Tag archives for Headline

Richard Ford – Herald of the Storm

Welcome to Steelhaven…

Under the reign of King Cael the Uniter, this vast cityport on the southern coast has for years been a symbol of strength, maintaining an uneasy peace throughout the Free States.

But now a long shadow hangs over the city, in the form of the dread Elharim warlord, Amon Tugha.

When his herald infiltrates the city, looking to exploit its dangerous criminal underworld, and a terrible dark magick that has long been buried once again begins to rise, it could be the beginning of the end.

Epic fantasy is my first love and even if I’ve since broadened my scope and fallen in love with other subgenres, a good epic tale will always catch my eye. The description for Richard Ford’s Herald of the Storm in Headline’s spring catalogue certainly jumped out at me and I was really pleased to be sent an ARC earlier this year. I’d read Ford’s previous novel Kultus last year and while I had some issues with it – largely due to some really foul language and some uneven world building – I really enjoyed it, so I was looking forward to seeing how Ford would take on epic fantasy. And I have to say, I really liked Herald of the Storm. There were some elements that didn’t completely work for me, but Ford’s clearly grown as a writer and Herald of the Storm is a totally different sort of book than Kultus was.

By Mieneke Published 2 May, 2013 Posted in fantasy, review Tagged: Headline | Leave a comment

Jennifer E. Smith – This is What Happy Looks Like

If fate sent you an email, would you answer?

It’s June – seventeen-year-old Ellie O’Neill’s least favourite time of year. Her tiny hometown is annually invaded by tourists, and this year there’s the added inconvenience of a film crew. Even the arrival of Hollywood heartthrob Graham Larkin can’t lift her mood.

But there is something making Ellie very happy. Ever since an email was accidentally sent to her a few months ago, she’s been corresponding with a mysterious stranger, the two of them sharing their hopes and fears. Their developing relationship is not without its secrets though – there’s the truth about Ellie’s past . . . and her pen pal’s real identity. When they finally meet in person, things are destined to get much more complicated. Can two people, worlds apart but brought together by chance, make it against all the odds?

When I was fourteen, my friends and I discovered Take That. This was around the time that their second album was released and we were smitten. I wasn’t a complete teenie-bopper, fan-girl, but we watched and read everything we could find about them. One of the things we did was make up scenarios where we’d unexpectedly run into them in the wild and of course we’d be swept off our feet by whichever one of the guys we liked best at the time. We’d meet like normal people, not superstar and fan, and we’d fall head over heels in love – stop laughing, you in the back, I was fourteen! Don’t judge me. – anyway, we had great fun coming up with scenarios, one even more unlikely than the next. Why the embarrassing confession? Because the premise for This is What Happy Looks Like brought those memories vividly back to the fore and it could easily have been a basis for one of those fantasies – if email had been as easily accessible – and it wouldn’t even have been far-fetched. In fact, this is a storybook romance that could come true in real life, not just in fiction. Even better, Jennifer E. Smith doesn’t make the story into a fairy-tale romance about two perfect people, but creates a story about two people who each have their flaws and their secrets. And while they both have secrets that might be a little out there, at the core This is What Happy Looks Like is about relationships, about friendship, and about making hard choices. Do they get a happily-ever-after? I don’t know, but they do end up the better for having met and known each other.

By Mieneke Published 16 April, 2013 Posted in review, romance, YA Tagged: Headline | Leave a comment

One Burning Question for Julianna Baggott (well, maybe two)

Tomorrow is the UK release day of the second book in Julianna Baggott’s Pure trilogy, Fuse. I reviewed the book last month and was offered the opportunity to ask Julianna one burning question about the series. Because I’m a special snowflake, or perhaps more because I screwed up with my email, I sent in two questions and Julianna was gracious enough to answer them both.

The first question was formulated before I had the chance to read Fuse, so it’s based on the first book in the series, Pure.

Q: What inspired the story Partridge’s mum told him, why give it that particular fairy tale slant?

A: I believe that we reveal so much of our fears and desires and obsessions in fairy tales. They’re powerful, especially those that endure generations. As I mention in PURE, there’s an actual fairy tale about a swan with black feet. I change details that lead to the story that’s been embedded into the tale for Partridge, in hopes that he remembers. Fairy tales are our essences, in a way. They’re primal and because they’re simple and image-based, they haunt us.

I came up with this second question after reading Fuse and it concerns the final book in the trilogy, Burn.

Q: In the Pure world history is clearly written by the victor, it’s more a figment of the powerful people’s imagination than the truth. The truth, which seems so important to Bradwell, remains a nebulous thing in Pressia’s world. Will we learn the full truth in Burn?

A: Interesting you ask this question. Yes, there is something that Bradwell writes — at the very end of BURN — that is especially important. BURN isn’t about the past, however, but it does wrestle with questions about what the truth is and how it matters.

Thank you, Julianna! If you haven’t yet checked the books out, I highly recommend you do so as they’re one of the most exciting YA series currently out there!

By Mieneke Published 13 February, 2013 Posted in interview Tagged: Author Query, Headline | 1 Comment

J.T. Brannan – Origin

Research scientist Evelyn Edwards always knew the Antarctic held deep secrets, yet the discovery of a 40,000-year-old-body buried under the icecaps surpasses even her wildest expectations. But just as her team begins extracting the body the dream turns into a horrific nightmare as they are targeted for death by someone who wants to keep this secret buried. Evelyn barely escapes with her life…

On the run, alone and desperate, she turns to her ex-husband Matt Adams, a former member of an elite government unit, for help. Soon, they find themselves caught up in a frantic race against time, which takes them from Area 51 to the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, as they try to uncover the biggest conspiracy of all time before it’s too late for everyone…

In my teens I was a huge X-Files fan. And when I say huge, I mean the kind that had taped all the episodes from TV, had the official season companions, and debated endless theories on the identity of the Well-Manicured Man, The Cigarette-Smoking Man, what happened to Samantha, and so and so forth. So when handed a review copy of a thriller on the origin of mankind and a mention of Area 51, I’m there—aliens, conspiracies, shadowy organisations, my fifteen-year-old self would have kicked me for passing it by. And while I enjoyed this trip down memory lane, I had some problems with Brannan’s writing in Origin.

First and foremost, there is the info dumping; because there is a lot of info dumping in this book. The reason is quite understandable as there is quite a lot of background information that needs to be conveyed, both of a scientific nature and as regards the various theories and conspiracies that surround the possibility of aliens having visited Earth. However, Brannan’s manner of going into these explanations is far from elegant. The narrative is mainly told in third person simple past tense, but on numerous occasions Brannan starts a new paragraph after a white line in the present tense and gives a short – sometimes single sentence – explanation about the location we’re in, the science being discussed etc. which only emphasised the fact that here was an explanation. There was a lot of telling, not showing of the most important plot points and that made for a less than smooth reading experience.

Several other things nagged. The story is told from an omniscient third person point of view, which admittedly isn’t my favourite narrative viewpoint. What bothered me most about it though was the inconsistency of some of the name usage. For example, Lynn is consequently referred to as Lynn, except when we’re watching through the villains’ consciousness, when she is referred to as Edwards. However, Matt Adams is, with a few exceptions when Lynn is contemplating emotional things, always referred to as Adams, even when we’re following Lynn, which makes no sense, as he’s her ex and theirs doesn’t seem the kind of relationship where they playfully call each other by their last name. The story head hops quite a bit. While it’s never unclear in whose head we are, there are a lot of heads to keep track off and that compared with the letter soup the villains swim around in (all the TLA-agencies and then some are represented) can get a little confusing.

While I obviously had some issues with the writing, there is also a lot Brannan gets right. In Lynn and Adams he has a very sympathetic pair of lead characters, who it’s very easy to root for. We learn only a little about their history, but we do get to watch them reconnect and realise that they still love each other, a development which is very enjoyable to follow. Still, Origin isn’t a book that is powered by its development of character; it’s driven by its nail-biting plot. Our characters get little or no chance to breathe during the entire novel, as they are continually on the run, first to evade their enemies and later to prevent them from carrying out their nefarious plan. It is here that Origin shines with a well thought through plot and short, pacey chapters that make reading ‘just one more chapter’ both very easy and very treacherous, because stopping at one more is all but impossible.

What Brannan definitely gets right is his research into the various alien theories and conspiracies, not just those concerning aliens, but larger ones as well. He not only name checks and incorporates a lot of the standard alien-related phenomena, such as Roswell, Area 51, the Nazca lines, and the theories of Erich von Däniken, but also brings in other well-loved objects of conspiracy theorist, such as the Bilderberg Group and the Large Hadron Collider. It was fun spotting all of these and seeing how Brannan put them together in quite an original way.

Origin ends on a large ‘Aha!’-moment, one I hadn’t seen coming at all, though Brannan had seeded the clues to this from almost the start of the novel. Then again hindsight is 20/20 and this gathering together of clues and still being surprised is what makes reading these kinds of books such fun. The ending of Origin is intriguing and leaves an opening for a sequel, though I haven’t been able to discover anything on a second book set in this world in the works. Despite my issues with the writing, Origin‘s plot comes through to form a good, if flawed, debut. Brannan shows he’s got the chops to come up with a very interesting plot, great action and a break-neck pace. It’ll be interesting to see how he develops as a writer, because the story-telling talent is there. Meanwhile, if you enjoy a good, roaring fast thriller with an X-Files vibe, Origin is the book for you.

