Showing posts with label Robert McCammon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Robert McCammon. Show all posts

Sunday, March 25, 2018

Book Review | Boy's Life by Robert McCammon

This year has been about reading a lot of really great books, but not so much about reviewing them. I’ve always had trouble reviewing McCammon, though. It’s impossible to match my words to my emotions when it comes to his work. That being said, I’m going to try to get a portion of my thoughts out about Boy’s Life bullet point style:
  • First of all, thanks to Lilyn (Sci-Fi & Scary) and Clare Favara for buddy reading Boy’s Life with me. Boy’s Life is my favorite book of all time, and I absolutely loved hearing their thoughts over the course of the book. This was my third time to read Boy’s Life, but it had been at least 10 years since my last read so there was plenty for me to discover as well.
  • One of the things I have loved most about Robert McCammon releasing The Listener this year has been seeing people discover McCammon for the very first time. Readers naturally flock to Boy’s Life after discovering McCammon, and it has been a joy watching people discover a new favorite author, a new favorite book, and in some cases their favorite book of all time.
  • Boy’s Life is the coming of age story of 11 year old Cory Mackenson.
Zephyr, Alabama, is an idyllic hometown for eleven-year-old Cory Mackenson -- a place where monsters swim the river deep and friends are forever. Then, one cold spring morning, Cory and his father witness a car plunge into a lake -- and a desperate rescue attempt brings his father face-to-face with a terrible, haunting vision of death. As Cory struggles to understand his father's pain, his eyes are slowly opened to the forces of good and evil that surround him. From an ancient mystic who can hear the dead and bewitch the living, to a violent clan of moonshiners, Cory must confront the secrets that hide in the shadows of his hometown -- for his father's sanity and his own life hang in the balance....
  • Boy’s Life is often labeled as a horror novel, but the supernatural elements in Boy’s Life are a fraction of a much larger book. If any label is appropriate for Boy’s Life, it’s simply “American Literature”.
  • I'm not one to write in my books, but I think the next time I read Boy’s Life, I'm going to get a copy that I can start highlighting and writing in. There are so many beautiful quotes to take from this book, and each time I have read it, I have gotten something different out of it.
  • I had forgotten the main character Cory was telling the story of Boy’s Life just before his fortieth birthday. I’m a little over a month away from my fortieth, and this was the perfect time in my life to be reading this book again.

    In me are the memories of a boy's life, spent in that realm of enchantments. I remember. These are the things I want to tell you....
  • During my first two reads of Boy’s Life, I really connected to the main character Cory and his coming-of-age story. This read, however, I found myself really connecting to Cory's dad. One of the best things about Boy’s Life is Cory's parents. In most books, the parents are unavailable, uninvolved in a neglectful way, or if they are around, they are just horrible parents. That's not what the reader gets in Boy’s Life. The reader is actually treated to a realistic and loving family relationship. Cory's parents are flawed as any parents are, but they are also available and loving parents. This is unique to most of the books that I’ve read, and one of the many reasons I love Boy’s Life.

    “My father could throw up a fistful of dice to make a decision, but my mother had an agony for every hour. I guess they balanced, as two people who love each other should.”
  • If I had to pick one favorite thing about Boy’s Life, it would be the way McCammon captured the magic of childhood.

    We are born with whirlwinds, forest fires, and comets inside us. We are born able to sing to birds and read the clouds and see our destiny in grains of sand.
  • Everything in Boy’s Life is so well done. Even the setting of Zephyr and the vehicles have their own character arcs.
  • I hope when I'm in the nursing home and nearing my final days, I'm surrounded by people who love me and know me well enough to play me the audio of Boy’s Life or to sit at my bedside and read it to me out loud. If I have to leave this world in the middle of a book, let it be Boy’s Life.

    “They may look grown-up,” she continued, “but it’s a disguise. It’s just the clay of time.”

10/10: Awesome Read

Jennifer

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Friday, May 4, 2012

Robert McCammon | Updates and Free Stories

I'm really excited about the month of May. Mostly because it's the month in my The Great McCammon Read that I get to read Boy's Life again. Speaking of Boy's Life, I have a few related bits of news I'd love to share with you guys. First, though, I'm going to point out where you can score some free McCammon.

Free Short Stories

Did you know May is National Short Story Month? As luck would have it, Robert McCammon's website has just been updated with a ton of new (to the site) short stories. You can check those out here.

