Showing posts with label supernatural. Show all posts
Showing posts with label supernatural. Show all posts
Sep 8, 2017
Jun 1, 2017
Feb 1, 2016
Soulless - Gail Carriger
Soulless - Carriger, GailSummary: The life of a spinster in Victorian London isn't an easy one on the best of days, but such a life becomes infinitely more complicated when said spinster is "soulless" - a preternatural bridging the gap between the natural and supernatural worlds. Miss Alexia Tarabotti has this unique distinction, and when she is assailed at a formal gathering by a rove vampire, an encounter that results in the death of the half-starved creature, her circumstances become exponentially more complicated indeed! Now caught up in an intrigue with life or death stakes, Alexia must rely on all her talents to outmatch the forces conspiring against her, but it may be the man who has caught her eye - Lord Conall Maccon - and their budding flirtation that truly drives her to her wit's end!
Publishers Weekly Review
*Starred Review* Carriger debuts brilliantly with a blend of Victorian romance, screwball comedy of manners and alternate history. Prickly, stubborn 25-year-old bluestocking Alexia Tarabotti is patently unmarriageable, and not just because she's large-nosed and swarthy. She's also soulless, an oddity and a secret even in a 19th-century London that mostly accepts and integrates werewolf packs, vampire hives and ghosts. The only man who notices her is brash Lord Conall Maccon, a Scottish Alpha werewolf and government official, and (of course) they dislike each other intensely. After Alexia kills a vampire with her parasol at a party—how vulgar!—she and Conall must work together to solve a supernatural mystery that grows quite steampunkishly gruesome. Well-drawn secondary characters round out the story, most notably Lord Akeldama, Alexia's outrageous, italic-wielding gay best vampire friend. This intoxicatingly witty parody will appeal to a wide cross-section of romance, fantasy and steampunk fans.
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Oct 16, 2015
Rivers of London Series - Ben Aaronovitch
Summary: My name is Peter Grant and until January I was just probationary constable in that mighty army for justice known to all right-thinking people as the Metropolitan Police Service (and as the Filth to everybody else). My only concerns in life were how to avoid a transfer to the Case Progression Unit - we do paperwork so real coppers don't have to - and finding a way to climb into the panties of the outrageously perky WPC Leslie May. Then one night, in pursuance of a murder inquiry, I tried to take a witness statement from someone who was dead but disturbingly voluble, and that brought me to the attention of Inspector Nightingale, the last wizard in England. Now I'm a Detective Constable and a trainee wizard, the first apprentice in fifty years, and my world has become somewhat more complicated: nests of vampires in Purley, negotiating a truce between the warring god and goddess of the Thames, and digging up graves in Covent Garden ...and there's something festering at the heart of the city I love, a malicious vengeful spirit that takes ordinary Londoners and twists them into grotesque mannequins to act out its drama of violence and despair. The spirit of riot and rebellion has awakened in the city, and it's falling to me to bring order out of chaos - or die trying.
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Nov 1, 2014
Unmarked - Kami Garcia
Unmarked - Garcia, KamiSummary: Kennedy Waters and her companions find themselves in a world where vengeance spirits kill, ghosts keep secrets, and a demon walks the Earth. As they learn more about their ancient secret society, its longtime rivals the Illuminati, and Kennedy's mysterious family, they wonder whether Kennedy is really meant to be a member of the Legion.
Booklist Reviews
Accidentally releasing the powerful demon Andras (in Unbreakable, 2013) leaves Kennedy Waters guilt-ridden, especially as destructive weather, widespread violence, and eerie kidnappings dominate the nightly news—surely it's a sign of Andras' evil at work. Even after her friends, especially hunky Jared, rescue her from boarding school, she still can't quite shake the feeling that she deserves all the blame. But her inner struggles quickly take a backseat to their quest to uncover the secret last member of the Legion, who happens to be Kennedy's long-lost relative. In this installment of Garcia's popular series, the teens dig up encoded clues all over the Eastern Seaboard to trace the ancient history of the Legion, and in the process, they learn life-altering truths about Kennedy's past and the source of her gifts. Garcia's cinematic scenes—full of timely reveals, terrifying moments of demonic possession, and crackerjack detective work— zip on by with a pace that rivals Dan Brown. That, coupled with snarky, mood-lightening teenage interludes, makes this a crowd-pleasing page-turner. Readers new to the series should start with the first installment.
