#BookReview In an Absent Dream by Seanan McGuire @seananmcguire @torbooks

In an Absent Dream by Seanan McGuire
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is the story of a very serious young girl who would rather study and dream than become a respectable housewife and live up to the expectations of the world around her. As well she should.

When she finds a doorway to a world founded on logic and reason, riddles and lies, she thinks she's found her paradise. Alas, everything costs at the goblin market, and when her time there is drawing to a close, she makes the kind of bargain that never plays out well.

For anyone...

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In an Absent Dream is the latest novella in Seanan McGuire's Wayward Children series. I've read every single novella and this, the fourth, is just like the previous ones fabulous. If you love reading books about children traveling to other realms then you really need to read these novellas. What I love about them is that they are so dark, so horribly cruel and also sometimes so funny. The story shows how children who travel to other worlds and come back, are so changed by their experience that they just want to go back.

In an Absent Dream, we meet a bookish girl that travels to a world of logic and reason and she feels at home. However, she is torn between two worlds, between the world she left behind and the one she found. Will she, in the end, be able to choose which one to belong to?

This story is fabulous, with a heartbreaking ending. I recommend it warmly.

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley!

#BookReview Indigo by Charlaine Harris @FreshFiction #FFreview @StMartinsPress

Indigo by Charlaine Harris
My rating: 2.5 of 5 stars

Investigative reporter Nora Hesper spends her nights cloaked in shadows. As Indigo, she's become an urban myth, a brutal vigilante who can forge darkness into weapons and travel across the city by slipping from one patch of shadow to another. Her primary focus both as Nora and as Indigo has become a murderous criminal cult called the Children of Phonos. Children are being murdered in New York, and Nora is determined to make it stop, even if that means Indigo must eliminate every member. But in the aftermath of a bloody battle, a dying cultist makes claims that cause Indigo to question her own origin and memories.

Nora's parents were killed when she was nineteen years old. She took the life insurance money and went off to explore the world, leading to her becoming a student of meditation and strange magic in a mountaintop monastery in Nepal...a history that many would realize sounds suspiciously like the origins of several comic book characters. As Nora starts to pick apart her memory, it begins to unravel. Her parents are dead, but the rest is a series of lies. Where did she get the power inside her?

In a brilliant collaboration by New York Times and critically acclaimed coauthors Charlaine Harris, Christopher Golden, Kelley Armstrong, Jonathan Maberry, Kat Richardson, Seanan McGuire, Tim Lebbon, Cherie Priest, James Moore, and Mark Morris join forces to bring you a crime-solving novel like you've never read before.

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INDIGO is a book about reporter Nora Hester who has a secret identity as Indigo. Indigo is a vigilante that uses shadows to travel and fight evil by making weapons out of shadows. She primarily fights the members of Children of Phonos. When children are being killed in New York, Nora is sure that the cult is behind the killings and as Indigo she launches a brutal attack on them. But Nora is starting to fall apart, she isn't sure about her identity anymore. Are her memories really her own? Where did she get her powers from? She decided to try to figure out who she really is...

READ THE WHOLE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BookReview The Brightest Fell by Seanan McGuire @BerkleyPub

The Brightest Fell by Seanan McGuire
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

For once, everything in October “Toby” Daye’s life seems to be going right. There have been no murders or declarations of war for her to deal with, and apart from the looming specter of her Fetch planning her bachelorette party, she’s had no real problems for days. Maybe things are getting better.

Maybe not.

Because suddenly Toby’s mother, Amandine the Liar, appears on her doorstep and demands that Toby find her missing sister, August. But August has been missing for over a hundred years and there are no leads to follow. And Toby really doesn’t owe her mother any favors.

Then Amandine starts taking hostages, and refusal ceases to be an option.

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All right, book 11 in a series is perhaps not the best book to start with. But, I "discovered" Seanan McGuire thanks to her Wayward Children series and thought I try this, the latest book to see if it's to my liking.

Now, the book is perfectly all right, it was a lot to take in, a lot of characters to get to know, and a lot of history, but I enjoyed learning more about Toby, her friends, and family, etc. However, the story was a bit slow, with the hunt for Toby's sisters August not awfully thrilling. It's started off amusing with the bachelorette party for Toby, then Amandine, her mother shows up and kidnaps two important people in Toby's life and she will only get them back if she finds August. Yeah, she makes Joan Crawford feel warm and cuddly. I liked the story, but I did not love it. But, it did make me interested in reading the previous books.

In the end, I will say that it was a pleasant book, I liked the characters, it was not hard to get into this book and understand what was going on, I just wish I had connected more with the story. The interesting thing is that there is a novella at the end of the book, which stars April O'Leary. And, story-wise was the novella much more interesting than the book's story.

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

#CoverCrush: Beneath the Sugar Sky by Seanan McGuire

For new visitors do I want to explain that Cover Crush is something that my friend Erin over at Flashlight Commentary came up with and I adopted the idea together with some other friends. And, now we try to put up a Cover Crush every week. You can check below my pick of the week for their choices this week!

A stand-alone fantasy tale from Seanan McGuire's Alex award-winning Wayward Children series, which began in the Hugo and Nebula finalist Every Heart a Doorway

Beneath the Sugar Sky, the third book in McGuire's Wayward Children series, returns to Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children in a stand-alone contemporary fantasy for fans of all ages. At this magical boarding school, children who have experienced fantasy adventures are reintroduced to the "real" world.

Sumi died years before her prophesied daughter Rini could be born. Rini was born anyway, and now she’s trying to bring her mother back from a world without magic.

Some thoughts about the cover:

This series has some of the best covers I've ever seen and I simply adore this the third books cover. Isn't this cover simply gorgeous? The colors in the sky, the red ocean and of course the tantalizing open door...

