Are you my mummy?

 I finished Tanya Huff's second collection of The Blood Books yesterday, consisting of Blood Lines and Blood Pact, both of which having a few emotional land mines in the prose. 

The first section deals with a pre-dynastic Mummy waking up in modern Toronto and essentially trying to set up shop on behalf of his own power and that of his Deity, who got folded in with Set after the Dynastic era started. As such, the Mummy more or less takes over Provincial police and government, while also deciding he wants to eat Henry's ka, while his god wants to eat Vicky's suffering. This does lead to some changed relationship dynamics in Henry and Mike's interactions, as both begin to realize that Vicki loves them both, but is not inclined to settle down with either of them. While this is all well written Dark Fantasy, Vicki's tortures while locked up by an out of control Mummy is a bit hard to get through. 

The second part, though, is really where the triggers are. Vicki spends the first part of the book avoiding talking to her never really seen mother in Kingston, mainly due to the ongoing rivalry between her suitors. Which doesn't work so well when Vicki figures out the reason behind the calls is that Mom was dying, and indeed is now deceased. Which leads Vicki to take the train to Kingston in a daze, without telling Herny or Mike what's going on. Both, of course, follow her, which leads into finding out that Mom's body isn't in the casket. Given this is horror and not the Christian Bible, it should come as no surprise that the resurrection of the body in this case has nothing to do with divine intervention, and everything to do with a crazed grad student, her greedy advisor, and a third assistant, who are using computers and bacteria to reanimate dead bodies.One of which happens to be Vicky's mom. Who manages to scare the heck of of everyone when she tries to walk home. By the finale, one student is dead, Henry gets captured, and eventually Mom and Vicki find each other. Which is by far one of the absolute hardest scenes to read in a book filled with reanimated corpses. 

This book ends with a fairly large surprise, although one that I knew about thanks to starting with the follow up Smoke series. I also wonder if, given some of the hints in the text, had these been written later, would Mike and Henry formed a true triad with Vicki, had social mores of the mid 90's likely dragged it down?

Seriously though, these are stil fun reads, although as I said above, a bit emotional.

Bad Jhorlac!

 I'm always so happy when Seanan McGuire releases a new book, and Calculated Risks did not let me down.

Picking up where Imaginary Numbers left off, Sarah, the Price family Cuckoo is tied to a chair in another dimension surrounded by people who have forgotten who she is. As such, most of the action takes place over roughly two days, as they try to find survivors among the University of Iowa campus that got transported with them, find the locals, and figure out how to get home. All while dealing with Clydesdale sized spiders, locals who while humanoid, aren't, flying millipedes, and the remnants of the Jhorlac race, all of whom got reduced to burnt out husks by the spell that crossed the dimensions. 

Through the course of this, we get more details on Cuckoo/Jhorlac and Lilu (incubus/succubus) history and physiology, as well as Sarah finally figuring out that the family will like her regardless. We close with a novella set before book 1, as Antimony, Sarah, and Artie go to emerald City Comic Con with Verity in tow to track down a siren. 

This is a wonderfully weird series that never fails to charm. Sarah, despite not being wired like a normal human, remains relatable none the less, and her pain is well conveyed through the narration. 

Well done. Read this series.

Poor Henry

 I'm a bit delayed in this write up, but my free time also has been rather tied up of late. I had occasion to get my hands on Tanya Huff's Blood Books and the sequel trilogy The Smoke Series, and I'm starting through the original. 

Which, due to availability, means reading the former as the 2-in-1 versions. 

We start with the initial book in the series, Blood Price, which introduces us to former cop turned Private Eye, Victoria Nelson, who left the Toronto Police Department after a storied career due to retinitis pigmentosa destroying her peripheral and night vision. This also lead to some very major rifts with her at the time boyfriend Mike Celluci, who remains at TPD in Homicide. We find out bits and pieces of this history as Vicki walks into a subway station only to witness a murder. One where the murderer manages to disappear in a crack in the wall.

This, along with the girlfriend of the victim hiring Vicki to find the "Vampire" (the local newspapers have dubbed the killer as such) gets Vicki involved in a series of murders involving exsanguination. Which leads to her eventually meeting Henry Fitzroi, bastard son of Henry VIII, loyal Catholic, romance novelist, and vampire since the Sixteenth Century, who is not involved in the murders. We also meet Tony, a male hustler who is also one of Vicki's contacts.

Anyway, by the end, we find out the murderer is a demon, using victims to spell the name of a Demon Lord. Said minor demon being summoned by 1991's version of what we know today as an "Incel". 

Then begins book 2, Blood Trail, in which Henry drags Vicki off to London, Ontario, to solve a case involving werewolves getting shot on their farm. We find out Henry has been feeding on Tony, the street kid, as well as helping Tony get off the streets. 