This book was provided for review by the publisher.

By Mieneke Published 4 February, 2013 Posted in review, science fiction, thriller Tagged: Headline | 1 Comment

Julianna Baggott – Fuse

After a young Wretch is abducted by the Dome and ‘cleansed’ of her fusings and imperfections, she is only able to repeat the Dome’s latest message: ‘We want our son returned. This girl is proof that we can save you all. If you ignore our plea, we will kill our hostages one at a time.’ Willux will go to any lengths to get his son Partridge back, including murder. Partridge sacrifices himself and returns, in the hope of taking over the Dome from within, only to uncover more of his father’s chilling, dark secrets.

Outside the Dome, Pressia, Bradwell, and El Capitan are decoding the secrets from the past – tucked away in one of the Black Boxes – to uncover the truth that might set the wretches free of their fusings forever. Those fighting Willux will be pushed over boundaries, both land and sea, heart and mind, in their quest – further than they ever imagined.

A little over a year ago I started off my reading year with Julianna Baggott’s Pure, the first book in this trilogy. I found it a fantastic read, which engaged the reader on several levels, had some fabulous characters and world-building, and most importantly, was just a compelling story. Cue January 2013 and in a month’s time the sequel, Fuse, will be out and I get to review that as well. While I was very much looking forward to reading the book, because I was curious to see what would happen next, I was also a little hesitant. What if the story didn’t hold up or the book would suffer from Middle Book Syndrome? But the story did hold up and the book didn’t suffer from Middle Book Syndrome and I was just as drawn in by Fuse as I was by Pure.

Fuse reunites us with all the main characters from the previous book, with the points of view being shared by Pressia, Partridge, El Capitan, and Lyda. After the final events of Pure, they’ve split up, Partridge and Lyda going with the Mothers and Pressia going with El Capitan and Bradwell to create an army to take on the Dome. From there, they all embark on a journey, one to save those outside of the Dome and to discover who they really are. All of them show tremendous emotional growth in this second book in the series. They have to learn trust, vulnerability, and that love, unrequited or not, is a source of strength and hope, not necessarily a weakness. They all need to learn how to be confident in their abilities, though some more than others. As with Pure, the character that impressed me most in this regard was Lyda. She learns to rely on herself and discovers a competence in herself she’d never have believed possible while she still lived in the Dome. Similarly, El Capitan’s gradual softening towards and the acceptance of his unavoidable relationship with his brother Helmud was heart-warming and believable.

If in the last book we learned the reasons for the Detonations, in Fuse we see how far-reaching they actually were and how hard it will be to change life both in the Dome and outside of it. The story is split in three, following Pressia and her friends outside of the Dome, Lyda with the Mothers on the outside, and Partridge on the inside. All three of them are equally exciting, though Pressia’s in the most action-filled. Through Partridge’s viewpoint we get a better look at the Dome, its society, and at how nefarious his father truly is. While Fuse didn’t suffer from the usual Middle Book Syndrome symptoms, it is very much a middle book, in that it sets up things neatly to be resolved in the last book, at least as far as events in the Dome are concerned. Outside the Dome, however, is a completely different matter and I’m really curious to see how Baggott will get Pressia and her friends back to the Dome.

Baggott’s world-building deepens, providing the reader with even more history of the Before; history discovered contained in the Black Boxes found in the last book. I loved these time capsules, these ‘libraries of data’ as Bradwell calls them. One of them, Fignan, was one of my favourite things about the book. It’s surprising how easily such an unlikely subject as an animated Black Box anthropomorphises into something with awareness and feelings. His function in the book is fascinating; he is a combination of information source, puzzle box and semi-sentient pet. Even if at times he’s a rather convenient way to move along the plot, it doesn’t take away from the narrative. We also get glimpses of what is left of humanity in the rest of the world. We move past the direct environs of the Dome and the city close to it, we see what is left of DC and even across the Atlantic. The consequences of the Detonations seem to have been different across the world and I hope we’ll find out more about this in the last book in the trilogy.

I called Pure a ‘cracker of a read’ and Fuse is that and more. It’s a dense story, with a lot to unpack, but it’s never less than entertaining. Baggott has once again succeeded in making me care deeply for these characters and I really hope they’ll get a somewhat happy ending in Burn, even if it seems unlikely in the wreckage that is the world of the Pure trilogy. Fuse is set in a bleak and dangerous world, but at its core it is a story about hope, love and human resilience. The Pure trilogy is shaping up to be a stunning series and Fuse is a worthy sequel to Pure.

This book was provided for review by the publisher.

By Mieneke Published 28 January, 2013 Posted in review, YA Tagged: dystopian, Headline | 1 Comment

Myke Cole – Fortress Frontier

US Cover

Alan Bookbinder might be a Colonel in the US military, but in his heart he fears he’s nothing more than a desk jockey, a clerk with a silver eagle on his jacket. But then one morning he is woken by a terrible nightmare and overcome by an ominous drowning sensation. Something is wrong. He has changed.

Forced into working for the Supernatural Operations Corps in a new and dangerous world, Bookbinder’s only hope of finding a way back to his family will mean teaming up with former SOC operator and public enemy number one: Oscar Britton. They will have to put everything on the line if they are to save thousands of soldiers trapped in a fortress frontier on the brink of destruction.

Myke Cole’s debut Control Point, published last year, was ‘Fast-paced, well-written and well-thought out’ as I put it and I was really looking forward to reading its sequel, Fortress Frontier, to see whether the magic would hold. And I’m pleased to say it did. Not only did we get to catch up with the first book’s protagonist, Oscar, we’re also introduced to another lead character, Colonel Alan Bookbinder. He allows us to get a different view of SOC and of the forward operating base in the Source we last saw through Oscar’s eyes.

It’s worth mentioning that Bookbinder’s narrative arc starts some time before the end of the previous book and that roughly the first quarter of the book is spent catching us up to where we left last time. This confused me at first, but once I realised the time shift, things made sense again and I could just settle into the story. Cole uses an interesting structure in the book; not only does he go back in time at the start to give us Bookbinder’s full story and show us the effects of Oscar’s decisions in the previous book on the FOB, he also switches story arcs for a bit, from Bookbinder to Oscar and back again. In this way, we get both of their stories from their point of view and all the puzzle pieces fit together smoothly once we get to the spectacular finale of the book.

UK Cover

In itself the plot is quite simple: Bookbinder has to find a way to rescue the stranded personnel from the beleaguered base. It sounds easy, but of course it isn’t. Cole takes us on a long trek through the Source to find assistance and on this trek we learn more about the Source and make some interesting discoveries. I loved how we got to explore the way other nations dealt with the Great Reawakening and their treatment of their Latents, especially those of the Sahir, the Indian version of the SOC. The naga en their Bandhav, their human partners, are fascinating and Cole’s portrayal of the naga court amazing. I loved the details he incorporated, from the architecture to the mythology and the diplomacy, though I could have done without the visuals of snakes blanketing every surface, but that’s my personal prejudice against the slithery darlings rearing its head.

As in Control Point, the characters shine brightly in Fortress Frontier. Bookbinder is a compelling character and his emotional growth over the course of the book was very well done. When we first meet him, Bookbinder is a desk jockey. He’s a Colonel who has never seen any action and as a result he feels that he’s less of a soldier than all those around him who have, but he’s also convinced he isn’t capable of being authoritative and a leader of men, so he’s rather accepted his lot. But when he turns up Latent, but not Manifesting, he’s shipped off to the SOC base and he’s forced to learn to be more and start believing in his own capabilities as much as his inferiors do. Bookbinder is a perfect example of the ‘hero against all odds’, the one who is forced into it by his sense of duty and his humanity. Cole shows his struggle to be the leader he needs to be, to believe in himself and his grief at what he sees as his failures. In a sense, Bookbinder’s movement in the book is the opposite of Oscar’s in the previous book. Oscar was an insider-turned-outsider by his magic, while Bookbinder felt he was an outsider, by dint of his career path, who becomes an insider and comes home in a sense, through his experiences in the Source.

Oscar is as cool a character as ever and where I found him a little frustrating in his last outing due to his indecisiveness on which side to pick, that is completely gone in Fortress Frontier. Oscar has found his mission and works to complete it, while at the same time trying to get his group to safety. His desire to effect change in a peaceful manner and without ‘normal’ casualties typifies the person he is and regardless what happens to him, he keeps his honour and sense of duty, which makes him very sympathetic. His growth in this book is less dramatic than Bookbinder’s and as such I found his storyline just a little less compelling than Bookbinder’s, but it was strong nonetheless and gave us some key information for the denouement of the book.

Fortress Frontier ends on a high, but also on a drawn breath. For while the plot for this book is quite resolved, there are several loose ends that tease an explosive final in the last book in this trilogy. Cole’s respect for the military and the values it upholds bleed through, without glorifying war or violence. With his second book Cole has proven once again that he can combine amazing action scenes with great characterisation and genuine emotion. Fortress Frontier is stronger than its predecessor and raises expectations for the next book, Breach Zone. The Shadow Ops series is proving to be one of my favourite series at the moment and one I highly recommend.

This book was provided for review by both the US and the UK publisher.

By Mieneke Published 21 January, 2013 Posted in fantasy, review Tagged: Ace, Headline | 4 Comments

Tanya Byrne – Heart-Shaped Bruise

When Archway Young Offenders Institution is closed down a notebook is found in one of the rooms.

