6th Annual Spooktacular Giveaway Hop (INT) - Enter to Win Maplecroft or Chapelwood by Cherie Priest! #Giveaway

Welcome to my stop on the humongous Spooktacular Giveaway Hop hosted by the scarily fantastic blogger, Kathy @ I Am A Reader, Not A Writer! Today I'm featuring The Borden Dispatches by Cherie Priest!

What You Can Win

I'm giving you your choice of one of the two books in the series as your prize. You can read about them below:

Title: Maplecroft (The Borden Dispatches #1)
Author: Cherie Priest
Publisher: Roc (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: September 2, 2014

Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks; and when she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty-one...

The people of Fall River, Massachusetts, fear me. Perhaps rightfully so. I remain a suspect in the brutal deaths of my father and his second wife despite the verdict of innocence at my trial. With our inheritance, my sister, Emma, and I have taken up residence in Maplecroft, a mansion near the sea and far from gossip and scrutiny.

But it is not far enough from the affliction that possessed my parents. Their characters, their very souls, were consumed from within by something that left malevolent entities in their place. It originates from the ocean’s depths, plaguing the populace with tides of nightmares and madness.

This evil cannot hide from me. No matter what guise it assumes, I will be waiting for it. With an axe.

Review: ZED by Jason McIntyre #BibPleaseReview @KHeniadis

Title: ZED
Author: Jason McIntyre
Publisher: Booktrope Editions
Release Date: July 26, 2015
Acquired Via: Publisher
It’s the waning dog days of August, 1975 and Tom Mason’s in Dovetail Cove for the last few weeks of his summer job at the group home. His boss and the home’s owner is Karen Banatyne, one of the wealthiest folks in town. It seems like she’s got it in for Tom; she’s the only one standing in his way as he scrimps for a new camera. But Karen has her own problems. A regulatory agency might cut off her funding, plus her hubby hasn’t been seen in a few weeks, and she’s not saying why. Most ominous of all, it seems as though something’s hiding in the hot spring north of the main beach and one of Karen’s ‘houseguests’ is about to come face to face with evil. Tom is too.

My Review

I really enjoyed the nostalgia in this book. Jason McIntyre’s reference to Jaws, slathering oneself with baby oil while sunbathing, and other things from the 70’s, made me feel like this story could have taken place during my childhood. I do think these references would have been unnoticed from readers in their 20’s. They are not needed to understand the story, they just make it a bit more enjoyable.

Blog Tour (Review): Dark Screams Volume Four by Clive Barker, Ed Gorman, and Heather Graham #TLCBookTours

Title: Dark Screams: Volume Four
Authors: Clive Barker, Ed Gorman, and Heather Graham
Publisher: Hydra (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: August 4, 2015
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
Clive Barker, Heather Graham, Lisa Morton, Ray Garton, and Ed Gorman lead readers down a twisted labyrinth of terror, horror, and suspense in Dark Screams: Volume Four, from Brian James Freeman and Richard Chizmar of the revered Cemetery Dance Publications.

THE DEPARTED by Clive Barker
On All Hallows’ Eve, a dead and disembodied mother yearns to touch her young son one last time. But will making contact destroy them both?

CREATURE FEATURE by Heather Graham
What could be better publicity for a horror convention than an honest-to-goodness curse? It’s only after lights out that the hype—and the Jack the Ripper mannequin—starts to feel a little too real.

THE NEW WAR by Lisa Morton
Mike Carson is a war hero and a decorated vet. He doesn’t deserve to be trapped in a hospital with some black thing sitting on his chest as patients die all around him. His only hope is to take out the nurse—before it’s his turn.

SAMMY COMES HOME by Ray Garton
It’s what every family prays for: a lost pet returning home. But when Sammy, the Hale family sheepdog, appears on their doorstep, he brings back something no parent would ever wish upon his or her child.

THE BRASHER GIRL by Ed Gorman
Cindy Marie Brasher is the prettiest girl in the Valley, and Spence just has to have her. Unfortunately, Cindy has a “friend” . . . a friend who tells her to do things . . . bad things.

