The nitty-gritty: Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Stranger Things in this addictively creepy tale of evil entities, friendships and girl power. This is my first Claire Legrand book, believe it or not, but it won’t be my last. I had a great time with Sawkill Girls, a young adult horror story that draws its strength […]
The nitty-gritty: A unique combination of elements comes together in this lush, fairy tale-inspired story. The Sisters of the Winter Wood is a beautifully written story with elements I loved and others that didn’t work quite as well, so I guess you could say this was sort of a mixed bag for me. I’m pushing […]
The nitty-gritty: Lots of potential, but unfortunately, this story was too problematic for my taste. Well, I think you can tell by my rating that A Winter’s Promise just didn’t work for me. I had high hopes for this book, which is apparently a huge success in the author’s native country of France, and has […]
The nitty-gritty: Grady Hendrix’s latest hums with frenetic energy, a dark and dangerous, pulse-pounding love letter to the power of music. A girl with a guitar never has to apologize for anything. I became a Grady Hendrix fan after reading Horrorstör several years ago, and I enjoyed My Best Friend’s Exorcism (although not quite as […]
The nitty-gritty: Full of mystery and adventure, The Night Crossing offers up fascinating history and supernatural eeriness in equal measure. I had no idea what to expect when I started reading The Night Crossing, only that real life author Bram Stoker was the main character in the story. I was sort of expecting a tale […]
The nitty-gritty: Romantic and thrilling, Phoenix Unbound is a fantastic start to a new series. You know those times when you start reading a book and you’re immediately swept up in the writing, the story and the characters? Well, this was one of those times for me. After a couple of pages I knew I […]
The nitty-gritty: Although I didn’t enjoy all the stories in this collection, I’m still a big fan of Mamatas and his unending, quirky imagination, and some of these stories will be hard to forget. I have read and enjoyed a couple of Nick Mamatas’ novels, and I thought it would be interesting to see how […]
The nitty-gritty: Lush imagery and beautiful writing make this a stand-out YA fantasy, despite some issues I had with one of the characters. Keeper of the Bees, as I found out after I requested it, is a companion novel to Blackbird of the Gallows, which got lots of rave reviews from the blogging community last […]
The nitty-gritty: Delightfully twisted and disturbing, The Mouth of the Dark is part Tales from the Dark Side, part Poltergeist, and completely bat shit crazy. The launch of small publisher Flame Tree Press caught my attention last month when they were blasted all over the internet—good marketing, guys!—and I was curious enough to head over […]
The nitty-gritty: Disturbing and atmospheric, The Chrysalis combines traditional horror elements with solid character development and delivers a cautionary tale about addiction. The Chrysalis is being described by a lot of readers on Goodreads as “science fiction,” but I just don’t get that. To me, this was pretty clearly a horror story, and while it […]