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Sep 1, 2014
Daughter of Smoke and Bone - Laini Taylor
Daughter of Smoke and Bone - Taylor, LainiSummary: Seventeen-year-old Karou, a lovely, enigmatic art student in a Prague boarding school, carries a sketchbook of hideous, frightening monsters--the chimaerae who form the only family she has ever known, in a unique fantasy by an award-winning author about forbidden love, an epic battle and hope for a world remade.
Booklist Reviews
Seventeen-year-old Karou moves deftly between her relatively normal high-school life in Prague and the strange world of the chimaera, in which she collects the human and animal teeth that the wishmonger, Brimstone, painstakingly sorts. The chimaera are the only family Karou has known, and when access to their world suddenly disappears behind smoldering black handprints, she vows to find them. Could this have been a result of the perpetual war between the chimaera and the seraphim? Along with this central mystery of monsters, a fantastical Romeo-and-Juliet romance develops between Karou and the angel Akiva, a romance destined for hurt and betrayal. Author Taylor has created a variety of worlds, time frames, and creatures with such detail and craft that all are believable. Blurring the boundaries of good and evil, slaves and owners, human and beast, she careens readers from sadness to love, from the predictable to the amazing, and from the outlandish to the bizarre. Readers will look forward to the suggested sequel to this complex, exciting tale.
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Jul 1, 2014
Dreams of Gods & Monsters - Laini Taylor
Dreams of Gods & Monsters - Taylor, LainiSummary: When a brutal angel army trespasses into the human world, Karou and Akiva must ally their enemy armies against the threat -- and against larger dangers that loom on the horizon in this thrilling conclusion to the Daughter of Smoke & Bone trilogy.
Booklist Reviews
In Taylor's third and final installment in her Daughter of Smoke and Bone trilogy, Karou and Akiva's dream of peace and a life together comes tantalizingly close, only to be repeatedly thwarted by their peoples' separate and conflicting histories, both mystical and real. Joined by angels and chimaera, Karou and Akiva lead their armies and fight side by side to prevent the apocalypse by banishing Jael, captain of the Dominion of Seraphim, from the earth he is determined to destroy. New revelations, characters, multiple love stories, and constant plot twists and suspense will not disappoint Taylor's many fans, who will also appreciate the novel's subtle philosophical undercurrents about racial harmony and the profound difficulty of making choices that reconcile duty, the greater good, and personal happiness.
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Let the Old Dreams Die - John Ajvide Lindqvist
Let the Old Dreams Die - Ajvide Lindqvist, JohnSummary: Called Sweden's Stephen King, the author of the internationally acclaimed Let the Right One In continues the story of Oskar and Eli in this terrifying collection that also includes "Equinox," in which a woman makes a disturbing discovery while taking care of her vacationing neighbor's house.
Booklist Reviews
Lindqvist's short stories pack the same emotional punch as his novels. This collection includes sequels to two of his best-known works, Let the Right One In and Handling the Undead. Both are pleasing, if frightening, epilogues to their respective stories. Aside from those, there are atmospheric tales of people with strange origins and things to hide in The Border, urban monsters in A Village in the Sky, and the terrible thing a woman finds while house-sitting in Equinox. There's also Eternal/Love, which explores the true horror of immortal love. Suffice it to say—this is only a small sampling of the stories presented here—that Lindqvist's short pieces are terribly effective horror fiction, both in the sense of being deeply unnerving and rarely safe to read any night, and also in the sense of exploring the hidden, shadowy facets of human emotional lives. These are excellent examples of the form, and well worth reading—just not alone in a cold, dark house.
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The Ghosts of Tupelo Landing - Sheila Turnage
The Ghosts of Tupelo Landing - Turnage, SheilaSummary: When Miss Lana accidentally buys a haunted inn at the Tupelo Landing town auction, Desperado Detectives--aka Mo LoBeau and her best friend Dale--opens up a paranormal division to solve the ghost's identity before the town's big 250th anniversary bash.
