Black Library.

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Writing for Black Library – Open Submissions 2018 Recap

Back in early 2018, Black Library announced an open submissions window – a fixed period of time during which the public was actively encouraged to submit pitches for stories set in the various worlds of Warhammer. BL don’t generally accept submissions outside one of these specific windows, and this one proved VERY popular! Ever since it closed there’s been speculation from fans about when the next such opportunity would arise…and now we know that it’s going to run between the 26th August and 23rd September 2019.

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The Best Black Library Anthologies of 2019: January to June

For my fourth and final article looking back at the best Black Library releases from the first half of 2019 – after looking at novels, audio dramas and short stories – this time I’m picking out my favourite anthologies published between January and June. While some of the other categories have been pretty tricky, this one was less of a tough choice, simply because there hasn’t been anywhere near as many anthologies released in 2019 as novels. I’m a huge fan of short story anthologies, however, so I think it’s definitely worth looking at a few of the best of these as well – if nothing else, they help demonstrate the sheer breadth of storytelling available to Black Library fans!

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The Best Black Library Short Stories of 2019: January to June

I’ve already written articles about the best Black Library novels, audio dramas and anthologies of 2019 so far, so this time around I’m picking out my personal favourite short stories released from January to June. For me personally the first couple of months of 2019 were a bit disappointing from the perspective of BL’s Digital Monday short stories, as the vast majority of them were pulled from older anthologies rather than being brand new stories. That changed as the year moved on, however, and looking back now there have been some fantastic tales released over the first half of the year.

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The Best Black Library Audio Dramas of 2019: January to June

The first half of 2019 brought with it a LOT of new content for Black Library fans to enjoy, with almost forty new books or audio dramas released between January and June, not to mention an impressive number reprints and digital-only short stories. In other articles I’ve run through my personal choices for the best BL novels, short stories and anthologies released so far, and in this article I’m going to do the same thing but for audio dramas. In recent years Black Library have invested heavily in this particular storytelling medium, and so far 2019 has – in my opinion – continued to show the benefits of that investment with some genuinely fantastic new releases.

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The Best Black Library Novels of 2019: January to June

2019 so far has been a busy year for Black Library, whose punishing release schedule continues to churn out new books, audio dramas and short stories at a phenomenal rate. Over the six months from January to June BL released somewhere in the region of FORTY new books or audio dramas, as well as a similar number of reprints (i.e. paperback editions, or reprinted hardbacks) and almost as many short stories. In this article I’m taking a look back at the first half of 2019 to highlight what I personally think have been the best new novels to have been released.

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