Emily Tesh Books In Order

Publication Order of The Greenhollow Duology Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Anthologies

Emily Tesh
Author Emily Tesh grew up in London and studied Classics at Trinity College, Cambridge, which was followed by a Master’s degree in Humanities at the University of Chicago.

She passes her time in Hertfordshire, teaching Ancient Greek and Latin to schoolkids that have done absolutely nothing to deserve any of it. Emily’s got a husband and cat. Neither one of whom knows any Latin, however that’s not for a lack of trying.

Emily is a winner of the World Fantasy Award for Best Novella and the Astounding Award. “Silver in the Wood” was nominated for a John W. Campbell Award for Best Book.

“Silver in the Wood” came from sort of an odd place; as she had just trunked a beloved manuscript which was never going to work and felt a bit disillusioned with the entire idea of writing. It was a novel she had spent five years refining and she really could not bear to let it go, but was beginning to realize it was broken on a fundamental level, which made her quite sad. So she decided to pen something short that was only for Emily and filled it with all the things she enjoyed and by being happy would make her quit thinking about it.

Emily had been on a Georgette Heyer reread marathon so she first thought: historical romance. But since she also likes magic: she then thought fantasy historical romance. Add in creepy things like ghosts and monsters. Then somewhere along the way she was rereading Lord of the Rings and playing the Witcher 3.

Growing up, she read anything mythical (Roman and Greek) she could get her hands on, but we are lucky to get a bunch of amazing sources for the myths of the Classical world in particular. She began with retellings for kids and was onto Homer and the tragedians by the time she got to her late teens, and never got past it, either, since her day job involves teaching this stuff.

She finds mythology and folklore so interesting to write about since people think they already know about them. Which provides you with some threads of audience assumption and expectation you can work with, which you can push against or lean right into. However with the “Greenhollow” books in particular she just made quite a bit of it up. She had this vague sense of an English-woodland-magic atmosphere, and a handful of monsters which were nabbed from these different traditions, and stuck it together in a way which felt interesting and fun.

“Silver in the Wood” is the first novel in the “Greenhollow Duology” and was released in 2019. There is a Wild Man that lives in the deep quiet of Greenhollow, and he just listens to the wood. Tethered to the forest, Tobias never dwells on his past life, yet he does live a perfectly unremarkable existence with his cat, his cottage, and his dryads.

Greenhollow Hall gets an intensely curious and handsome new owner in Henry Silver, it all changes. Old secrets that were better left buried deep get dug up, and Tobias must reckon with his own troubled past, both the green magic of the woods, and the dark things resting in his heart.

This is a beautifully told, ethereal yet grounded novella. Fans of the book found this to be one of the most atmospheric books they’ve ever read, and is a dark, whimsical, and verdant read. Tobias immediately captivated readers, because he’s that wild old man of the woods that is grown into the trees as much as they are into him. While his backstory gets told, the fairy tale vibes get even stronger.

“Drowned Country” is the second novel in the “Greenhollow Duology” and was released in 2020. Henry and Tobias, and the magic of a myth that they have always known.

Even the Wild Man of Greenhollow cannot ignore a summons coming from his mom, when that mom is the indomitable Adela Silver, a practical folklorist. Henry Silver does not relish what he is going to find in the grimy seaside town of Rothport, where the ancient wood extended before it got drowned underneath the sea once. One missing girl, a monster on the loose, or, the worst of all, Tobias Finich, the man that loves him.

Both stories in this little duology is fully folklorish and filled with twisted vines and growing things as well as the aching loneliness that comes from attempting to figure out what you actually want in life. Readers found this to be dreamy and soft, yet still packing such a massive punch. Emily’s writing is lovely, with the contrast between the concerns of immortality and magic and the rather normal growing pains of a relationship is quite interesting. Readers loved every moment they got spend in this world.

“Some Desperate Glory” is the first stand alone novel and was released in 2023.
All of her life Kyr’s been training for the day that she can avenge the planet Earth’s murder. Growing up in the bowels of Gaea Station right alongside the few remaining scraps of humanity, she prepares herself to face the Wisdom, which is the reality-shaping and all powerful weapon which gave the Majoda their victory over mankind.

They are what remains, and they’re what has to survive. Kyr is one of the very best warriors of her entire generation, the sword from a dead planet. However when Command assigns her own brother to a certain death and relegates her merely to the nursery to have sons until she dies trying, she knows that she must take humanity’s revenge into her very own hands.

Along with her brother’s seditious yet brilliant buddy and a captive, lonely alien, she escapes from all that she has ever known into a universe that is much more complex than she was taught and much more wondrous than she could’ve imagined.

A thrillingly told queer space opera all about the wreckage of war, the family that you find, and who you are forced to become when every choice becomes stripped out of your hands.