BROKEN MONSTERS by Lauren Beukes (Mulholland)

A superb, surreal crime novel

Detective Gabriella Versado has seen a lot of bodies. But this one is unique even by Detroit’s standards: half boy, half deer, somehow fused together. As stranger and more disturbing bodies are discovered, how can the city hold on to a reality that is already tearing at its seams?

If you’re Detective Versado’s geeky teenage daughter, Layla, you commence a dangerous flirtation with a potential predator online. If you’re desperate freelance journalist Jonno, you do whatever it takes to get the exclusive on a horrific story. If you’re Thomas Keen, known on the street as TK, you’ll do what you can to keep your homeless family safe — and find the monster who is possessed by the dream of violently remaking the world.

Broken Monsters is in many ways a novel of decline: of society, the city, sanity… But not, thankfully, of the author’s talent. Beukes is on top-form here once again, delivering a superb, surreal follow-up to The Shining Girls. It’s really very good.

Franklin Ship Discovered – Time to Read “The Terror”?

This is huge news in Canada at the moment: one of the Franklin expedition’s lost ships has been discovered under the northern ice. The ship will either be the HMS Terror or the HMS Erebus, both Royal Navy ships commanded by Sir John Franklin were lost during his doomed 1845 search for the Northwest Passage. From the Toronto Star:

“Because the wrecks of Erebus and Terror are both British property and Canadian national historic sites, the the 1997 memorandum of understanding carefully lays out each country’s claims and responsibilities. Britain retains ownership of the wrecks but has assigned ‘custody and control’ to the Government of Canada. That means Canadian archeologists get to lead the recovery mission, and Canada can keep everything taken from the wreck — with a few important exceptions.”

The Star and Globe & Mail have both published multiple stories today about the discovery, so I’d recommend heading to their websites to read more. Stand-outs include this commentary by Ken McGoogan, a short piece on the HMS Terror’s history, and also this piece about the Franklin expedition.

While nobody seems to be prepared to make a guess as to which of the two ships the discovered wreck is, the news naturally made me think of Dan Simmons’s The Terror, which was published in 2007 by Transworld Books (UK) and Little, Brown (US).

I have yet to read the novel (like oh-so-many others), but it has been inching up my TBR mountain for some time. With this latest discovery, though, I have a feeling it will leap closer to the top. Here is the synopsis…

The men on board Her Britannic Majesty’s Ships Terror and Erebus had every expectation of triumph. They were part of Sir John Franklin’s 1845 expedition – as scientifically advanced an enterprise as had ever set forth – and theirs were the first steam-driven vessels to go in search of the fabled North-West Passage.

But the ships have now been trapped in the Arctic ice for nearly two years. Coal and provisions are running low. Yet the real threat isn’t the constantly shifting landscape of white or the flesh-numbing temperatures, dwindling supplies or the vessels being slowly crushed by the unyielding grip of the frozen ocean.

No, the real threat is far more terrifying. There is something out there that haunts the frigid darkness, which stalks the ships, snatching one man at a time – mutilating, devouring. A nameless thing, at once nowhere and everywhere, this terror has become the expedition’s nemesis.

When Franklin meets a terrible death, it falls to Captain Francis Crozier of HMS Terror to take command and lead the remaining crew on a last, desperate attempt to flee south across the ice. With them travels an Eskimo woman who cannot speak. She may be the key to survival – or the harbinger of their deaths. And as scurvy, starvation and madness take their toll, as the Terror on the ice become evermore bold, Crozier and his men begin to fear there is no escape…

You can read an excerpt from The Terror on the author’s website.

Upcoming: THE MYSTERIES by Lisa Tuttle (Jo Fletcher Books)

I’ve never read anything by Lisa Tuttle, but I receive a press release a few days ago for The Mysteries, and I was quite taken by the cover. It’s really quite excellent:

The novel is due to be published in the UK by Jo Fletcher Books, on September 4th, 2014. Here’s the synopsis:

Laura Lensky’s daughter, Peri, has been missing for two years. For the police it’s a closed case – she wanted to run away – but for her mother and boyfriend, Hugh, it’s a different story.