Robert McCammon Group on Goodreads

Lou Pendergrast, a Goodreads friend of mine and fellow blogger at More 2 Read, started a Robert McCammon group over at Goodreads. If my McCammon worship here at Book Den isn't enough for you, you will find plenty there as well. I'd love for you to join us. We will be reading a McCammon book each month, and guess which book was chosen for May...? Boy's Life. I get to read it for my The Great McCammon Read and the group read!

Cover Love

Earlier this week I was perusing McCammon's website, and I got caught up on the cover gallery page for Boy's Life. There are 58 images depicting covers from all over the world! I love the idea that people all over the world cherish this book as much as I do.



Then the folks at Open Road Media who are so awesome they can read minds (I can't make this up) sent me a graphic they created featuring the foreign covers of Swan Song throughout the years.


If you read my review of Swan Song in March, you know how much I love this epic book. If you haven't read my review, well... go read it! And then read Swan Song.

The Providence Rider

The latest book in McCammon's Matthew Corbett series will be released later this month, but I just found out the ebook was released early and is available now! I have a review copy the awesome folks at Subterranean Press sent me so expect a review on that coming soon.

Jealousy, Death, and More Jealousy 

Pam over at Midnyte Reader rode in a car with Robert McCammon last week. I died when I heard the story. Just died. But all of the jealously coursing through my veins brought me back to life. She has all of the details of the World Horror Convention including lots of great pics of her and McCammon posted on her blog.

Let Me Hear From You
 
Are you new to McCammon's works? If you are a fan, do you have a favorite? If you check out any of his free stories, be sure to let me know.

Jennifer

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Thursday, March 8, 2012

Book Review | Swan Song by Robert McCammon

Swan Song is an epic post-apocalyptic novel by Robert McCammon.

Book Description

In a wasteland born of rage and fear, populated by monstrous creatures and marauding armies, earth's last survivors have been drawn into the final battle between good and evil, that will decide the fate of humanity: Sister, who discovers a strange and transformative glass artifact in the destroyed Manhattan streets; Joshua Hutchins, the pro wrestler who takes refuge from the nuclear fallout at a Nebraska gas station; and Swan, a young girl possessing special powers, who travels alongside Josh to a Missouri town where healing and recovery can begin with Swan's gifts. But the ancient force behind earth's devastation is scouring the walking wounded for recruits for its relentless army, beginning with Swan herself.

Here's the bottom line: Swan Song is one of my favorite books of all time. It's one of the books I was most looking forward to rereading during my The Great McCammon Read. It stills impacts me every bit as much as the first time I read it.

Swan Song is very dark, and it's scary, but it's also one of the most beautiful and hopeful books I have ever read.

Weighing in at 956 pages, it's a huge story in every sense of the word. There are characters you will hate and fear as well as characters you will fall in love with and care about long after you've finished reading. There is magic, evil, goodness, hope, ruin, and beauty throughout the pages of Swan Song.

If you are a fan of post-apocalyptic fiction, Swan Song is an absolute must read. I give it my highest recommendation.

10/10: Awesome

Jennifer

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Monday, January 2, 2012

Book Review: Mystery Walk by Robert McCammon

Mystery Walk is another epic read from Robert McCammon.

Book Description
One talks to the dead. The other heals the living. Both must make the ...Mystery Walk

From deep within the empty house of a murdered family, Billy Creekmore hears his name whispered... and is drawn inside. At a revival meeting in Alabama, Wayne Falconer demonstrates his miraculous healing powers... while demons feast and grow in his soul. On separate journeys through the Deep South to Chicago, from a world of innocence to a world of evil, greed and lust, the two young men discover their manhood - and fuel a deadly rivalry. On a scorched slab of desert they will meet in fear and unite their extraordinary powers against a raging, unshackled spirit - the walking, hungry corpse of the Shape Changer. - Goodreads

I have a strong desire to read The Five again. I can't help but wonder if the shapeshifter from Mystery Walk is the same evil that is in The Five.

Mystery Walk has everything I love in a story: coming of age characters, good vs. evil, ghosts, suspense, scares... Like all of McCammon's works, Mystery Walk is a huge story I was able to lose myself in.

If you are a fan of McCammon and you haven't read Mystery Walk, you need to read it. If you aren't familiar with McCammon but enjoy books like Justin Cronin's The Passage, you would also enjoy Mystery Walk.