The weres follow a bit of a dated code (the whole Alpha gendered thing), but generally open up the series to rubbing rough edges off the human characters, particularly Mike when he drives over. We get a really good object lesson in the differences between a Lawful alignment and a Chaotic alignment 

Honestly, these are a bit rough around the edges, particularly book one, but the story is engaging nonetheless, and only gets better if I remember correctly.

OASIS returns

 I finally got a copy of Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline from the library.

Let's start with the elephant in the room. The original, while enjoyable to me, got caught in the emerging #MeToo novement as well as the horrors of toxic gamers, gatekeeping, and the generally much needed exposure of how poorly minorities are treated within what's supposed to be a much more open community of nerds and geeks. (I'll also state my opinion that the book was less bad about this than the movie, wherein the strong female characters do wind up getting saved by the underdog with much more frequency. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the movie once I got my head around the very major plot changes and just enjoyed what they were able to do with licensing deals, but Spielberg did turn it much more into male power fantasy than the book really was.) 

I got the impression that this, the sequel was written to better illuminate those issues in ways to help people who are still fans of the original see better where the issues are. Whether or not it succeeds with this remains to be seen, although it did show me a few things I hadn't noticed previously. 

Anyway, as we open, Aech, Shoto, Art3mis, and Parzvial are currently still the board of GSS, having absorbed the last book's antagonist company and sending the main villain to jail awaiting execution. However, Wade, aka Parzival. has broken up with Samantha, aka Art3mis, due to his own toxic behaviors. Much of the friction comes from the fact that 3 of them are building a ship to fly humans and their OASIS avatars to Alpha Centauri rather than try to fix the Earth. When ONI comes around, the fractures deepen. ONI is a new OASIS interface, wherein one literally uploads one's brain into the Oasis for up to 12 hours for the ultimate experience. Samantha is against it, but the other 3 live for it. Not long after ONI is released to the public (James Halliday, the originator of GSS, created it, but never released it, leaving the decision up to his heir), a new Scoreboard and riddle show up, and despite everyone telling him not to, Wade starts the search. He doesn't get far for quite some time until a new breed of gunter shows him how to get the first shard of the Siren's Soul. For which Wade pays her 1 Billion dollars and helps her and her crew to relocate to Columbus. 

Then, suddenly, Wade's mentor and one of the co-creators of the Oasis gets on the board, finding two of the shards. And then the plot actually takes off, as Og vanishes off the grid and Wade's robes of office are stolen by the first true AI in the Oasis, everyone using ONI is unable to log out, and Wade is given roughly 12 hours to find the other 6 shards are return them to Anorak, the OASIS version of James Halliday, who evidently gained sentience during a brief period of free will at the end of the first book. 

What follows is a peek into the life of Og's wife, Kira, who dies before the first book started, but who's memories are relived by Wade every time he collects a shard. As all the shards are on worlds Kira helped create... Along the way, we get illustrations of valid issues within geek and nerd worlds as people point out to Wade their problems with various planets. For instance, one of the shards involves a planet based on John Hughes' movies, at which point we get shown exactly why so many people HATE both male leads in Pretty in Pink. Indeed, Art3mis beheads Ducky, which frankly, was a highlight, given how much I hate that character. As we wind up on Afterlife, a planet devoted to Prince, Aech discusses the pain involved in some of the Artist's statements after converting to Jehovah's Witness, as prior to that, he was a role model for queer and non gender conforming folks. On the other hand, the battle with the Seven incarnations of Prince makes Simon Green proud, what with Morris Day and the Time joining forces with Janet Jackson and her Rhythm Nation to take on the NPG and the Revolution. It also takes Shoto out of the game sue to his unfortunate but hysterical musical pun that is considered blasphemy in the realm. 

We even get a different perspective on Tolkien (which frankly, I've watched both the Bakashi and Jackson versions, but never made it through the books), as we discuss the fact that everyone but the orcs in the world are lily white, but the monstrous orcs are of black skin. In the end, Wade must contend with how flawed and downright horrible his idol, Halliday was in life. 

And truthfully, this is a discussion we'll likely be having for quite some time, as we reexamine the lives of people we admire and see some of their actions as less than heroic, as we reevaluate our relationship with art as we find out unsavory aspects of the artist. (A recent case would be Rowling's transphobia, wherein we all were forced to examine how much we LOVED the Wizarding World and how those ideas were places we could fit in, verses the sad reality that the original creator can't recognize that the very same people who identified with her world are valid in their identities. Or our relationships with historical figures, like the Founding Fathers who owned slaves while writing documents filled with egalitarian ideology, or colonization leading to genocide.) 