Praise for Dark Screams: Volume Four

“Collectively, Volume Four constitutes the most cohesive, narratively enriching and entertaining Dark Screams entry to date. Be it the presence of genre icons Barker and Morton, stories from the lesser-known but equally talented Garton and Gorman, or the pure fun of Graham’s tale, fans of horror of every variety will find something to love in these pages.” — LitReactor

“The best of the bunch so far.” — Examiner.com

“Stacks up well with any of the other three books so far [with] a fairly good variety in the kinds of horror stories too . . . If you’re new to the series, this is a good jumping-on point.” — Wagging the Fox

“Dark Screams is one of the best values on the horror market. . . . Do yourself a favor, and pick it up.” — Adventures Fantastic

My Review

I'll break down my review of Dark Screams Volume Four by short story to make things simple.

The Departed by Clive Barker

This story was not at all what I had expected from Clive Barker. I've read some of this other work, which was mostly horror-laced fantasy, but The Departed was about a single mother who is coping wtih her new status as a ghost. It affected me emotionally, as I also spent several years as a single mother myself. That emotional reaction to this story was the most unexpected thing of all, and this was my favorite story in the collection.

Review: Alice by Christina Henry #AceRocStars #Horror #adultlit

Title: Alice
Author: Christina Henry
Publisher: Ace (Penguin)
Release Date: August 4, 2015
Acquired Via: Ace Roc Stars
A mind-bending new novel inspired by the twisted and wondrous works of Lewis Carroll…

In a warren of crumbling buildings and desperate people called the Old City, there stands a hospital with cinderblock walls which echo the screams of the poor souls inside.

In the hospital, there is a woman. Her hair, once blond, hangs in tangles down her back. She doesn’t remember why she’s in such a terrible place. Just a tea party long ago, and long ears, and blood...

Then, one night, a fire at the hospital gives the woman a chance to escape, tumbling out of the hole that imprisoned her, leaving her free to uncover the truth about what happened to her all those years ago.

Only something else has escaped with her. Something dark. Something powerful.

And to find the truth, she will have to track this beast to the very heart of the Old City, where the rabbit waits for his Alice.

My Review

If I could only choose two words to describe Christina Henry's Alice, they would be "whimsical" and "gruesome". The book deftly captures the essence of Lewis Carroll's classic, while giving it a gory twist that will thrill horror fans. Readers familiar with the original work will find most of their favorite characters, but none of them are as they will remember.

Blog Tour (Review): Mercy House by Adam Cesare #Horror @TLCBookTours

Title: Mercy House
Author: Adam Cesare
Publisher: Hydra (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: June 9, 2015
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
Welcome to Mercy House, a state-of-the-art retirement home that appears perfectly crisp, clean, and orderly . . . but nothing could be farther from the truth. In Adam Cesare’s thrilling novel, the residents will find little mercy—only a shocking eruption of unfathomable horror.

Harriet Laurel notices the odor at Mercy House as soon as she sets foot inside, brought there against her will by her son, Don, and his wife, Nikki. In the early stages of dementia, Harriet has grown resentful of Nikki, blaming her daughter-in-law for failing to supply grandchildren. Yet even Harriet must admit that her mind becomes clearer as soon as she crosses the threshold. If it wasn’t for that annoying smell.

Arnold Piper is an eighty-five-year-old ex-Marine, a proud man who has cared for himself his whole life. But no longer. Betrayed by his aging body, Arnold is learning that the trials he survived long ago in war-torn Korea pale beside the daily indignities of growing old. Little does he know that his greatest nightmares are still ahead of him.

Sarah Campbell is an idealistic nurse whose compassion has been stretched to the breaking point at the chronically understaffed facility that is Mercy House. But now Sarah’s list of unpleasant duties is about to take a terrifying turn. For something wicked is brewing in Mercy House. Something dark and rotten . . . and deadly.

Praise for Mercy House

“Of all the new writers busting out on the scene—and there are some great ones, without a doubt—Cesare’s the young guy with the greatest encyclopedic gorehound know-how, blistering cinematic pace, unquenchable love of both fiction and film, and hell-bent will to entertain. . . . [He] does just about everything right.” — John Skipp, Fangoria

My Review

I'm glad that I've reached the end of the horror reviews that I have scheduled because I think my opinion of Mercy House suffered from me being burned out on the genre. I mean, it's set in a nursing home, which is horror in itself to many people. It sounded so good before I jumped into the horror swarm, but I was bored and skimming by the time I got to read it.