9/10: Highly Recommended

The Great McCammon Read

If you'd like to learn more about McCammon's books, you can find all the details of The Great McCammon Read here. This month I'll be reading and reviewing Usher's Passing if you'd like to join me!

Jennifer

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Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Book Review: The Five by Robert McCammon

The Five is the latest novel from Robert McCammon.

Book Description
Subterranean Press is proud to present Robert McCammon's first contemporary novel in nearly two decades, a tale of the hunt and unlikely survival, of the life and soul, set against a supernatural backbeat. Robert McCammon, author of the popular Matthew Corbett historical thrillers (Speaks the Nightbird, Mister Slaughter), now gives us something new and completely unexpected: The Five, a contemporary novel as vivid, timely, and compelling as anything he has written to date.

The Five tells the story of an eponymous rock band struggling to survive on the margins of the music business. As they move through the American Southwest on what might be their final tour together, the band members come to the attention of a damaged Iraq war veteran, and their lives are changed forever.

The narrative that follows is a riveting account of violence, terror, and pursuit set against a credible, immensely detailed rock and roll backdrop. It is also a moving meditation on loyalty and friendship, on the nature and importance of families those we are born into and those we create for ourselves and on the redemptive power of the creative spirit. Written with wit, elegance, and passionate conviction, The Five lays claim to new imaginative territory, and reaffirms McCammon's position as one of the finest, most unpredictable storytellers of our time.

I'm kicking off the first official review in The Great McCammon Read with  Robert McCammon's The Five. I've been holding on to The Five since its release in May waiting for the weather to turn cooler, the nights to grow longer, and to get the general "the timing is right" feel. (I clearly have reader issues.)

One thing I love about McCammon is how different each of his works are from one another. It feels like it's always about the story and not about being pidgeonholed into a genre. As usual, I can't pidgeonhole this one. It's contemporary, it's thriller, it's horror. More importantly, it's a really great story.

Despite how unpredictable and intense The Five is, McCammon managed to create this intimate, gradual pacing throughout the entire novel. I was invested in the band, invested in the story, and I felt like I was invested in the fate of the world.

The Five is a story of good versus evil, light versus dark, family, sacrifice, and the power of music.

The end of The Five evoked a lot of emotion in me which was awesome. I don't normally cry in a book (unless a dog dies!), but the end was a wonderful personification of The Five's story and a testament to McCammon's epic storytelling.

I'd recommend McCammon to anyone, but I'm especially recommending The Five to those who have a heart for music.

8/10: Great Read

The Great McCammon Read

Plan on reading The Five? Let me know if you post/have posted a McCammon review somewhere so I can point folks to it. You can find all the details of The Great McCammon Read here. Next month I'll be reading and reviewing Mystery Walk if you'd like to join me!

Jennifer

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Monday, November 28, 2011

Cyber Monday (+ Giveaway!): Robert McCammon

If you've been wanting to check out Robert McCammon, I have great news for you! Open Road Media is running a Cyber Monday sale on their ebooks today making them all just $2.99. This includes all nine titles from Robert McCammon. That's a steal.

If you are still unsure, fill out the form at the bottom with the title you'd like to win, and I'll pick a random winner tonight and gift it to one winner (Kindle version only). You don't have to have a Kindle to read it, just a Kindle app on your PC, phone, tablet, etc. (Amazon is the only store that allows "gifting"...)

Be sure to check out all the details on my The Great McCammon Read in case you want to join in with your selection! (And tune in tomorrow for my review of McCammon's The Five!)

The Wolf's Hour

On the eve of D-Day, a British secret agent with unique powers goes behind Nazi lines

Michael Gallatin is a British spy with a peculiar talent: the ability to transform himself into a wolf. Although his work in North Africa helped the Allies win the continent in the early days of World War II, he quit the service when a German spy shot his lover in her bed. Now, three years later, the army asks him to end his retirement and parachute into occupied Paris. A mysterious German plan called the Iron Fist threatens the D-Day invasion, and the Nazi in charge is the spy who betrayed Michael’s lover. The werewolf goes to France for king and country, hoping for a chance at bloody vengeance.



Mine

A mother fights to rescue her newborn from a six-foot-tall madwoman

No one knows Mary Terrell’s real name. She killed a man during the climax of the Summer of Love, and for two decades she has changed her name and location regularly, always keeping watch over her shoulder for the FBI. She has three passions: LSD, firearms, and children. She visits toy stores a few times a week, picking out a baby doll to take home and treat as a child. The new family always starts out happy, but when the baby refuses to eat, Mary gets angry. Murdered dolls fill her closet, and the woman who calls herself Mary Terror is tired of children made of plastic.