When Laura hires private investigator Ian Kennedy, it is a last-ditch attempt to find her daughter before she leaves for America.

Drawn in by strange parallels to an obscure Celtic myth and his first, almost unexplainable case, Ian takes the job. But his beliefs are about to be stretched to their limit – there are darker and more devious forces at work here than any of them imagined.

JFB have done a great job with the design for the novel (something the publisher is invariably good at, actually). And, while it’s got a larger palette than her previous books, it fits rather nicely with her other works, many of which will be released as eBooks in the coming weeks/months.

Guest Post: “Setting as a Character” by Patty Templeton

I have a great many tattoos. Entire appendages are coated in ink. One of my favorites is a small arsenic bottle and a sprig of blackberries on my left arm. It was inspired by the book We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson.

Shirley Jackson. Geez. That woman. Though We Have Always Lived in the Castle is my favorite novel of hers – and the novel that inspired the tattoo, The Haunting of Hill House is what Jackson is most known for. Made famous by two movie adaptations and lauded by Stephen King as one of only two “great novels of the supernatural in the last hundred years,”^[1] The Haunting of Hill House was the first novel that made me aware of Setting as a Character.

If you are unfamiliar with The Haunting of Hill House, the main story thread is thus: four psychically-inclined characters (two women and two men) visit an 80-year-old mansion named Hill House to study the supernatural activity that may or may not be happening there. Strange. Events. Occur. Is it all in the minds of the slightly terrified inhabitants, do ghosts roam the halls, or can a place actually be alive and evil?

Upcoming: “Broken Monsters” by Lauren Beukes (Harper)

I’m a latecomer to the excellence that is Lauren Beukes’s work. Last year, I was quickly sucked into The Shining Girls, and since then I’ve been eagerly awaiting her next novel. Now, BROKEN MONSTERS is on the horizon! Published in the UK on July 31st by Harper.

In the city that’s become a symbol for the death of the American dream, a nightmare killer is unravelling reality…

Broken city, broken dreams

In Detroit, violent death – along with foreclosure and despair – is a regular occurrence. But the part-human, part-animal corpses that have started appearing are more disturbing than anything Detective Gabriella Versado has ever seen.

As Gabriella works the case, her teenage daughter Layla embarks on a secret crime-fighting project of her own – hunting down online paedophiles – but it all goes horribly wrong…

TK has learned how to make being homeless work for him and his friends, but something evil is threatening the fragile world he’s constructed on the streets…

Ambitious blogger Jonno is getting desperate. The big four-oh isn’t that far away, and he’s still struggling to make his mark. But then he stumbles across some unusual and macabre art, which might just be the break he needs to go viral…

Broken Monsters lays bare the decaying corpse of the American Dream, and asks what we’d be prepared to do for fifteen minutes of fame, especially in an online world.

Can’t wait to read this! Broken Monsters is published by Mulholland Books in the US, and Umuzi in South Africa. Here are the other two covers…

“Field of Prey” by John Sandford (Putnam US / Simon & Schuster UK)

24 books in, series still firing on all cylinders…

The night after the fourth of July, Layton Carlson Jr., of Red Wing, Minnesota, finally got lucky. And unlucky.

He’d picked the perfect spot to lose his virginity to his girlfriend, an abandoned farmyard in the middle of cornfields: nice, private, and quiet. The only problem was… something smelled bad – like, really bad. He mentioned it to a county deputy he knew, and when the cop took a look, he found a body stuffed down a cistern. And then another, and another.

By the time Lucas Davenport was called in, the police were up to fifteen bodies and counting. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, when Lucas began to investigate, he made some disturbing discoveries of his own. The victims had been killed over a great many years, one every summer, regular as clockwork. How could this have happened without anybody noticing?