Blog Tour (Review): Consumption by Heather Herrman #Horror #Giveaway @TLCBookTours

Title: Consumption
Author: Heather Herrman
Publisher: Hydra (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: May 26, 2015
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
For fans of Stephen King, Joe Hill, and Sarah Langan comes a thrilling new vision of American horror. In Heather Herrman’s heart-pounding debut novel, evil is ready to feed—and it’s got one hell of an appetite.

In the wake of tragedy, John and Erma Scott are heading west in search of a new life. So when car trouble strands them in sleepy Cavus, Montana, they decide to stay for a while, charmed by the friendly residents and the surrounding ambiance. Here, they hope, is the healing balm that their marriage needs.

Then John and Erma find themselves in a fight not just to save their marriage, but their very lives. For this is no ordinary town. Its quiet streets conceal a dark and bloody secret that has slumbered for centuries. Now, that secret is awake . . . and it’s hungry.

Like a slow infection, evil is spreading through Cavus. Soon John and Erma—along with the local sheriff, an undocumented immigrant, a traumatized teenage girl, and an old man with terrible secrets of his own—must join together to battle an all-consuming force that has set its sights on its prey: the entire human race.

Praise for Consumption

“Both the evil that suffuses the pages of Consumption and the motley gang of innocents who defend against it are much more interesting than those usually found in your average scare fare. Solid writing elevates this imaginative fright-fest from an invigorating new voice.” — Sophie Littlefield, bestselling author of the Aftertime series

My Review

I haven't read as much horror as I've been doing lately since I was a teenager. That used to be my genre of choice, but I'm really starting to drift away from it. Heather Herrman's Consumption was a good, solid read, but it also helped me to realize what I do and do not like when it comes to horror.

There are several characters that are focused on in Consumption, and they are all utterly human. (Major kudos on character development!) They all have their secrets, fantasies, darkness, and lies, and it made them all a little more relatable while being harder to like. If they didn't have any flaws, there wouldn't be a fear (at least for me) of them succumbing to the evil forces at work in the novel.

Blog Tour (Guest Post): Consumption by Heather Herrman @horrorandbrains @TLCBookTours

Title: Consumption
Author: Heather Herrman
Publisher: Hydra (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: May 26, 2015
For fans of Stephen King, Joe Hill, and Sarah Langan comes a thrilling new vision of American horror. In Heather Herrman’s heart-pounding debut novel, evil is ready to feed—and it’s got one hell of an appetite.

In the wake of tragedy, John and Erma Scott are heading west in search of a new life. So when car trouble strands them in sleepy Cavus, Montana, they decide to stay for a while, charmed by the friendly residents and the surrounding ambiance. Here, they hope, is the healing balm that their marriage needs.

Then John and Erma find themselves in a fight not just to save their marriage, but their very lives. For this is no ordinary town. Its quiet streets conceal a dark and bloody secret that has slumbered for centuries. Now, that secret is awake . . . and it’s hungry.

Like a slow infection, evil is spreading through Cavus. Soon John and Erma—along with the local sheriff, an undocumented immigrant, a traumatized teenage girl, and an old man with terrible secrets of his own—must join together to battle an all-consuming force that has set its sights on its prey: the entire human race.

Praise for Consumption

“Both the evil that suffuses the pages of Consumption and the motley gang of innocents who defend against it are much more interesting than those usually found in your average scare fare. Solid writing elevates this imaginative fright-fest from an invigorating new voice.” — Sophie Littlefield, bestselling author of the Aftertime series

Guest Post

Why the Best Horror Authors are Fem
Heather Herrman
Look at any “best of” list of horror authors, and you’ll find them dominated by, if not entirely composed of, men. You might think this is because mostly men write and read horror. And if we limit the definition of “horror,” you may be right. Often women horror authors are kept out of the genre discussion because of misleading labels (i.e. by calling their work paranormal romance, gothic, etc.). So, I’d like to posit something different: the best horror authors, male or female, are Fem.

