Category: Reading Material

Your Guide to Vampires That Don't Swoon

Posted on by tavia.

Dark Horse wants us to remember what made vampires scary in the first place. They’re monsters that feed on humans… mostly that’s why they should be scary. But for a long time we’ve been fed the drivel that vampires are chisel-jawed, deep feeling, hopeless romantics.

We’ve mentioned before that a supernatural apocalypse staring vampires would probably suck hard. It would not be epic high school love and sexy accents fighting over local nobodies. It would be scary and bloody as fuck until it turned into Daybreakers.

Dark Horse is here to remind us to hie our kids, hide our wives, and our husbands because vampires are raping killing everybody! They’ve compiled a free handy digital sampler comic showcasing the best of their vampire line up.

Some of them you’ve heard of, some probably not. It’s free. Try it, you might find something you like. Or you might learn something.

If you’ve got a taste for bloodsuckers, then look no further! Dark Horse does vampires right and gives readers who crave creatures of the night a crypt full of creepy comics!

Step into the world of Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9, as everyone’s favorite Slayer adapts to her new life in San Francisco. Then check out Angel & Faith, where the vampire with a soul and the once-evil Slayer work to atone for past sins.

This preview issue also features Mike Mignola and Christopher Golden’s Baltimore, which follows a vampire hunter living in a world beset by a post–World War I vampire infestation; samples from P. C. and Kristin Cast’s story of a vampyre boarding school in House of Night; and Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan’s The Strain, in which Manhattan suffers from a vampiric plague!

• Issue features selections from Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9 #1,Angel & Faith #1, Baltimore: The Curse Bells #1, The Strain #1, and House of Night #1. Plus, the entirety of a short story entitled “Magical Mystery Tour Featuring the Beetles,” a previously unreleased, digital-only retailer exclusive from Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9.

They’ve also provided an infographic. I’m always down for an inforgraphic:

Book review: Dark Magic by James Swain

Posted on by char

Dark Magic cover

Book review: Dark Magic by James Swain, published May 2012 by Tor Books

Note: The review copy was provided by the publisher.

Blurb:

Peter Warlock is a magician with a dark secret. Every night, he amazes audiences at his private theater in New York, where he performs feats that boggle the imagination. But his day job is just a cover for his otherworldly pursuits: Peter is a member of an underground group of psychics who gaze into the future to help prevent crimes. No one, not even his live-in girlfriend, knows the truth about Peter—until the séance when he foresees an unspeakable act of violence that will devastate the city. As Peter and his friends rush to prevent tragedy, Peter discovers that a shadowy cult of evil psychics, the Order of Astrum, know all about his abilities. They are hunting him and his fellow psychics down, one by one, determined to silence them forever. Dark Magic is a genre-bending supernatural thriller from national bestselling novelist and real-life magician James Swain.

First off, I’m going to admit that while I love science fiction and fantasy, I no longer read a lot of urban fantasy. Why? Because, quite frankly, I’m tired of reading about vampires, werethings, and ninja heroines with attitude problems.

Second, I’m going to admit that this review has taken such a long time to write because I read the book twice. (Yeah, I really it.)

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Dark Horse Extends Free Comic Book Day Through the End of May

Posted on by tavia.

Did you miss out on Free Comic Book Day this past Saturday? If you did, you also missed out on the Buffy/ The Guild preview (?) issue and the Star Wars/Serenity one-shots offered by Dark Horse. That’s sad.

You missed the space pirates, bandits, aliens, and heroes. You missed out on high-flying hijinks, and intergalactic world  universe saving awesomeness.

Lucky for you Dark Horse, specifically, Dark Horse Digital are nice people (is a nice person? cares about their readers’ happy feelings to sadness ratio?). Over in the “free” section of the digital.darkhorse.com website you’ll be able to read or download their Free Comic Book Day comics for the rest of the month of May. All you need is a free account and you’re on your way to slacking like a professional at work or number munching your monthly data allotment. Continue reading “Dark Horse Extends Free Comic Book Day Through the End of May”

Book review: The Unbidden Magic series by Marilee Brothers

Posted on by char

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Unbidden Magic Series, by Marilee Brothers (Moonstone, Moon Rise, Moon Spun, Shadow Moon). Published by Bell Bridge Books.

