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Decima is an ambitious, sex-crazed TV presenter. She's the host of a talk-show in which she claims that her magical powers (she's a witch), combined with her natural allure make her irresistible to anyone whom she desires.  And she desires everyone. She believes that the charm of her show is knowing that the guest du jour will wind up in bed with Decima - but will it be after the end of the program, or while people are still watching? But Decima has a secret ... she's not really a witch, and this is a secret she must keep or the whole theme of her program goes away. And fortunately, her guests and her crew are all on tight contracts which keeps them bound to her. 'Fortunately' because all the men are naturally attracted to Alice - Decima's beautiful but wallflower of a PA. Alice also has a secret, though.  She really is a witch, fighting a demon, and in love with someone she can never have. Can Decima keep her secret and satisfy her lust with the ever-present li...

Antsy is struggling to be comfortable and accepted in the land behind the doors, where wayward children often find themselves.  She had gotten kicked out of The Shop Where the Lost Things Go in the previous book and now finds her way to Eleanor West's School for Wayward Children. She'd like nothing more than to fit in but word gets around that she has the innate ability to find things and now some of the other wayward children want to know if she can find the Doors which remain hidden until needed. Antsy is bullied into trying to find the doors and ultimately this bullying works as Antsy searches for a Door in order to escape the bullies. This leads her to strange new (and old) worlds (did you note the dinosaurs on the cover?) and she'll question her choices. It's no secret that I'm a fan of Seanan McGuire's work and that I absolutely love this series. One of the rules for world building is to have a set of rules by which the world operates, but McGuire has clev...

Two orphan boys, Benjamin Timmons and John Nicholas are adopted by a toymaker, Rudolph Stern, in 1820, as they show talent in woodwork. They apprentice Stern, a kind and giving man, and become journeymen, on their way to becoming master craftsmen. One day, Mr. Stern passes away of a heart attack, and not long after, Benjamin dies from a cholera epidemic and John is left to run the toy making business by himself. John is visited by the spirits of Ben and Rudolph and told of a workshop at the North Pole just for him. When he arrives he encounters magical elves, animals that ha can talk to and who can talk to him, and Jessica ... the manager of the castle where he will live. Everything will come together, with Rudolph and Benjamin's oversight from beyond, to have John Nicholas become Santa Claus, and Jessica, his wife. I was quite disappointed in this and I'm not entirely sure who the target audience is. It's not a picture book, it's not an easy reader, and yet it's to...

Liv Spyer, a young, female photographer, has been working hard to make a name for herself as a professional photographer when she lands the prime job of photographing Bisa ... only the biggest Grammy Award-winning pop star on the planet. To add to Liv's joy, her new boyfriend, Harry, will be taking her to the opening of Bisa's movie debut. Bisa's sister, Anna, however, is holding a grudge and promises to make PR/photo event into a disaster. This would have such a negative impact on Liv's up-coming career, that she goes after Anna to get her to back off. But it backfires when Anna is killed and Liv becomes the prime suspect.  Bisa believes in Liv and the two of them will try to find Annay's killer while Liv also tries to keep hold of her relationship with Harry, despite many trying to keep them apart. This is the second book in the Snapshots of NYC Mystery series and, like the first, is an upbeat, swift, cozy with a young millennial, amateur detective. It is refreshi...

Combining the best of folklore and horror, Graeme Reynolds has written a lovely (if you like dark and eerie) novel of terrifying horror. Samantha "Sam" Ashlyn is a single, working mother of two children. She's a journalist for a newspaper when she's asked to return to her hometown to investigate a spate of recent drownings. But doing so brings back some very uncomfortable memories and she knows, deep down, that these are not ordinary drownings. Teaming up with a former police diver, Chris, they discover a conspiracy to keep the information about an ancient evil under wraps. That evil is growing and Sam and Chris hope they can put a stop to it and bring awareness of the danger to the general public. Reynolds does a masterful job of bringing the horror to us and immersing us (submersing?) into the world and the horror. Something I really appreciated was that the horror grew and became more and more disturbing even though it had gotten off to a strong start. We can sense...