I have to start by saying that this isn’t an apology. I’m not sorry. I’m not.

This is that notebook.

They say I’m evil and everyone believes it. Including you. But you don’t know.

Its pages reveal the dark and troubled mind of Emily Koll, Archway’s most notorious inmate.

Sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever shake off my mistakes or if I’ll just carry them around with me forever like a bunch of red balloons.

Heart-Shaped Bruise by Tanya Byrne was one of the books all over my Twitter feed in the past year. It received a lot of buzz and enthusiastic reactions, so I was pleased to get a copy for Christmas. As soon as it landed on my huge TBR-pile, Wiebe made off with it – to my complete and utter amazement, as I’d never expected him to start reading contemporary YA, but that’s a different story – and after finishing the book in three hours flat he came back and said: “You have to read this NOW, this is something special.” For a book to draw such a reaction from my quite critical husband it has to be extraordinary, so I read it I did, and he was right; it is something special indeed. Heart-Shaped Bruise is a stunning book, which just left me speechless when I finished it. I even had to take a few days to gather my thoughts so I could write a somewhat coherent review for it.

From the first pages I was gripped; as a reader, one of the things I look for in a book is a strong authorial voice and Byrne has that in spades. It didn’t take long to see that this was quite a unique voice, one that I really connected with whole-heartedly. What was surprising was how much the book made me laugh. Emily is genuinely funny and wields a kind of gallows humour that tickled my funny bone. In Emily, Byrne has created a character that will be hard to forget for anyone who meets her. She’s funny, hard, angry, vulnerable, insecure, broken, and ultimately very, very human. As narrators go, she’s also rather unreliable as she deliberately leaves things out and tells us so. In addition, we never learn what she’s incarcerated for exactly. We learn what happens, but we don’t learn the charges. In the first chapter of the book, Emily says she did what she did, because Juliet had broken her, while through the narrative the Emily we get to know seems to have at least been structurally weakened even before finding out about her dad. Byrne succeeds in making the reader care for this damaged, creepy girl, despite all she does, which reminded me of this guest blog by Foz Meadows over on The Book Smugglers. Emily is like the new bad boys Foz describes, she displays all the symptoms of being seriously disturbed and dangerous. Where she differs though, is that she knows very well that what she did was wrong and even if she’ll never admit it, you get the sense that she’s sorry.

The other characterisations in the book are very strong as well—my favourites being Juliet, Sid, and Dr Gilyard. What I loved about the character of Juliet is how completely skewed the reader’s emotions become towards her. Here is a girl, who was attacked and had her father brutally murdered, to all intents and purposes scrabbling back up and going on with her life and despite all life has thrown at her she seems to have kept her innate kindness and decency intact. And through Emily’s narration she takes on a slightly petulant and spoiled cast, which seems both natural – nobody is that perfect – and slightly wrong. I also liked the juxtaposition of the two girls; Dr Gilyard draws Emily’s attention to the many similarities in their background, raised by single dads, who were very successful at their chosen professions and both smart and well-educated. If only their dads hadn’t been on opposing teams, so to speak, what would have happened had they met then? Sid is one of my favourite love interests I’ve ever encountered in my YA reading; he’s slightly dark and bad boyish on first acquaintance, but turns out to be a really decent guy with a complicated past and a heart filled with good intentions. Again, it’s unclear whether this shift is due to Emily’s perceptions of him being affected by her feelings for him or whether it is just a case of first impressions being shallow, but I rather like that uncertainty. Dr Gilyard’s tenacity and the sessions with her Emily describes were fabulous, not only did they bring out Emily’s inner snark, I also loved how cool, calm, and collected Dr Gilyard remained when Emily tried to get under her skin. She really seems to care for these girls without turning into a bleeding heart. I do have to add that I think Byrne writes genius characters, even those we only encounter the once in Emily’s narration. One of those was her college councillor Ms Grace Humm. Now there’s a lady who jumped off the page and who I kept hoping we’d see more off as she was just so amazingly cool.

The settings are rather limited. Obviously, the parts pertaining to Emily’s time on ward would be rather limited, as it’s a small world they get to occupy, but even so, those few rooms we’re shown are clear and I found the glimpses we got of life there interesting and Emily’s fellow long-staying inmates were interesting and well-developed. The ‘outside’ setting in comparison felt rather flat. That part of the story is set in London and while clearly London, it didn’t ooze the city as much as some of the other books I’ve read this year. However, I think that in the parts set in the past the emphasis is very heavily on character interaction and the relationships between various characters, so the ‘stage’ rather fades into the background. The plot is rather brilliant, as we’re kept in suspense almost until the last page, even if from page one we know she did it. The suspense here is concerned with what and how, not with whether she did it or not. And even while I knew that there wasn’t going to be a happy ending for Emily, as we know she’s in prison when we meet her, I kept hoping that she would get one, that she wouldn’t do whatever horrible thing she was going to do and just sail off into the sunset to a happily ever after. That is how powerful Byrne’s writing is.

To convey how much I loved Heart-Shaped Bruise is hard without turning into a gabbling fan girl. It had me chuckling and laughing out loud at some of Emily’s snarky remarks and had me reading with bated breath and hoping against hope that everything would be okay. Its story and characters are still stuck in my mind and they made me ponder their intent and have a long discussion with Wiebe on what had happened and why, and what did this mean etc. If you only get to pick one more book to read this year, let it be Heart-Shaped Bruise. Even if you don’t read YA or non-genre books, read this one. It’s an amazing story and to think this is only Ms Byrne’s debut—imagine what her next book must be like. I know I’ll be reading it soon as I can.

By Mieneke Published 27 December, 2012 Posted in contemporary, review, thriller, YA Tagged: Headline | Leave a comment

Anticipated Books (Winter/Spring) 2013: YA April-June

Here’s the second half of my Anticipated Books YA post. For some of these I already have an (e)ARC or review copy, so they’ll definitely be read and reviewed. And for the rest, I’ll have to see whether I get the chance to get my hands on them.

April
Jennifer Archer – The Shadow Girl (Mystery, HarperTeen)
Sometimes I forget for an hour or two that she’s with me. Sometimes I convince myself that she was only a dream. Or that I’m crazy.

For as long as Lily Winston can remember, she has never been alone. Iris, a shadowy figure who mimics Lily’s movements and whispers in her ear, is with her always—but invisible to the rest of the world. Iris is Lily’s secret.

But when Lily’s father is killed in a tragic accident, his cryptic final words suggest that he and Lily’s mother have been keeping secrets of their own. Suddenly, Iris begins pushing Lily more than ever, possessing her thoughts and urging her to put together the pieces of a strange puzzle her father left behind. As she searches for answers, Lily finds herself drawn to Ty Collier, a mysterious new boy in town. Together, Lily and Ty must untangle a web of deception to discover the truth about her family, Iris . . . and Lily’s own identity.

Catherine Fisher – Obsidian Mirror (Fantasy, Dial Books)
The obsidian mirror. Its power is great and terrible. Men have been lost in it, the dead brought back to life through it, and the future annihilated by it. Or it will be, unless the mirror is destroyed. One has been sent from the future to do just that. One protects the mirror at all costs, obsessed with its power. One needs the mirror to find a murdered father and save his life. Only one can succeed.

The mirror can send you to the past, but it will not bring you back.

Jordana Frankel – The Ward (Science Fiction, Katherine Tegen Books)
Sixteen-year-old Ren is a daredevil mobile racer who will risk everything to survive in the Ward, what remains of a water-logged Manhattan. To save her sister, who is suffering from a deadly illness thought to be caused by years of pollution, Ren accepts a secret mission from the government: to search for a freshwater source in the Ward, with the hope of it leading to a cure.

However, she never expects that her search will lead to dangerous encounters with a passionate young scientist; a web of deceit and lies; and an earth-shattering mystery that’s lurking deep beneath the water’s rippling surface.

Helen Grant – Silent Saturday (Mystery, Random House Children’s Books)
Seventeen-year-old Veerle is bored with life in suburban Brussels. But a chance encounter with a hidden society, whose members illegally break into unoccupied buildings around the city, soon opens up a whole new world of excitement – and danger.

When one of the society’s founding members disappears, Veerle suspects foul play. But nothing can prepare her for the horror that is about to unfold when an old foe emerges from the shadows… No one is safe, and The Hunter will strike again…

Karen Mahoney – The Stone Demon (Fantasy, Flux)
The just-unleashed demon hordes have delivered an impossible ultimatum to the Order of the Crow: produce the Philosopher’s Stone, or suffer a reaper storm of demonic tribulation. If alchemist’s apprentice Donna Underwood can’t recreate the mythical artifact, the world will be plunged into a devastating modern-day Dark Age.

Pitting her dangerously unpredictable powers against a vengeful demon king, two maleficent faery queens, and an immortal magus with his own shadowy agenda, Donna must be willing to make the ultimate sacrifice–but this time, even death may not be enough.

Emily Murdoch – If You Find Me (Contemporary, Indigo)
A gripping mystery – can Carey finally face the terrible secret she’s been keeping?

A fluid, compelling and thought-provoking debut. Sisters, Carey and Jenessa, live with their mother in the heart of the woods – until Mum disappears and a social worker arrives with Carey’s father. Suddenly the sisters must adapt to the wider world. But Carey is burdened by a terrible secret that she fears will destroy her new life and new relationships. Can the truth set her free?

