An Artificial Night

By Seanan McGuire

An October Daye Novel

Toby Daye, knight errant and half-fae PI, has always be what you might call danger-prone. She manages to get herself fairly messed up a bit too often for her friends tastes, and it shows no sings of stopping. See, the problem is that whatever she's getting shot at, stabbed for, turned into a fish because of, et cetera, is usually very important. This time is no different.
Children are disappearing: fae, changeling, and human. They disappear in the night without a trace, and all the signs point to Blind Michael. Two of Toby's best friend's children have disappeared, and another won't wake. Blind Michael takes children every century for his hunt, the fae to ride, the humans to be ridden. Now Toby must face an enemy more dangerous than any before, and time is running out. She is in the realm of childrens' games now, always fair and never kind. Kids are in danger, the Wild Hunt rides, and Toby's Fetch just showed up at her door.
How many miles to Babylon?
It's threescore miles and ten
Can I get there by candlelight?
Aye and back again.
If your feet are nimble and your steps are light
you can get there and back by the candle's light.
I know I've said this before, but I really love Toby, Seanan McGuire, and the Luidaeg. Oh, and May, but she's new to anyone who hasn't read the whole series already. May's Toby's Fetch. She's fun, even with the whole harbinger of death thing. Anyway, as always, SUCH a good book. Lyrical, funny, enthralling, and suspenseful. Toby's in as much trouble as usual, and as usual she's letting her hero complex do the thinking. Such an amusing idiot, that girl is. Gives her friends too many heart attacks for their comfort, but that just makes it more entertaining. LOVE IT! I need to go reread it now. Bye!

Awesome Word (Or Phrase) of the Unspecified Random Time Period

Effervescent: adjective: Effervescent means sparkly, fizzy, or bubbly, and can be applied to either a liquid or a person. This seems to me one of those words that sounds like what it means, whats the term I'm thinking of... ah yes, a homophone*.  Effervescent is just a sparkly word. "Layla's effervescent personality lit up a room." mmm.... I really do like this word.

*No, wait, that's wrong. I can't believe I had that up for three weeks without noticing that. The word I was looking for was onomatopoeic. Effervescent is onomatopoeic, not a homophone. Grrr. Stupid confusing English language.

Discount Armageddon

By Seanan McGuire
Book One of the InCryptids series


Verity Price isn't your average girl. Nor is she your average monster hunter. Her job is to, rather than exterminate the monsters, study them, protect them, and when necessary keep them from hurting humans. She is a Price girl, and cryptozoology is the family business.
At this point Very is living in New York for a year, trying to prove that ballroom dancing is a viable career option and keeping track of the city's cryptids. Unfortunately, it's never that simple.
Now local cryptids are vanishing, there are lizard men in the sewers, and there are rumors of a dragon sleeping underneath Manhattan. And to top it all off, there is the arrogant, aggravating Covenant operative Dominic De Luca poking about and trying to kill any cryptid he come across, the brainwashed idiot. For the sake of a token attempt at brevity, let's not even get into her boss, the religious mice, her telepathic, math geek, cryptid cousin Sarah, the snake cult trying to wake the dragon, or the attractiveness of the aforementioned brainwashed idiot.
Well, I am certainly glad I picked this book up. The next Toby Daye book doesn't come out until fall, and I've read everything else written by Seanan McGuire several times. Discount Armageddon, along with providing me with a much-needed new book, has hooked me on yet another series. I mean, really, the book is fantastic! Well written, hysterically funny, addictive plot-line and characters, and with fascinating new critters I'd never heard of! Just what I expect from such a good author. As always, loved it, need the next one! Which isn't out yet. Grr...

Awesome Word (Or Phrase) of the Unspecified Random Time Period

Autocratic: Adjective: resembling or pertaining to an autocrat. also known as being high and mighty, tyrannical, despotic, and/or domineering. Very old or very powerful vampires tend to be very autocratic, for some reason. I think it's something about knowing you could have everyone in the room killed--or kill them yourself. I find their bewilderment when the hero or heroine of the piece shows up and doesn't do whatever they say ever so entertaining. Curran from Magic Bites is somewhat autocratic, I believe.

