Llewellyn, 2001

ISBN: 9780738700502

Available: New and used

This is a New Agey manual on the fantasy creatures we know and love. How to find them, identify them, protect yourself against them, run a basic investigation, as well as a hodgepodge of history and cultural takes can all be found in this book. However, it has a tone that’s bitterly anti-science (citing the Santa Claus defense, “so many people believe it, how could it not be true” as proof of these creatures existence) liberally redefines terms, and cherry picks data and history to suit the author’s arguments that these creatures still exist, as the author defines them, and it’s close minded to think otherwise.

The author contradicts himself on several occasions and his facts absolutely must be taken with a cup or so of salt. But each section (vampires, werewolves, ghosts, demons, angels, fae, mermaids, dragons and spirits) is also filled with clear historical research, as well as including non-Western folklore. Primarily suited for heavily used New Age or occult collections Monsters is a reminder of just how little we understand about nature, the past, and the world around us.

Reviewed for MonsterLibrarian.com

Ace, 2009

ISBN: 978-0441018130

Available: mass market and digital

Deadtown depicts a world where parahumans have no civil rights and are forced to live in one area of town, to the point where they have to have permits to leave that area of town. The lead character is Victory Vaughn, the latest in a recent line of Welsh true shape shifters, and a demon hunter. Her kind-of-boyfriend is the lead civil rights attorney for Paranormal Americas, and a werewolf. When one of her clients is found dead Vicky realizes that the Hellion that killed her father is now hunting her. She has to balance her personal life with dealing with a scientist who wants to make her a lab rat, and protecting a client who by all rights she should want dead. Somehow, she must also find it in herself to stop the demon she fears.

Deadtown has all the makings of a good urban fantasy, but falls flat in the execution. Most of the characters are either blah, or completely annoying. Holzner has created an interesting world with her oppressive society, but the plot doesn’t revolve around making things better. The characters consistently make choices that are stupid, dangerous and even violent. It’s hard to connect with the people in this tale, making it a lackluster example of urban fantasy. Deadtown is not without its charms, so collections that service voracious paranormal readers—or those with no taste for the full-on erotic scenes in other books—will still have a place for Deadtown in their collections.

Contains: Violence, language

Del Rey, 2010
ISBN: 9780345522603
Available: New
Yet another literary mash up, Little Women and Werewolves is the classic tale of Jo, Beth, Meg and Amy, four girls trying to grow up, once rich, now poor, their father gone off to the Civil War and with werewolves running around. Unlike other mash ups there is no tongue-in-cheek take on the original, just a telling of the traditional tale with the occasional line, or scene, about werewolves crammed in. If someone spliced frames from a slasher flick into a high brow romance then peppered in some morals, you’d get the same effect.
Grand mimics Alcott’s style very well, even rounding the edges a bit. Readers who loved the original will likely enjoy this tale (particularly because Alcott also wrote gothic style novels, thus the set up of this being the “original” version of Little Women that was rewritten into what we know today is fitting). While it has a certain charm it also is unlikely to appeal to the contemporary audiences of most paranormal and horror books because of an overdose of generally repressive morals and a lack of plot. The book encompasses about six years in the girls’ lives, and a lot happens. Although the writing is often lovely, it seems as if just when the good stuff is about to get going, the narrative shies away for another lesson about being “a good little woman”. Overall, despite promising prose, I found myself disappointed. Those acquiring for public collections should be assured that there are better mash ups out there. However if the library’s patrons seem to have a taste for Little Women or the “new classics”, no doubt they’ll love this.
Contains: violence and some gore

Sookie Stackhouse book #10

I was given this book as a gift.

Spoiler Warning: This review will include spoilers of earlier books in the series.

Also the Sookie books are very different from the True Blood TV series, so if you’re coming here as a fan of the TV show don’t expect the two to line up at all.

I’ve reviewed many Sookie books before, and nearly every time I point out that Harris’ strength is in her character building. Well, it’s also in the deep sense of community she’s embedded in Dead in the Family.