Because one thing was for sure: the killer had to live close by. He was probably even someone they saw every day…

It really is quite impressive, the fact that this is the 24th book featuring Lucas Davenport (also known as the Prey Series) and it is so very good. Add to that the fact that Sandford is also writing the Virgil Flowers spin-off series as well (each gets a new book each year, for the past seven or eight years), and you start to realise just how talented and disciplined Sandford is as an author. I have read all of the Prey novels, and each one has been at the very least great and gripping. Field of Prey is no exception, but this time you can also add harrowing and intense. A great addition to the series.

“Galveston” by Nic Pizzolatto (Sphere)

An interesting, if flawed debut thriller

Roy Cady is by his own admission “a bad man”. With a snow flurry of cancer in his lungs and no one to live for, he’s a walking time-bomb of violence. Following a fling with his boss’s lover, he’s sent on a routine assignment he knows is a death trap. Yet after a smoking spasm of violence, Roy’s would-be killers are mostly dead and he is mostly alive.

Before Roy makes his getaway, he finds a beaten-up woman in the apartment, and sees something in her frightened, defiant eyes that causes a crucial decision. He takes her with him on the run from New Orleans to Galveston, Texas, permanently entwining their fate along a highway of seedy bars and fleabag hotels, a world of treacherous drifters, pick-up trucks, and ashed-out hopes, with death just a car-length behind.

Only after finishing this novel, did I learn that Pizzolatto is the creator of HBO’s critically-acclaimed True Detective series (starring Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConnaughey). I can certainly see it, now, though. This is a good thriller: very well-written and fast-paced. However, it also left me slightly dissatisfied at the end.

“The Girl With All the Gifts” by M.R. Carey (Orbit)

A superb novel, one of my favourite so far this year

Melanie is a very special girl. Dr. Caldwell calls her “our little genius”. Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don’t like her. She jokes that she won’t bite, but they don’t laugh. Melanie loves school. She loves learning about spelling and sums and the world outside the classroom and the children’s cells. She tells her favourite teacher all the things she’ll do when she grows up. Melanie doesn’t know why this makes Miss Justineau look sad.

I have long been familiar with Carey’s comics work – mainly the amazing Lucifer and The Unwritten, both of which I am addicted to. It took me a long time to get around to reading this novel, though, for reasons I cannot quite figure out. Long-time readers of the blog will know I’m a fan of certain types of post-apocalyptic-zombie novels. The Girl With All the Gifts is absolutely brilliant, and one of this year’s Must Reads. I loved it.

Interview with ALISON LITTLEWOOD

Let’s start with an introduction: Who is Alison Littlewood?

Ah, the hardest question of all... I’m a probably slightly odd person who writes probably slightly odd books! I’ve been writing dark fantasy and horror for several years now, and was lucky enough a while back to get a three-book deal from Jo Fletcher Books at Quercus. A Cold Season was picked for the Richard and Judy book club, and it went from there.

Your next novel, The Unquiet House, is due to be published by Jo Fletcher Books in April 2014. How would you introduce the novel to a new reader?

It’s a ghost story set in a rather dour Yorkshire house, following the fates of different generations of the same family. There are sections set in the present day as well as the seventies and the thirties, which each shed light on each other. It’s probably the oddest of my odd books, and in a way it’s perhaps best to read it knowing nothing at all, so I will leave it at that…!

Interview with SARAH LOTZ

Let’s start with an introduction: Who is Sarah Lotz?

I’m a genre-crossing pulp-fiction writer based in South Africa. I’m addicted to coffee and collaborating, and write horror novels with author Louis Greenberg under the name S.L Grey; a ‘choose-your-own’ erotica series with authors Helen Moffett and Paige Nick (as Helena S. Paige), and a YA series co-written with my daughter under the name Lily Herne.

Your next novel, The Three, is due to be published by Hodder in May. How would you introduce the novel to a new reader?

I’m tempted to say it’s about plane crashes and (possibly) evil children – but I hope there is more to it than that! Here’s a brief description:

Four devastating plane crashes. Three child survivors. A fanatic who insists the survivors are possessed by the harbingers of the apocalypse. What if he’s right?