Laura Clayborne’s marriage gives her little joy, but she can’t wait for her son to come into the world. But if Mary Terror has her way, it won’t be long before he leaves it again.



Blue World

A novella and twelve stories from a master of supernatural horror

Father John has lived his whole life without knowing a woman’s touch. Hard at first, his self-denial grew easier over time, as he learned to master his urges with a regimen of prayer, cold showers, and jigsaw puzzles. That changed the day that Debra Rocks entered his confessional. A rough-talking adult film actress, she has come to ask him to pray for a murdered costar. Her cinnamon perfume infects Father John, and after she departs he becomes obsessed. Around the corner from his church is a neon-lit alley of sin. He goes there hoping to save her life before he damns himself.

That is “Blue World,” the novella that anchors this collection of chilling stories by Robert R. McCammon. Although monsters, demons, and murderers fill these pages, in McCammon’s world the most terrifying landscape of all is the barren wasteland of a lost man’s soul.



Swan Song

McCammon’s epic bestselling novel about a girl psychic struggling to survive in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust

Something flashes in nine-year-old Swan’s brain, telling her that trouble is coming. Maybe it’s her mother, fed up with her current boyfriend and ready to abandon their dismal trailer park and seek a new home. But something far worse is on the horizon. Death falls from the sky—nuclear bombs which annihilate American civilization. Though Swan survives the blast, this young psychic’s war is just beginning.

As the survivors try to make new lives in the wasteland, an evil army forms, intent on murdering all those tainted with the diseases brought by fallout. When Swan finds a mysterious amulet that could hold the key to humankind’s salvation, she draws the attention of a man more dangerous than any nuclear bomb. To rescue mankind, this little girl will have to grow up fast.



Mystery Walk

Two young psychics do battle with an ancient evil

Billy Creekmore was born to be a psychic. His mother, a Choctaw Indian schooled in her tribe’s ancient mysticism, understood that the barrier between life and death is permeable. She knew how to cross it, and used that knowledge to help the dead rest easier. She passed that power on to her son, and he has spent his whole life learning how to communicate with the dead to prevent them from meddling with the living.

Though his powers are the same, Wayne Falconer’s background could not be more different. The son of a prominent preacher, he would be disowned if his father learned he was using supernatural powers in service of the church. Though they don’t know each other, Billy and Wayne share a recurring dream—and a common enemy. When a nightmarish monster descends on their community in Alabama, mankind’s fate will rest in their hands.



Stinger

A UFO crash sends a small Texas town into uproar

The sun rises on Inferno and Bordertown: patches of civilization carved out of the tough Texas earth, watching each other and waiting to see which dies first. The copper mine is finished, and both towns—one for the whites and one for the Mexicans—are wasting away. Now a pair of mysterious visitors is about to make them shrink faster.

The black ball lands first. A small sphere, snapped off of an alien ship as it plummets through the atmosphere, it explodes onto Jessie Hammond’s truck. When Jessie’s daughter picks it up, the object possesses the young girl’s body and begins trying to communicate. As Jessie tries to rescue her daughter, something far more deadly sets down in the desert. An interstellar war has come to Texas, and Inferno is going to burn.



Gone South

A moment of madness forces a Vietnam veteran to run for his life

Two decades after he finished serving his country in the jungles of Southeast Asia, Dan Lambert still pays the price. As he hustles for construction work in the heat of a brutal Louisiana summer, Dan tries to ignore the pounding in his head—a constant reminder of the Agent Orange–caused leukemia which will soon end his life. And now the bank wants to repossess his truck. His attempt to reason with the loan officer does not get him far. Dan loses himself in rage, and for a moment is back in the jungle again. When he comes out of his bloodlust, he has shot the banker through the chest. There is nothing to do but run.

On his trail are two peculiar bounty hunters: a onetime Siamese twin and a heavyset Elvis impersonator. To save his own life, Dan is going to have to remember why it was worth living in the first place.



Boy's Life

In Zephyr, Alabama, a bizarre murder is only the beginning

Small town boys see weird sights, and Zephyr has provided Cory Jay Mackenson with his fair share of oddities. He knows the bootleggers who lurk in the dark places outside of town. On moonless nights, he’s heard spirits congregate in the churchyard to reminisce about the good old days. He’s seen rain that flooded Main Street and left it crawling with snakes. Cory knows magic, and relishes it as only a young boy can.

