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Book Review: The Band From Another World (Alien Survival Guide #3) by Kevin Garone

cover art for The Band from Another World by Kevin Garone

The Band From Another World (Alien Survival Guide #3), by Kevin Garone

Temor Press, 2026 (pre-order out September 8)

ISBN: 9798991328470

Available: Hardcover, paperback, ebook edition

Buy: Amazon.com | Bookshop.org

 

 

The teenaged scallywags of Kevin Garone’s Alien Survival Guide series return for their third (and unfortunately, final) adventure, and like the last two, this doesn’t disappoint. This series should not be missed by young readers (and young-at-heart adults), and it deserves recognition in its genre for how good it is.

 

The team of Marv, Jace, Kenji, Nora, and their new member, Liv (code name: Alien Lover) manage to get into trouble in the first few pages while investigating an abandoned cabin in the woods. There they find instruments that somehow enable them to play better than the band Dream Theatre, which leads to possession and a homing signal, which leads to a school battle of the bands… and in the end, finally resolves whether Marv’s unshaking belief in alien invaders was justified, or a delusional waste of time.

 

As with the previous volumes, these work so well because, as much as they are adventure stories for young readers, Garone manages to throw in some pretty heartfelt material from time to time that adult readers are sure to appreciate. The conversation between Marv and Liv later in the book is a prime example. It’s about finding your big interest when young, and how kids just want something that makes them stand out and be unique from the other kids, even if it is something silly, such as preparing for alien invasions. The conversation is a good example of using simple, straightforward writing to convey some pretty heady ideas. Young readers will relate, and it will certainly make adult readers think back. Didn’t we all have something we wanted to be our own thing, that no one else had?

 

Although there is some touching material, at heart this is a thrill ride of aliens vs. humans, and the author keeps the story moving at a quick pace, right up to the final page of the story, as mankind will finally be saved, or ended. It’s worth noting that the author has always shown an ability to introduce new characters as good as the originals in each book, which helps keep the story from getting predictable, and this is no exception. In the last book it was Kenji, the flame-wielding maniac; this time it’s alien-obsessed Liz, an utterly charming character. Where Marv’s take on potential aliens resembles the mentality of Independence Day or Mars Attacks, Liv is from the Close Encounters of the Third Kind school of thought, that aliens must be benevolent. Her character is an excellent contrast to Marv, and together they learn something important: you can be friends, even if some of your ideas are diametrically opposed, a lesson adults in this day would do well to remember.

 

Bottom line is, this series is a fantastic trilogy of YA fiction, and the final volume proves to be a fitting capstone to the series. Keep an eye out for what the author writes next, he’s very good and worth noticing. Definitely recommended!

 

 

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson

 

 

Posted on August 18, 2026 by , Reply

Book Review: Observer by Nicholas Russell

Observer bookcover

Observer by Nicholas Russell

HarperCollins, 2026 (pre-order)

ISBN-13: 978-0063452398

Available: Hardcover, Audiobook, Kindle, MP3CD

Buy: Bookshop.org

 

A threatening landscape, the arrival of all of a mother’s worldly goods without explanation, and the mysterious world of a suddenly closed Nevada observatory, set the stage for this debut novel.

 

Observeropens in a canyon where signs of life are vanishing as the inanimate remnants anticipate the return of a “flying creature” that might be responsible and is now lying in wait to end “you.” From this strange start, the story quickly transitions to Renata and the two family members with whom she lives. Renata struggles to find out about the mother she barely knew, a woman who seems to have chosen a career in science over having a daughter, and quickly realizes that the desert her mother studied is not the empty place one might imagine. Their past and current interactions and how they are now responding to what they assume is the death of Renata’s mother, Corinne, are complicated and suggest that each person has unrevealed and unresolved feelings about their family and about Corinne.

 

As Renata reads from a journal about her mother’s work in the desert, she is fascinated by connections to a diary written in the early twentieth century by a surveyor whose notes have similarities to those written by her mother. This propels Renata into a journey through what becomes, simultaneously, a dream-memory landscape and a desert death-nightmare. Time and human contact seem less real and the hidden life of the desert more real.