Good horror is inherently Fem.

Blog Tour (Character Interview): Sweet by Emmy Laybourne #Giveaway #YAlit @FierceReads

Hello, everyone! I'm off on a cruise this week, but prior to me setting sail, I was able to interview former child star, Tom Forelli. (Okay, maybe I mean Emmy Laybourne for her new book, Sweet, but shhhhh! Let's be in character!) I know you guys are just as excited as I was about this interview, so I hope you enjoy hearing about Tom's new gig as the celebrity host of Solu's Cruise to Lose!



Title: Sweet
Author: Emmy Laybourne
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends (Macmillan)
Release Date: June 2, 2015
A cruise to die for...

Solu’s luxurious celebrity-filled Cruise to Lose is billed as “the biggest cruise since the Titanic,” and if the new diet sweetener works as promised — dropping five percent of a person’s body weight in just days — it would be the answer to the world’s obesity problem. But Laurel is starting to regret accepting her friend Viv’s invitation. She’s already completely embarrassed herself in front of celebrity host Tom Forelli (otherwise known as the hottest guy ever!), and she’s too seasick to even try the sweetener. And that’s before Viv and all the other passengers start acting really strange.

Tom knows that he should be grateful for this job and the chance to shed his childhood “Baby Tom-Tom” image. His publicists have even set up a “romance” with a sexy reality-TV star. But as things on the ship start to get a bit wild, he finds himself drawn to a different girl. And when his celebrity hosting gig turns into an expose on the shocking side effects of Solu, it’s Laurel that he’s determined to save.

Emmy Laybourne takes readers on a dream vacation that goes first comically, then tragically, then horrifyingly, wrong.

Character Interview with Tom Forelli

Kayla: Hi, Tom! Thank you soooo much for taking time out from your very busy schedule to talk with my readers! Can you tell us a little about yourself?

Tom: Sure thing! Can I just say that it’s really a pleasure to be connecting with you and your readers today? (Tom puts his broad, muscular hand over Kayla’s and gives it a little squeeze.)

Kayla: *giggling* If you don’t mind my asking, what made you decide to cross over from acting to becoming a reality show host?

Blog Tour (Review & #Giveaway): Dark Screams Volume Two edited by Brian James Freeman and Richard Chizmar

Title: Dark Screams: Volume Two
Editors: Brian James Freeman and Richard Chizmar
Publisher: Hydra (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: March 3, 2015
Acquired Via: Publisher
Robert McCammon, Norman Prentiss, Shawntelle Madison, Graham Masterton, and Richard Christian Matheson scale new heights of horror, suspense, and grimmest fantasy in Dark Screams: Volume Two, from Brian James Freeman and Richard Chizmar of the renowned Cemetery Dance Publications.

THE DEEP END by Robert McCammon
Everyone thinks the drowning death of Neil Calder in the local swimming pool was a tragic accident. Only his father knows better. Now, on the last night of summer, Neil returns in search of revenge.

INTERVAL by Norman Prentiss
Flight 1137 from St. Louis by way of Nashville has gone missing. As anxious friends and family gather around the gate, a ticket clerk finds herself eyewitness to a moment of inhuman evil.

IF THESE WALLS COULD TALK by Shawntelle Madison
Eleanor has come from New York City to prep an old Victorian house in Maine for America’s Mysterious Hotspots. Although she’s always thrown herself into her work, this job will take her places she’s never dreamed of going.

THE NIGHT HIDER by Graham Masterton
C. S. Lewis wrote about a portal that led to a world of magic and enchantment. But the wardrobe in Dawn’s room holds only death—until she solves its grisly mystery.

WHATEVER by Richard Christian Matheson
A 1970s rock ’n’ roll band that never was—in a world that is clearly our own...but perhaps isn’t, not anymore...or, at least, not yet—takes one hell of a trip.