One frosty winter morning, he and his father watch a car jump the curb and sail into the fathomless town lake. His father dives into the icy water to rescue the driver, and finds a naked corpse handcuffed to the wheel. This chilling sight is only the start of the strangest period of Cory’s life, when the magic of his town will transform him into a man.



Usher's Passing

A struggling author must confront the dreadful secrets of his famous family’s past

Two men argue in the low light of one of nineteenth-century New York’s vilest bars. One is an aristocrat, clearly slumming, while the other, in appearance no better than the gutter-trash around him, is the finest author of his age. The wealthy man is Hudson Usher, come to berate Edgar Allen Poe for using Usher’s family history as fodder for his most famous story. The house of Usher has not fallen, Hudson boasts. It will endure into the centuries.

One hundred and fifty years later, the Usher line persists. The newest heir is Rix Usher, a hack horror writer whose ailing father has just called him back to the family’s North Carolina estate. To become the new Usher patriarch, Rix must confront a Gothic mystery more twisted than anything even Poe could have imagined.



Update: This contest is now closed. Congratulations Gidge! Your book has been "gifted". I hope you enjoy it!

Jennifer

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Tuesday, November 1, 2011

The Great McCammon Read: The Details


It's here! Beginning this month I am planning to read/reread Robert McCammon's works.

My "The Great McCammon Read" will follow this one book a month schedule:
  • The Five
  • Mystery Walk
  • Usher's Passing
  • Swan Song
  • Stinger
  • The Wolf's Hour
  • Blue World
  • Mine
  • Boy's Life
  • Gone South
  • Speaks the Nightbird
  • The Queen of Bedlam
  • Mister Slaughter
  • The Providence Rider
  • Baal
  • Bethany's Sin
  • The Night Boat
  • They Thirst
  • I Travel by Night



I know that's a pretty huge schedule. I'm going to start with The Five this month because that is McCammon's latest release, and I have been waiting for fall to read it. Then I am going to go back through McCammon's backlist starting at the fifth book he published for a couple of reasons, but most notably because the ebooks will be available from Open Road Media if anyone wants to check them out. The last four books in my list are McCammon's first four published novels, and slated for future release by Subterranean Press.

There are some exciting things in the works in regards to The Great McCammon Read. You know, other than getting to revisit a few of my favorite stories ever. If at anyone wants to join in at any level during the course of The Great McCammon Read, please jump in or let me know! If you review (or have reviewed) a McCammon book (anywhere) let me know, and I'll be sure to showcase it no matter what month. It doesn't have to follow my schedule. If you have a favorite McCammon and you want to do something official during the month it is scheduled - on your own blog or on Book Den - let me know!

Jennifer

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Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Book News: Robert McCammon Ebooks

Open Road Media released nine (9!) of McCammon's books as ebooks yesterday. If you haven't read Robert McCammon or you simply haven't read them all, I can't recommend enough that you do so.



These are the Open House Media ebooks now available at Amazon, BN, Sony, Kobo, etc. These titles are also supposed to be available through Overdrive.com. I'm hoping that means you will be able to check them out through your local library, but I don't see them on there yet.

And yes, I'm a bit shocked by the covers. Mostly because they don't match the price tag, but they also don't do the stories any justice. These are pretty epic must reads.

The Wolf's Hour

On the eve of D-Day, a British secret agent with unique powers goes behind Nazi lines

Michael Gallatin is a British spy with a peculiar talent: the ability to transform himself into a wolf. Although his work in North Africa helped the Allies win the continent in the early days of World War II, he quit the service when a German spy shot his lover in her bed. Now, three years later, the army asks him to end his retirement and parachute into occupied Paris. A mysterious German plan called the Iron Fist threatens the D-Day invasion, and the Nazi in charge is the spy who betrayed Michael’s lover. The werewolf goes to France for king and country, hoping for a chance at bloody vengeance.



Mine

A mother fights to rescue her newborn from a six-foot-tall madwoman

No one knows Mary Terrell’s real name. She killed a man during the climax of the Summer of Love, and for two decades she has changed her name and location regularly, always keeping watch over her shoulder for the FBI. She has three passions: LSD, firearms, and children. She visits toy stores a few times a week, picking out a baby doll to take home and treat as a child. The new family always starts out happy, but when the baby refuses to eat, Mary gets angry. Murdered dolls fill her closet, and the woman who calls herself Mary Terror is tired of children made of plastic.