Jennifer E. Smith – This Is What Happy Looks Like (Contemporary, Headline)
When 17-year-old Graham Larkin sends an email to a friend about his pet pig, Wilbur, the last thing he expects is a response from the other side of the country, from one Ellie O’Neill. As their online friendship blossoms, they begin to reveal more about themselves, but crucially leave out the truth about Ellie’s past and Graham’s career as a Hollywood heartthrob. But, now that they’re together, it’s impossible to keep their secrets for long and there’s a lot to overcome if love is to blossom…

Scott Tracey – Moonset (Fantasy, Flux)
Justin Daggett, his trouble-making sister, and their three orphan-witch friends have gotten themselves kicked out of high school. Again. Now they’ve ended up in Carrow Mills, New York, the town where their parents–members of the terrorist witch organization known as Moonset–began their evil experiments with the dark arts one generation ago.

When the siblings are accused of unleashing black magic on the town, Justin fights to prove their innocence. But tracking down the true culprit leads him to a terrifying discovery about Moonset’s past…and its deadly future.

Martha Wells – Emilie and the Hollow World (Fantasy, Strange Chemistry)
While running away from home for reasons that are eminently defensible, Emilie’s plans to stow away on the steamship Merry Bell and reach her cousin in the big city go awry, landing her on the wrong ship and at the beginning of a fantastic adventure.
Taken under the protection of Lady Marlende, Emilie learns that the crew hopes to use the aether currents and an experimental engine, and with the assistance of Lord Engal, journey to the interior of the planet in search of Marlende’s missing father.
With the ship damaged on arrival, they attempt to traverse the strange lands on their quest. But when evidence points to sabotage and they encounter the treacherous Lord Ivers, along with the strange race of the sea-lands, Emilie has to make some challenging decisions and take daring action if they are ever to reach the surface world again.

May
K.L. Armstrong and M.A. Marr – Loki’s Wolves (Fantasy, Atom)
In Viking times, Norse myths predicted the end of the world, an event called Ragnarök that only the gods can stop. When this apocalypse happens, the gods must battle the monsters – wolves the size of the sun, serpents that span the sea beds – all bent on destroying the world.

But the gods died a long time ago.

Matt Thorsen knows every Norse myth, saga, and god as if it was family history – because it is family history. Most people in the modern-day town of Blackwell, South Dakota, are direct descendants of either Thor or Loki, including Matt’s classmates Fen and Laurie Brekke. However, knowing the legends and completely believing them are two different things. When the rune readers reveal that Ragnarök is coming and kids – led by Matt – will stand in for the gods in the final battle, Matt can hardly believe it.

Matt’s, Laurie’s and Fen’s lives will never be the same as they race to put together an unstoppable team to prevent the end of the world.

Alex Flinn – Towering (Fantasy, HarperTeen)
High in my tower I sit. I watch the birds fly below, the clouds float above, and the tall, green forest stretch to places I might never see.

Mama, who isn’t my mother, has kept me hidden away for eight long years. My only companions, besides Mama, are my books – great adventures, mysteries, and romances, that I long to make my reality. But I know that no one will come to save me—my life is not a fairy tale after all.

Well, at least no one has come so far. Recently, my hair has started to grow rapidly and it is now long enough to reach the bottom of the tower from my window. I’ve also had the strangest dreams of a beautiful green-eyed boy.

When Mama isn’t around, I plan my escape, even if it’s just for a little while. There’s something— maybe someone—waiting for me out there and it won’t find me if I’m trapped here TOWERING above it all.

Dan Krokos – The Planet Thieves (Science Fiction, Starscape)
Two weeks ago, thirteen-year-old Mason Stark and seventeen of his fellow cadets from the Academy for Earth Space Command boarded the SS Egypt. he trip was supposed to be a short routine voyage to log their required spacetime for summer quarter.

But routine goes out the airlock when they’re attacked by the Tremist, an alien race who have been at war with humanity for the last sixty years.

With the captain and crew dead, injured, or taken prisoner, Mason and the cadets are all that’s left to warn the ESC. And soon they find out exactly why the Tremist chose this ship to attack: the Egypt is carrying a weapon that could change the war forever.

Now Mason will have to lead the cadets in a daring assault to take back the ship, rescue the survivors, and recover the weapon. Before there isn’t a war left to fight.

Bennett Madison – September Girls (Fantasy, HarperTeen)
Critically acclaimed author Bennett Madison presents a darkly imaginative and painfully honest novel about oblivious parents, sibling rivalries, first loves… and mermaids. This modern reimagining is perfect for fans of the irreverent wit of Ned Vizzini and the seductive magic of Alex Flinn’s retold fairy tales.

Lauren Miller – Parallel (Science Fiction, HarperTeen)
Abby Barnes had a plan. The Plan. She’d go to Northwestern, major in journalism, and land a job at a national newspaper, all before she turned twenty-two. But one tiny choice—taking a drama class her senior year of high school—changed all that. Now, on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, Abby is stuck on a Hollywood movie set, miles from where she wants to be, wishing she could rewind her life. The next morning, she’s in a dorm room at Yale, with no memory of how she got there. Overnight, it’s as if her past has been rewritten.

With the help of Caitlin, her science-savvy BFF, Abby discovers that this new reality is the result of a cosmic collision of parallel universes that has Abby living an alternate version of her life. And not only that: Abby’s life changes every time her parallel self makes a new choice. Meanwhile, her parallel is living out Abby’s senior year of high school and falling for someone Abby’s never even met.

As she struggles to navigate her ever-shifting existence, forced to live out the consequences of a path she didn’t choose, Abby must let go of the Plan and learn to focus on the present, without losing sight of who she is, the boy who might just be her soul mate, and the destiny that’s finally within reach.

Chelsea Pitcher – The S-Word (Contemporary, Gallery Books)
Lizzie wasn’t the first student at Verity High School to kill herself this year. But the difference is, she didn’t go quietly.

First it was SLUT scribbled all over the school’s lockers. But one week after Lizzie Hart takes her own life, SUICIDE SLUT replaces it—in Lizzie’s own looping scrawl. Photocopies of her diary show up in the hands of her classmates. And her best friend, Angie, is enraged.

Angie had stopped talking to Lizzie on prom night, when she caught Lizzie in bed with her boyfriend. Too heartbroken to let Lizzie explain the hookup or to intervene when Lizzie gets branded Queen of the Sluts and is cruelly bullied by her classmates, Angie left her best friend to the mercy of the school, with tragic results.

But with this new slur, Angie’s guilt transforms into anger that someone is still targeting Lizzie even after her death. Using clues from Lizzie’s diary and aided by the magnetic, mysterious Jesse, Angie begins relentlessly investigating who, exactly, made Lizzie feel life was no longer worth living. And while she might claim she simply wants to punish Lizzie’s tormentors, her anguish over abandoning and then losing her best friend drives Angie deeper into the dark, twisted side of Verity High—and she might not be able to pull herself back out.

Christian Schoon – Zenn Scarlett (Science Fiction, Strange Chemistry Books)
Zenn Scarlett is a bright, determined, occasionally a-little-too-smart-for-her-own-good 17-year-old girl training hard to become an exoveterinarian. That means she’s specializing in the treatment of exotic alien life forms, mostly large and generally dangerous. Her novice year of training at the Ciscan Cloister Exovet Clinic on Mars will find her working with alien patients from whalehounds the size of a hay barn to a baby Kiran Sunkiller, a colossal floating creature that will grow up to carry a whole sky-city on its back.

But after a series of inexplicable animal escapes from the school and other near-disasters, the Cloister is in real danger of being shut down by a group of alien-hating officials. If that happens, Zenn knows only too well the grim fate awaiting the creatures she loves.

Now, she must unravel the baffling events plaguing her school, before someone is hurt or killed, before everything she cares about is ripped away from her and her family forever. To solve this mystery – and live to tell about it – Zenn will have to put her new exovet skills to work in ways she never imagined, and in the process learn just how powerful compassion and empathy can be.

Amy Tintera – Reboot (Science Fiction, HarperTeen)
La Femme Nikita meets Maximum Ride in this action-packed debut novel about seventeen-year-old Wren, who rose from the dead as a Reboot and is now the government’s top soldier—until she is given an order she refuses to obey.

June
Sage Blackwood – Jinx: The Wizard’s Apprentice (Fantasy, Quercus Children’s)
Never stray far from the path is the rule every child in the Urwald Forest follows. Every child, that is, except a boy named Jinx.

Jinx is an apprentice to Simon, a wizard who is just a little bit evil. When one of Simon’s spells robs Jinx of his ability to see other people’s thoughts, he decides to head off into the forest to try recover his magic.

Jinx’s mission brings him face to face with a very evil, soul-sucking wizard, the terrible Bonemaster. With help only from Elfwyn, who is cursed with a truth-telling spell, and Reven, who is far too polite to be useful in a fight, it looks like Jinx’s magic could be gone forever …

John Carter Cash – Lupus Rex (Fantasy, Ravenstone)
Isyl and Cormo are two quail who must risk their lives when they are driven from their home by the crows when the Murder fractures over the decision of who shall rule the Tree. The disorder this brings to the region comes to the attention of the wolf Asmod and he sees an opportunity to make himself King. To restore order the quails must venture far from their home to seek an audience with a potentially dangerous ally, the hawk Pitrin. As the forest trembles with the approach of Asmod’s army, the two quail will find themselves entangled in an epic struggle, as they fight to bring peace to the Field.

