Get Lost in Literature

  "I edged Hobb away from the side of the road, where a tangle of vines draped over a bare tree like spilled entrails." What Feast at Night by T.Kingfisher We're back for another story of Alex Easton, who is headed to her  family lodge and is in for a surprise. Upon arrival she and Angus find the caretaker Codrin has died in their absence and the town talks of a demon of nightmares that stalks the grounds. T.Kingfisher was inspired by Edgar Allen Poe. Now some people like Austin or Dickens, but I hold Poe to be one of the best classic writers of time. It all comes down to atmosphere. A good Gothic Horror should have a setting as ghostly as its monster and as much a character as its hero, and Kingfisher delivers. In the opening pages, it's implied that Alex is a she, which surprised me. (I'd been calling her he, up until she announced that her father had no sons.) She is an interesting character, war heroine, naive skeptic, and altogether force to be reckoned with ...

T. Kingfisher's  What Moves the Dead,  is a retelling of Edgar Allen Poe's, The Fall of the House of Usher.  I've never read anything by T.Kingfisher before, I couldn't resist the temptation offered by this ARC from NetGalley. I'm a longtime Poe fan, and The Fall of the House of Usher is my favorite. Alex Easton, a retired Gallacian soldier, receives a letter from his childhood friend, Madeline Usher. The letter is urgent, she doesn't have long left to live and now her brother's health is failing as well. He rides out to the House of Usher, to find the manor decrepit; its occupants too poor to maintain it, and too sickly to leave it. An American surgeon, Dr. James Denton, has been called to treat the Ushers' strange malady, but admits to not knowing what it is or how to help them. As Alex tries to help his friends, he begins to realize there is more to the mystery than meets the eye. Out on the heath, the animals are acting strangely... The first two par...

Countdown: A Newsflesh Novella   by Mira Grant This was an ok novella... A bit of a let down after reading the Newsflesh Trilogy. What worked: I liked seeing the doctors who created the virus and the jerk who set it free as far as understanding how it all began.  And despite the peeks at the Mason family before Shaun and Georgia became a part of it, the POV of Marigold was most effective at explaining how innocent lives were being affected.  I liked at the end of each "chapter" they showed the news reports.  What didn't work: The writing was frantic and vague; I know it was supposed to be a short story, but if a prequel is going to be invented it should add to the story somehow--it needed a little development.  I wish the cause and effect had been built upon a little more; the Mason's are lovely before the infection and despite the devastating loss of their son I don't really see how they transformed into rating-hungry villains. Rating: 2/5...