Horn Book Guide Reviews
In this sweet, laid-back sequel to Three Times Lucky, Mo LoBeau and Dale find themselves in another mystery. When the abandoned Tupelo Inn goes up for auction, Miss Lana and Grandmother Miss Lacy outbid a snippy banker and take ownership of the ramshackle inn, including a strange apparition. Mo's distinctive voice, full of humor and Southern colloquialisms, narrates a tale with many twists and turns.
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May 1, 2014
The last werewolf - Glen Duncan
Summary: Jacob Marlowe has lost the will to live. For two hundred years he has wandered the world, enslaved by his lunatic appetites and tormented by the memory of his first and most monstrous crime. Now, the last of his kind, he contemplates suicide --until a violent murder and an extraordinary meeting plunge him straight back into the desperate pursuit of life--and love.
Staff Comments: The book on CD has a great narrator/reader
AudioFile Reviews
Jake is thought to be the world's last werewolf. Chronicling his final months, narrator Robin Sachs expertly captures his introspection and fatalism, followed by his determination to live when he discovers he's no longer alone. Just as Jake is being hunted by anti-paranormal agents and stalked by vampires that want his help to walk in daylight, he finds her. Tallulah--a female werewolf. Sachs leads listeners through Jake's emotional journey to reclaim his life and protect the woman with whom he wants to build a future. Languidly, Sachs evokes Jake's reminiscing tones as he writes journal entries about his overwhelming hungers and insatiable lusts. Tight pacing secures listeners' attention to Duncan's paranormal thriller. J.M. (c) AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine
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Mar 1, 2014
Hollow city - Ransom Riggs
Hollow city - Riggs, Ransom
Summary: Having escaped Miss Peregrine's island by the skin of their teeth, Jacob and his new friends must journey to London (circa 1940), the "peculiar" capital of the world. Illustrations feature vintage photography.
Kirkus Reviews
Along with picking up the action where it left off in Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (2011), Riggs fills in background detail while adding both talking animals and more children with magical powers to the cast. With evil wights and murderous hollowgasts in hot pursuit—and only days to save their beloved Miss Peregrine from permanently becoming a bird—Jacob and his nine young (in body, if not age) companions fling themselves through time loops to Blitz-torn London. The growing attachment between Jacob and kindhearted fire-conjurer Emma turns out to play a crucial role in the plot. After a brisk round of chases, captures, escapes and bombings—capped by a devastating reversal—the two end up separated from most of their allies but with a new talent that just might save "peculiardom" from its seemingly all-powerful enemies. As before, the author spins his tale in part around a crop of enigmatic vintage trick or portrait photographs, including two men (corpses?) sharing a bed with skeletons, a pipe-smoking dog and a staring girl with a huge hole through her midsection. Though less of a novelty here than in the opener, these still add distinctly creepy notes (even when the subject is supposedly comical) to a tale already well-stocked with soul eaters and tentacled monsters. Less a straightforward horrorfest than a tasty adventure for any reader with an appetite for the…peculiar. (Fantasy. 11-14) Copyright Kirkus 2014 Kirkus/BPI Communications.All rights reserved.
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Far far away - Tom McNeal
Summary: "When Jeremy Johnson Johnson's strange ability to speak to the ghost of Jacob Grimm draws the interest of his classmate Ginger Boltinghouse, the two find themselves at the center of a series of disappearances in their hometown"-- Provided by publisher.
Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* So it begins: What follows is the strange and fateful tale of a boy, a girl, and a ghost. Ghostly Jacob Grimm, of the famous Brothers, narrates this tale of Jeremy and Ginger and their near-tragic encounter with town baker Sten Blix, whose long-held grudges figure in the disappearance of several village children. Unappreciated as a youngster, Blix has elevated revenge to a sweet art, and he holds Jeremy, Ginger, and an additional victim, Frank Bailey, in a hidden dungeon under the bakery, while Jacob desperately tries to tell parents and friends of the predicament. If he fails, the three may become grist in the baker's next batch of Prince Cakes. Reminiscent of Hansel and Gretel and rife with allusions to the Brothers Grimm tales, this is a masterful story of outcasts, the power of faith, and the triumph of good over evil. McNeal's deft touch extends to the characterizations, where the ritual speech of traditional tales (Listen, if you will) establishes Jacob's phantasmagoric presence amid the modernist American West. There are moments of horror (as there were in the Brothers Grimm original tales), but they are accomplished through the power of suggestion. Details aplenty about Jacob and his famous sibling make this a fiction connector to both fairy tales and Grimm biographies, too. Copyright 2013 Booklist Reviews.