I’m fascinated by how quickly fear and paranoia can spread throughout society – especially during the aftermath of a devastating event – and the novel attempts to explore how this could potentially influence the political landscape.

“The Accident” by Chris Pavone (Crown Publishing/Faber)

An engaging suspense, featuring a secret manuscript, a conspiracy, and unwitting pawns caught in the middle.

As dawn approaches in New York, literary agent Isabel Reed is turning the final pages of a mysterious, anonymous manuscript, racing through the explosive revelations about powerful people, as well as long-hidden secrets about her own past. In Copenhagen, veteran CIA operative Hayden Gray, determined that this sweeping story be buried, is suddenly staring down the barrel of an unexpected gun. And in Zurich, the author himself is hiding in a shadowy expat life, trying to atone for a lifetime’s worth of lies and betrayals with publication of The Accident, while always looking over his shoulder.

Over the course of one long, desperate, increasingly perilous day, these lives collide as the book begins its dangerous march toward publication, toward saving or ruining careers and companies, placing everything at risk—and everyone in mortal peril.  The rich cast of characters—in publishing and film, politics and espionage—are all forced to confront the consequences of their ambitions, the schisms between their ideal selves and the people they actually became.

The action rockets around Europe and across America, with an intricate web of duplicities stretching back a quarter-century to a dark winding road in upstate New York, where the shocking truth about the accident itself is buried.

Pavone’s The Expats was an international bestseller – one I seem to have missed almost entirely. When The Accident popped up on NetGalley, though, its synopsis sent it right to the top of my Must Read titles. The story is located at the confluence of a number of my key interests: politics, media, international relations/espionage, and publishing. While the novel is not perfect, it is nevertheless a gripping, fast-paced thriller that entertained and gripped me from the start.

Animated Cover for Stephen King’s MR. MERCEDES (Hodder)

I know it hasn’t been very long since I shared the news that Hodder would be publishing two books by Stephen King this year. But, today they unveiled the UK cover for one of the novels – Mr. Mercedes – and to top it off, there is an (slightly) animated version! Which I thought was rather cool. So here it is, in all it’s moody glory…

Mr. Mercedes is due to be published by Hodder on June 3rd 2014 in Hardcover and eBook. Here’s the synopsis:

It is a riveting cat-and-mouse suspense thriller about a retired cop and a couple of unlikely allies who race against time to stop a lone killer intent on blowing up thousands.

Retired homicide detective Bill Hodges is haunted by the few cases he left open, and by one in particular: in the pre-dawn hours, hundreds of desperate unemployed people were lined up for a spot at a job fair in a distressed Midwestern city. Without warning, a lone driver ploughed through the crowd in a stolen Mercedes. Eight people were killed, fifteen wounded. The killer escaped.

Months later, on the other side of the city, Bill Hodges gets a letter in the mail, from a man claiming to be the perpetrator. He taunts Hodges with the notion that he will strike again. Hodges wakes up from his depressed and vacant retirement, hell-bent on preventing that from happening. Brady Hartfield lives with his alcoholic mother in the house where he was born. And he is indeed preparing to kill again.

Hodges, with a couple of misfit friends, must apprehend the killer in this high-stakes race against time. Because Brady's next mission, if it succeeds, will kill or maim hundreds, even thousands. Mr Mercedes is a war between good and evil, from the master of suspense whose insight into the mind of this obsessed, insane killer is chilling and unforgettable.

“A Love Like Blood” by Marcus Sedgwick (Mulholland)

A gripping, chilling psychological thriller

“I’ve chased him for over twenty years, and across countless miles, and though often I was running, there have been many times when I could do nothing but sit and wait. Now I am only desperate for it to be finished.”

In 1944, just days after the liberation of Paris, Charles Jackson sees something horrific: a man, apparently drinking the blood of a murdered woman. Terrified, he does nothing, telling himself afterwards that worse things happen in wars.

Seven years later he returns to the city – and sees the same man dining in the company of a fascinating young woman. When they leave the restaurant, Charles decides to follow...