Check out what my friends have picked for Cover Crush's this week:

Stephanie @ Layered Pages

Heather @ The Maiden’s Court

Holly @ 2 Kids and Tired Books

Colleen @ A Literary Vacation

Meghan @ Of Quills & Vellum

Erin @ Flashlight Commentary

indieBRAG

#BookReview Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire @torbooks

Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire
My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

Twin sisters Jack and Jill were seventeen when they found their way home and were packed off to Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children.

This is the story of what happened first…

Jacqueline was her mother’s perfect daughter—polite and quiet, always dressed as a princess. If her mother was sometimes a little strict, it’s because crafting the perfect daughter takes discipline.

Jillian was her father’s perfect daughter—adventurous, thrill-seeking, and a bit of a tom-boy. He really would have preferred a son, but you work with what you've got.

They were five when they learned that grown-ups can’t be trusted.

They were twelve when they walked down the impossible staircase and discovered that the pretense of love can never be enough to prepare you a life filled with magic in a land filled with mad scientists and death and choices.

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In Every Heart a Doorway we get to meet two sisters called Jack and Jill. In this, the sequel to that book does we get the whole background to their story. But, you don't have to have read Every Heart a Doorway to enjoy this book. It can definitely be read as a stand-alone. However, Every Heart a Doorway is an amazing book and I recommend warmly either reading it before this one or after.

So, Down Among the Sticks and Bones tells the tale of how Jill and Jack traveled through a chest to another world. Like the wardrobe in Narnia, however, the land they got to is not like Narnia, there is no lion waiting for them in this land. Only darkness and different paths for them ...even though they are sisters are they quite different...

I liked this story, I did not love it the way I loved In Every Heart a Doorway, but I enjoyed reading the book. It's always interesting to read a fleshed out story of something you learn in another book, to get the full story. Now, I can't wait to read the next stand-alone story; Beneath the Sugar Sky! That comes in January 2018 ... sigh

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

#BookReview Shadowed Souls by Jim Butcher

Shadowed Souls by Jim Butcher
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

In this dark and gritty collection—featuring short stories from Jim Butcher, Seanan McGuire, Kevin J. Anderson, and Rob Thurman—nothing is as simple as black and white, light and dark, good and evil..

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what makes it so easy to cross the line.

In #1 New York Times bestselling author Jim Butcher’s Cold Case, Molly Carpenter—Harry Dresden’s apprentice-turned-Winter Lady—must collect a tribute from a remote Fae colony and discovers that even if you’re a good girl, sometimes you have to be bad...

New York Times bestselling author Seanan McGuire’s Sleepover finds half-succubus Elsie Harrington kidnapped by a group of desperate teenage boys. Not for anything “weird.” They just need her to rescue a little girl from the boogeyman. No biggie.

In New York Times bestselling Kevin J. Anderson’s Eye of Newt, Zombie P.I. Dan Shamble’s latest client is a panicky lizard missing an eye who thinks someone wants him dead. But the truth is that someone only wants him for a very special dinner...

And New York Times bestselling author Rob Thurman’s infernally heroic Caliban Leandros takes a trip down memory lane as he deals wih some overdue—and nightmarish—vengeance involving some quite nasty Impossible Monsters.

ALSO INCLUDES STORIES BY

Tanya Huff * Kat Richardson * Jim C. Hines * Anton Strout * Lucy A. Snyder * Kristine Kathryn Rusch * Erik Scott de Bie *

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Shadowed Souls is one of the best collection of short stories I have ever read. Sure there were one or two that I did not fully like as much as the other ones (not bad, just not my cup of tea), but there were several stories that were quite good. I mean I even ordered the first book in Tanya Huff's Vicki Nelson series after finished her short story. That is not something I do often.

What I really liked about the stories is that you don't have to have read anything before by the authors to get the gist of these short stories, sure there were times when I had wanted a short introduction before each story so that I had known more about what is going on. But, at the same time was it kind of nice to get to know the characters without any previous knowledge. It's like getting a chance to try out each author and see if the story and the writer's style are something for you. I mean several of the authors in this book have I never read anything of before and now I would love to read more from them.

Shadowed Souls has everything from ghost to zombies and it's a perfect book for urban fantasy fans. It's a collection that will work both for fans of the authors in this book and people that just like me loves urban fantasy and want to find new authors to read!  

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Welcome to Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children, where children learn to live again in our world after spending time in another dimension. But, what if the children doesn't want to adjust bake to a normal life, what if they dream of going home again, what if someone would do anything to go back? Even kill?

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Have you ever dreamed of stepping into a wardrobe or falling down a rabbit's hole? Or why not a blue box? But, what about the consequences? What if you were a child growing up in a magical land and then have to return “home”, and be a child again, but in your mind being an adult? That's what this book is all about. Wouldn't you want to go back home again...?

This is by far one book that I've been waiting to read this year. A book about children that have returned home after spending time in a magical world, sometimes the world is bright and sunny, and sometimes dark and dangerous. Nancy is one of those children and she just like the rest of the children at the school wants to go back. But finding the door back is sometimes very hard and other times the door is closed for good.

It's a short book, a little over 100 pages long, but interesting enough it was enough to tell the tale. Sometimes I think that short stories never really manage to tell everything I want to know, but this one did. And, I loved every minute of it. It's a dark story, even darker than I expected, to be honest, and the loss of some of the children in this book was painful to read about, even those that I previous hadn't cared for. Especially the first child to fall victim hit me hard.

The plot was great, sure I suspected quite quickly who the culprit in the book was, but still I just didn't mind being right. It was such a fantastic story.

I want to thank the publisher for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!