Praise for Dark Screams: Volume Two

“Dark Screams: Volume Two [is] a worthwhile read and a great entry to this series. If this upward trend in quality continues, we are sure to see amazing things in the volumes to come.” — LitReactor

“[Brian James Freeman] and Richard Chizmar set themselves a high standard with the first volume, and it’s good to see that they have maintained that level of excellence. . . . If you like good, solid horror, check it out. I’ve found some new authors to read.” — Adventures Fantastic

“Five fun-to-read stories by top-notch horror scribes. How can you lose? The answer: you can’t.” — Atomic Fangirl

“Once I started this book, I didn’t want to read anything else.” — Carole’s Random Life

My Review

I don't read that much horror now, as a blogger, but I still enjoy the genre. When I was offered Dark Screams Volume Two, I had to take it because it's been quite a while since I've read anything creepy or scary.

The Deep End
Robert R. McCammon

Sometimes there is little I love more than an unreliable narrator. (Just because something is horror does not mean that I will believe that a character believes to be true.) The protagonist, Glenn, just lost his son two weeks before in a swimming accident at the public pool. He's convinced that there is a monster lurking in the deep end and that it's his job to kill it. Being as this is a horror anthology, maybe Glenn hasn't gone "off the deep end" himself, and there's a monster after all.

Interval
Norman Prentiss

Blog Tour (Interview & Giveaway): The Crimson Gate by Whitney A. Miller

Thank you so much for visiting by Bibliophilia, Please for my stop of The Crimson Gate blog tour! Today, I'll be talking with Whitney Miller! If you haven't read The Violet Hour, you may want to skip down straight to the interview.



Title: The Violet Hour
Author: Whitney A. Miller
Publisher: Flux
Release Date: March 8, 2015
Harlow must stop her evil counterpart in this thrilling sequel to The Violet Hour.

Harlow Wintergreen has just been named the new Matriarch of VisionCrest, the powerful religious organization previously led by her father. But there's one big problem. The real Harlow is trapped inside a Cambodian temple, and her double, the evil Isiris, has escaped confinement and is masquerading as her.

Now initiated as their leader, Isiris intends to unleash a killer super virus aimed at cleansing the planet of VisionCrest. In order to stop her, Harlow must find a way out of the temple and locate the Resistance...or the world will be destroyed.

Interview

Kayla: Hi Whitney, thank you so much for stopping back by Bibliophilia, Please allowing me to ask you a few questions. To start us off, I would like to congratulate you on being nominated for a Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a First Novel for The Violet Hour. How did you find out about your nomination?

Whitney A. Miller: Thank you! It was really exciting to be on the long list for the Bram Stoker. I’m an active member of the Horror Writers Association so I knew the list was coming out, but didn’t know I’d been nominated until I saw some congratulatory tweets! Twitter is how I found out most of my exciting book info, and this was no exception. :-)

Kayla: Can you tell us a little bit about The Violet Hour? Should we read it before The Crimson Gate?

Early Review: Sweet by Emmy Laybourne

Title: Sweet
Author: Emmy Laybourne
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends (Macmillan)
Release Date: June 2, 2015
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
A cruise to die for...

Solu’s luxurious celebrity-filled Cruise to Lose is billed as “the biggest cruise since the Titanic,” and if the new diet sweetener works as promised — dropping five percent of a person’s body weight in just days — it would be the answer to the world’s obesity problem. But Laurel is starting to regret accepting her friend Viv’s invitation. She’s already completely embarrassed herself in front of celebrity host Tom Forelli (otherwise known as the hottest guy ever!), and she’s too seasick to even try the sweetener. And that’s before Viv and all the other passengers start acting really strange.

Tom knows that he should be grateful for this job and the chance to shed his childhood “Baby Tom-Tom” image. His publicists have even set up a “romance” with a sexy reality-TV star. But as things on the ship start to get a bit wild, he finds himself drawn to a different girl. And when his celebrity hosting gig turns into an expose on the shocking side effects of Solu, it’s Laurel that he’s determined to save.

Emmy Laybourne takes readers on a dream vacation that goes first comically, then tragically, then horrifyingly, wrong.

My Review

Sweet is a book that you're going to want to get your hands on when it releases this summer. It's the perfect summertime book because it reads quickly, it's set on a cruise ship, and who isn't worrying about their size in bathing suit season? And the best thing about Sweet? It handles weight loss and body image very tactfully and presents quick fixes as a less than ideal way to go around it.

