Frontier

by Grace Curtis

Overview

FRONTIER is a heartfelt queer romance in a high noon standoff with our planet’s uncertian future.

Frontier is The Mandalorian meets Mad Max, with the emotional heart of the Wayfarers series. But at its core, Frontier is a love story, about two women who find each other, lose each other and then find each other again.

"Curtis oozes charm and humour in this pacey debut, which will be devoured by fans of Fallout and Firefly" Tamsyn Muir

A dazzling debut for fans of Becky Chambers and Mary Robinette Kowal.




In the distant future most of the human race has fled a ravaged Earth to find new life on other planets. For those who stayed a lawless society remains. Technology has been renounced, and saints and sinners, lawmakers and sheriffs, travelers and gunslingers, abound.

What passes for justice is presided over by the High Sheriff, and carried out by his cruel and ruthless Deputy.

Then a ship falls from the sky, bringing the planet’s first visitor in three hundred years. This Stranger is a crewmember on the first ship in centuries to attempt a return to Earth and save what’s left. But her escape pod crashes hundreds of miles away from the rest of the wreckage.

The Stranger finds herself adrift in a ravaged, unwelcoming landscape, full of people who hate and fear her space-born existence. Scared, alone, and armed, she embarks on a journey across the wasteland to return to her ship, her mission, and the woman she loves.

Fusing the fire and brimstone of the American Old West with sprawling post-apocalyptic science fiction, FRONTIER is a heartfelt queer romance in a high noon standoff set against the backdrop of our planet’s uncertain future.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781786187048
Publisher:	Solaris
Publication date:	02/14/2023
Pages:	304
Sales rank:	219,718
Product dimensions:	5.30(w) x 8.50(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Outside of novels, Grace Curtis mostly makes her living from video games. She's written for magazines like Eurogamer and Edge, and has a wonderful day job at an indie game publisher called Future Friends. When not writing she can usually be found up a hill somewhere, climbing or hiking or lolling idly in the grass. She lives in Bristol, UK.

Editorial Reviews

10/31/2022

The far-future Earth of Curtis’s rocky debut is devastated and near abandoned when its first visitor in three centuries falls from an escape pod. There’s an Old West feel to this apocalyptic world, which will draw in readers of weird westerns, but after the strong opening, the plot devolves into an increasingly disjointed series of vignettes, each featuring a different name for the newly arrived “stranger” and a different trial she must overcome in her trek to be reunited with the rest of her ship and the woman she loves. Raising the stakes are the nefarious High Sheriff at New Destiny and his invidious Deputy Seawall, who pose a threat to the stranger’s mission. The style shifts repeatedly and often abruptly as Curtis gradually reveals her heroine’s military backstory and the truth of her arrival on Earth. A moving theme of redemption and an admirable focus on environmentalism are both obscured by the jerky and convoluted structure. There are good ideas here, but the execution falters. Agent: Zoë Plant, Bent Agency. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

“Curtis oozes charm and humour in this pacey debut, which will be devoured by fans of Fallout and Firefly” — Tamsyn Muir, NY Times bestselling author of The Locked Tomb series

“A delightfully inventive sci-fi western. With her debut, Curtis weaves a masterful web of longing, desperation, and intrigue, effortlessly transporting you to a climate-ravaged Earth, where the stakes are high and the body count is even higher. If you liked Firefly, you’re going to absolutely love Frontier” — Kate Dylan, author of Mindwalker

“Full of action and adventure, but never forgets its heart” — Beth Revis, NY Times bestselling author of Across the Universe and Star Wars: The Princess and the Scoundrel

“I’m officially a member of the Grace Curtis fan club!” — Amie Kaufman, NY Times bestselling author of llluminae

“The character development is some of the best I’ve ever encountered” — SCIFI.radio

“Adventurous... and intimate” — Library Journal

From the Publisher

11/01/2022

DEBUT Earth has succumbed to lawlessness: those humans who were not fortunate enough to escape the damage they had caused three centuries ago were left to survive in a near-barren land, eschewing technology and turning their suffering into a religious cause. Then a Stranger lands on this long-abandoned world, searching for survivors of her spacecraft, hoping that the woman she loves has survived. Facing off against zealots, fearmongers, and the iron hand of the Sheriff, she travels across the wastelands for the glimmer of hope she carries in her heart. The Stranger's interactions also lead her on a journey of understanding that just because a world is left behind, it does not mean that it is gone. The pacing is almost leisurely, although it speeds up towards the end. Moving between character interactions brings a deeper view into how the world could go in such an anti-technology direction. VERDICT This western-inspired, post-apocalyptic tale is an adventurous science-fiction story, filled with a high-action quest and intimate looks at what people will do to survive.—Kristi Chadwick

Library Journal