in Books, Free Reads
Free Read Pick: City of Ruin by Mark Charan Newton
This week’s free read is a 50-page excerpt from City of Ruin, the new novel by fantasy writer Mark Charan Newton.
On the Del Ray Spectra website, Newton describes his latest work:
“City of Ruin is a standalone novel within the Legends of the Red Sun world – so it can be read with or without Nights of Villjamur. That gave me some creative freedom, too – I wasn’t restricted by the constraints of a linear series. So, while of course continuing the overarching plot, I felt the need for reinvention of myself as a writer, as well as to build up a different region of the world I’d created. I like new things; I like exploring different places. So I developed another city.
…the novel is about a siege. It’s a war story. Villiren is a city under threat from an outside force, a race not natural to the world in which the book is set….Villiren is pretty despicable. People are treated so poorly. Gangs control so much of the place, corporate greed is everywhere, there are high levels of unemployment, the ice is coming… It doesn’t seem like the city is really worth saving at all.”
Read the excerpt.
DEEPER DIVE
Learn five facts about City of Ruin shared by Mark Charan Newton as part of Del Ray Spectra’s Take Five series.