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Nov 1, 2013
How to catch a bogle - Catherine Jinks
How to catch a bogle - Jinks, Catherine
Summary: In 1870s London, a young orphan girl becomes the apprentice to a man who traps monsters for a living.
Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* Ten-year-old Birdie considers herself fortunate not to be begging, stealing, or living in the workhouse. As an apprentice to Alfred the Bogler, she receives food and shelter in exchange for helping him trap and destroy the hungry, monstrous bogles (goblins) that lurk in houses, where they snatch and eat the occasional child. Her role in the business? Birdie is the bait. Standing with her back to the bogle's hideout, she sings sweetly until he shows himself and Alfred dispatches him. Despite her dangerous occupation, Birdie balks when Miss Eames, a lady with a scientific interest in bogle hunting, offers to raise her above her station. Suspense mounts when human enemies begin to surpass the supernatural ones in malevolence, destruction, and sheer terror. Birdie proves her mettle time and time again in this richly atmospheric tale set in London around 1870. In the pitch-perfect narrative, the bogles seem as normal a part of the city's life as the costers, griddlers, mudlarks, and toffs (a glossary is appended). The first volume of a planned trilogy from the author of the Evil Genius series and the Pagan series, this intense historical thriller is rewarding on its own, but A Plague of Bogles is scheduled to arrive next fall. Copyright 2013 Booklist Reviews.
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Oct 1, 2013
House of leaves - Mark Z. Danielewski
House of leaves - Danielewski, Mark Z.
Summary: A family relocates to a small house on Ash Tree Lane and discovers that the inside of their new home seems to be without boundaries - (Baker & Taylor)
Library Journal
When Johnny Truant attempts to organize the many fragments of a strange manuscript by a dead blind man, it gains possession of his very soul. The manuscript is a complex commentary on a documentary film (The Navidson Record) about a house that defies all the laws of physics. Navidson's exploration of a seemingly endless, totally dark, and constantly changing labyrinth in the house becomes an examination of truth, perception, and darkness itself. The book interweaves the manuscript with over 400 footnotes to works real and imagined, thus illuminating both the text and Truant's mental disintegration. First novelist Danielewski employs avant-garde page layouts that are occasionally a bit too clever but are generally highly effective. Although it may be consigned to the "horror" genre, this novel is also a psychological thriller, a quest, a literary hoax, a dark comedy, and a work of cultural criticism. It is simultaneously a highly literary work and an absolute hoot. This powerful and extremely original novel is strongly recommended for all public and academic libraries.--Jim Dwyer, California State Univ. Lib., Chico Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.
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Sep 1, 2013
Necromancing the stone - Lish McBride
Necromancing the stone - McBride, Lish
Summary: Six weeks after escaping from the necromancer Douglas, Sam LaCroix is under the protection of the Blackthorn pack of werewolves and fey hounds and unsure if his necromancer rival is dead.
Kirkus Review
A slacker wrangles zombies, werewolves, gnomes and gods in this amiable second entry in a humor-horror mashup series (Hold Me Closer, Necromancer, 2010). Life is looking up for Samhain LaCroix, college dropout, oldies aficionado and former fry-cook. After accidentally killing the evil necromancer Douglas, Sam has inherited his powers, fortune, minions and seat on the Seattle Council of magical beings. On the downside, Sam's new servants hate him, one of his best friends is now a ghost and another a were-bear, his girlfriend's father has just been murdered, and her werewolf pack blames him…and, oh yeah, apparently Douglas isn't completely dead after all. Fans will be happy to revisit the likable characters and learn more about paranormal politics, but those expecting the first book's manic action, grisly violence and sexy romance will be disappointed by the leisurely pace and wistful, almost melancholic tone. Indeed, the plot consists almost entirely of endless and repetitive meetings, leading up to a climactic confab with his erstwhile enemy. While the story stops dead when a few chapters slip into the viewpoints of secondary characters, only important for setting up the (just barely plausible) denouement, Sam's marvelously witty, self-deprecating narration carries readers along effortlessly to the very end. With most loose plot threads neatly tied off, there is still room for further adventures with Sam and his merry band. After all, they've got rhythm, they've got music, they've got the legions of the undead--who could ask for anything more? (Urban fantasy. 14 & up)(Kirkus Reviews, August 1, 2012)
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Doll bones - Holly Black
Doll bones - Black, Holly
Summary: Zach, Alice, and Poppy, friends from a Pennsylvania middle school who have long enjoyed acting out imaginary adventures with dolls and action figures, embark on a real-life quest to Ohio to bury a doll made from the ashes of a dead girl.
Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* A trio of adolescents goes on a quest to satisfy the demands of a ghost. Sounds like standard middle-grade fare, but in Black's absolutely assured hands, it is anything but. Zach, Poppy, and Alice have been playing the same make-believe game for years, one involving pirates and mermaids and, of course, the Great Queen—a creepy, bone-china doll at Poppy's house. Then Poppy reveals that she's been haunted by a girl whose ground-up bones lie inside the Great Queen, so the doll must be properly buried. Begrudgingly, the three agree to play one last game and hope against hope for "a real adventure, the kind that changed you." With heart-wrenching swiftness, Black paints a picture of friends at the precipice of adulthood; they can sense the tentative peace of youth that is about to be demolished. The tightly focused, realistic tale—bladed with a hint of fairy-tale darkness—feels cut from the very soul of youth: there is no sentimentality, no cuteness, only the painful, contradictory longing to move forward in one's life without leaving anything behind. Stories about the importance of stories ("Maybe no stories were lies," thinks Zach) don't come much more forthright and affecting than this one. Wheeler's sketches ameliorate some of the tension and dread—not a bad thing. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Black's best-selling Spiderwick Chronicles pave the way for this powerful stand-alone, which comes with an author tour, in-theater promos, and more. Copyright 2012 Booklist Reviews.
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Feb 1, 2013
Midnight's children - Salman Rushdie
Midnight's children - Rushdie, Salman
Summary: The story of Saleem Sinal, born precisely at midnight, August 15, 1947, the moment India became independent. Saleem's life parallels the history of his nation.
Kirkus Review
/* Starred Review */ When Indian novelist Rushdie arrived with Grimus in 1979 we called him "an imagination to watch." And he'll be watched indeed once this bravura fiction starts circulating--a picaresque entertainment that's clearly inspired by close readings of the modern South American fabulists and, above all, Sterne's Tristram Shandy. Rushdie's own Tristram is named Saleem Sinai--and he is born at the stroke of midnight, August 15, 1947, making him exactly contemporary with the life of India-as-a-nation. In fact, Saleem and 580 other "midnight children" born at that moment grow up to find themselves equipped with powers of telepathic communication, foresight, and heightened individual sensoria: Saleem's particular gift is a "cucumber" of a nose with which he goes through life literally smelling change. The Sinai family, originally Kashmiri Moslems, migrate to Bombay, living in ex-colonial digs. And a switch at birth with a neighbor's baby seeds narrative trouble that flowers at different times later on in the book: opera buffa complications all the way. Saleem seems to be in the middle of all cataclysmic Indian events, too. He's present during language riots and a dinner-party coup in Pakistan (where his mother fled after a marital spat involving the revealed baby-switch). Because of his olfactory talent, he becomes a "man-dog" tracker for a Pakistani military unit during the debacle in Bangladesh. And, back in Bombay, Saleem is clapped into jail with the other "midnight children" by "the Widow"--Indira Gandhi--during the dictatorial Emergency. Rushdie swoops, all colors unfurled, all stops out, through and around his synchronic fable with great gusto and sentimental fizz. And though such a rodomontade would be shameless if made out of more familiar material, the sub-continental excessiveness (and the fascinating history lesson which is incidentally built in) keeps us loading and firing right along. Tour de force, in other words--and so, of course, a little exhausting; but, unlike other fantastical picaresques, this one is truly worth the effort. A big striped balloon of a book, often dizzying with talent. (Kirkus Reviews, March 1, 1981)
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