The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie

I have to be brutally honest here: I quit reading genre fiction for about ten years and have just recently begun indulging in the genre again. I’ve found that I still very much love reading genre fiction and there was a lot that I’ve missed during my little sabbatical. While reintroducing myself to the genre, I bumped [...]

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The Girls with Games of Blood by Alex Bledsoe

It’s 1975 in Memphis, Tennessee, and Alex Bledsoe returns with his Memphis vampires for a novel filled with fast cars, rock and roll, and steamy southern nights. Baron Rudolfo Vladimir Zginski has his eye on a car, and not just any car. He outmaneuvers a good old boy, Byron Cocker, to buy the 1973 Mach 1 Mustang of his dreams. Cocker [...]

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The Girl Who Chased the Moon by Sarah Addison Allen

I’ll keep this review short and sweet — kind of like Sarah Addison Allen’s books.  This is Allen’s third book and much like Garden Spells and The Sugar Queen, it has elements of fairy tale mixed with small town North Carolina flavor and a pinch of romance.  Emily Benedict returns to quirky Mullaby, North Carolina in [...]

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Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier

Mary Anning truly was a remarkable creature.  Born in 1799, she was struck by lightning at the age of one and survived.  Living with her family in the village of Lyme Regis on the southern coast of Britain, little Mary spent many hours on the beach with her father searching for “curies” or “curiosities” which [...]

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The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart by Jesse Bullington

The Dragon sits on the fence about this one, my good Wild Things. I simply do not know, so I will render the tale as impartially as I can and let you decide: Set in 1364, The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart follows the adventures of Manfried and Hegel Grossbart, two German grave robbers [...]

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Twelve by Jasper Kent

Voordalak, voordalak, voordalak . . . ah, yes! Vampire. Hmm, even the Dragon is getting a little burned out on the vampire spin, but at least Kent does vampires right in his debut novel, Twelve. The Grande Armée of Napoleon Bonaparte is poised on Moscow’s doorstep in the autumn of 1812. In a desperate bid [...]

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The Bell at Sealey Head by Patricia A. McKillip

I believe this is the most recent book by Patricia McKillip (published in late 2008) and it is my third McKillip book.  While I did enjoy it for the most part, it was the least satisfying McKillip book to date for me. The story centers around a crumbling manor house in the small town of [...]

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Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Having read Gaiman’s graphic novel, Coraline, I was eager to dig into his adult fantasy, Neverwhere, but as I moved through this book, I kept experiencing déjà vu. I began rooting through my old paperbacks and found that I had read Neverwhere when it was first published in 1996. I felt good knowing this wasn’t [...]

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College Girl by Patricia Weitz

Shy and awkward Natalie Bloom arrives at UConn, her dream school, as a junior after attending community college for two years.  The youngest of seven children, Natalie is the first in her family to seek a higher education.  Majoring in Russian history, Natalie spends literally all of her time in class or in the library studying, [...]

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Coraline by Neil Gaiman

“Coraline discovered the door a little after they moved into the house.”  Thus begins the creepy adventures of a little girl who discovers an alternate world in her own house.  The world beyond the door is similar to her own world.  There is even an identical set of parents…but wait!  Are those big black buttons [...]

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