Publishers Lunch is reporting that a division within Google—Niantic Labs—is readying the first in a potentially extensive line of ebooks and books, in conjunction with author and co-publisher Thomas Greanias and his @lantis Books. It’s known as the ALIGNMENT series and the first first ebook novella, the 150-page THE ALIGNMENT: INGRESS, is set for publication on April 2 in the Google Play Store, but also on all other major ebook platforms, either simultaneously or shortly thereafter.
So Michael Cader scoops in this weekend’s Publishers Lunch dated March 15.
“The books tie in to Niantic’s hot alternate/augmented reality MMOG Ingress that Google has been rolling out in closed beta over the past few months,” Cader reports. “Google product manager for the Ingress game Brandon Badger confirms the ebook release, as well as plans for a potentially extensive line of additional books.”
Publishers Lunch is the first to display the cover outside of a small circle at Google. Even there, Cader reports, “information about the book line has been tightly held, and Greanias says this release will be followed shortly by a widely-disseminated trailer and short excerpt.”
The series features astro-archaeologist Conrad Yeats and linguist Serena Serghetti from Greanias’s New York Times bestselling RAISING ATLANTIS series of books. They join a new character from the Ingress game, Hank Johnson, in a “sci-tech adventure set in Africa and the hunt for the true secret behind the Queen of Sheba’s gold and her relationship with King Solomon.”
Greanias calls his Alignment series a re-imagined “reboot” that takes place before his RAISING ATLANTIS storyline but unfolds in the present day, in real-time conjunction with current events in the Ingress game.
Current plans call for “several ALIGNMENT ebooks that will ultimately be published in a single hardcover,” THE ALIGNMENT: FEDERAL CITY. There are potentially 13 ALIGNMENT books to follow and a variety of other books and enhanced ebooks that draw on game assets, and more.