While I did enjoy this, as Wade examines his own prejudices and shortcomings, I honestly wonder if we would have gotten a different story had not his previous two books gotten thrown in with other issues. So, yes, worth reading, and again, keep Youtube open while reading, since it's the only way to get rid of the earworms that come with pop culture nostalgia.

What is your damage, Heather?

I have no idea is goodreads adds the standard boilerplate to the review or not, but since Blogger doesn't: I won an Advance Reader Copy (ARC) of this book for an honest review of it prior to publication. 

 I hate to use what may seem like a flippant title for this post, given it takes away from the serious nature of the topic, but frankly, one of my defense mechanisms is to make jokes when I'm uncomfortable. 

And let's face it, Together We Will Go by J. Michael Straczynski will make more than a few readers uncomfortable. Which is sad, since it's a very compelling read and a deep dive into suicidal ideation. something that often gets ignored or shoved away in real life. 

We open with a statement from Mark, who explains the set up for this grand adventure. Mark, a failed writer, has decided to to rent a party bus, grab a few folks in similar mindsets on the way, then drive the bus off a cliff into the Pacific in San Francisco. The driver is contracted to drive them to the City by the Bay, but is supposed to get off before the final flight. The bus is wired with wifi and a cloud server to record journals and audio entries from the riders, although we also get text messages in there as well.

And so Mark and Dylan (the driver) begin the drive, picking up Karen first. Karen suffers from chronic pain, caused by her nerves mirroring pain to each other. She ends up naming her arachnoiditis "Spider". and many of her early journal entries talk about how Spider and depression kept her from living a normal life. 

We then pick up Tyler, suffering from Eisenmenger Syndrome; Lisa, who's bipolar manifests in destructive ways; Vaughn, who's wife died a few months prior; Theresa and Jim, who look to want to punish her racist dad; Sunny Shanelle, the obese girl; Zeke, the drug addict; Theo, the nonbinary dreaming of a perfect world; and Peter, the philosopher. 

There's quite a bit of interpersonal drama between the passengers, as most of them find friends and enemies among the other riders, and quite a bit of outside drama, as the purpose of the trip gets revealed to people outside the bus, leading to a bunch of drama as to whether or not Nebraska or Utah police will stop the bus. Colorado, having legalized assisted suicide, can more or less let them pass with minimal cooperation with the more hardline border states. 

Quite a few of these characters resonated with me on a personal level. Zeke, who's living for his cat, General, and says that neither will live long without the other, puts me in mind of a friend of mine who has made similar statements in my presence. Shanelle, who's weight has lead to her being socially exiled. I too, like Theo, occasionally dream of a shining city of the hill where people can be themselves.I, however, am currently not living in a headspace where the ideation is almost omnipresent, where a disconnect notice sends me running for the knife drawer, or where a bad night at work has me wondering if a leash would make a good noose. And I thank whatever God may be that I've managed to get to where I am now. But these folks, they're in a moment I've known too well, or watched enough of my friends go through, where the idea of a happy ending is one where existence itself ends. 

I did have a minor quibble towards the end, as the record of the bus trip gets uploaded to the internet, one gets the impression the person who hits send is judging the very same people they were part of for not trying hard enough. That may not be how it was intended, but it kind of felt that way. 

One of Straczynski's greatest gifts, based on my exposure to his other projects, has always been getting inside his character's heads. This remains very true in this book, as even the characters you want to hate you wind up understanding better and indeed feeling empathy with. I found myself wishing each of them a happy ending, even if that end was not one I'd choose for myself any more.

Very well written and engaging read. I hope its release in July is a resounding success.

Starting at the end

 I evidently picked up Yasmine Galenorn's Night's End at a library sale, and recently decided to read it. 

Problem being, that its the last book in a five book series, and therefore, while I was engaged, I also was missing much of the story. 

We open on Queen Cicely, newly crowned Queen of Winter, married to a member of the Summer Court, as she prepares for final battle against Myst, a winter fey who also happens to have been turned into a vampire. Essentially Myst wanted to be queen, wasn't going to be, so she plotted with a vampire to gain power and ended up forming the Indigo court. At some point, Cicely, in a past life, was Myst's daughter, and her now current husband was there as well...they made a pact somewhere along the line to reincarnate together and get their happy ending. 

Anyway, most of the book is the invasion of the Indigo court as they try to kill off the vampires and bring Fimbulwinter to the world.

Most of the characters wind up making pacts that lead to major changes in their lives; again, since I hadn't read the preceding chapters, I can't say how much this matters honestly.

I enjoyed it, but I imagine if I go back and read the other 4, it will make a bunch more sense.

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,