REVIEW | Under My Skin

Series: N/A
Author: Zoë Markham
Genre: young adult, science fiction, horror
Published: March 31, 2015
Publisher: Carina UK
Purchase: Amazon

Inside we are all monsters… 

Chloe was once a normal girl. Until the night of the car crash that nearly claimed her life. Now Chloe’s mother is dead, her father is a shell of the man he used to be and the secrets that had so carefully kept their family together are falling apart. 

A new start is all Chloe and her father can hope for, but when you think you’re no longer human how can you ever start pretending? 

A contemporary reworking of a British horror classic, Under My Skin follows seventeen-year-old Chloe into an isolated world of darkness and pain, as she struggles to understand what it really means to be alive.  

Set against the familiar backdrop of everyday, normal teenage worries, Chloe's world has become anything but...

[REVIEW] Girl of Nightmares

Series: Anna #2
Author: Kendare Blake
Genre: young adult, horror, paranormal, ghosts, fantasy, romance, supernatural, urban fantasy, magic
Published: June 17, 2014 (first published August 7, 2012)
Publisher: Tor Teen
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

It's been months since the ghost of Anna Korlov opened a door to Hell in her basement and disappeared into it, but ghost hunter Cas Lowood can't move on.

His friends remind him that Anna sacrificed herself so that Cas could live - not walk around half dead, pining for her. He knows they're right, but in Cas's eyes, no living girl he meets can compare to the dead girl he fell in love with.

Now he's seeing Anna everywhere: sometimes when he's asleep, and sometimes in waking nightmares. But something is very wrong... Therese aren't just daydreams. Anna seems tortured, torn apart in new and ever more gruesome ways every time she appears.

Cas doesn't know what happened to Anna when she disappeared into Hell, but he knows she doesn't deserve whatever is happening to her now. Anna saved Cas more than once, and it's time for him to return the favor. 

[REVIEW] UnDivided

Series: Unwind #4
Author: Neal Shusterman
Genre: young adult, science fiction, dystopia, fantasy, romance, thriller, horror, adventure
Published: October 14, 2014
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository

Proactive Citizenry, the company that created Cam from the parts of unwound teens, has a dark military plan for him. But below the surface of that horror lies another shocking level of intrigue: Proactive Citizenry has been suppressing technology that could make unwinding completely unnecessary. As Connor, Risa, and Lev uncover these shocking secrets, enraged teens begin to rise up, demanding justice and a better future.

But more trouble is brewing. Starkey's group of stroked kids are growing more powerful and militant with each new recruit. If they have their way, they'll burn the harvest camps to the ground and put every adult in them before a firing squad - which could destroy any chance America has for a peaceful future. 

The finale to the New York Times bestselling futuristic thriller dystology that Booklist called, "Perfectly poised to catch the Hunger Games wave, and based on an even more plausible dystopian scenario," is unexpected, unsettling, and startlingly unconventional.

[REVIEW] UnSouled

Series: Unwind #3
Author: Neal Shusterman
Genre: young adult, science fiction, dystopia, fantasy, romance, thriller, horror, adventure
Published: October 14, 2014 (first published October 15, 2013)
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Purchase: Amazon

Connor and Lev are on the run after the destruction of the Graveyard, the last safe haven for AWOL Unwinds. But for the first time, they're not just running away from something. This time, they're running toward answers, in the form of a woman whom Proactive Citizenry has tried to erase from history itself. If they can find her, and learn why the shadowy figures behind unwinding are so afraid of her, they may discover the key to bringing down unwinding forever.

Cam, the rewound boy, is plotting to take down the organization that created him. Because he knows that if he can bring Proactive Citizenry to its knees, it will show Risa how he truly feels about her. And without Risa, Cam is having trouble remembering what it feels like to be himan. 

With the Juvenile Authority and vindictive parts pirate on the hunt, their paths will converge explosively - and everyone will be changed. 

[REVIEW] UnWholly

Series: Unwind #2
Author: Neal Shusterman
Genre: young adult, science fiction, dystopia, fantasy, romance, thriller, horror, adventure
Published: August 28, 2012
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Purchase: Amazon

The Harvest Camp revolt was victorious, but the war on unwinding is just beginning.

Thanks to Connor, Lev, and Risa, and their high-profile revolt at Happy Jack Harvest Camp, people can no longer turn a blind eye to unwinding. But even as the future of unwinding is brought into question, AWOL kids are still fighting to make it to their eighteenth birthday. 

Connor has his hands full running the Graveyard, a safe haven for kids like him who escaped unwinding. Risa, paralyzed from the waist down after the attack on the camp, is afraid that she may be more of a burden than a help. And Lev finds himself involved in an underground movement to rescue tithes, where he is practically worshiped as a god. 