Cassandra Rose Clarke – The Pirate’s Wish (Fantasy, Strange Chemistry Books)
After setting out to break the curse that binds them together, the pirate Ananna and the assassin Naji find themselves stranded on an enchanted island in the north with nothing but a sword, their wits, and the secret to breaking the curse: complete three impossible tasks. With the help of their friend Marjani and a rather unusual ally, Ananna and Naji make their way south again, seeking what seems to be beyond their reach.

Unfortunately, Naji has enemies from the shadowy world known as the Mists, and Ananna must still face the repercussions of going up against the Pirate Confederation. Together, Naji and Ananna must break the curse, escape their enemies — and come to terms with their growing romantic attraction.

Shannon Delany – Weather Witch (Fantasy. St. Martin’s Griffin)
Some fled the Old World to avoid war and some fled to leave behind magic. But even the fiercely regulated New World—with its ranks and standards and emphasis on decorum—cannot avoid the power that wells up in certain people and influences weather and calls down storms. So the Weather Witches—those who can control the weather—are hunted by Testers and Wraiths and made to power the Grounded population’s ships, their lights—their every luxury—in a time before either steam or electricity takes hold. Jordan Astraea, a high-ranking member of The Nine is from a flawless background with seemingly no taint of magic or witchery. But on the night of her seventeenth birthday celebration the Wraiths and the Tester appear and blame her for summoning an unscheduled storm. Taken from her family and near-boyfriend, Rowen, Jordan is sentenced to be Made—to become a Conductor—and be enslaved as a living battery for an airship. But breaking Jordan may prove the very thing the carefully constructed New World society cannot survive. And the chance of losing Jordan forever may make Rowen become the hero he would have never dared otherwise be.

David Fleming – The Saturday Boy (Contemporary, Viking Children’s Books)
Eleven-year-old Derek Lamb likes superhero comic books, Saturday morning cartoons, and Chocolate Ka??Blams, but he’d gladly trade all of these things to have his father home. For as long as Derek can remember, his father has been in Afghanistan piloting Apache helicopters for the US Army. The letters they write to each other are all they have to bridge the distance—ninety-one letters to date. But just when Derek’s best friend becomes his archnemesis, a time when Derek could use his father’s advice most, the letters stop. Derek’s whole life is on the brink of change and he doesn’t even know it.

P.J. Hoover – Solstice (Fantasy, Tor Teen)
Piper’s world is dying. Each day brings hotter temperatures and heat bubbles which threaten to destroy the Earth. Amid this Global Heating Crisis, Piper lives under the oppressive rule of her mother, who suffocates her even more than the weather does. Everything changes on her eighteenth birthday, when her mother is called away on a mysterious errand and Piper seizes her first opportunity for freedom.

Piper discovers a universe she never knew existed—a sphere of gods and monsters—and realizes that her world is not the only one in crisis. While gods battle for control of the Underworld, Piper’s life spirals out of control as she struggles to find the answer to the secret that has been kept from her since birth—her very identity…

Imogen Howson – Linked (Science Fiction, Quercus Children’s)
For years, Elissa has suffered nightmarish visions and unexplained bruises. Finally, she’s promised a cure, and an operation is scheduled. But on the eve of the procedure, she discovers the truth: she’s seeing the world through another girl’s eyes. A world filled with wires, machines and pain. Elissa follows her visions, only to find a battered, broken girl.

A girl who looks exactly like her. A twin she never knew existed.

Elissa and Lin go on the run, but even after changing their looks and clothes, they’re barely a step ahead of the government agents who are ruthlessly tracking them down. For Lin and Elissa are too valuable to let go, and the dark truth at the heart of it all is too shocking to risk exposing …

Elizabeth Knox – Mortal Fire (Fantasy, Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Sixteen-year-old Canny Mochrie’s vacation takes a turn when she stumbles upon a mysterious and enchanting valley, occupied almost entirely by children who can perform a special type of magic that tells things how to be stronger and better than they already are. As Canny studies the magic more carefully, she realizes that she not only understands it–she can perform the magic, too, so well that it feels like it has always been a part of her. With the help of an alluring seventeen-year-old boy who is held hostage by a spell that is now more powerful than the people who first placed it, Canny figures out the secrets of this valley and of her own past.

Stephanie Kuehn – Charm & Strange (Contemporary, St. Martin’s Griffin)
Andrew Winston Winters is at war with himself. He’s part Win, the lonely teenager exiled to a remote Vermont boarding school in the wake of a family tragedy. The guy who shuts all his classmates out, no matter the cost, because his darkest fear is turning into a vicious wolf, just like his father. But he’s also part Drew, the angry young boy with violent impulses that control him. The boy who spent a fateful summer with his brother and teenage cousins, only to endure a family secret so painful it led three children to do the unthinkable. Over the course of one night, while stuck at a party deep in the New England woods, Andrew battles the pain of his past and the isolation of his present. Before the sun rises, he’ll either surrender his sanity to the wild wolves inside his mind or learn that surviving means more than not dying.

Alex London – Proxy (Science Fiction, Philomel Books)
Knox was born into one of the City’s wealthiest families. A Patron, he has everything a boy could want—the latest tech, the coolest clothes, and a Proxy to take all his punishments. When Knox breaks a vase, Syd is beaten. When Knox plays a practical joke, Syd is forced to haul rocks. And when Knox crashes a car, killing one of his friends, Syd is branded and sentenced to death.

Syd is a Proxy. His life is not his own.

Then again, neither is Knox’s. Knox and Syd have more in common than either would guess. So when both boys realize that the only way to beat the system is to save each other, they flee. Yet Knox’s father is no ordinary Patron, and Syd is no ordinary Proxy. The ensuing cross-country chase will uncover a society of rebels, test both boys’ resolve, and shine a light onto a world of those who owe and those who pay. Some debts, it turns out, cannot be repaid.

Amy McCulloch – The Oathbreaker’s Shadow (Fantasy, Random House Children’s Books)
Fifteen-year-old Raim lives in a world where you tie a knot for every promise that you make. Break that promise and you are scarred for life, and cast out into the desert.

Raim has worn a simple knot around his wrist for as long as he can remember. No one knows where it came from, and which promise of his it symbolises, but he barely thinks about it at all – not since becoming the most promising young fighter ever to train for the elite Yun guard. But on the most important day of his life, when he binds his life to his best friend (and future khan) Khareh, the string bursts into flames and sears a dark mark into his skin.

Scarred now as an oath-breaker, Raim has two options: run, or be killed.

Sarah Jamila Stevenson – Underneath (Contemporary, Flux)
With New Agey parants and a Pakistani heritage, it might have been difficult for Sunny Pryce-Shah to fit in. Thankfully, she had her older, popular cousin Shiri to talk to–until now. Shiri’s shocking suicide brings heart-wrenching pain and grief, and also seems to have triggered a new and disturbing ability in Sunny: hearing people’s thoughts.

It’s awful, especially when Sunny learns what her so-called friends really think of her. Feeling more comfortable with the Emo crowd, she tells them about her strange talent and uses it to help cute, troubled Cody. But when his true motives are revealed, she isn’t sure whom to trust anymore. Sunny hopes to find answers in Shiri’s journal. Was her cousin also cursed with this “gift”? Will Sunny end up like Shiri?

By Mieneke Published 22 December, 2012 Posted in article, children's books, contemporary, fantasy, mystery, science fiction Tagged: anticipated, Atom, Dial Books, Farrar Straus and Giroux, Flux, Gallery Books, HarperTeen, Headline, Indigo, Katherine Tegen Books, Philomel Books, Quercus Children's, Random House Children's Books, Ravenstone, St. Martin's Griffin, Starscape, Strange Chemistry Books, Tor Teen, Viking Children's Books | Leave a comment

Anticipated Books (Winter/Spring) 2013: YA Jan-March

One of my reading resolutions for 2012 was to explore more YA fiction, which I did. I did it to such an extent that this list has just exploded this year, so much so that I’ve had to split it up, much like my fantasy list. Today the Anticipated Books will showcase YA fiction published from January to March and tomorrow we’ll look at April to June. For some of these I already have an (e)ARC or review copy, so they’ll definitely be read and reviewed. And for the rest, I’ll have to see whether I get the chance to get my hands on them!

January
Lenore Appelhans – Level 2 (Fantasy, Simon&Schuster)
Since her untimely death the day before her eighteenth birthday, Felicia Ward has been trapped in Level 2, a stark white afterlife located between our world and the next. Along with her fellow drones, Felicia passes the endless hours reliving memories of her time on Earth and mourning what she’s lost–family, friends, and Neil, the boy she loved.

Then a girl in a neighboring chamber is found dead, and nobody but Felicia recalls that she existed in the first place. When Julian–a dangerously charming guy Felicia knew in life–comes to offer Felicia a way out, Felicia learns the truth: If she joins the rebellion to overthrow the Morati, the angel guardians of Level 2, she can be with Neil again.

Suspended between Heaven and Earth, Felicia finds herself at the center of an age-old struggle between good and evil. As memories from her life come back to haunt her, and as the Morati hunt her down, Felicia will discover it’s not just her own redemption at stake… but the salvation of all mankind.