Review: The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman (Spoilers)

Title: The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Author: Neil Gaiman
Publisher: William Morrow (HarperCollins)
Release Date: June 18, 2013
Acquired Via: Personal Collection
#1 New York Times Bestseller in hardcover.

A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn’t thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she’d claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse where she once lived, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.

A groundbreaking work as delicate as a butterfly’s wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out.

You can read Kayla's review of the book HERE.

My Review (Spoilers Below)

An unnamed narrator visits his childhood home and is flooded with magical memories his adult mind can no longer rationalize. Like Mary Poppins or Nanny McPhee, the Hempstock women take the narrator under their wing and open his mind to mysterious possibilities. Mrs. Hempstock reads minds. Old Mrs. Hempstock vanquishes evil forces. Eleven-year-old Lettie Hempstock believes the pond in her farm’s backyard is an ocean.

#Lionsgate Horror Movie #Giveaway

The Blair Witch Project was one of my favorite movies as a kid, so I want to share the opportunity to win a copy with you today, thanks to our friends at Lionsgate!

About #LionsgateHorror


Relive the horror classic! The Blair Witch Project follows a trio of filmmakers on what should have been a simple walk in the woods, but quickly becomes an excursion into heart-stopping terror.

Or dive into a new horror experience - from the director of The Blair Witch Project comes Exists, for five friends, it was a chance for a summer getaway - a weekend of camping in the Texas Big Thicket. But visions of a carefree vacation are shattered with an accident on a dark and desolate country road.

What’s a Halloween party without some creepy background visuals? Download the films and be prepped for this month’s creepy festivities.

THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT
Download | Facebook

EXISTS
Download | Facebook

CABIN IN THE WOODS
Download

CABIN FEVER
Download

THE DESCENT
Download
Blog App

#TheDevilsHand - #ProphecyParty & $15 iTunes Gift Card #Giveaway

Bibliophilia, Please is a "book blog", but I want to share the opportunity to win a prize with you guys. Today I'm featuring The Devil's Hand blog app, along with the opportunity to enter to win a $15 iTunes Gift Card!

About the Movie


When six girls are born on the sixth day of the sixth month to different mothers in the small, devout village of New Bethlehem an ancient prophecy is set in motion - on their 18th birthday one of the girls will become the Devil's Hand. As the day approaches and one by one the young women begin to disappear, terror overtakes the quiet community and those remaining girls band together to uncover who or what is behind these treacherous acts.

Starring Jennifer Carpenter (Dexter), Rufus Sewell (Dark City), and Adelaide Kane (The CW’s Reign), it will give you thrills and chills this October!

The Devil’s Hand is now available on iTunes, VOD and in select theaters.
Blog App

2014 Debut Author Bash (Guest Post & Giveaway): Whitney A. Miller

Thank you so much for visiting by Bibliophilia, Please for my stop of the 2014 Debut Author Bash! Today, I'll be featuring Whitney A. Miller and her debut novel, The Violet Hour. I reviewed The Violet Hour back in March, and you can read it HERE.

Guest Post

Scary Books I've Read
Whitney A. Miller
It’s REALLY HARD to pick just one book I read as a teenager that was the absolute scariest. I spent A LOT of time reading scary books. Everything from Lois Duncan (seriously, what did you do last summer? based on the cover I’d say it has something to do with MURDER) to Christopher Pike (don’t open that chain letter! the person who wrote it also knows what you did last summer!!) to Margaret Atwood (I mean, summer, winter or fall, The Handmaid's Tale is terrifying, y’all).

But hands-down the scariest book I read was one I smuggled off my parents’ bookshelf as a nine year old...Stephen King’s IT. It had a sewer grate on the cover with an unassuming paper boat about to be swept into it. If you looked closer, there was a tiny, evil claw emerging from between the bars of the grate. This told me all I needed to know. I was probably not allowed to read this book and it was certainly going to give me nightmares. Two important criteria on my summer reading list. I had to have it immediately.