One of them will be betrayed. One of them will go on the run. And one of them will cross paths with Cam, a teen who doesn't exist. A twenty-first-century Frankenstein's monster, Cam is made entirely out of the parts of other unwinds. 

And none of them will be ready for the startling truth behind unwinding... 

[REVIEW] Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

Series: Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children #1
Author: Ransom Riggs
Genre: young adult, fantasy, mystery, horror, historical fiction, time travel, supernatural, paranormal, adventure
Published: June 4, 2013 (first published June 7, 2011)
Publisher: Quirk Books
Purchase: Amazon

A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. A strange collection of peculiar photographs. It all waits to be discovered in Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience. As out story opens, a horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. As Jacob explores its decaying bedrooms and hallways, it becomes clear that Miss Peregrine's children were more than just peculiar. They may have been dangerous. They may have been quarantined on a deserted island for good reason. And somehow - impossible though it seems - they may still be alive.

[BOOK BLITZ] Glittering Shadows

Series: Dark Metropolis #2
Author: Jaclyn Dolamore
Genre: young adult, science fiction, dystopia, horror, zombies, fantasy, magic, lgbt
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Published: June 16, 2015
Purchase: Amazon | B&N

The revolution is here.  

Bodies line the streets of Urobrun; a great pyre burns in Republic Square. The rebels grow anxious behind closed doors while Marlis watches as the politicians search for answers—and excuses—inside the Chancellery.  

Thea, Freddy, Nan, and Sigi are caught in the crossfire, taking refuge with a vibrant, young revolutionary and a mysterious healer from Irminau. As the battle lines are drawn, a greater threat casts a dark shadow over the land. Magic might be lost—forever.  

This action-packed sequel to Dark Metropolis weaves political intrigue, haunting magic, and heartbreaking romance into an unforgettable narrative. Dolamore's lyrical writing and masterfully crafted plot deliver a powerful conclusion. 

[COVER REVEAL] The Infected

Series: PODs #2

Author: Michelle K. Pickett

Genre: young adult, science fiction, dystopia, romance, zombies, horror, post apocalyptic

Publisher: Hayes Publications

Expected Publication: October 12, 2015

From the author of the award winning Unspeakable, and the best selling PODs, comes the highly anticipated sequel to PODs. A world where death stalks the unsuspecting, and this time even the PODs might not save them. 

A virus nearly wiped out humankind...

Months have passed since a human infection has been reported. Survivors of the deadly pandemic have finally started to build a life in a world left devastated by plague. 

Ironically, for nineteen-year-old Eva, life made more sense when she battled the deadly Infected than it does in the serenity of her new home in Rosewood. Separated from fiancé and former POD-mate, David, after an impossible ultimatum, Eva finds her life a little lonely and a lot confusing. 

But as troubled as Eva’s life is, it's about to take a turn for the worse as untold dangers watch and wait for the right moment to attack…

The virus refuses to die quietly.

[REVIEW] Mary Hades

Series: Mary Hades #1
Author: Sarah Dalton
Genre: young adult, paranormal, ghosts, fantasy, horror, romance, mystery, thriller
Published: May 4, 2014 (first published April 30, 2014)
Publisher: Createspace
Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Book Depository | Kobo

Not many seventeen year old girls have a best friend who’s a ghost, but then Mary Hades isn’t your average teenager.  

Scarred physically and mentally from a fire, her parents decide a holiday to an idyllic village in North Yorkshire will help her recover. Nestled in the middle of five moors, Mary expects to have a boring week stuck in a caravan with her parents. Little does she know, evil lurks in the campsite…  

Seth Lockwood—a local fairground worker with a dark secret—might be the key to uncovering the murky history that has blighted Nettleby. But Mary is drawn to him in a way that has her questioning her judgement.  

Helped by her dead best friend and a quirky gay Goth couple, Mary must stop the unusual deaths occurring in Nettleby. But can she prevent her heart from being broken?
The first in a series of dark YA novels, Mary Hades follows on from the bestselling Kindle Single 'My Daylight Monsters'. A spine-tingling tale with romance, readers will be shocked and entertained in equal measure.  

With some scenes of horror and some strong language, this book is best suited for readers aged fifteen and up.

[REVIEW] The Walls Around Us

Series: N/A
Author: Nova Ren Suma
Genre: young adult, paranormal, fantasy, ghost, horror, mystery
Published: March 24, 2015
Publisher: Algonquin Young Readers

“Ori’s dead because of what happened out behind the theater, in the tunnel made out of trees. She’s dead because she got sent to that place upstate, locked up with those monsters. And she got sent there because of me.” 