It stands to reason that in the early Sookie books, Sookie, a mind reader in a small town where everyone is reeling from the coming out of vampires, doesn’t have many friends. She was the odd one out, the one that no matter how sweet and serving, made other people uncomfortable, as much with her as with their idea of what they might be forced into admitting they were thinking at the time they dealt with her. But with the slow expanding of Sookie’s world, vampires are becoming old hat, shape shifters just came out, and the “normal” world hasn’t even met fairies yet, Sookie is becoming at least a familiar power in Bon Temps. Compared to the others Sookie seems almost harmless. Not to mention she’s ingratiated herself, sort of, into the community as a loyal and helpful member.

Dead in the Family sees the residents of the world struggling to deal with the recent outing of the weres, and Sookie’s own little community still trying to recover after Victor, a vampire from Nevada, forcibly took over Louisiana, killing the injured Queen, Sophie-Anne. Sookie herself is trying to recover, physically and mentally, from being brutally tortured in the last book as well as her impromptu marriage (and *ahem* consummation) to the only surviving New Orleans sheriff, Eric.

Readers who have been aching for Sookie to finally give in to her feelings for Eric will not be surprised to discover there are more obstacles to their relationship than Sookie herself, and the potentially untrustworthy Victor, when Eric’s maker comes to town with his newest child–the last crown prince of Russia Alexei Romanov. All is not well in Sookie’s paranormal world as there are still unfriendly fairies in her woods, anti-shifter groups picketing Merlott’s and Victor’s emissary to Louisiana makes his hatred of Eric and Sookie very clear by trying to have Sookie killed.

However, Sookie does have allies; Eric himself, her brother Jason, who is now a werepanther, Alcide, alpha of the local werewolf pack, her cousin (and a fairy) Claude, Sam, and a handful of humans who are outclassed by Sookie’s supernatural problems, but still think her good people. It’s easy with Harris’ off-beat, unique style to get caught up in the ordinary bits of Sookie’s life–the daily struggle to get through work, reach out to friends and family in need, and try to maintain her own boundaries and identity in the wake of so many overpowering characters–and be caught completely off guard by invading fae, vampire assassination attempts and werewolf feuds.

There really are no even close imitators to Harris’ stand-alone style. Die hard fans will eagerly devour this latest chapter of Sookie and crew’s story, and new fans will find a complex community of people plucked out of the real world and smothered in entertaining (one hopes) fiction with the promise of a lot more good stuff to come.

Silver Kiss by Naomi Clark
Queered Fiction, 2010
ISBN: 978-1920441128
Available: New, print and digital

Some books wrap themselves up in the tropes of a genre like a comfortable blanket, and others seem to transcend genre and theme with their very nature. Silver Kiss is one of these. Labeled an “urban werewolf novel”, it’s the tale of Ayla, a werewolf, and Shannon, a human, trying to make a new life together as part of Ayla’s Pack and family while they deal with the recent murder of Ayla’s cousin Adam (which drew her back to the Pack in the first place) which may not be an isolated event. There’s also a new street drug that’s highly addictive to werewolves and triggers their animal instincts, making them rage-filled animals ready to fight. Sure enough, Shannon and Ayla get dragged in (and blackmailed), ending up way over their heads.
Silver Kiss is not an urban fantasy or paranormal romance. It is a werewolf mystery, with a strong overlying theme of community and family acceptance and how it relates to humans, werewolves, and lesbians. Ayla is a high-strung character whose nervous energy infects a book that otherwise has very much normalized the concept of werewolves and werewolf culture. Her emotionality does, at times, distract from the main plot, possibly the book’s only flaw, and her independent streak leads her to distrust the people around her, even family and friends.

Clark has created an interesting balance between the paranormal elements and the struggle for normalcy in what’s considered deviancy even in our supposedly modern and accepting culture. Highly recommended for library collections, with a good mystery and moments of surprising depth, Silver Kiss is the sort of stand out, inclusive fiction that more collections should have on their shelves.
Contains: sex, violence, cursing