It could be that I just have kaiju books on the brain, what with our upcoming podcast episode and all, but when I ran across a Kickstarter page promoting a new anthology book about giant kaiju-fighting robots, I had to run back here and fill you all in.
The series of stories written by an intense assortment of best-selling authors focuses on giant mechs and the pilots who control them. Each story will be its own slice of kaiju-battling action and drama that will be unique to the contributing author's perspective. The book is actually a follow up to the well known Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters anthology collection and is being called a "companion" of sorts to that book. A few of the stories will be related to or reference the other, so I think it's probably worth checking out the original if this looks interesting to you.
Here's a list of the stories and their author's contributing to MECH: Age of Steel :
- “Travailiant” by Kevin J. Anderson & David Boop
- “Easy as Pie” by Jody Lynn Nye
- Untitled by Peter Clines (Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters tie-in)
- “Ordo Talos” by Graham McNeill
- “Rogue 57” by Jeremy Robinson
- “Toy Soldier” by James Swallow
- “Birthright” by Martha Wells
- “A Single Feather” by Jeffrey J. Mariotte & Marsheila Rockwell
- “Jäegermeister” by Gini Koch (as J.C. Koch)
- “All for One” by Mark Teppo
- “I Am the Pilot” by Ramez Naam & Jason M. Hough
- “All Together Now” by Ramez Naam & Jason M. Hough
- “The Bonus Situation” by Jeff Somers
- “Fadem” by Anton Strout
- “The Tempered Steel of Antiquity Grey” by Shawn Speakman
- “Mecha Mishipeshu vs Theseus IV” by C.L. Werner (Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters tie-in)
- "After the Victory" by M.L. Brennan
- “The Cold and the Dark” by James R. Tuck
- “Vulture Patrol” by Jennifer Brozek
- “Here We Go! Fight!” by Kane Gilmour
- “The Stars Shine Home” by Mallory Reaves
- "Battlefield Recovery" by Andrew Liptak
- “Integration” by Steve Diamon
- “Of the Fire” by Paul Genesse
- “Machine Heart” by Patrick M. Tracy
I didn't start this podcast or blog to be a mouthpiece for promoting Kickstarters, but I thought this looked really interesting and I'm going to have to pick up the first book and keep an eye on this new one after seeing the talent involved. Let me know if you might do the same.
MECH: Age of Steel will release on January 10, 2017 by Ragnarok Publications. You can get an early pre-release copy by contributing to their Kickstarter here.