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Book Review: Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire


Down Among the Sticks and Bones (Wayward Children #2) by Seanan McGuire

Tor, 2017

ISBN-13: 978-0765392039

Available: Hardcover, Kindle edition, audiobook

Down  Among the Sticks and Bones is a companion novella to Seanan McGuire’s award-winning novella Every Heart a Doorway. Every Heart a Doorway explored the question of what happens after children who walk through a door to a fantasy world return to our own. In that novella, the main character was sent to a boarding school specifically for children who have returned, to help them readjust. It’s a spare, magical, heartbreaking, and brutal mystery that explores identity, destiny, and desire in multiple ways.

Down Among the Sticks and Bones is the story of Jack and Jill, twins who play major roles in Every Heart a Doorway, and their lives in the world they walked into. The girls escaped a life of strictly enforced gender roles by entering a door to a world with many dangers called “The Moors.” There, the girls are able to discard their parents’ expectations, although they are shaped by new ones.  Unfortunately, what the girls’ parents wanted for them affected not just their outward actions, but their interior thoughts and emotions, so the characters are very flat. Jack has a little more self-awareness and develops a genuine loving relationship with another girl, so her character is slightly more developed. The story is more of a fable than a work requiring deep character development, but it means the reader feels much less invested.

In Every Heart a Doorway, Jack and Jill are a mysterious and disturbing pair, but Down Among the Sticks and Bones dispels a lot of that mystery, in the process making their actions, or lack of them, more explicable and sympathetic. The story also lacks tension: it’s the story of growing up over time, and doesn’t have the urgency or bloodiness of the mystery in the earlier novella (this isn’t to say it lacks blood and gore: in a Gothic world of vampires and mad scientists, there’s always going to be blood and gore, but I feel like it’s dialed down in this story).

Seanan McGuire is a fantastic writer, and I’m glad she wrote this second novella, because almost the first thing I wanted to know after finishing Every Heart a Doorway was Jack and Jill’s story. Despite the events of Down Among the Sticks and Bones taking place first, though, and although it can stand alone, readers should read Every Heart a Doorway first, to prevent spoilers and preserve its suspense and wonder. Recommended.

Contains: murder, gore.

 

Posted on September 13, 2017 by , Reply

Book Review: High Moon, Volume 1: Bullet Holes and Bite Marks by David Gallaher, art by Steve Ellis

High Moon Volume 1: Bullet Holes and Bite Marks by David Gallaher, art by Steve Ellis

Super Genius, 2017

ISBN: 9781629918419

Available: print

High Moon, the horror adventure webcomic from Zudacomics.com, full of werewolves, hoodoo, and supernatural mystery, is now in graphic novel form. In the first chapter, set in the Old West, bounty hunter Matthew Macgregor investigates the strange occurrences in Blest, Texas. Plagued by drought, famine, and hardship, Blest’s townspeople are suspicious of newcomers, especially when they are acting as the hand of the law. However, Matthew’s unwanted presence is the least of the town’s worries. Matthew discovers unnatural creatures stalk to town in the dark of night. Not one to cower from a fight, he pushes to bring light to the darkness, and chase the monsters out, while he tries to bury his own supernaturally driven past.

The second chapter centers on outlaw Eddie Conroy, who happens to be under the curse of the werewolf. The story opens with a train robbery in Ragged Rock, Oklahoma that yields mysterious cargo. A series of grisly murders follows in its wake. Things get even weirder when Tristan Macgregor, Matthew’s brother, arrives in town, with a mechanical arm, and hid face obscured by goggles and a mask. What does this mysterious figure want in this town? Another key part of the story is a violent love triangle between brothers, August and Frederick Kittel, and the beautiful Vivian. Conroy, while attempting to make amends for his past, discovers a dark secret about the strained relationship in the small town of Ragged Rock.

I am not normally a fan of Westerns, or of werewolf tales, but this is a great combination of the two genres. Ellis’ artwork provides the perfect atmosphere and tone for Gallaher’s well-crafted story of the supernatural in the Old West. If you want to read another amazing title by this team, pick up The Only Living Boy, the survival story of 12-year old Erik Farrell, who finds himself in an unknown, dangerous world where nothing is as it seems.

 

 

Contains: some blood, violence in the Old West

Reviewed by Lizzy Walker

Highly recommended

Posted on September 7, 2017 by , Reply

Book Review: Demon Freaks by J.R.R.R. Hardison

Demon Freaks by J.R.R.R. (Jim) Hardison

Fiery Seas Publishing, 2017

ISBN-13: 978-1-946143-16-7

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition

 

Jim Hardison’s Demon Freaks pits high schoolers on the eve of their SAT exams against wicked would-be wizards and monsters, with the fate of the world at stake.  The story is written with irony and humor from the viewpoint of teenagers.  The protagonists are members of an ad hoc school band, including twin boys who don’t look or think alike.  The drummer, who is the low-achieving son of a high-achieving family, is the comic foil. The female member is a “brain” who is happiest taking a shower.

The night before the SAT, the band members plan to meet to jam and cram, but are caught in the middle of a deadly rivalry between two groups of elderly, evil golfers, the Servants of Darkness and the Golfers’ Association.   The Servants of Darkness are led by the teens’ sarcastic, vindictive English teacher, while the Golfers follow his power-hungry brother, who looks like a twisted Santa Claus.  Both groups want to possess a magical dagger that traps souls, communicates telepathically with its victims, and can control their minds. Think of the Ring of Power in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring.

Each group plans to use the dagger for a human sacrifice, in order to open the gates to Hell and release a powerful demon that they hope will help them dominate the world.  Two of the teens are captured, possibly to be the human sacrifices.  The rest of their friends, along with commandos from a clandestine division of the McDonald’s Corporation called McODD (McDonald’s Occult Dangers Division) fight the Servants, the Golfers and Teethheads (scaly, fish-headed monsters with hundreds of teeth) in tunnels and chambers under the golf course.

The story is told in an engaging, fast-paced, tongue–in-cheek style.  The teenagers are quirky, but discover hidden talents that help them outwit the adults.  The adults are caricatures of hubris and greed.  The plot will appeal to children and teenagers.  The monsters are scary, but not frightening.  The violence and gore are mild.  The author has written another novel, an epic fantasy Fish Wielder. Recommended.

 

Contains: Not applicable.

 

Reviewed by Robert D. Yee

Posted on September 1, 2017 by , Reply
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