Wilder Harlow is a writer and he's now working on the last book he will ever write. This one is the story of his own childhood. At sixteen years old, Wilder's uncle has died and has left his Maine summer cottage to his parents and while visiting, Wilder meets two people who will become life-long friends - a boy named Nathaniel and a girl named Harper. But the town has a dark secret - it is home to a serial killer known as the Dagger Man of Whistler Bay who takes polaroid photos of children while they are sleeping.  Years later and Wilder heads off to college where he meets Sky, a boy who seems to be a kindred spirit. But Sky betrays Wilder by stealing his unfinished manuscript - his memoir - and turning it into a horror novel that becomes a best-seller, titled Looking Glass Sound . I've been impressed with author Catriona Ward, who rather burst onto the horror scene just a few years ago with some really powerful works which I've enjoyed. This might be her best work yet,...

I am one of the many people around the globe who would put Fleetwood Mac's Rumors album among the top albums of all time.  It is easily one of my top three favorite albums (the exact placement might  depend on the day you ask me). Though I've listen to most of their subsequent releases since then, I would count myself as a huge fan of the group - just the album.  Still, seeing this book about the band available, I thought I'd dig just a little deeper. Nearly everything presented here is freely available online, but author Tyler Martin Sehnal pulls it together in an almost cohesive manner.  Almost. Sehnal organizes the book in sequential order from the band's earliest years to the most recent information with chapters organized by a period of years. But within the chapter Sehnal plays a little lose with time without making it clear beforehand, sometimes restating an incident but from another band member's perspective. One for instance is Buckingham's firing from...

There's a formula for angsty YA books and it's there because when done well, it works. That formula includes a teenage, female protagonist, without her parents (generally recently gone or taken away), responsible for a younger sibling/friend, imminent danger, and there's usually a boy - nice and not pushy (he understands what she's going through) - but she can't think about him with everything else going on ... until that moment when she needs him.  Think about some of the top YA books, like The Hunger Games , and you'll see these points. You'll also see this formula in action in Em Garner's Contaminated ... also done very well. An epidemic (a pandemic?) was recently caused by a very trendy diet drink, which has created a 'contamination'. Those contaminated become, mindless, aggressive people - essentially 'zombies.' Teenager Velvet Ellis has been alone with her little sister since their parents were taken in the 'Round Up' when ...

I don't remember when I first read a Robert Aickman story, but I think it was sometime in the mid-to-late 1970's. My reaction then was the same as now ... wow. Robert Aickman's work is some of the best horror/dark fantasy fiction I've read. These stories are so tightly written - no word or thought wasted - that they are a pleasure to read, despite the dark and creepy tones. One of the things about Aickman's work is that he trusts that his reader is intelligent and able and willing to read carefully. There's no hand-holding here, and the books aren't full of in-your-face shock or splatter. It's hard to pick a favorite in this collection because each story is powerful and they're all pretty different. I'd lean toward "The Inner Room" which might be most easily described as a story about a haunted doll house, but it's so much more than that. Like most of these stories, the influence of growing up in Britain during World War II pervades...

Dwayne Finnegan believes that he has made the theatrical connection that will finally give him a shot at working on Broadway.  All he has to do is show the Broadway producer what he's capable of ... no pressure there, right? He's got an idea for Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus that should set the town on fire (does Chicago need another fire?) and he's got a cast that will get some attention and who are more than capable of pulling it off. But first there's the little problem of getting the theatre. Spaces get booked many months in advance, but Dwayne needs a theatre ASAP. Those still available, are so for a reason, but his technical director assures him the space can be made ready in time for opening. But in keeping with Murphy's Law, securing the space for his masterful production is only one of many set-backs Finnegan will face before the coup de grâce. I've spent a fair amount of time working in theatre myself and can recognize all these characters and al...

Three women, three stories, different and yet somehow the same. Celia - wakes up in a home with a husband and child and something doesn't feel right. The house ... the husband ... the child ...? She recognizes none of it, but sensing danger, she plays along until she can find a way to get out and think about her options. Allie - goes along on a weekend outing with her two best friends and their boyfriends (not the weekend she was expecting!) to a cabin in the woods. She's seen enough horror movies that start this way, that she's almost prepared when their car is destroyed, the guys go missing, and the other girls are killed in front of her. Maggie - just wants to be with her daughter, but when she wakes up in a shipping container with a number of other women, she finds herself in a dystopian-like situation - not unlike The Hunger Games or The Maze Runner - where she has to fight to survive to see her daughter again. Three women; three horror stories. Their stories will co...