Review: Beyond the Pale by Henry Herz

Title: Beyond the Pale
Author: Henry Herz (editor)
Publisher: Birch Tree Publishing
Acquired Via: Editor
Release Date: July 7, 2014
Beyond the Pale contains eleven dark fantasy, urban fantasy and paranormal short stories by award-winning and New York Times bestselling authors:

• "Hooves and the Hovel of Abdel Jameela" by Saladin Ahmed (author of Throne of the Crescent Moon)
• "The Children of the Shark God" by Peter S. Beagle (author of The Last Unicorn)
• "Misery" & "Shadow Children" by Heather Brewer (author of The Chronicles of Vladimir Tod)
• "Even Hand" by Jim Butcher (author of The Dresden Files)
• "Red Run" by Kami Garcia (author of Beautiful Creatures)
• "Pale Rider" & "The Adventures of Lightning Merriemouse-Jones" by Nancy Holder (author of Wicked)
• "Frost Child" and "South" by Gillian Philip (author of Rebel Angels)
• "A Knot of Toads" by Jane Yolen (author of Owl Moon)

The noun “pale” refers to a stake (as in impaling vampires) or pointed piece of wood (as in a paling fence). “Pale” came to refer to an area enclosed by a paling fence. Later, it acquired the figurative meaning of an enclosed and therefore safe domain. Conversely, "beyond the pale" means foreign, strange, or threatening. You are about to go Beyond the Pale.

My Review

I love love love to read short stories (the literary ones from college are my favorites!), but I don't think that I've ever reviewed an anthology. Since I was so intrigued by the authors and the premise of Beyond the Pale, I figured that I would give it a shot.

I have to be honest and say that I skipped some of the stories for various reasons. I know that Jim Butcher is everyone else's favorite here at Bibliophilia, Please, but I am yet to read The Dresden Files. (Before you string me, I bought them on Kindle and Audible, so Storm Front will be happening soon.) I also skipped Frost Child by Gillian Philip because I wasn't in the mood for fairies at the time. Jan Yolen's A Knot of Toads and Nancy & Belle Holder's The Adventures of Lightning Merriemouse-Jones were both passed over, as I could get into them. That being said, these stories will not factor into my overall rating of the book.

Blog Tour (Review & Giveaway): The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

Title: The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Author: Neil Gaiman
Publisher: William Morrow (HarperCollins)
Release Date: June 18, 2013
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
#1 New York Times Bestseller in hardcover.

A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn’t thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she’d claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse where she once lived, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.

A groundbreaking work as delicate as a butterfly’s wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out.

My Review

It would be easy for me to say that I love Neil Gaiman's writing, but it would not be enough. Nor would it be enough to say that I admire him as a writer. No, I think only a wordsmith such as Neil Gaiman himself could put such emotions as he makes me feel to words, and, sadly, I am not one. Unless you have read his books, you cannot truly understand the power in his words.

Blog Tour (Review & Giveaway): The Quick by Lauren Owen

Title: The Quick
Author: Lauren Owen
Publisher: Random House
Release Date: June 17, 2014
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
An astonishing debut, a novel of epic scope and suspense that conjures up all the magic and menace of Victorian London.

London, 1892: James Norbury, a shy would-be poet newly down from Oxford, finds lodging with a charming young aristocrat. Through this new friendship, he is introduced to the drawing-rooms of high society, and finds love in an unexpected quarter. Then, suddenly, he vanishes without a trace. Unnerved, his sister, Charlotte, sets out from their crumbling country estate determined to find him. In the sinister, labyrinthine city that greets her, she uncovers a secret world at the margins populated by unforgettable characters: a female rope walker turned vigilante, a street urchin with a deadly secret, and the chilling “Doctor Knife.” But the answer to her brother’s disappearance ultimately lies within the doors of one of the country’s preeminent and mysterious institutions: The Aegolius Club, whose members include the most ambitious, and most dangerous, men in England.

In her first novel, Lauren Owen has created a fantastical world that is both beguiling and terrifying. The Quick will establish her as one of fiction’s most dazzling talents.

