14 fantasy and science fiction books to read in June 2023

GODS OF THE WYRDWOOD by RJ Barker (The Forsaken Trilogy #1) — June 27

The Bone Ships author RJ Barker is launching a new series this month: The Forsaken Trilogy, which kicks off with Gods of the Wyrdwood. It doesn’t sound like there’ll be any seafaring this time around, which marks a departure from Barker’s previous series. Instead, the author will be taking readers into a mystical forest under the watchful eye of gods and goddesses. A child is missing, and something tells me the people looking for them will find more than they expect in the mysterious Deepforest.

Cahan du Nahare is known as the forester—a man who can navigate the dangerous Deepforest like no one else. But once he was more. Once he belonged to the god of fire.

Udinny serves the goddess of the lost, a goddess of small things; when she ventures into the Deepforest to find a lost child, Cahan will be her guide. But in a land where territory is won and lost for uncaring gods, where temples of warrior monks pit one prophet against another—Cahan will need to choose the forest or the fire—and his choice will have consequences for his entire world.

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THE ARCHIVE UNDYING by Emma Mieko Candon (The Downworld Sequence #1) — June 27

AI is a hot topic at the moment, so this book comes along at a good time. Author Emma Mieko Candon’s latest novel The Archive Undying is a mecha fiction story that brings in a ton of intriguing sci-fi elements like AI deities and police states. With an LGBTQ+ lead, this is also a solid choice for Pride Month. This one sounds like a mind-bender:

WHEN AN AI DIES, ITS CITY DIES WITH IT
WHEN A CITY FALLS, IT LEAVES A CORPSE BEHIND
WHEN THAT CORPSE RUNS OFF, ONLY DEVOTION CAN BRING IT BACK

When the robotic god of Khuon Mo went mad, it destroyed everything it touched. It killed its priests, its city, and all its wondrous works. But in its final death throes, the god brought one thing back to life: its favorite child, Sunai. For the seventeen years since, Sunai has walked the land like a ghost, unable to die, unable to age, and unable to forget the horrors he’s seen. He’s run as far as he can from the wreckage of his faith, drowning himself in drink, drugs, and men. But when Sunai wakes up in the bed of the one man he never should have slept with, he finds himself on a path straight back into the world of gods and machines.

The Archive Undying is the first volume of Emma Mieko Candon’s Downworld Sequence, a sci-fi series where AI deities and brutal police states clash, wielding giant robots steered by pilot-priests with corrupted bodies.

Come get in the robot.

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THE FRUGAL WIZARD’S HANDBOOK TO SURVIVING MEDIEVAL ENGLAND by Brandon Sanderson — June 27

What, you thought a month would sneak by without a new release from Brandon Sanderson? Think again!

Okay, so this isn’t a completely new release, but it’s still worth noting. The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook to Surviving Medieval England is the second of Sanderson’s “Secret Projects,” the four books he revealed as part of his record-shattering Kickstarter campaign last year. This one went out to the Kickstarter backers and was available as an ebook as of April 2023, but in June we’ll see a proper hardcover release courtesy of Sanderson’s longtime publisher Tor Books.

This is interesting, because up until now the plan according to Sanderson was for the Tor hardcover versions of each Secret Project to come out four months after the ebook was released; this happened with the first one, Tress of the Emerald Sea, which went out to the Kickstarter patrons and on the ebook market in January and was followed up with a physical release in April. Something has changed, since The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook to Surviving Medieval England was originally released in May, with a much shorter gap between that and the hardcover version.

Whatever the background, it’s certainly good news if you’ve been waiting to pick up a physical copy of this book! It’s a fun, somewhat outrageous romp in the vein of Terry Pratchett, and since it’s not a part of Sanderson’s wider Cosmere universe, no prior reading is necessary to fully enjoy it.

A man awakes in a clearing in what appears to be medieval England with no memory of who he is, where he came from, or why he is there. Chased by a group from his own time, his sole hope for survival lies in regaining his missing memories, making allies among the locals, and perhaps even trusting in their superstitious boasts. His only help from the “real world” should have been a guidebook entitled The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England, except his copy exploded during transit. The few fragments he managed to save provide clues to his situation, but can he figure them out in time to survive?

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And so ends our monthly round-up of science fiction and fantasy books. Which ones will you be reading this month?

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