The city of mirrors : a novel

by Cronin, Justin,

December 19, 2016

Call Number: CD

In The Passage, book one of The Passage Trilogy, Justin Cronin showed us how the world would end. A group of scientists begin working with a rare virus from South America and dream of solving all illnesses and possibly death. Their work is taken over by the military, who secure the test-subjects, and all but one are death-row inmates. The exception is an abandoned six-year-old girl known as Amy NLN (NLN=no last name). They become known as the virals, who have almost all of the classic characteristics of a vampire. They drain their prey of blood and others they infect with a disease.... Read Full Review

The creeping shadow

by Stroud, Jonathan.

December 6, 2016

Call Number: x

Jonathan Stroud's Lockwood & Co. series is terrific with arresting content, covers and titles. Even though written primarily for children (Remember The Harry Potter series was written for kids too.), teens and adults will thrill to each installment. Thus far the series is comprised of The Screaming Staircase, The Whispering Skull, The Hollow Boy and this recent installment, The Creeping Shadow. These are masterful tales of adventure and horror that are perfect for a quiet night in, but leave all the lights on.

The series is set in England where the country... Read Full Review

Homegoing

by Gyasi, Yaa

November 21, 2016

Two half sisters in 18th-century Africa have never met, yet their lives, and the lives of their descendants, are deeply enmeshed.  Esi is abducted and taken as a slave to America; Effia "marries" a white slaver who conducts his trade in Cape Coast, Ghana. As time marches towards the present, we are immersed in the experiences of their children and their children's children, alternating between Africa and America. Each descendant's story is worthy of a book in itself, giving this novel the feel of interlinked novellas. The American descendants suffer through slavery, the... Read Full Review

Hex

by Olde Heuvelt, Thomas,

October 31, 2016

Horror, true horror, is difficult to find these days. The genre has been overshadowed by images meant to shock rather than scare. With Hex, Thomas Olde Heuvelt, an established and successful author in Holland, unleashes a classic ghost story, with enough modern twists to keep all readers from having a good night's sleep. In 1664, Katherine van Wyler was accused of being a witch and then killed. Her unfair treatment immediately culminated in her cursing her home town and its residents in the following ways:  If you are born there, you can never leave. If you settle there,... Read Full Review

Addlands : a novel

by Bullough, Tom,

October 17, 2016

On the day in 1941 that his nineteen-year-old wife gives birth to a son, middle-aged Welsh farmer Idris Hamer discovers a large, flat stone with unusual lettering on it while plowing one of his fields.  Over the next 70 years, the stone will reappear periodically in the lives of the Hamers, serving as a sort of guardian talisman or tormenting demon in this bleak yet compelling family chronicle. Idris and his wife, Etty, live in Radnorshire, a rural area bordering England where the residents consider themselves neither Welsh nor English, but something altogether different. ... Read Full Review