Thursday means Lockdown Reading day. Today we have a new story from Juliet McKenna. Fire in the Night takes place after the events of Southern Fire, the first book in the Aldabreshin Compass series. There are two more short stories that follow on from this one. We’ll put them both out if Lockdown lasts that long. Juliet talks about the genesis of the stories here.

I am reminded that Southern Fire came out in 2003. It featured a black lead character, and is set in a majority-black society, long before such things happened. Tor, who did the US edition, even put the hero, Daish Kheda, on the cover, which of course meant that the book sank without trace. Thankfully things are better these days.