When Esther was a child, she watched as one of the most dangerous creatures alive, a manticore, killed and devoured her mother and baby brother. Esther survived only by hiding out of reach  in the family well - coming out only when rescuers arrived.  It is likely that this event shaped who Ether becomes - a rukher.  Joining the King's Royal Mews, Esther, a young woman to be paired with her first roc - a giant bird of prey named Zahra. Both Esther and Zahra will make sacrifices to bond with one another. Rocs are masterful manticore hunter/killers, but a roc that isn't trained well could just as easily attack a human when hungry. Now, Esther and Zahra  will head out on one of the most dangerous manticore hunts ever. Threats will come from manticore but also from other rocs, which tend to be very territorial. This is a beautifully written novella. Esther isn't a 'hero' in the sense of someone who goes above and beyond does something unusually remarkable.  But she I...

Widowed Countess Amelia Amesbury could sit back and enjoy the life that her title entails, but as someone who has always seen herself as being clear-headed and helpful, she's taken on the role of 'Lady Agony' - an advice columnist in Victorian England. Many of the letters she receives revolve around a woman's propriety of the era and in which Amelia's responses sometimes defy modern convention and sometimes it falls right in line with convention - keeping readers on their toes. When Amelia gets a letter for Lady Agony in which the writer asks for advice in following a suspected murderer, she knows that she must help investigate - that she may be the writer's only true hope, and help. She enlists the assistance of an acquaintance - a handsome marquis - and her best friend. It doesn't seem too dangerous in theory, but the more Amelia and friends learn about the murder and potential killer, the more dangerous it becomes.  Her secret about being the advice colum...

In this fourth, and final, volume in the Olav Audunsson series by Sigrid Undset, Winter , Olav's life is wrapped up as the man, now in his twilight years, looks on at his life and guilt over some of his actions (as detailed in the previous three books) overwhelms him and he wants to set things right with what time he has left. Watching his son, Eirik make mistakes, may be the most difficult thing for Olav to see as he reflects on his own poor choices. Forgiveness might be impossible, but he might be able to clear his conscience with some effort.  It's difficult to say whether or not this would have the same impact on a reader if this were the only volume of the series to be read.  There is some reflection on past deeds, but to not have read of the events definitely would prove to be a disadvantage - this is the end of a long life and things are slower, more reflective.  The excitement happens in the previous three volumes. But this is an important look at not only Olav's ...

My familiarity with Oscar Wilde is based primarily on his plays. What college theatre student isn't familiar with The Importance of Being Earnest which generally leads to reading some of his other works. Only one other play is included in this collection (which, honestly, was a little disappointing), that being An Ideal Husband . For the most part, this book is a decent sampler of all that Wilde had to offer and interested readers can certainly seek out more pretty handily. The only work of fiction that I had previously read was The Picture of Dorian Gray  (and that reading was decades ago), and the non-fiction was completely new to me. However, what I took away from reading through this was that my impression of Wilde has changed greatly since my college play reading days. Whereas he at one time seemed so clever and witty, I now see a man who was so completely full of himself.  What was once clever repartee now seems out of place - as if really all he wanted to do was be quo...

 Brian Hanson is a Vietnam Vet, a recovering alcoholic who still struggles with PTSD. He's now a psychologist, working in Portland, and he's upset over the death of a client - ruled a suicide but Hanson doesn't believe it.  He decides to do some investigating on his own and discovers that there have been a number of criminals and lowlifes who have been murdered in the Portland area in the past few years.  Is this coincidence, or is there someone inside the City administration or police force culling the criminal herd on the sly? While Hanson starts looking at the city administrators (who've been boosting of a reduction in major crimes), Hanson's wife, Jeanie, is an ambitious banker working with the city on some major projects. One city administrator has his eye on Jeanie, but not for her working skills. That same administrator sees Brian Hanson as a potential threat to his work and claiming Jeanie as a conquest is only one step in his plan to ruin the psychologist. ...