Here’s the latest Books, Graphic Novels, and DVDs being released this week. Enjoy! And make sure when you are visiting our local shops like Park Road Books and VisArt Videos, that you tell them you heard about them on CharlotteGeeks.com!
Books
(courtesy of Park Road Books, http://www.parkroadbooks.com)
The Rithmatist
Author: Brandon Sanderson
Release date: May 14, 2013
More than anything, Joel wants to be a Rithmatist. Chosen by the Master in a mysterious inception ceremony, Rithmatists have the power to infuse life into two-dimensional figures known as Chalklings. Rithmatists are humanity’s only defense against the Wild Chalklings—creatures that leave mangled corpses in their wake. Having nearly overrun the territory of Nebrask, the Wild Chalklings now threaten all of the American Isles.
As the son of a lowly chalkmaker at Armedius Academy, Joel can only watch as Rithmatist students study the magical art that he would do anything to practice. Then students start disappearing—kidnapped from their rooms at night, leaving trails of blood. Assigned to help the professor who is investigating the crimes, Joel and his friend Melody find themselves on the trail of an unexpected discovery—one that will change Rithmatics—and their world—forever.
The Human Division
Author: John Scalzi
Release date: May 14, 2013
Following the events of The Last Colony, John Scalzi tells the story of the fight to maintain the unity of the human race
The people of Earth now know that the human Colonial Union has kept them ignorant of the dangerous universe around them. For generations the CU had defended humanity against hostile aliens, deliberately keeping Earth an ignorant backwater and a source of military recruits. Now the CU’s secrets are known to all. Other alien races have come on the scene and formed a new alliance—an alliance against the Colonial Union. And they’ve invited the people of Earth to join them. For a shaken and betrayed Earth, the choice isn’t obvious or easy.
Published online from January to April 2013 as a three-month digital serial, The Human Division will appear as a full-length novel of the Old Man’s War universe, plus—for the first time in print—the original tale of Lieutenant Harry Wilson, and a coda that wasn’t part of the digital serialization.
River of Stars
Author: Guy Gavriel Kay
Release date: April 2, 2013
In his novel Under Heaven, Guy Gavriel Kay told a powerful story inspired by China’s Tang Dynasty. Now, Kay revisits that invented setting four centuries later with an epic of prideful emperors, battling courtiers, bandits and soldiers, nomadic invasions, and a woman battling in her own way, to find a new place for women in the world – a world inspired by the Song Dynasty.
Ren Daiyan was still just a boy when he took the lives of seven men while guarding an imperial magistrate of Kitai. That moment on a lonely road changed his life—in entirely unexpected ways, sending him into the forests of Kitai among the outlaws. From there he emerges years later—and his life changes again, dramatically, as he circles towards the court and emperor, while war approaches Kitai from the north.
Lin Shan is the daughter of a scholar, his beloved only child. Educated by him in ways young women never are, gifted as a songwriter and calligrapher, she finds herself living a life suspended between two worlds. Her intelligence captivates an emperor—and alienates women at the court. But when her father’s life is endangered by the politics of the day, Shan must act in ways no woman ever has.
Make Good Art
Author: Neil Gaiman & Chip Kidd
Release date: May 14, 2013
In May 2012, bestselling author Neil Gaiman delivered the commencement address at Philadelphia’s University of the Arts, in which he shared his thoughts about creativity, bravery, and strength. He encouraged the fledgling painters, musicians, writers, and dreamers to break rules and think outside the box. Most of all, he encouraged them to make good art.
The book Make Good Art, designed by renowned graphic artist Chip Kidd, contains the full text of Gaiman’s speech.
Graphic Novels
Montague Terrace
Author: Warren and Gary Pleece
Release date: May 13, 2013
Meet the residents of Montague Terrace: landlocked sailors, fake pet psychics, hounded inventors and randy postmen, unsuccessful megalomaniacs, nervous magicians, 1930s detectives. And all under one roof.
In Montague Terrace, nothing is quite what is seems. Within its boundaries live an array of strange and extraordinary residents, including Paul Gregory, self-exiled pop crooner holed up in his Montague hovel for close to forty years, with only fading memories of a semi-successful music career and a bottle of JD for company. Mrs Beatrice Green, codename Babushka, an aged former special ops agent fighting a new war against overzealous council officials. Marvo the Magic Bunny and Mystical Marvin, a pair of down-on-their luck entertainers, shielding a disturbing past. The Puppeteer, toiling away day and night, pulling the strings of world events and causing chaos out of order.
Landlocked sailors, fake pet psychics, hounded inventors and randy postmen. Welcome to Montague Terrace.From Amazon.com
Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 9 Volume 3 [Kindle Edition]
Author: Various (Author, Illustrator), Scott Allie (Editor), Sierra Hahn (Editor)
Release Date: May 14, 2013
In a bold move to give disenfranchised Slayers a meaningful societal role (with pay), Kennedy recruits Buffy to act as bodyguard for high-profile clientele. But unlike the other recruits, Buffy struggles to abandon her Slaying instincts and looks for demony threats where none lie (much to Kennedy’s dismay). So it’s only natural that her first job is to protect a tech mogul who just so happens to be running from demon assassins! Collects Buffy Season 9 #11–#15. From Amazon.com
Dungeons & Dragons: The Legend of Drizzt – Neverwinter Tales [Paperback]
Author: Agustin Padilla (Contributor), R. A. Salvatore (Contributor), Geno Salvatore (Contributor)
The most popular character from the most popular fantasy world of all time comes to life in his first original comic book tale. Drizzt and his companion, Dahlia, hunt for something that seems part vampire and part elite dwarven warrior, and must find out how the evil lich Valindra Shadowmantle and her minion Korbin Dor’crae factor into the mystery. From Amazon.com
DVDs
(Courtesy of VisArt Video, http://www.visartvideo.org)
Cloud Atlas
An exploration of how the actions of individual lives impact one another in the past, present and future, as one soul is shaped from a killer into a hero, and an act of kindness ripples across centuries to inspire a revolution. From imdb.com
Face 2 Face
This summer Katherine Brooks travels across the Unites States to meet 50 of her facebook friends, documenting the entire trip. Finally bringing us real reality. From imdb.com
Texas Chainsaw
A young woman travels to Texas to collect an inheritance; little does she know that an encounter with a chainsaw-wielding killer is part of the reward. From imdb.com.