Bitter Seeds (The Milkweek Triptych Book 1)

From “a major talent,” a WWII alternate military history that pits German soldiers with superpowers against British occult forces (George R. R. Martin, New York Times–bestselling author of Game of Thrones).It’s 1939. The Nazis have supermen, the British have demons, and one perfectly normal man gets caught in between.Raybould Marsh is a British secret agent in the early days of the Second World War, haunted by something strange he saw on a mission during the Spanish Civil War: a German woman with wires going into her head who looked at him as if she knew him.When the Nazis start running missions with people who have unnatural abilities—a woman who can turn invisible, a man who can walk through walls, and the woman Marsh saw in Spain who can use her knowledge of the future to twist the present—Marsh is the man who has to face them. He rallies the secret warlocks of Britain to hold the impending invasion at bay. But magic always exacts a price. Eventually, the sacrifice necessary to defeat the enemy will be as terrible as outright defeat would be.Bitter Seeds is an epic tale of a twentieth century like ours and also profoundly different.“Exciting and intense . . . The clash of magic and (mad) science meshes perfectly with the tumultuous setting.” —Publishers Weekly“A white-knuckle plot, beautiful descriptions, and complex characters—an unstoppable Vickers of a novel.” —Cory Doctorow, New York Times–bestselling author of The Bezzle“[Bitter Seeds] may rival Naomi Novik’s Tales of Temeraire as a sustained historical fantasy.” —Booklist

From Publishers Weekly

Debut novelist Tregillis breathes new life into alternate military history with this fun take on WWII. In this version of 1939 Germany, the insane Dr. von Westarp has given WWI orphans superpowers, such as fire-starting, intangibility, and invisibility. As they use their abilities to aid German expansion, young mutant Klaus starts to suspect that he and the other soldiers are being manipulated by his precognitive sister, Gretel. Meanwhile, British secret agent Raybould Marsh recruits his old college buddy, magic-wielding aristocrat Will Beauclerk, to the British cause. Tregillis has trouble fleshing out characters and is overly fond of worn-out plot devices—a disastrous raid survived only by the protagonists, an urchin destined for greatness—but the action sequences are exciting and intense, and the clash of magic and (mad) science meshes perfectly with the tumultuous setting. (Apr.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

In the Spanish Civil War, British secret agent Raybould Marsh thinks he saw a German woman with wires growing out of her head. Once WWII erupts, he learns that his eyes weren’t fooling him. The Germans have developed various kinds of real live supermen, such as the wired-up lady, with the ability to foretell and influence the future. The British have their own, equally secret occult arsenal, including warlocks to conjure “friendly” demons and fight the other kind. A member of the Wild Cards group, Tregillis begins a saga in his first novel, one that may rival Naomi Novik’s Tales of Temeraire as a sustained historical fantasy. --Roland Green

George R. R. Martin

“A major talent.”

Publishers Weekly

“Exciting and intense… The clash of magic and (mad) science meshes perfectly with the tumultuous setting.”

an unstoppable Vickers of a novel.”

“A white-knuckle plot, beautiful descriptions, and complex characters

Booklist

“Bitter Seeds may rival Naomi Novik’s Tales of Temeraire as a sustained historical fantasy.”

About the Author

IAN TREGILLIS lives near Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he works as a physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory. He is a member of the Wild Cards writing collective, directed by George R. R. Martin. Bitter Seeds is his first novel.

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