Shadows of the Apt

I put together a list of all the short fiction I've had in print, mostly so I could keep track of things myself. However, if anyone is feeling like a monomaniac completionist, look upon my works, as they say:   Year Published Publisher 2144 And All That 2013 Feast and Famine Newcon 21^st Century Girl 2012 (online) Nature.com Ancien Régime […]

I. Lives of the Monster Insects (from the secret histories of the Moths) “An age ago, before all records, before metal was smelted, before writing began, the great insects came. That was a world with different skies, with strange beasts, with stranger people. But the insects were the end of them. They hunted the beasts, they devoured […]

O‑kay, on the back of all that Fantasyconcatenation I have some more confirmed dates for signings. Or at least date. As well as joining Adam Nevill and Mark Charan Newton at Forbidden Planet on the 15^th October, 1–2pm, I shall be in Reading the day before at the Waterstones Bookshop (the one on Broad Street as usual) on […]

Herewith the lands of the Insect-kinden, as so far revealed. Click on each map to view in full detail. All maps are the work of Hemesh Alles. The Lowlands, showing the Three City Alliance The East-Empire and the Exalsee The South and West-Empire and the Dominion of Khanaphes The Spiderlands And last, for now, the […]

Language tends to get one of two treatments in fantasy — either it's never looked at, everyone speaks English and it's all fine, or Tolkien. Mr T being a professor of Anglo-Saxon, I think, he went to town on the languages in a big way. Indeed I believe I read that the languages came first, the history second, the actual fiction […]

(Beware, this list takes the cast up to the end of Salute the Dark. There may be spoilers) Aagen — Wasp artificer ACHAEOS — Moth seer and raider, lover of Cheerwell Maker Adax — Tarkesh Ant, duellist at the College Adran — Wasp soldier, member of the Broken Sword Adraxa — Ant, one of Scuto's […]

There are small city-states of Bee-kinden in surprisingly many places. They are a quiet, industrious people who do their best not to trouble their neighbours. Bees work tirelessly for Spider overlords in the south, and cling to the inhospitable western coast. Most of all, however, Bee-kinden are slaves of the Empire. They are an Apt people, […]

To coincide with the publication of Dragonfly Falling I recently interviewed Adrian about the world behind the Shadows of the Apt and what readers might expect from the new book. So, without further ado, you can listen to the podcast in its various forms on the Pan Macmillan podcast page. Alternatively you can download it. Enjoy!

Scorpion-kinden live lives of violence, greed and savage joy. Raiders, traders, slave-takers and mercenaries, they can be found making a brutal living across the Empire, the Spiderlands and the eastern Lowlands. Clawed and belligerent, they respect only strength. For the old, the weak, the infirm of purpose, there is only death or flight. So it is […]