Life and Things
Still dealing with the exhaustion, but I actually accomplished writing this week! Yaay! Hope to post some more WIP snippets soon. I retrieved my artwork from the dying Nexus tablet. Here is Ari Jefferson and Ari as Arius the Technomancer in his alter form.
I’ve been listening to an audiobook at work- The Beekeeper’s Apprentice by Laurie R King- and working through it slowly. It’s mostly a ‘doing night audit and stocking breakfast’ listen, so it’s been slow going. I love King’s works though, and the narrator is awesome.
Books read, reviewed, and posted/scheduled this past week:
Wicked Bugs: Young Reader’s Edition by Amy Stewart, 4*
Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero, 5*
The Way It Hurts by Patricia Blount, 5*
Favourite read of the week:
Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero, 5*
“With raucous humor and brilliantly orchestrated mayhem, Meddling Kids subverts teen detective archetypes like the Hardy Boys, the Famous Five, and Scooby-Doo, and delivers an exuberant and wickedly entertaining celebration of horror, love, friendship, and many-tentacled, interdimensional demon spawn.
SUMMER 1977. The Blyton Summer Detective Club (of Blyton Hills, a small mining town in Oregon’s Zoinx River Valley) solved their final mystery and unmasked the elusive Sleepy Lake monster—another low-life fortune hunter trying to get his dirty hands on the legendary riches hidden in Deboën Mansion. And he would have gotten away with it too, if it weren’t for those meddling kids.
1990. The former detectives have grown up and apart, each haunted by disturbing memories of their final night in the old haunted house. There are too many strange, half-remembered encounters and events that cannot be dismissed or explained away by a guy in a mask. And Andy, the once intrepid tomboy now wanted in two states, is tired of running from her demons. She needs answers. To find them she will need Kerri, the one-time kid genius and budding biologist, now drinking her ghosts away in New York with Tim, an excitable Weimaraner descended from the original canine member of the club. They will also have to get Nate, the horror nerd currently residing in an asylum in Arkham, Massachusetts. Luckily Nate has not lost contact with Peter, the handsome jock turned movie star who was once their team leader . . . which is remarkable, considering Peter has been dead for years.
The time has come to get the team back together, face their fears, and find out what actually happened all those years ago at Sleepy Lake. It’s their only chance to end the nightmares and, perhaps, save the world.
A nostalgic and subversive trip rife with sly nods to H. P. Lovecraft and pop culture, Edgar Cantero’s Meddling Kids is a strikingly original and dazzling reminder of the fun and adventure we can discover at the heart of our favorite stories, no matter how old we get.”
Current Read:
The Ice Queen by Rebecca Bauer
“Ten years after a chilling coup, Aria finds her hopes quashed in a lifestyle she never chose. Closed off and quiet, she’s resigned herself to servitude–until a fortuitous set of circumstances send her back to her home realm.
Nothing but an instinct drives her to reveal her face to a man determined to kill her, but when he forces her to expose her true identity, the course of her life changes forever.
In a kingdom on the brink of civil war, Aria must rediscover the woman she was meant to be–and to take back the seat stolen from her as a child, she must overcome more than her past.
The only way to win is by the blade.”
Next Up
Crash Land on Kurai by SJ Pajonas due Aug 7, Lola’s
Misadventures of Lady Ophelia by Christina McKnight Aug. 9, Barclay
Banged Up Heart by Shirley Melis Aug 10. CBR
Women Within by Anne Leigh Parrish. Aug 10. CBR
The Wardrobe Mistress by Meghan Masterson, release Aug 15, St Martin’s
Remember, Remember by Anne Elliot (Sherlock) NG
Education of a Coroner by John Bateson. CBR. NG
Book Haul:
No hardcopies this week. A few egalleys. These are the ones I’m most looking forward to.
Luciano’s War by David Weston
“February 1942, U-Boats are sinking American ships faster than they can be built. The New York Waterfront is awash with Italian spies. Only one man can stop the rot, but Lucky Luciano is serving a fifty-year sentence for running whorehouses.
The US Navy is forced to eat humble pie ask for his assistance. As the invasion draws near, he sent into Sicily, to meet with the Mafia Dons and prepare the way for the Allies. All too soon he finds himself swept up by the terror and anguish of war.
Luciano’s War is a meticulously researched, fast-moving adventure based on a little-known campaign. Apart from the two main protagonists and their immediate associates, all the characters and events are based on truth. The story supposes what might have happened if the US authorities had granted Luciano his wish to go behind the lines.
It is part military history, part crime novel, a story of unrequited love, corruption and revenge. It is thrilling, moving and funny, with flesh and blood characters that leap off the page. The heroism and sacrifice at Piano Lupo, Triona and Brolo deserve to be commemorated alongside Normandy, Arnhem and the Bulge.”
The Midnight Dance by Nikki Katz
“When the music stops, the dance begins.
Seventeen-year-old Penny is a lead dancer at the Grande Teatro, a finishing school where she and eleven other young women are training to become the finest ballerinas in Italy. Tucked deep into the woods, the school is overseen by the mysterious and handsome young Master who keeps the girls ensconced in the estate – and in the only life Penny has never known.
But when flashes of memories, memories of a life very different from the one she thinks she’s been leading, start to appear, Penny begins to question the Grand Teatro and the motivations of the Master. With a kind and attractive kitchen boy, Cricket, at her side, Penny vows to escape the confines of her school and the strict rules that dictate every step she takes. But at every turn, the Master finds a way to stop her, and Penny must find a way to escape the school and uncover the secrets of her past before it’s too late.”
Convergence by JR Rain and Matthew S Cox
“Solstice Winters has spent most of her life halfway between normal society and the world of her magical parents. However, when getting caught between two worlds becomes more than metaphorical, being able to summon light or open locks might not be enough.
Neither her love life nor her professional life are going anywhere in a hurry. Her boyfriend is successful and handsome, but she constantly has to compete with his job for affection. At thirty-two, she works as a photojournalist for The Spirtualist, a small paper dedicated to magic and the supernatural―that most people regard as a tabloid. Desperate for that ‘one break,’ she’ll do almost anything to get that big story and get into a ‘real’ media outlet.
Years of always not quite fitting in begin to make sense after an error at a particle physics laboratory alters the dimensional alignment of the world, strengthening magic and revealing an unexpected truth to Solstice.
She’s not even human.
In the wake of an event her boss at the paper is calling The Convergence, magical beings are appearing all over the Earth. Solstice doesn’t hesitate, racing to be the first to capture indisputable evidence of mythical beasts. Alas, being a magical creature herself, she soon winds up in the cross-hairs of not only a three-letter government agency, but an ancient sect of mages with dark intentions.”
New events added!
Blog Tour: The Longing and the Lack by CM Spivy, Sept 11- 16
Blog Tour: The Smallest Thing Sept 11- 16