A Love Like Blood is a dark, compelling thriller about how a man's life can change in a moment; about where the desire for truth – and for revenge – can lead; about love and fear and hatred. And it is also about the question of blood.

This wasn’t what I was expecting. I had expected a good novel, with perhaps a supernatural component. Instead, what I found was an excellent psychological thriller about obsession and the science and mythology of blood. Sedgwick’s first novel for adults is damned good, and a must-read of the year.

Upcoming/News: “REVIVAL” and “MR. MERCEDES” by Stephen King (Hodder)

I’m a relative newcomer to Stephen King, but I am certainly a fan of his writing (I’ve read a good amount of his non-fiction already). Last year, I finally read The Shining, and Hodder published its long-awaited sequel, Doctor Sleep. This year, Hodder will be publishing two new novels by King: Mr. Mercedes and Revival.

The latter was just announced on the publisher’s website, so I thought I’d start with that one. Here’s some info:

In a small New England town, over half a century ago, a shadow falls over a small boy playing with his toy soldiers. Jamie Morton looks up to see a striking man, the new minister. Charles Jacobs, along with his beautiful wife, will transform the local church. The men and boys are all a bit in love with Mrs Jacobs; the women and girls feel the same about Reverend Jacobs – including Jamie’s mother and beloved sister, Claire. With Jamie, the Reverend shares a deeper bond based on a secret obsession. When tragedy strikes the Jacobs family, this charismatic preacher curses God, mocks all religious belief, and is banished from the shocked town.

Jamie has demons of his own. Wed to his guitar from the age of 13, he plays in bands across the country, living the nomadic lifestyle of bar-band rock and roll while fleeing from his family’s horrific loss. In his mid-thirties – addicted to heroin, stranded, desperate – Jamie meets Charles Jacobs again, with profound consequences for both men. Their bond becomes a pact beyond even the Devil’s devising, and Jamie discovers that revival has many meanings.

Revival is due to be published by Hodder on November 11th, 2014. No artwork has been unveiled, yet (for either of these titles), but I’ll share them when they become available.

The other novel, Mr. Mercedes, will actually be published before Revival (in June 2014). Here’s the synopsis:

Retired homicide detective Bill Hodges is haunted by the few cases he left open, and by one in particular: in the pre-dawn hours, hundreds of desperate unemployed people were lined up for a spot at a job fair in a distressed Midwestern city. Without warning, a lone driver ploughed through the crowd in a stolen Mercedes. Eight people were killed, fifteen wounded. The killer escaped.

Months later, on the other side of the city, Bill Hodges gets a letter in the mail, from a man claiming to be the perpetrator. He taunts Hodges with the notion that he will strike again. Hodges wakes up from his depressed and vacant retirement, hell-bent on preventing that from happening.

Brady Hartfield lives with his alcoholic mother in the house where he was born. And he is indeed preparing to kill again.

Hodges, with a couple of misfit friends, must apprehend the killer in this high-stakes race against time. Because Brady's next mission, if it succeeds, will kill or maim hundreds, even thousands.

Mr Mercedes is a war between good and evil, from the master of suspense whose insight into the mind of this obsessed, insane killer is chilling and unforgettable.

Upcoming: “Innocence” & “Wilderness” by Dean Koontz (Harper Collins/Bantam)

Dean Koontz is an author who I have been familiar with for years (it’s hard to miss his novels in the SFF and Crime sections of any bookstore in – at least – the English-speaking world). And yet, I have never read anything by him. I think this novel, though, could change that. It sounds great. And, I’ll admit, the UK cover caught my eye – well played, Harper Collins Design Team. Well played. Then I saw the US cover (on the right), and I was even more smitten. Here’s the synopsis:

Addison Goodheart is not like other people…

Addison Goodheart lives in solitude beneath the city, an exile from a society which will destroy him if he is ever seen.

Books are his refuge and his escape: he embraces the riches they have to offer. By night he leaves his hidden chambers and, through a network of storm drains and service tunnels, makes his way into the central library.

And that is where he meets Gwyneth, who, like Addison, also hides her true appearance and struggles to trust anyone.

