WASSUP!

 I needed a severe break from Dune, so I dug out The Wrong Number, a Fear Street novel by R.L. Stine. (I swear, between him and Christopher Pike, they kept my childhood LIT!)

 Urgh, so anyway, we have Jade and Deena, making deep, breathy phone calls to boys at their high school, as kind of a prank. Problem being Deena's half brother Chuck arrives from California, where he's been kicked out of his high school for reasons unknown. He finds Deena and JAde making phone whoopie, and joins in the game. Problem is, his call goes to a house of Fear Street *DUNdunDUN*, where the woman who answers is screaming for help. The three teens drive out, break in the back door, and find a dead woman with a phone in her hand, and get attacked by a guy with a mask on. 

Anyway, the husband accuses  Chuck of killing his wife, everyone winds up in trouble, Chuck goes to jail, and Deena and Jade, being utter dumbasses that they are, decide to clear Chuck's name. Given this is YA fiction, they succeed, only after putting themselves in moderate danger. 

OK, this was quite a bit more fun tan some of the other reprints I have on hand. While it's not undying prose by any means, I remained amused throughout the narrative, which is all I really wanted.  

Kicking the Wasp's Nest

 So I forget how I wound up preordering Butterfly Effects, the newest installment in Seanan McGuire's InCryptid series, but I did, and I wound up mostly devouring it during my free time. 

So, basically we're centered around Sarah the Cuckoo Queen, and Antimony, the fire sorcerer dating a monkey hybrid. We start with Sarah getting kidnapped (arrested) by the Jhorlac, the species of sentient wasp that her race, the Cuckoos split from. Seems the Instar Sarah went through a ways back violates their laws, and she's in deep doo doo. They kidnap Arthur, the half incubus Sarah mindwiped a while back as evidence. 

This sends Antimony, Sam, and Grandma Alice, and Grandpa Thomas dimension hopping to free her.

 Let's just say it takes two trips, gets into Matrix Reloaded territory, and winds up with a whole new love triangle that promises to be really ugly in future volumes. 

Fun read. I enjoy that the characters in this series are a lot more flexible than some of the others.  

Ah alchemy

 OK, so I somehow missed Seanan McGuire's next October Daye book dropped a while back (indeed a newer one is coming soon), but hey, Silver and Lead showed up at the end of my Incarnations of Immortality reread, so yay!

OK, so we're joining Toby and 8.5 months pregnant and confined to quarters while she's getting ready to give birth. Well, at least until the Queen manages to rouse Toby into action to investigate who the hell stole all the kingdom's treasures during Titania's illusion. 

Which, as seems to happen in these books, has Toby running around investigating, getting kidnapped, getting put in mortal danger, and even getting a Caesarian in the middle of a boss fight. (And at 8.5 months pregnant, I started hearing every character talking like they were from Fargo. 

By the end, everything is back to semi normal, and we spend the novella after witnessing Dianda give birth Undersea. 

While these pretty much have a formula of sorts the longer this goes on, it remains engaging and fun reading. 

Sometimes, they come back again

 I was kind of shocked to find out David R. Slayton's Redneck Revenant existed, since I though book 3 was a series ender. But no, Book 4 came out, the library didn't have a copy, so I managed to get an InterLibrary Loan to get a copy, mainly because I don't own any of the first 3 books, and I try to avoid buying hardcovers if I don't own any of the other books. 

Anyway, Adam (the Redneck Warlock) and his boyfriend Vic (the Latino Reaper) are still dating, but not quite moving forward. Adam's brother, Bobby, whom Adam is still living with, get a shock when his dead wife shows up on the doorstep, alive and fully healed. Yes, Annie, who died while possessed by something older than Death, is alive and well with no memory of of pretty much anything that happened in the last few days she was alive. 

What follows is finding out why her Mom and Dad brought her back to life, who the mysterious spirit wearing a wolf mask is, and sorting out Elven Court drama. 

Which is all exquisitely readable and absorbing, even as we get hit with themes of forgiveness and acceptance, none of which is easy for the traumatized. 

I'm happy to see that this series is continuing, I just wish I had known sooner.