The Walls Around Us is a ghostly story of suspense told in two voices—one still living, and one long dead. On the outside, there’s Vee, an eighteen-year-old dancer days away from the life of her dreams when something threatens to expose the shocking truth of her achievement. On the inside, within the walls of a girls’ juvenile detention center, there’s Amber, locked up for so long she can’t imagine freedom. Tying these two worlds together is Orianna, who holds the key to unlocking all the girls’ darkest mysteries: What really happened when Orianna stepped between Violet and her tormentors? What really happened on two strange nights at Aurora Hills? Will Amber and Violet and Orianna ever get the justice they deserve – in this life or in another one? We hear Amber’s story and Violet’s, and through them Orianna’s, first from one angle, then from another, until gradually we begin to get the whole picture – which is not necessarily the one that either Amber or Violet wants us to see. 

In prose that sings from line to line, Nova Ren Suma tells a supernatural tale of guilt and of innocence, and of what happens when one is mistaken for the other.

[REVIEW] My Daylight Monsters

Series: Mary Hades #0.5
Author: Sarah Dalton
Genre: young adult, paranormal, mystery, horror, ghosts, thriller, suspense
Published: October 2013
Publisher: Createspace

I always thought my demons came out in the day, rather than at night. I’ve never been scared of the dark. I’ve only ever been scared of real things: getting ill, having injections, physical pain… death. Those are my monsters, not ghosts or vampires or whatever else can hide under your bed at night.  

I was wrong.  

The dark makes everything worse.  

When 17-year-old Mary Hades is admitted by her parents to a psychiatric unit, her worst nightmares are confirmed. How can she get better in a place that fills her with dread? Her friendships with the other patients — her wacky roommate Lacey, her protector Mo, and the mysterious, green-eyed Johnny — begin to fill her with hope, until she realizes that people in the hospital are dying without explanation. Something sinister stalks the corridors, and it’s up to Mary to stop it. But the closer she gets to the answer, the more perilous her situation becomes, and Mary discovers the only way to get out alive is to confront the things that scare her most. 

Sarah Dalton is the author of the Blemished Series. Her fiction has appeared in Medulla Literary Review, PANK magazine and the British Fantasy Society publication Dark Horizons. She grew up in the countryside of Derbyshire.

[REVIEW] Judge, vol5

Series: JUDGE #5 | Prequels
Author: Yoshiki Tonogai
Genre: manga, mystery, thriller, horror
Published: October 28, 2014 (first published May 22, 2012)
Publisher: Yen Press

IT'S TIME TO CLEAR THE DOCKET 

Who could possibly be responsible for this game? That question swirls among the participants, who grow more desperate as they are forced to make one horrific choice after another. The game is to conclude when the requisite four survivors have been determined. For those fortunates, court will be adjourned... But what awaits them on the other side of the courthouse doors?

[WAITING ON WEDNESDAY] Shutter

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming can't wait to read.

Series: N/A
Author: Courtney Alameda
Genre: young adult, horror, paranormal, ghost, thriller, romance, supernatural
Expected Publication: February 3, 2015

Horror has a new name: introducing Courtney Alameda. 

Micheline Helsing is a tetrachromat—a girl who sees the auras of the undead in a prismatic spectrum. As one of the last descendants of the Van Helsing lineage, she has trained since childhood to destroy monsters both corporeal and spiritual: the corporeal undead go down by the bullet, the spiritual undead by the lens. With an analog SLR camera as her best weapon, Micheline exorcises ghosts by capturing their spiritual energy on film. She's aided by her crew: Oliver, a techno-whiz and the boy who developed her camera's technology; Jude, who can predict death; and Ryder, the boy Micheline has known and loved forever. 

When a routine ghost hunt goes awry, Micheline and the boys are infected with a curse known as a soulchain. As the ghostly chains spread through their bodies, Micheline learns that if she doesn't exorcise her entity in seven days or less, she and her friends will die. Now pursued as a renegade agent by her monster-hunting father, Leonard Helsing, she must track and destroy an entity more powerful than anything she's faced before . . . or die trying.

Lock, stock, and lens, she’s in for one hell of a week.

[REVIEW] JUDGE, vol4

Series: JUDGE #4 | Prequel: #1, #2, #3
Author: Yoshiki Tonogai
Genre: manga, mystery, thriller, horror
Published: June 24, 2014 (first published November 22, 2011)
Publisher: Yen Press
Purchase: Amazon | Book Depository | Eiwa Manga (PH)

YOU ARE NOT THE ONLY ONES PLAYING THIS GAME. 