Laura Clayborne’s marriage gives her little joy, but she can’t wait for her son to come into the world. But if Mary Terror has her way, it won’t be long before he leaves it again.



Blue World

A novella and twelve stories from a master of supernatural horror

Father John has lived his whole life without knowing a woman’s touch. Hard at first, his self-denial grew easier over time, as he learned to master his urges with a regimen of prayer, cold showers, and jigsaw puzzles. That changed the day that Debra Rocks entered his confessional. A rough-talking adult film actress, she has come to ask him to pray for a murdered costar. Her cinnamon perfume infects Father John, and after she departs he becomes obsessed. Around the corner from his church is a neon-lit alley of sin. He goes there hoping to save her life before he damns himself.

That is “Blue World,” the novella that anchors this collection of chilling stories by Robert R. McCammon. Although monsters, demons, and murderers fill these pages, in McCammon’s world the most terrifying landscape of all is the barren wasteland of a lost man’s soul.



Swan Song

McCammon’s epic bestselling novel about a girl psychic struggling to survive in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust

Something flashes in nine-year-old Swan’s brain, telling her that trouble is coming. Maybe it’s her mother, fed up with her current boyfriend and ready to abandon their dismal trailer park and seek a new home. But something far worse is on the horizon. Death falls from the sky—nuclear bombs which annihilate American civilization. Though Swan survives the blast, this young psychic’s war is just beginning.

As the survivors try to make new lives in the wasteland, an evil army forms, intent on murdering all those tainted with the diseases brought by fallout. When Swan finds a mysterious amulet that could hold the key to humankind’s salvation, she draws the attention of a man more dangerous than any nuclear bomb. To rescue mankind, this little girl will have to grow up fast.



Mystery Walk

Two young psychics do battle with an ancient evil

Billy Creekmore was born to be a psychic. His mother, a Choctaw Indian schooled in her tribe’s ancient mysticism, understood that the barrier between life and death is permeable. She knew how to cross it, and used that knowledge to help the dead rest easier. She passed that power on to her son, and he has spent his whole life learning how to communicate with the dead to prevent them from meddling with the living.

Though his powers are the same, Wayne Falconer’s background could not be more different. The son of a prominent preacher, he would be disowned if his father learned he was using supernatural powers in service of the church. Though they don’t know each other, Billy and Wayne share a recurring dream—and a common enemy. When a nightmarish monster descends on their community in Alabama, mankind’s fate will rest in their hands.



Stinger

A UFO crash sends a small Texas town into uproar

The sun rises on Inferno and Bordertown: patches of civilization carved out of the tough Texas earth, watching each other and waiting to see which dies first. The copper mine is finished, and both towns—one for the whites and one for the Mexicans—are wasting away. Now a pair of mysterious visitors is about to make them shrink faster.

The black ball lands first. A small sphere, snapped off of an alien ship as it plummets through the atmosphere, it explodes onto Jessie Hammond’s truck. When Jessie’s daughter picks it up, the object possesses the young girl’s body and begins trying to communicate. As Jessie tries to rescue her daughter, something far more deadly sets down in the desert. An interstellar war has come to Texas, and Inferno is going to burn.



Gone South

A moment of madness forces a Vietnam veteran to run for his life

Two decades after he finished serving his country in the jungles of Southeast Asia, Dan Lambert still pays the price. As he hustles for construction work in the heat of a brutal Louisiana summer, Dan tries to ignore the pounding in his head—a constant reminder of the Agent Orange–caused leukemia which will soon end his life. And now the bank wants to repossess his truck. His attempt to reason with the loan officer does not get him far. Dan loses himself in rage, and for a moment is back in the jungle again. When he comes out of his bloodlust, he has shot the banker through the chest. There is nothing to do but run.

On his trail are two peculiar bounty hunters: a onetime Siamese twin and a heavyset Elvis impersonator. To save his own life, Dan is going to have to remember why it was worth living in the first place.



Boy's Life

In Zephyr, Alabama, a bizarre murder is only the beginning

Small town boys see weird sights, and Zephyr has provided Cory Jay Mackenson with his fair share of oddities. He knows the bootleggers who lurk in the dark places outside of town. On moonless nights, he’s heard spirits congregate in the churchyard to reminisce about the good old days. He’s seen rain that flooded Main Street and left it crawling with snakes. Cory knows magic, and relishes it as only a young boy can.