Praise for The Quick

“A suspenseful, gloriously atmospheric first novel, and a feast of gothic storytelling that is impossible to resist.” — Kate Atkinson, bestselling author of Life After Life and Case Histories

“A sly and glittering addition to the literature of the macabre . . . As soon as you have breathed with relief, much worse horrors begin. It’s a skilled, assured performance, and it’s hard to believe it is a first novel.” — Hilary Mantel, bestselling author of Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies

“Ambitious, elegant, atmospheric, and often deeply poignant, The Quick is a seamless blend of Victorian London and rich imagination. This is a book to savor.” — Tana French, bestselling author of In the Woods and Broken Harbor

My Review

Sometimes, I wish I wasn't a blogger so I would have more time to devote to books like Lauren Owen's debut, The Quick. I love books set in Victorian England, and this one was right up my alley. The book is beautifully written and the characters are well imagined, but it is also very, very long.

Blog Tour (Guest Post): Confessions of the Very First Zombie Slayer (That I Know of) by F.J.R. Titchenell

Title: Confessions of the Very First Zombie Slayer (That I Know of)
Author: F.J.R. Titchenell
Publisher: Jolly Fish Press
Release Date: May 6, 2014
The world is Cassie Fremont’s playground. Her face is on the cover of every newspaper, she has no homework, no curfew, and no credit limit, and she spends her days traveling the country with her friends, including a boy who would flirt with death just to turn her head. Life is just about perfect—except that those newspaper headlines are about her bludgeoning her crush to death with a paintball gun, she has to fight ravenous walking corpses every time she steps outside, and one of her friends is still missing, trapped somewhere in the distant, practically impassable wreckage of Manhattan. Still, Cassie’s an optimist. More prone to hysterical laughter than hysterical tears, she’d rather fight a corpse than be one, and she won’t leave a friend stranded when she can simply take her road trip to impossible new places to find her, even if getting there means admitting to that boy that she might just love him, too. Skillfully blending effective horror with unexpected humor, this diary-format novel is a fast-paced and heartwarming read.

Guest Post

The Creation of Cassie Fremont
F.J.R. Titchenell
At the time when the idea first came to me for Confessions of the Very First Zombie Slayer (That I Know of), I'd spent the last three years working on The Changeling Saga, a paranormal romance-y YA low fantasy that I was convinced was going to be my breakout. I was utterly in love with it, and it did have elements that I'm still proud of, but it was a pretty by-the-numbers fantasy epic/paranormal romance story, and I was writing it while both those trends were taking a major decline. Several waves of agent rejection letters had already drilled this truth into me, and I was just beginning to come to terms with the fact that I would probably need a new project sooner rather than later.

Author Interview: The Ghoul Archipelago by Stephen Kozeniewski

Title: The Ghoul Archipelago
Author: Stephen Kozeniewski
Publisher: Severed Press
Release Date: October 16, 2013
After ravenous corpses topple society and consume most of the world’s population, freighter captain Henk Martigan is shocked to receive a distress call. Eighty survivors beg him to whisk them away to the relative safety of the South Pacific. Martigan wants to help, but to rescue anyone he must first pass through the nightmare backwater of the Curien island chain.

A power struggle is brewing in the Curiens. On one side, the billionaire inventor of the mind-control collar seeks to squeeze all the profit he can out of the apocalypse. Opposing him is the charismatic leader of a ghoul-worshipping cargo cult. When a lunatic warlord berths an aircraft carrier off the coast and stakes his own claim on the islands, the stage is set for a bloody showdown.

To save the remnants of humanity (and himself), Captain Martigan must defeat all three of his ruthless new foes and brave the gruesome horrors of...THE GHOUL ARCHIPELAGO.

Interview

1. Let’s start off getting to know you – what is something about you that very few people know or suspect?

I am an unabashed slave to the needle. I have nine tattoos after thirteen studio sessions (confusing hint: only one was a cover-up.) Most people who meet me think either, “Oh, he’s a marshmallow,” (in personal situations) or, “Oh, he’s a stick-in-the-mud,” (in professional.) I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone that wasn’t shocked by all my ink.

2. Please tell us a little bit about The Ghoul Archipelago in your own words but with a Twitter twist – 140 characters or less.

Oh, fun. Dammit, I just wasted 8 characters. Now it’s 43! OK, it’s about smugglers trying to save zombocalypse survivors from pirates and...

3. What makes The Ghoul Archipelago stand apart from other zombie apocalypse type books?