Cat Clarke – Undone (Contemporary, Quercus Children’s)
How far would you go to avenge the death of your best friend?

A video appears online. And a boy jumps off a bridge. Jem is determined to avenge the death of Kai – her beloved best friend who was driven to desperation after being ‘outed’ by the popular crew at school. Transforming herself from introverted emo to in-crowd acceptable, Jem becomes part of the clique. She’s going to take down those responsible, one by one.

But what if Kai was keeping secrets from Jem? Could her quest for revenge be directed at the wrong people? And can Jem find out what really happened before someone else gets hurt?

Gavin Extence – The Universe versus Alex Woods (Contemporary, Hodder & Stoughton)
This is the story of seventeen-year-old Alex Woods – born to a clairvoyant mother and a phantom father, victim of an improbable childhood accident – who is stopped at Dover customs in possession of 113 grams of marijuana and the ashes of his best friend, Vietnam veteran Isaac Peterson. What follows is a highly original and compelling account of Alex’s life and the strange series of events that brought him here.

Ellen Oh – Prophecy (Fantasy, HarperTeen)
The greatest warrior in all of the Seven Kingdoms . . . is a girl with yellow eyes.

Kira’s the only female in the king’s army, and she’s also the prince’s bodyguard. She’s a demon slayer and an outcast, hated by nearly everyone in her home city of Hansong. And, she’s their only hope. . . .

Murdered kings and discovered traitors point to a demon invasion, sending Kira on the run with the young prince. He may be the savior predicted in the Dragon King’s prophecy, but the legendary lost ruby treasure just might be the true key to victory. With only the guidance of the cryptic prophecy, Kira must battle demon soldiers, an evil shaman, and the Demon Lord himself to find what was once lost and raise a prince into a king.

Broken by A E Rought (Science Fiction/Horror, Strange Chemistry)
Imagine a modern spin on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein where a young couple’s undying love and the grief of a father pushed beyond sanity could spell the destruction of them all.

A string of suspicious deaths near a small Michigan town ends with a fall that claims the life of Emma Gentry’s boyfriend, Daniel. Emma is broken, a hollow shell mechanically moving through her days. She and Daniel had been made for each other, complete only when they were together. Now she restlessly wanders the town in the late Fall gloom, haunting the cemetary and its white-marbled tombs, feeling Daniel everywhere, his spectre in the moonlight and the fog.

When she encounters newcomer Alex Franks, only son of a renowned widowed surgeon, she’s intrigued despite herself. He’s an enigma, melting into shadows, preferring to keep to himself. But he is as drawn to her as she is to him. He is strangely…familiar. From the way he knows how to open her locker when it sticks, to the nickname she shared only with Daniel, even his hazel eyes with brown flecks are just like Daniel’s. The closer they become, though, the more something inside her screams there’s something very wrong with Alex Franks.

And when Emma stumbles across a grotesque and terrifying menagerie of mangled but living animals within the walls of the Franks’ estate, creatures she surely knows must have died from their injuries, she knows.

Megan Shepherd – The Madman’s Daughter (Science Fiction, HarperTeen)
Sixteen-year-old Juliet Moreau has built a life for herself in London—working as a maid, attending church on Sundays, and trying not to think about the scandal that ruined her life. After all, no one ever proved the rumors about her father’s gruesome experiments. But when she learns he is alive and continuing his work on a remote tropical island, she is determined to find out if the accusations are true.

Accompanied by her father’s handsome young assistant, Montgomery, and an enigmatic castaway, Edward—both of whom she is deeply drawn to—Juliet travels to the island, only to discover the depths of her father’s madness: He has experimented on animals so that they resemble, speak, and behave as humans. And worse, one of the creatures has turned violent and is killing the island’s inhabitants. Torn between horror and scientific curiosity, Juliet knows she must end her father’s dangerous experiments and escape her jungle prison before it’s too late. Yet as the island falls into chaos, she discovers the extent of her father’s genius—and madness—in her own blood.

Inspired by H. G. Wells’s classic The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Madman’s Daughter is a dark and breathless Gothic thriller about the secrets we’ll do anything to know and the truths we’ll go to any lengths to protect.

Catherynne M. Valente – The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There (Fantasy, Corsair)
In this, Valente’s second Fairyland book, September returns to Fairyland – but all is not well there. Folk have been losing their shadows and, with them, their magic. September must enter the dark, beautiful, strange kingdom of Fairyland-Below to discover what has happened and save Fairyland from losing all its magic and slipping into the mundane world entirely. But Fairyland-Below has a new ruler, Hallowe’en, the Hollow Queen – and Hallowe’en does not want to give Fairyland’s shadows back.

K.M. Walton – Empty (Contemporary, Simon Pulse)
Dell is used to disappointment. Ever since her dad left, it’s been one let down after another. But no one–not even her best friend–understands all the pain she’s going through. So Dell hides behind self-deprecating jokes and forced smiles.

Then the one person she trusts betrays her. Dell is beyond devastated. Without anyone to turn to for comfort, her depression and self-loathing spin out of control. But just how far will she go to make all of heartbreak and the name-calling stop?

Brenna Yovanoff – Paper Valentine (Crime, Razorbill)
Hannah’s best friend Lillian died six months ago. Now it is high summer and Hannah can no longer pretend everything’s fine. Because Lillian’s ghost still haunts Hannah, and Hannah can’t tell anyone about her. Then a young girl is found murdered in Muncy Park—the first of three who will be killed during the summer’s heat wave. Hysteria grips the city of Ludlow. And Hannah finds herself drawn to Finny Boone, a bad boy and petty criminal. Lillian’s ghost demands that Hannah investigate the mysterious string of murders. And though she would prefer to be with Finny, Hannah enters a world populated by ghost girls and horrifying secrets. Hannah becomes obsessed with the crimes and realizes that only by confronting the killer will she be able to come to terms with her grief, and put the loss of Lillian behind her.

February
Julianna Baggott – Fuse (Science Fiction, Headline)
After a young Wretch is abducted by the Dome and “cleansed” of her fusings and imperfections, she is only able to repeat the Dome’s latest message: “We want our son returned. This girl is proof that we can save you all. If you ignore our plea, we will kill our hostages one at a time.” Willux will go to any lengths to get his son Partridge back, including murder. Partridge sacrifeces himself and returns, in the hope of taking over the Dome from within, only to uncover more of his father’s chilling, dark secrets.

Robyn Bavati – Dancing in the Dark (Contemporary, Flux)
Ditty Cohen is passionate about ballet–she loves how it feels to stand en pointe, to rise and spin across the room. But her Orthodox Jewish parents want Ditty to focus on the teachings of the Torah and to marry at a young age according to their religious tradition. Although her parents forbid her to take dance lessons, Ditty secretly signs up for ballet and becomes entangled in a web of deceit. As one lie leads to another and another, Ditty knows she must stop dancing, but she can’t abandon the one thing that gives her freedom. She begins to question her faith and everything her parents have taught her, realizing just how much is at stake as her two worlds collide.

Ilsa J. Bick – Drowning Instinct (Contemporary, Quercus Children’s)
Jenna is sweet sixteen, the age when a girl is supposed to find her prince.

Instead she finds Mr Anderson – intelligent, handsome, married Mr Anderson, who just happens to be her chemistry teacher. With a dark past and a difficult family, Jenna is just happy to have someone to protect her, to worry about her, to love her.

But should she be suspicious of Mr Anderson’s reputation for helping ‘damaged’ students? Why is the most popular girl in school suddenly jealous of her? And where is Mr Anderson’s wife?

This is a love story that breaks all the rules, but that won’t stop it breaking your heart.

Gail Carriger – Etiquette & Espionage (Fantasy, Atom)
It’s one thing to learn to curtsy properly. It’s quite another to learn to curtsy and throw a knife at the same time. Welcome to finishing school.

Sophronia is a great trial to her poor mother. Sophronia is more interested in dismantling clocks and climbing trees than proper manners – and the family can only hope that company never sees her atrocious curtsy. Mrs Temminnick is desperate for her daughter to become a proper lady. So she enrols Sophronia in Mademoiselle Geraldine’s Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality.

But Sophronia soon realizes the school is not quite what her mother might have hoped. At Mademoiselle Geraldine’s young ladies learn to finish . . . everything. Certainly, they learn the fine arts of dance, dress and etiquette, but they also learn to deal out death, diversion and espionage – in the politest possible ways, of course. Sophronia and her friends are in for a rousing first year’s education.

Miriam Forster – City of a Thousand Dolls (Fantasy, HarperTeen)
Nisha was abandoned at the gates of the City of a Thousand Dolls when she was just a child. Now sixteen, she lives on the grounds of the isolated estate, where orphan girls apprentice as musicians, healers, courtesans, and, if the rumors are true, assassins. Nisha makes her way as Matron’s assistant, her closest companions the mysterious cats that trail her shadow. Only when she begins a forbidden flirtation with the city’s handsome young courier does she let herself imagine a life outside the walls. Until one by one, girls around her start to die.

Before she becomes the next victim, Nisha decides to uncover the secrets that surround the girls’ deaths. But by getting involved, Nisha jeopardizes not only her own future in the City of a Thousand Dolls—but her own life.

N. Griffin – The Whole Stupid Way We Are (Contemporary, Atheneum)
What happens when everything you’ve got to give isn’t enough to save someone you love?