Review copies were provided by Bell Bridge Books.

This review covers a series of four books, so I’m not going to write the blurb for each of them. That would just take too long.

Here’s the background: 15 year old Allie Emerson is given a moonstone necklace by her friend and sometime guardian, Kizzy (who is a Romany Gypsy, but everyone calls her a witch). Allie’s mother, Faye, is pretending to have fibromyalgia to get out of working.

So, okay. The moonstone necklace. It’s pretty, it’s a necklace, it has special powers. (I KNOW.)

Continue reading “Book review: The Unbidden Magic series by Marilee Brothers”

Book review: The Fate of the Species by Fred Guterl

Posted on by char

Publisher’s blurb:[1. Review copy provided by Bloomsbury USA]

The revelatory account of the biggest threats we face as a species–and what we can do to save ourselves.

In the history of planet earth, mass species extinctions have occurred five times, about once every 100 million years.

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A “sixth extinction” is known to be underway now, with over 200 species dying off every day. Not only that, but the cause of the sixth extinction is also the source of single biggest threat to human life: our own inventions.

What this bleak future will truly hold, though, is much in dispute. Will our immune systems be attacked by so-called super bugs, always evolving, and now more easily spread than ever? Will the disappearance of so many species cripple the biosphere? Will global warming transform itself into a runaway effect, destroying ecosystems across the planet?

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In this provocative book, Fred Guterl examines each of these scenarios, laying out the existing threats, and proffering the means to avoid them.

This book is more than a tour of an apocalyptic future; it is a political salvo, an antidote to well-intentioned but ultimately ineffectual thinking. Though it’s honorable enough to switch light bulbs and eat home-grown food, the scope of our problems, and the size of our population, is too great. And so, Guterl argues, we find ourselves in a trap: Technology got us into this mess, and it’s also the only thing that can help us survive it. Guterl vividly shows where our future is heading, and ultimately lights the route to safe harbor.

Note: This book is available from Amazon on May 22, 2012.

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Graphic Novel Review: DOLLHOUSE VOLUME 1: EPITAPHS

Posted on by tavia.

Publisher’s blurb:

The Rossum Corporation’s Dollhouse technology has gone viral with a synchronized phone call that wiped the minds of everyone it reached, turning them into mindless killers. Those who avoided the call–including show favorites Echo, Alpha, Mag, Zone, and Griff–must try to survive in the sudden apocalypse and be wary of Rossum’s expansive technological reach.

In DOLLHOUSE VOLUME 1: EPITAPHS (Dark Horse) [1. This book was provided for review by Dark Horse] we get a look at the worst case scenario for the imprint technology used in Dollhouse the TV show. Robo-calls are made to just about everyone in America and if the person at the other end answered the phone, they were hit with an imprint. The imprint erased their personality and replaced it with that of a blood-thirsty killing drone.

Imprinted people have no actual reasoning or logic, just standing orders they’re compelled to obey. If every last person is dead, they don’t just snap out of it because the job’s done. Nope. They can either go on to task number two, be erased, or be reprogrammed.

Is a person still a person if you remove them from their body? Similarly, is a body still a person without the individual person inside of it?

It has always been easy enough to decide that a zombie should be killed. A change takes place that removes them from the Human bucket. Not only do they die but they also look dead and act inhuman.

What if they only did one of those things? Would we be so quick to pull the trigger or swing the bat if Mrs. May still looked exactly the same except with a new rage behind her eyes?

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Comic Review: The Strain #1

Posted on by anninyn

The Strain #1 [1. Review copy provided by Dark Horse]

When a Boeing 777 lands at JFK International Airport and goes dark on the runway, the Center for Disease Control, fearing a terrorist attack, calls in Dr. Ephraim Goodweather and his team of expert biological-threat first responders.

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Only an elderly pawnbroker from Spanish Harlem suspects a darker purpose behind the event-an ancient threat intent on covering mankind in darkness.