Catch-22

By Joseph Heller


People are trying to kill Yossarian. He knows this is true because every time he goes up in the air to drop bombs, people he doesn't know shoot at him with cannons. He wants nothing more than to be out of the war, but that is looking increasingly impossible. Technically he only has to fly a certain number of missions, then he can go home. Unfortunately, Colonel Cathcart keeps raising the number of missions he has to fly. He could also, theoretically, be excused on grounds of insanity. Catch 22, however, states that wanting to fly dangerous missions is insane, and not wanting to is sane. Therefore, if he applies to get out, he is sane, and so has to keep flying missions. This is war in the twentieth century though the prism of sanity. Or insanity, if you prefer.
This book is really quite entertaining. Wierd as all get out, but entertaining. I wouldn't call it funny in the same way that, say, Terry Pratchett is funny. It's more just the sheer weirdness of the book and the insanity of the characters that gives it its unique character. Every single character, I swear, is utterly, completely insane. I know I keep using this word, but there is really no way to describe this book than brilliant, weird, genius. There is a movie, which I haven't seen, so I don't know if it's any good. I am a bit apprehensive, because I'm not sure Catch-22 would translate well. Really an extremely good book. It's too odd a book for me to gush on like I usually do, but it is fantastic nonetheless.

Awesome Word (Or Phrase) of the Unspecified Random Time Period

Defenestration: Verb: To throw a person or object out of a window. For instance, "Oh, good! Marvin has defenestrated the villain!"

Beautiful City of the Dead

By Leander Watts

"It begins with fire"
Zee is a quiet, odd girl with a notebook full of band names and song lyrics, a fascination with the bizarre, and a bass guitar. Relly is a strange, thin kid with a band, a burning, and the peculiar, extraordinary truth. When Zee joins Scorpio Bone, things begin to come together. Relly's band plays Ghost Metal, so loud it almost crushes your skull, but inside the sheer noise is silence, singing. And with Zee, they are no longer ordinary, outcasts, less. They are more, they are magic: Teenage heavy metal gods in a battle for survival and success.
"It takes four and no more.
It takes four to win the war."
An orchestral phantasm of screaming midnight storms and the utter silence of gravestone poetry, Beautiful City of the Dead is an absolutely stunning book. Not a very long book, but the sheer poetry of it really packs a punch. Lovely, absolutely lovely. Unusual, original, and pure magic.

Awesome Word (Or Phrase) of the Unspecified Random Time Period

Zenzizenzizenzic: Noun: An obsolete term for the 8th power of a number, or the square of a square squared. The zenzizenzizenzic of 2, for instance, is 16. Now obsolete except as a curiosity, zenzizenzizenzic also has the most z's of any word in the Oxford English Dictionary. I ran across this word in the third Emily the Strange book, Dark Times, and, having verified that it is really a word, am sharing it with you. Enjoy!

A Local Habitation

By Seanan McGuire
An October Daye Novel


After a shattering fifteen years, mostly spent as a fish, Toby's life is slowly staring to reassemble itself--she's got a PI licence in the mortal world, friends , and most importantly, she is not dead. However, that last one may change, and quickly. When her liege lord Sylvester Torquill, Duke of Shadowed Hills sends her to check up on his niece, it wasn't supposed to be overly dangerous. January O'Leary is the countess of Tamed Lightening in Fremont, and hasn't been in touch with Sylvester for a while, which is unusual. Sylvester wants Toby to check on her and make sure its all right. It isn't supposed to take more than a few days, and she is to take Quentin, the Daoine Sidhe page from Shadowed Hills, so he can get some experience. However, as we all know, nothing is that simple with Toby
When Toby gets there she finds an odd place, even by Faerie standards. She also finds blocked phones, dead Faeries, and lots of secrets. The most worrying thing, even besides the killer stalking Tamed Lightening, is that when the victims die, the night haunts don't take the bodies and switch them with human-seeming replacements. (For why this is so bad, check the Glossary for a description of the night haunts and their habits.) Now Toby must find the killer, hopefully before whoever or whatever it is kills her, Quentin, Connor, Tybalt or anyone else.
Well, once again, I loved, absolutely loved this book. I always appreciate novel forms of faeries and critters, and A Local Habitation did not disappoint.  I had never heard of some of these creatures and concepts before. Seanan McGuire has created a wonderful sequel to Rosemary and Rue, with all of its predecessor's dark charm and gripping writing. I have read this entire series so far and am waiting with bated breath for the next one. If you don't like murder mysteries or dark worlds, this book may not be for you. However, if you don't mind a little violence, dark humor, and some creepy characters, this series can be funny, enthralling, and absolutely addictive.

Awesome Word (Or Phrase) of the Unspecified Random Time Period

A Base Canard: Noun: An unfounded or baseless rumour or story, generally derogatory in nature. For instance: "A vampire? Me? That is but a base canard!" Not a phrase you run into very often, but it is fun, isnt it? *smug*