It’s Maine. It’s winter. And it’s FREEZING STINKIN’ COLD! Dinah is wildly worried about her best friend, Skint. He won’t wear a coat. Refuses to wear a coat. It’s twelve degrees out, and he won’t wear a coat. So Dinah’s going to figure out how to help. That’s what Dinah does–she helps. But she is too busy trying to help to notice that sometimes, she’s doing more harm than good. Seeing the trees instead of the forest? that’s Dinah.

And Skint isn’t going to be the one to tell her. He’s got his own problems. He’s worried about a little boy whose dad won’t let him visit his mom. He’s worried about an elderly couple in a too-cold house down the street.

But the wedge between what drives Dinah and what concerns Skint is wide enough for a big old slab of ice. Because Skint’s own father is in trouble. Because Skint’s mother refuses to ask for help even though she’s at her breaking point. And because Dinah might just decide to…help. She thinks she’s cracking through a sheet of ice, but what’s actually there is an entire iceberg.

Pantomime by Laura Lam (Fantasy, Strange Chemistry)
R.H. Ragona’s Circus of Magic is the greatest circus of Ellada. Nestled among the glowing blue Penglass – remnants of a mysterious civilisation long gone – are wonders beyond the wildest imagination. It’s a place where anything seems possible, where if you close your eyes you can believe that the magic and knowledge of the vanished Chimeras is still there. It’s a place where anyone can hide.

Iphigenia Laurus, or Gene, the daughter of a noble family, is uncomfortable in corsets and crinoline, and prefers climbing trees to debutante balls. Micah Grey, a runaway living on the streets, joins the circus as an aerialist’s apprentice and soon becomes the circus’s rising star. But Gene and Micah have balancing acts of their own to perform, and a secret in their blood that could unlock the mysteries of Ellada.

Kasie West – Pivot Point (Fantasy, HarperTeen)
Knowing the outcome doesn’t always make a choice easier. . . .

Addison Coleman’s life is one big “What if?” As a Searcher, whenever Addie is faced with a choice, she can look into the future and see both outcomes. It’s the ultimate insurance plan against disaster. Or so she thought. When Addie’s parents ambush her with the news of their divorce, she has to pick who she wants to live with—her father, who is leaving the paranormal compound to live among the “Norms,” or her mother, who is staying in the life Addie has always known. Addie loves her life just as it is, so her answer should be easy. One Search six weeks into the future proves it’s not.

In one potential future, Addie is adjusting to life outside the Compound as the new girl in a Norm high school where she meets Trevor, a cute, sensitive artist who understands her. In the other path, Addie is being pursued by the hottest guy in school—but she never wanted to be a quarterback’s girlfriend. When Addie’s father is asked to consult on a murder in the Compound, she’s unwittingly drawn into a dangerous game that threatens everything she holds dear. With love and loss in both lives, it all comes down to which reality she’s willing to live through . . . and who she can’t live without.

March
Kristin Bailey – Legacy of the Clockwork Key (Fantasy, Simon Pulse)
When a fire consumes Meg’s home, killing her parents and destroying both her fortune and her future, all she has left is the tarnished pocket watch she rescued from the ashes. But this is no ordinary timepiece. The clock turns out to be a mechanical key–a key that only Meg can use–that unlocks a series of deadly secrets and intricate clues that Meg is compelled to follow.

Meg has uncovered evidence of an elite secret society and a dangerous invention that some will stop at nothing to protect–and that Meg alone can destroy. Together with the handsome stable hand she barely knows but hopes she can trust, Meg is swept into a hidden world of deception, betrayal, and revenge. The clockwork key has unlocked her destiny in this captivating start to a trilogy.

Liz Coley – Pretty Girl-13 (Contemporary, Katherine Tegen Books)
Pretty girl
13 when she
went missing

lost
to her family
to her friends
to the world

found
but still missing
her self

In Liz Coley’s alarming and fascinating psychological mystery, sixteen-year-old Angie Chapman must piece together the story of her kidnapping and abuse. Pretty Girl-13 is a disturbing—and ultimately empowering—page-turner about accepting our whole selves, and the healing power of courage, hope, and love.

Alan Gibbons – Raining Fire (Contemporary, Indigo)
Ethan is a promising footballer, and when he is selected to go on a training programme in the US, he feels sure that he has found his chance to escape the gangs that dominate his streets. But as life spirals out of control for his brother, Alex, and things unexpectedly take a turn for the worse for Ethan, he finds himself drawn into the midst of an explosive feud with the gun at its heart.

Shannon Messenger – Let the Sky Fall (Fantasy, Simon Pulse)
Seventeen-year-old Vane Weston has no idea how he survived the category five tornado that killed his parents. and he has no idea if the beautiful, dark-haired girl who’s swept through his dreams every night since the storm is real. But he hopes she is.

Seventeen-year-old Audra is a sylph, an air elemental. She walks on the wind, can translate its alluring songs, and can even coax it into a weapon with a simple string of commands. She’s also a guardian–Vane’s guardian–and has sworn an oath to protect Vane at all costs. Even if it means sacrificing her own life.

When a hasty mistake reveals their location to the enemy who murdered both of their families, Audra’s forced to help Vane remember who he is. He has a power to claim–the secret language of the West Wind, which only he can understand. But unlocking his heritage will also unlock the memory Audra needs him to forget. And their greatest danger is not the warriors coming to destroy them–but the forbidden romance that’s grown between them.

Julianna Scott – The Holders (Fantasy, Strange Chemistry)
17-year-old Becca has spent her whole life protecting her brother – from their father leaving and from the people who say the voices in his head are unnatural. When two strangers appear with apparent answers to Ryland’s “problem” and details about a school in Ireland where Ryland will not only fit in, but prosper, Becca is up in arms.
She reluctantly agrees to join Ryland on his journey and what they find at St. Brigid’s is a world beyond their imagination. Little by little they piece find out information about their family’s heritage and the legend of the Holder race that decrees Ryland is the one they’ve been waiting for—but, they are all, especially Becca, in for a surprise that will change what they thought they knew about themselves and their kind.

Sherri L. Smith – Orleans (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
After a string of devastating hurricanes and a deadly epidemic of Delta Fever, the Gulf Coast had been quarantined. Now, years later, a new primitive society has been born over the wall.

Fen de la Guerre is living with the O-Positive blood tribe in the Delta when they are ambushed. Left with her tribe leader’s newborn, Fen is determined to get the baby to a better life over the wall before her blood becomes tainted. Fen soon meets Daniel, a scientist from the Outer States researching a cure for Delta Fever. The pair form an unlikely bond and, in the end, may be each other’s last hope for survival.

By Mieneke Published 21 December, 2012 Posted in article, contemporary, crime, fantasy, YA Tagged: anticipated, Atheneum, Atom, Constable and Robinson, Flux, G.P. Putnam's Sons, HarperTeen, Headline, Hodder, Indigo, Katherine Tegen Books, Quercus Children's, Razorbill, Simon and Schuster, Simon Pulse, Strange Chemistry Books | Leave a comment

Anticipated Books (Winter/Spring) 2013: Crime and Historical Crime Fiction

Murder, mayhem, sleuthing… who doesn’t like a good crime story every once in a while? Today my Anticipated Books post focuses on crime and historical crime fiction. For some of these I already have an (e)ARC or review copy, so they’ll definitely be read and reviewed. And for the rest, I’ll have to see whether I get the chance to get my hands on them!

Crime

January
David Jackson – Marked (MacMillan)
Her tattoo wasn’t just a mark for life; it marked her for death too.

In New York’s East Village a young girl is brutally raped, tortured and murdered. Detective Callum Doyle has seen the victim’s remains. He has visited the distraught family. Now he wants justice.

Doyle is convinced he knows who the killer is. The problem is he can’t prove it. And the more he pushes his prime suspect, the more he learns that the man is capable of pushing back in ways more devious and twisted than Doyle could ever have imagined.

Add to that the appearance of an old adversary who has a mission for Doyle and won’t take no for an answer, and soon Doyle finds himself at risk of losing everything he holds dear. Including his life.

Chris Kuzneski – The Hunters (Headline)
Chris Kuzneski, bestselling author of the Payne and Jones series, including Sign of the Cross and The Death Relic, moves to Headline for his brand new series, The Hunters.

The Hunters: a team of renegades, an ex-military leader, a historian, a computer whiz, a weapons expert and a thief – financed by a billionaire philantropist are tasked with finding the world’s most legendary treasures.

February
A.K. Benedict – The Beauty of Murder (Orion)
Stephen Killigan has been cold since the day he came to Cambridge. Then he finds the body of a missing beauty queen and thinks he’s found the reason why. But the police go to retrieve the body and find no trace…So begins a trail of tattooists, philosophers and scholars as Killigan must question how a corpse can be found before someone goes missing…

Jonathan Kellerman – Guilt (Headline)
When a young couple takes possession of their dream home, they can’t wait to remodel the neglected mansion. That is until they make a gruesome discovery of a rusted metal strongbox containing two rotting leather doctor’s bags. And inside each bag, swaddled in sheets of sixty-year-old newspaper, lies a tiny human skeleton. The case hits the media, and theories abound. The most likely culprit is a mysterious woman, employed as private nurse to wealthy L.A. families during World War Two and Lieutenant Milo Sturgis consults psychologist Alex Delaware for insight into the perpetrator’s motives. But the horror is just beginning. Two more bags are discovered, but this time the infants inside have been dead less than a month. Is a copycat at work? Or is there a link between the two finds which goes back decades? By the time both cases close, Alex and Milo will have confronted unprecedented narcissism, cruelty, deceit and a cold but fiendish objectification of the human spirit that shakes both men to the core…

Becky Masterman – Rage Against the Dying (Orion)
In her hey-day, Brigid Quinn worked serial killer cases. Small and blonde, she was the perfect bait to catch a killer. But as Quinn got older, she realised she needed to find a protégé. So Quinn trains a twenty-two year old to take her place. The plan works, Until the killer not only takes the bait, but kills it.