But the bond between them runs deeper than the tragedies that have scarred their lives. Something more than chance − and nothing less than destiny − has brought them together in a world whose hour of reckoning is fast approaching.

Innocence is due to be published in the UK December 10th 2013 (eBook), and on January 2nd 2014 (Hardcover) – according to Amazon UK. The novel is due to be published in the US by Bantam, also on December 10th 2013.

In the meantime – and, if like me, you’ve never read anything by Koontz – the author has written a prequel novella! It’s called The Wilderness, and is published on October 29th 2013 in both the UK and US. Here’s the synopsis for the novella:

Addison Goodheart is a mystery even to himself. He was born in an isolated home surrounded by a deep forest, never known to his father, kept secret from everyone but his mother, who barely accepts him. She is haunted by private demons and keeps many secrets—none of which she dreads more than the young son who adores her.

Only in the woods, among the wildlife, is Addison truly welcome. Only there can he be at peace. Until the day he first knows terror, the day when his life changes radically and forever...

Guest Post: “How a Cult Tried to Get Me” by Koethi Zan

Koethi Zan is the author of The Never List, which was published this week by Viking. To celebrate the release of the novel (and in advance of the review), here is a guest post from the author…

***

When I was eighteen years old, my college roommate and I were lured into a cult. It isn’t what you might imagine. We didn’t move to a commune somewhere in Texas with some charismatic leader who had a cache of weapons and multiple wives. They were much too sophisticated for that. They drew us in slowly with very innocent “study sessions” that were part self-help, part group therapy, and part meditation class.

It started with my college boyfriend’s parents who had been involved with this “philosophy study group” for many years. They urged my boyfriend to go so my roommate Ann and I decided we’d tag along. We were up for anything and curious about what we’d heard.

“NOS4R2”/“NOS4A2” by Joe Hill (Gollancz/William Morrow)

A slow-burning suspense

Summer. Massachusetts.

An old Silver Wraith with a frightening history. A story about one serial killer and his lingering, unfinished business.

Anyone could be next.

We’re going to Christmasland...

I’m not a big reader of horror. I’m not really sure why, though, as I tend to be attracted to darker and more twisted tales. Nevertheless, I have enjoyed some of Hill’s previous writing, and after reading a little bit about NOS4R2, I eagerly awaited its arrival.

Despite that, and perhaps inevitably, I was not really in the mood for horror when I first started to read NOS4R2. Rather than letting this ruin it for me, I decided to put it aside and got back to it recently. I’m glad I did this, too: this is a pretty solid suspense/horror novel, sure to appeal to his existing fans and also new readers (with caveats). The novel is also, frustratingly, very difficult to review – and doubly so if I want to avoid any form of spoiler.

Once again, therefore, I find myself at a loss for how to review something by Joe Hill. Seriously. I’m completely stumped. His other work that I struggle to review is his Locke & Key comic series, a story that shares some similar sensibilities and aesthetics as NOS4R2. Both are heavily character-focused, with a slow-burning plot that allows for great tension and suspense to build brilliantly. It’s not action-packed (though there is some conflict), there are a fair few surprises, and some really creepy scenes.

I must admit that I did find the start a little slower than I would normally like, and this maybe influenced my decision to put it aside for a short while. Given how long the book is (the ARC is 700 pages, or there about), I think some people may not have the patience for Hill’s pacing. When I was about a third of the way through, even I couldn’t help but think, “When are things going to kick off?” However, when I allowed myself to just sit and read (recently, life has been very disruptive and stop-start), I found myself swept up by Hill’s prose and story, drawn on through the novel.

The author manages to make the mundane fascinating – the little details of these characters’ lives, their thoughts and every-day concerns… In many authors’ hands, this attention to detail would be suffocating and perhaps tedious, giving the novel a bloated feel. Not so for Hill; when added to the creepy goings-on related to Christmasland and its master, Charles Manx, he spins a fascinating, engrossing, suspenseful tale.