* From director Guillermo del Toro and novelist Chuck Hogan (Prince of Thieves)!

* Adapted for comics by Eisner Award-winning writer David Lapham!

I’ll be honest, I have no idea if The Strain is going to go apocalyptic or not- but it’s a damn good comic.

Continue reading “Comic Review: The Strain #1”

Book review: Endworlds by Nicholas Read

Posted on by char

Note: My review copy was provided by the publisher via NetGalley. I can no longer seem to find the publisher’s website, so unfortunately I can’t link to it.

Another note: This is actually a series, so “book 1.1” won’t get you the whole story.

Amazon blurb:

Billionaire industrialist Raef Eisman loses his daughter on an airliner in midair after flying through a strange electrical storm. With no body, no ransom and no explanation, he embarks on a crusade to find her . . . which sees him ousted from his company, stripped of his fortune and vilified by the world press. Only his faithful assistant, retired special forces colonel William Hills, stands at his side as they uncover primitive legends of ‘skypeople’ in the clouds, the trafficking of humans between dimensions, and a worldwide conspiracy of revisionist history that obscures our race’s true origin and purpose.Thought mad by his peers, Eisman inexplicably disappears as his vehicle plunges into the Thames. Instead of the 50-year old corporate raider emerging from the depths, a soggy 15-year old amnesiac rises in his place. A boy with no identity and no past.Dubbed “Eastwood” by those who find “the boy with no name”, he is conscripted by an underground army of teen refugees in the tunnels below Waterloo. Wards of an ancient organization intent on protecting the world from an increasing alien and inter-dimensional threat, these “Longcoats” induct Eastwood into a new life, with new allies and deadly enemies: the Fae’er of the First Age; the ageless Cassandrans; the shadowy Dae’mon; and a covert military junta known only as GRID – all on a collision course.

So…okay. This book has an interesting premise, that’s for sure. Raef’s disappearance early on was a little weird, especially considering an amnesiac teenage boy seemed to take his place. (Although that whole process was interesting, too.)

It took me a long time to read even a small part of this book. That in itself is usually not a good sign (well, for me, anyway; YMMV). I only got a quarter of the way through before I stopped reading.

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Book Review: Apocalyse How by Rob Kutner

Posted on by anninyn

[1. provided for review by Running Press]

Let’s face it: Our world’s gotta go sometime.

Whether it’s due to mushroom clouds, asteroids, a mad supergenius, Jesus, newly sentient iPods, or Pod People, everything about life on Earth is going to change.

And you should be psyched.

APOCALYPSE HOW is a comprehensive cataclysmic guide that walks you through the Nine Most Likely World-Ending Scenarios, and provides useful and inspiring advice on every aspect of surviving (and thriving!) in the new world to come. Covering everything from food, shelter, and relocation to social life, dating, recreation and career, APOCALYPSE HOW is the only book you’ll need – and just might be the last one left at all.

 

OK, this is going to be a short review. Why? Because if you like this website, you will LOVE this book.

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Book review — Plan and Prep: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse by Alex Newton

Posted on by char

Disclaimer: While the author and I are Twitter acquaintances, I did not receive compensation for reviewing this book, nor did I receive a free copy for review.

This review was first published on my blog. The link to the original review is here.

This book is available from Amazon in both ebook and print formats.

Amazon blurb:

Plan and Prep: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse is an introductory guide to emergency and disaster planning and preparation.

This book follows Bill Jones and his family as they navigate their way through a series of emergency and disaster events, culminating in the outbreak of a Zombie Apocalypse.

Plan and Prep: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse walks the reader through basic planning and preparation techniques and attempts to answer most of the more basic questions before they are asked. Areas that are often overlooked by beginners are explored, and some of the more common misconceptions are discussed.

This book does not claim to be a survival handbook, so if you’re looking for a how-to book about how to become Survivorman(TM), you’re reading the wrong book.

Also, note that Plan and Prep: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse isn’t actually about zombies–not the Hollywood kind, anyway. It does include zombies, but not the undead-eat-your-brains version that are currently prevalent in movies and TV.

Continue reading “Book review — Plan and Prep: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse by Alex Newton”