One frosty winter morning, he and his father watch a car jump the curb and sail into the fathomless town lake. His father dives into the icy water to rescue the driver, and finds a naked corpse handcuffed to the wheel. This chilling sight is only the start of the strangest period of Cory’s life, when the magic of his town will transform him into a man.



Usher's Passing

A struggling author must confront the dreadful secrets of his famous family’s past

Two men argue in the low light of one of nineteenth-century New York’s vilest bars. One is an aristocrat, clearly slumming, while the other, in appearance no better than the gutter-trash around him, is the finest author of his age. The wealthy man is Hudson Usher, come to berate Edgar Allen Poe for using Usher’s family history as fodder for his most famous story. The house of Usher has not fallen, Hudson boasts. It will endure into the centuries.

One hundred and fifty years later, the Usher line persists. The newest heir is Rix Usher, a hack horror writer whose ailing father has just called him back to the family’s North Carolina estate. To become the new Usher patriarch, Rix must confront a Gothic mystery more twisted than anything even Poe could have imagined.

Jennifer

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Monday, August 8, 2011

Review: The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs by Robert McCammon

The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs is a Michael Gallatin* novella from Robert McCammon.  *The werewolf from McCammon's The Wolf's Hour.

The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs was originally published with the recent limited edition of The Wolf's Hour.  If the limited edition is not in your possession - perhaps like me you already own an older edition of The Wolf's Hour - I have great news for you.  Subterranean Press has The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs available on their website for free.

Description

“The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs” tells of an impossible, ultimately tragic love affair set in the embattled city of Berlin during the latter stages of World War II. 

The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs is a stand alone novella.  You don't have to read The Wolf's Hour in order to enjoy The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs.

It is no surprise (to me) that I enjoyed The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs. My only regret is this intense longing for more.  I can only imagine that is Subterranean Press's evil plan in offering this novella for free.

The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs will be re-released as part of The Hunter from the Woods due out in November.  The Hunter from the Woods contains a total of six Michael Gallatin stories.

If you are a fan of McCammon or want a great (free!) Nazi Gestapo romance thriller with a touch of lycanthropy - download The Room at the Bottom of the Stairs here.

Jennifer

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Wednesday, April 6, 2011

TBR: The Five by Robert McCammon

I am extremely excited to share my "Waiting for Wednesday" selection with you.

The Five by Robert McCammon
Pub Date: May 31, 2011
Subterranean Press is proud to present Robert McCammon's first contemporary novel in nearly two decades, a tale of the hunt and unlikely survival, of the life and soul, set against a supernatural backbeat. Robert McCammon, author of the popular Matthew Corbett historical thrillers (Speaks the Nightbird, Mister Slaughter), now gives us something new and completely unexpected: The Five, a contemporary novel as vivid, timely, and compelling as anything he has written to date.

The Five tells the story of an eponymous rock band struggling to survive on the margins of the music business. As they move through the American Southwest on what might be their final tour together, the band members come to the attention of a damaged Iraq war veteran, and their lives are changed forever.

The narrative that follows is a riveting account of violence, terror, and pursuit set against a credible, immensely detailed rock and roll backdrop. It is also a moving meditation on loyalty and friendship, on the nature and importance of families those we are born into and those we create for ourselves and on the redemptive power of the creative spirit. Written with wit, elegance, and passionate conviction, The Five lays claim to new imaginative territory, and reaffirms McCammon's position as one of the finest, most unpredictable storytellers of our time.
I already have my copy pre-ordered.  Yes, yes. I. do.  Check out what Stephen King had to say about The Five:
“The Five isn't just Robert McCammon's best novel in years; it's his best novel ever. Terrifying, suspenseful, unputdownable, and full of rock and roll energy. It's also uplifting, a book you'll finish feeling better about your world, your friends, and your music. Here's one you'll beg friends to read.”

That's exactly how I feel about McCammon's Boy's Life.  I beg you - right now - read it.  I've bought every used copy of Boy's Life I've come across just so I could give it to people.  McCammon is an extraordinary writer, and I'm looking forward to (waiting for!) The Five!

This post is being shared as part of Breaking the Spine's "Waiting for" Wednesday.

Jennifer

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