A Forest has taken villages across rural Britain, and the fae inside it steal children. Richard K. Morgan's standalone dark fantasy follows the war veteran who goes in to bring them back.

Readical Key Points

• A standalone novel of dark fantasy, set in Britain after World War I; no earlier books needed
• Reviewed in Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and Booklist
• Content note: includes graphic violence and the abduction of children
• Hardcover, 496 pages, Del Rey (2026)

Duncan Silver came home from the trenches still carrying the war. He now hunts the Huldu, an ancient and inhuman fae race, armed with an iron knife and a shortened trench gun loaded with iron shot, and returns stolen children to their families. One commission, from a mother whose four-year-old daughter was taken six months earlier, with a changeling left in her place, pulls him into a much larger contest and back toward secrets in his own past.

Publishers Weekly called it hardboiled fantasy, and Library Journal placed it in grimdark. It suits readers of dark and historical fantasy, and readers who know Morgan from Altered Carbon. It sets one veteran's iron against an older kind of war, fought among trees that stand where villages used to be.

About the Author

Richard K. Morgan is the author of Altered Carbon, a New York Times Notable Book and winner of the Philip K. Dick Award, later adapted as a two-season Netflix series. His novel Market Forces won the John W. Campbell Award, Thirteen won the Arthur C. Clarke Award, and The Steel Remains won the Gaylactic Spectrum Award.

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