I found his characters all too realistic, in a way. This is, in my opinion, Hill’s greatest talent: despite writing creepy, weird, oft-supernatural stories, his characters have a vividly real feel to them. Victoria McQueen, the protagonist, feels complete, fully realised and familiar, and in some ways we grow up with her over the course of the novel: first meeting her as a child, when she first gets her special bike and stumbles across her strange ability. Then time jumps ahead to her rebellious adolescence and onwards, as her childhood brush with information of the Silver Wraith and Manx, and her confrontations with him later.

As I said at the start, I have no real idea of how to review Hill’s work. Nothing I try seems to convey the atmosphere and feel of the author’s work appropriately.

Needless to say, if you have any interest in classic, literary horror fiction, then NOS4R2 is for you. Recommended.

Also by Joe Hill: Horns, Heart-Shaped Box, 20th Century Ghosts, Locke & Key Vols.1-5

Also Try: Benjamin Percy, Justin Cronin, Stephen King, Adam Neville

Guest Review: “What Lies Within” by Tom Vowler (Headline)

A tightly spun, atmospheric and powerful psychological suspense.

Reviewed by Milo Milton-Jefferies

Living in a remote Devon farmhouse, Anna and her family have always been close to nature, surrounded by the haunting beauty of the moor. But when a convict escapes from nearby Dartmoor prison, their isolation suddenly begins to feel more claustrophobic than free. Fearing for her children's safety, Anna's behaviour becomes increasingly irrational. But why is she so distant from her kind husband Robert, and why does she suspect something sinister of her son Paul? All teenagers have their difficult phases...

Meanwhile, a young idealistic teacher has just started her first job, determined to 'make a difference'. But when she is brutally attacked by one of her students, her version of events is doubted by even those closest to her. Struggling to deal with the terrible consequences, she does what she can to move on and start afresh.

As the two narratives converge, the tension builds to a devastating denouement, shattering everything you thought you believed about nature, nurture and the true meaning of family.

There are several reasons why I love being a part of the blogging community, but I think one of the more important reasons is that there are literally loads of novels out there that I would never have heard of and discovered were it not for reviewing. When Stefan offered me the chance to guest review What Lies Within by Tom Vowler, I leapt at the chance, and this book turned out to be a very enjoyable reading experience, despite the fact I went into it knowing almost nothing about the book, except for the blurb and the cover.

“Blackwood” by Gwenda Bond (Strange Chemistry)

A historical horror mystery

On Roanoke Island, the legend of the 114 people who mysteriously vanished from the Lost Colony hundreds of years ago is just an outdoor drama for the tourists, a story people tell. But when the island faces the sudden disappearance of 114 people now, an unlikely pair of 17-year-olds may be the only hope of bringing them back.

Miranda, a misfit girl from the island’s most infamous family, and Phillips, an exiled teen criminal who hears the voices of the dead, must dodge everyone from federal agents to long-dead alchemists as they work to uncover the secrets of the new Lost Colony. The one thing they can’t dodge is each other.

I blitzed through this novel. Bond’s writing is tight and her plotting fluid. Taking a North Carolina historical mystery and twisting it for a supernatural, horror flavour, Blackwood is a pretty solid YA novel. If you like your fiction with a dollop of suspense and an understated romance, then Blackwood is for you. This is a solid debut that has put Gwenda Bond onto my “Authors to Watch” List.

“Morning Glories” Vol.1 (Image)

A mystifying, engrossing series…

Writer: Nick Spencer | Artist: Joe Eisma | Colours: Alex Sollazzo

Morning Glory Academy is one of the most prestigious prep schools in the country, but something sinister and deadly lurks behind its walls. When six gifted but troubled new students arrive, they find themselves trapped and fighting for their lives as the secrets of the academy reveal themselves!

This is a little difficult to review at length, given the comic’s nature and the fact that I’m still not entirely sure what’s going on. This latter point is not, however, in a bad way. Morning Glories shows that a little mystery can go a long way to keeping readers interested and coming back for more. This is a twisted comic, but one that has a lot of potential.