Do the clues discovered in a new room herald nothing more than a new despair? Soon, the brutal sentencing of the third judgment is visited upon the participants. Who here is the victim, and who the perpetrator? Until all is revealed, time is on no one’s side…

[REVIEW] The Vines

Series: N/A
Author: Christopher Rice
Genre: adult, horror, paranormal, thriller, fantasy, supernatural
Published: October 21, 2014
Publisher: 47north
Purchase: Amazon | B&N

From the mind of New York Times bestseller, Lambda Award Winning author, and Bram Stoker nominee Christopher Rice comes a harrowing new supernatural thriller that will hook readers to the final page. 

The dark history of Spring House, a beautifully restored plantation mansion on the outskirts of New Orleans, has long been forgotten. But something sinister lurks beneath the soil of the old estate. 

After heiress and current owner Caitlin Chaisson is witness to her husband’s stunning betrayal at her birthday party, she tries to take her own life in the mansion’s cherished gazebo. Instead, the blood she spills awakens dark forces in the ground below. Chaos ensues and by morning her husband has vanished without a trace and his mistress has gone mad. 

Nova, daughter to Spring House’s groundskeeper, has always suspected that something malevolent haunts the old place, and in the aftermath of the birthday party she enlists Caitlin’s estranged best friend, Blake, to help her get to the bottom of it. The pair soon realizes that the vengeance enacted by this sinister and otherworldly force comes at a terrible price.

[Waiting on Wednesday] Feral

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming can't wait to read.

Series: N/A
Author: Holly Schindler
Genre: young adult, contemporary, mystery, thriller, horror, fantasy, supernatural, suspense
Expected Publication: August 26, 2014

The Lovely Bones meets Black Swan in this haunting psychological thriller with twists and turns that will make you question everything you think you know. 

It’s too late for you. You’re dead. Those words continue to haunt Claire Cain months after she barely survived a brutal beating in Chicago. So when her father is offered a job in another state, Claire is hopeful that getting out will offer her a way to start anew. 

But when she arrives in Peculiar, Missouri, Claire feels an overwhelming sense of danger, and her fears are confirmed when she discovers the body of a popular high school student in the icy woods behind the school, surrounded by the town’s feral cats. While everyone is quick to say it was an accident, Claire knows there’s more to it, and vows to learn the truth about what happened. 

But the closer she gets to uncovering the mystery, the closer she also gets to realizing a frightening reality about herself and the damage she truly sustained in that Chicago alley…. 

Holly Schindler’s gripping story is filled with heart-stopping twists and turns that will keep readers guessing until the very last page.

[Waiting on Wednesday] Servants of the Storm

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming can't wait to read.

Series: N/A
Author: Delilah S. Dawson
Genre: young adult, paranormal, fantasy, demons, romance, supernatural, horror, thriller
Expected Publication: August 5, 2014

A year ago Hurricane Josephine swept through Savannah, Georgia, leaving behind nothing but death and destruction — and taking the life of Dovey's best friend, Carly. Since that night, Dovey has been in a medicated haze, numb to everything around her.  

But recently she's started to believe she's seeing things that can't be real ... including Carly at their favorite cafe. Determined to learn the truth, Dovey stops taking her pills. And the world that opens up to her is unlike anything she could have imagined.  

As Dovey slips deeper into the shadowy corners of Savannah — where the dark and horrifying secrets lurk — she learns that the storm that destroyed her city and stole her friend was much more than a force of nature. And now the sinister beings truly responsible are out to finish what they started. 

Dovey's running out of time and torn between two paths. Will she trust her childhood friend Baker, who can't see the threatening darkness but promises to never give up on Dovey and Carly? Or will she plot with the sexy stranger, Isaac, who offers all the answers — for a price? Soon Dovey realizes that the danger closing in has little to do with Carly ... and everything to do with Dovey herself.

[Waiting on Wednesday] SYMBIONT

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases can't wait to read.

Title: SYMBIONT
Series: Parasitology #2
Author: Mira Grant
Genre: science-fiction, dystopia, horror, zombies
Expected Publication: November 25, 2014

Synopsis: 

THE SECOND BOOK IN MIRA GRANT'S TERRIFYING PARASITOLOGY SERIES. 

THE ENEMY IS INSIDE US. 

The SymboGen designed tapeworms were created to relieve humanity of disease and sickness. But the implants in the majority of the world's population began attacking their hosts turning them into a ravenous horde. 

Now those who do not appear to be afflicted are being gathered for quarantine as panic spreads, but Sal and her companions must discover how the tapeworms are taking over their hosts, what their eventual goal is, and how they can be stopped.