Mark Roberts – The Sixth Soul (Corvus)
London is in the grip of a barbaric serial killer. Four women have been abducted in quick succession, their bodies mutilated and dumped. When a fifth woman is taken from her home, DCI David Rosen knows that time is running out…

Then Rosen gets a mysterious phone call from Father Sebastian Flint, an enigmatic priest who seems to know rather too much about the abductions. But it isn’t until Rosen discovers the existence of an ancient text – said to be the devil’s answer to the bible – that the true horror of Herod’s plan begins to unfold.

Lachlan Smith – Bear is Broken (Headline)
Leo Maxwell grew up in the shadow of his older brother, Teddy, a successful yet reviled criminal defence attorney, who racked up enemies as fast as he racked up acquittals.

The two are at lunch when Teddy is shot, the gunman escaping through a crowd. As Teddy lies in a coma, Leo realises that the search for his brother’s shooter falls upon him, as Teddy’s enemies are not just among his criminal clients but embedded within the police department as well…

Leo must navigate the seedy underbelly of San Francisco, but the deeper he digs into his brother’s life, the more questions arise: about Teddy and his estranged ex-wife, about the ethics of Teddy’s career, and about the murder that tore their family apart decades ago. And somewhere, the person who shot Leo’s brother is still on the loose, and there are many who would happily kill Leo in order to keep it that way.

March
Tom Harper – The Orpheus Descent (Hodder & Stoughton)
Would you pay the ultimate price for the ultimate knowledge?

Today, twelve golden tablets sit in museums around the world, each created by unknown hands and buried in ancient times, and each providing the dead with the route to the afterlife.

And archaeologist Lily Barnes, working on a dig in southern Italy, has just found another. Then Lily vanishes. Has she walked out of her job, her marriage and her life – or is the explanation more sinister? Her husband, Jonah, is desperate to find her.

But not everyone who journeys to the hidden place where Lily has gone can return.

Julia Keller – A Killing in the Hills (Headline)
Nestled in the breathtaking beauty of the Appalachian Mountains, Acker’s Gap is a town rife with problems. Bell Elkins is a single mother with a sister in prison and a background full of secrets. She has returned to Acker’s Gap to become Raythune county’s prosecuting attorney and is desperate to bring stability to the town. But when her daughter is witness to a multiple murder, Bell must work fast to find the truth before her daughter pays the price.

Richard Montanari – The Killing Room (Sphere)
‘The thing is, Detective . . .

If you believe in God, you’ve got to believe in the Devil.’

Deepest winter. Darkest Philadelphia.

A murder shocks the frozen city – the most spectacular homicide in its 300-year-old history: an ex-cop has been lured to the basement of an abandoned chapel, wrapped in barbed wire – and kept alive for ten days.

Twenty-four hours after the discovery, Detectives Kevin Byrne and Jessica Balzano find another victim in another church, encased in a pristine block of ice.

Someone is transforming the city’s cathedrals into killing rooms, someone who is determined to raise hell on earth.

April
Roberta Kray – Bad Girl (Sphere)
It’s 1959 and Lynsey Quinn has done the unthinkable. She’s got herself pregnant by a cop. Rejected by her criminal family, she will pay the price for her betrayal, and so too will her daughter.

At the age of eleven, Helen is returned to the clan. Hated by her grandfather, loved only by her uncle, she struggles to fit into a world she doesn’t understand. As warring factions battle for control of the East End, tragedy is about to strike again.

How can she survive? And who can she trust as the murderous past comes back to haunt her?

Andrew Pyper – The Demonologist (Orion)
Professor David Ullman, an authority on Christian religion and myth, accepts a mysterious offer to visit Venice with his teenage daughter in order to offer his expertise in an undisclosed case. But what he experiences when he gets there is horrifying beyond belief and leaves him with the unshakeable feeling he isn’t alone…

May
Lauren Beukes – The Shining Girls (HarperCollins)
The girl who wouldn’t die, hunting a killer who shouldn’t exist…

1930’s America: Lee Curtis Harper is a delusional, violent drifter who stumbles on a house that opens onto other times.

Driven by visions, he begins a killing spree over the next 60 years, using an undetectable MO and leaving anachronistic clues on his victims’ bodies.

But when one of his intended ‘shining girls’, Kirby Mazrachi, survives a brutal stabbing, she becomes determined to unravel the mystery behind her would-be killer. While the authorities are trying to discredit her, Kirby is getting closer to the truth, as Harper returns again and again…

Historical Crime Fiction

April
James Benmore – Dodger (Heron Books)
London, 1850s.

After five years in an Australian penal colony, the Artful Dodger returns to London in search of a hidden fortune. Unaware of the fate that befell Twist, Fagin and Sykes, Dodger revisits the criminal underworld of Dickensian London to seek out his old comrades, any of whom might possess the key to the treasure.

He finds the city a changed place from his youth: with law and order upheld by a new police force, Fagin gone to the gallows, his old gang scattered and danger around every corner.

Alex Connor – Isle of the Dead (Quercus)
In 15th Century Venice it is a dangerous time to be alive. A permanent winter has rolled in over the canals and bodies keep washing up on the banks of the city, especially hard to identify, since they have been skinned.

In the present day, a famous portrait by Titian has been discovered of the 15th Century murderer Angelico Vespucci. It is rumoured that when the portrait arises, so will the man. And when flayed bodies start turning up all over the world, it looks like this is more than just a superstition.

Lindsey Davis – The Ides of April (Hodder & Stoughton)
First of a new series of crime novels set in ancient Rome and featuring Flavia Albia, the adopted daughter of much-loved Marcus Didius Falco.

Based in real historical events: mysterious poisonings, in which victims died, often unaware they had been attacked. Albia is now twenty-eight and an established female investigator.

We meet Albia’s personal circle, glimpse old haunts and hear of old friends, but the focus is on Albia herself, a tough, witty, winning personality who fearlessly tackles inhumanity and injustice, braving any risks and winning the friendship of unexpected allies.

Sarah Pinborough – Mayhem (Jo Fletcher Books)
Gaslit London: and while Jack the Ripper’s murders are making headlines, there’s another madman on the loose in the East End . . .

A new killer is stalking the streets of London’s East End. Though newspapers have dubbed him ‘the Torso Killer’, this murderer’s work is overshadowed by the hysteria surrounding Jack the Ripper’s Whitechapel crimes.

Mayhem is a masterwork of narrative suspense: a supernatural thriller set in a shadowy, gaslit London, where monsters stalk the cobbled streets and hide in plain sight.

May
S.G. Maclean – The Devil’s Recruit (Quercus)
1635, and Europe is in the grip of the brutal territorial and religious struggle of the Thirty Years’ War.

Fear stalks the town of Aberdeen as a ship recruiting for the wars lies at anchor in the river mouth. A sinister figure watches from the shadows as apprehension grows and culminates in the disappearance of the son of a Highland chief – a student of Alexander Seaton.

When the frozen body of a young woman is found in the garden of a prominent citizen, Alexander becomes more deeply embroiled. He realises that the figure in the shadows is known to him and has come for him. He can hide from his past no longer.

Steven Saylor – The Seven Wonders (Constable & Robinson Crime Fiction)
Steven Saylor, the bestselling author of Empire and Roma, turns the clock back to 92 BC, where Gordianus, just turned 18, is set to embark on the adventure of a lifetime: a far-flung expedition to see the Seven Wonders of the World, the most spectacular constructions ever devised by mankind. Accompanied by his tutor, the celebrated poet Antipater of Sidon, he will journey to the fabled cities of Greece and Asia Minor, to Babylon and Egypt.

In this compelling prequel, Gordianus is not yet called ‘The Finder’ – that title still belongs to his father. But at each of the Seven Wonders, the wide-eyed Roman encounters a mystery to challenge his deductive powers. Here is a portrait of a master sleuth in the making, the earliest exploits of the man who will become Rome’s most sought-after investigator.

By Mieneke Published 20 December, 2012 Posted in article, crime, historical fiction Tagged: anticipated, Constable and Robinson, Corvus, HarperCollins, Headline, Heron Books, Hodder, Jo Fletcher Books, Macmillan, Orion, Quercus, Sphere | Leave a comment

Tag archives for Headline

Richard Ford – Herald of the Storm

Jennifer E. Smith – This is What Happy Looks Like

One Burning Question for Julianna Baggott (well, maybe two)

J.T. Brannan – Origin

Julianna Baggott – Fuse

Myke Cole – Fortress Frontier

Tanya Byrne – Heart-Shaped Bruise

Anticipated Books (Winter/Spring) 2013: YA April-June

Anticipated Books (Winter/Spring) 2013: YA Jan-March

Anticipated Books (Winter/Spring) 2013: Crime and Historical Crime Fiction

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Historical Crime Fiction

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