You and me and the bottle makes three tonight

 A long long time ago, one of my teachers (Mrs. Barnes, whom I loved) figured out I was devouring horror novels and recommended Dean R. Koontz's Darkfall, which she had just finished. I remember reading it and loving it, and I recently found a used copy I evidently bought someplace and forgot about. While it still remains one of my favorite books of his (and indeed, one of the very few where the supernatural actually plays a part, instead of technology), there are a couple of things that stand out like a sore thumb in this era. 

We open on widower Officer Jack's daughter Penny as she hears noises under her bed. Being inquisitive, she sticks a plastic wiffle ball bat under the bed, only to find it dented and clawed when she pulls it out. 

We then rejoin her father and his partner Rebecca as they investigate a series of gangland murders that don't look like normal NYC mafia hits. Indeed, the victims appear to be chewed to death, often behind closed and locked doors. Jack is very forthright and honest, Rebecca is very closed off. But Jack is in love with her, and she's...undecided. She also criticizes him as being excessively open minded due to him investigating the possible Voodoo angle of the investigation. (The only suspect is Baba Lavelle, a Haitian who appears to be ghost like, due to no one being able to find him.) 

Anyway, the long and the short of it is that Voodoo (here, more fantastical than what you find in real practices....while it would appear that Koontz did some reading up on the subject, by the end we've hit a few tropes) works, and Lavelle has cracked the Gates of Hell open to create murder poppets. As Jack finds out via good Voodoo Houngon Carver Hampton, Jack is a Righteous man, and therefore protected by the Rada from the Congo and Petro deities Lavelle is working with. 

That immunity doesn't extend to Rebecca, Davey, and Penny, however, so by the time the climax rolls around, Rebecca and the kids are running around the Upper West Side trying to find a safe harbor from the murder poppets while Jack and Carver go to confront Lavelle and keep the gates from swinging wide open. 

As a book, it holds up well. I found myself caught up in the chase, and feeling very involved with the characters and their problems. However, since I mentioned tropes above, I should point out this one has two very blatant Magical Negros running around. And of course, the main characters are all lily white and being sucked into the underworld of black magic! *gasp* I mean, as a product of its time, it's a very good read, but like many books, time tends to make things frowned upon today become much more visible. 

I'd still read it again, though.

Burning down the house....

 So, I actually finished the omnibus edition of the Fear Street Saga by R, L. Stine a few days ago, but I haven't had a bunch of time to sit down and review it. 

The collected edition is named Betrayal, containing the volumes The Betrayal, The Secret, and The Burning. Near as I can tell, it's really the first time the Fear family gets mentioned in the overall series, let alone mention of the Fear family. 

Anyway, we learn of a rich family, the Fiers, and a poor family, the Goodes, who start off in colonial Massachusetts. The youngest Goode girl is in love with the son of the Magistrate Fier. The Magistrate wants his son to marry someone else, so he produces evidence that the Goode girls are witches. Mr Goode pays off the Magistraye's brother to save his wife and daughter, but the Fier family takes the money and runs, leaving the Goode girls hunka hunka burnin loves. We then find out Mr. Goode is the Real thing, as he curses the Fiers. Seems the Fiers are also witches, complete with a magical amulet with Latin for Power Through Evil written on it.

So, we progress from 1640ish to 1900, following the Fiers/Fears nd the Goodes as they curse and burn each other from both sides of the grave. 

It's actually kind of silly, but engaging.

Foxy Twinkie!

 One of my Christmas gifts, which I didn't realize was on my Amazon wish list, was Huntsman by Morgan Brice. Which lead to some amusement as I unwrapped a book with a half naked wolf shifter on the cover at a family house.

Anyway, if you've read Morgan Brice's other works, you have a general idea of what you're going to get here.

We open on Liam, a Fox Shifter (here defined as something akin to a werefox, although the animal side is more or less like a second personality that communicates openly with the human one, and shifting forms is voluntary), who finds out the hard way his ex has hired a Huntsman to kill him. Liam gets a step ahead and drives north to Fox Hollow, New York, up in the Adirondacks. Fox Hollow, we find out, was founded by shifters for shifter outcasts, although the public story is that it was settled by disgraced psychics out of Buffalo. Liam's former psychic prof has a job lined up for him and a place to live.

Liam's car breaks down 10 miles out of town, and Russ comes to get the car. Russ is a Wolf Shifter who works at the local garage as well as the fire department. Russ's husband died a few years prior, so he lives with his brother Drew in a cabin they expanded from summer home into year round cabin palace. When they touch, both realize they're Fated Mates, although given their pasts, neither human wants to particularly acknowledge this, even if their animals do. 

There is still the problem of the Huntsman, though, as said villain has followed Liam north from Ithaca, and has other plans in mind for the fox. 

What follows is a fairly smutty romance with quite a bit of danger mixed in, as the Huntsman is using magic and arson to cover his tracks. 

It's a really fun read, as I've come to expect from the author. I will also state there's a brief bit at the end when Russ and Liam acknowledge certain stereotypes among shifters that also seems to apply quite a bit to the real world gay culture, in how certain types are expected to conform to other types and the stereotypes therein (like all foxes are drama twinks, big cats are all jocks, etc.) I don't know how it ended up in here, but it really struck a chord with me.

What a perfect night for MURDER

 So, one of my birthday gifts last year was a reprint of what was and probably still is my favorite of R. L. Stine's Fear Street series, Halloween Party.

 The set up for this one involve Terry and Niki, a dating couple getting an invite to a new student's Halloween Party on Fear Street, along with a few other classmates, almost none of whom run in the same circles. This, coupled with Terry's former best friend and Niki's ex, Alex being on the invite list, adds a "Jocks vs Wimps" contest to the affair. Indeed, during the first part, we get a flashback to the preceding weeks, and the rivalry heats up, followed by the arrival of all parties involved at the house. 

And the games begin in earnest, what with a fake death and several surprises, including mostly deaf Niki finding out the hostess, Justine, is not who she claims to be. Then an actual murder happens, and we set the stage for the grand finale, filled with grudges and the sins of the parents being wrought on the children. 

I rather enjoyed it when I was in the targeted age range, and indeed, as an adult, I found myself better understanding some of the motivations, since I too, know how to hold a grudge. I'm not inclined to turn them into a gothic pyre, though. Still fun,