 

Nicholas Russell’s writing is infused with mystery and is, at times, phantasmagoric– which corresponds to Renata’s experience of her mother as a type of mirage. This image contrasts the experiences of the surveyor with her mother’s scientific account while casting doubt on the science. Francis Brown’s diary records how he “witnessed visitations” and “experienced them.” He did not view them as “encounters with the devil” but “failures of the rational mind to comprehend its surroundings with any reliability or discernment.” Brown concludes, “We imagine monsters” but “what frightens me is not their existence, but our fatal sensory impotence.”

 

While Brown opines a human lack of awareness, Russell recognizes where horror comes from and draws us slowly to it, all the while making us wonder when it will rear its supernatural head. This promising novelist’s work conjures a Western Gothic feel through prose that sketches the recognizable yet odd characters and delineates the menacing setting in that disquieting way you can’t quite put your finger on. What will Russell do next? Whatever it is, hopefully it’s soon!

 

 

Reviewed by Nova Hadley

Posted on August 17, 2026 by , Reply

Book Review: Imperfect Creatures by Joe Butler

 

Cover art for Imperfect Creatures by Joe Butler

Imperfect Creatures by Joe Butler
Diachroneity Books, 2025
ISBN-13: 9781738360925
Available: Paperback, audio
Buy: Bookshop.org | Amazon.com

 

As Clare drives along the road to the small town of Harrow to attend her father Marshall’s funeral, she hits a man with her car. A panic attack strikes her as the man dies in front of her. The police and paramedics arrive, asking the usual questions, until one of them asks if she has heard of the New Foundation. After Clare accepts a ride to the diner there from a police officer, she has a strange conversation with her aunt, and finally returns to her childhood home. Warned against working with Marshall’s research assistant Jack, she searches for his research notes for his final book.

 

Shortly after the funeral, Clare collapses, and wakes up as she finds herself driving along the road to attend her father Marshall’s funeral, when she hits a deer with her car. She attends the funeral, and meets Jack who knows many things about Marshall’s research and wants to help Clare put the pieces together, even though she has been warned not to get involved with her. Then, she wakes up to another vehicular accident.

 

Stuck in a warped time loop, with each cycle opening a different mystery, the pattern repeats several times. With each repetition, Clare discovers more about the New Foundation, and the House, an eons-old eldritch being. She faces her mother’s dementia and tragic death, as well as family secrets.

 

The book is sectioned into the acts that are titled for the five stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance), plus one called “Trauma.” Butler’s story is unsettling, with characters that are Lynchian in their small-town ways and even the environment. An aunt delivering warnings of doom, an enigmatic cult leader with a wish to bring people to the House, the ghost of Clare’s father providing clues, and more, provide an eerie cast, guiding or hindering Clare throughout the book. Clare’s paranoia about impending doom, reliving family trauma, and her own death, always simmer underneath, even when she tamps them down and tries to deny them. She questions her sanity and wonders if what she experiences is real, which makes for an interesting and frightening read.

 

The physical environments are effective at creating a sense of unease. It was difficult not to imagine the diners from Mulholland Drive and Twin Peaks as Clare was taking in her surroundings when she was inside the local diner. I was never sure if it was a safe place, an in-between space, where characters could breathe before their next dilemma or if it was a place where danger lurked underneath.

 

The design of the book itself is reminiscent of books like House of Leaves, and Uketsu’s Strange Houses and Strange Buildings. Text boxes are arranged throughout, disrupting the main story. Strange figures appear in the margins. Disjointed sentences litter some of the pages, making the reader stop to decipher the words and images. Excerpts from Marshall’s notebooks lead Clare and the reader through his thought processes, research, and disturbing discoveries that could not possibly be real (could it?). I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of just flipping through the pages where Butler experimented with the layout.

 

This would be a great book for readers who are fans of David Lynch, House of Leaves, and cosmic horror. Highly recommended.

 

Reviewed by Lizzy Walker

Posted on July 19, 2026 by , Reply
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