Boneshaker by Cherie Priest

Synopsis From Back Cover:

In the early days of the Civil War, rumors of gold in the frozen Klondike brought hordes of newcomers to the Pacific Northwest. Anxious to compete, Russian prospectors commissioned inventor Leviticus Blue to create a great machine that could mine through Alaska’s ice. Thus was Dr. Blue’s Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine born.

But on its first test run the Boneshaker went terribly awry, destroying several blocks of downtown Seattle and unearthing a subterranean vein of blight gas that turned anyone who breathed it into the living dead.

Now it is sixteen years later, and a wall has been built to enclose the devastated and toxic city. Just beyond it lives Blue’s widow, Briar Wilkes. Life is hard with a ruined reputation and a teenage boy to support, but she and Ezekiel are managing. Until Ezekiel undertakes a secret crusade to rewrite history.

His quest will take him under the wall and into a city teeming with ravenous undead, air pirates, criminal overlords, and heavily armed refugees. And only Briar can bring him out alive.
 
Fantastic.  Amazing.  Brilliant.  Spectacular.  Thrilling.  I could go on and on but I think too many adjectives gets annoying after a while.  This was only my third foray into steam punk and I loved it even more than my first time.  It's rather like sex that way, it's gets better as you gain experience.
 
Boneshaker is a brilliantly told story of what happens when family secrets start to eat away to the point they have to come out.  The fact that these secrets will shake Briar and her son to the core and force them to deal with zombies, mad scientists, and air pirates while juggling the truth just made it that much better. 
 
The action is intense and once it gets started it never really slows down.  I can't recall one moment in the book that I found to be boring or dragging.  Thankfully though the action never got in the way of the storytelling.  The author did an amazing job of meshing the action with the journey itself and by the end, both Briar and her son were able to reach a point in their lives where they were able to deal with the past and make a new life for themselves in the future.
 
I'm slowly getting sucked into the steam punk world and I can't wait for the next experience.

Winner of Never Wave Goodbye by Doug Magee

It's time to annouce the winner of Never Wave Goodbye by Doug Magee.

Congrats to Beverly!

She has 48 hours to email me her address so I can forward to the publicist or a new winner will be picked.

Guest Post Over At The Christmas Spirit

Please head on over to Michelle's The Christmas Spirit to read a guest post I wrote about one of my favorite Christmas movies, "Christmas In Connecticut".

Favorite Fictional Character --- Willow Ufgood

When it comes to big heroes in small packages I will take Willow Ufgood over Frodo Baggins every time.  For those of you who don't know who he is, shame on you, but that's what this post will be all about. 

Willow a Nelwyn farmer, husband, and father who has dreams of being a great sorcerer.  The only problem for him, is that he's scared.  He's scared to fail and that fear keeps him from achieving his dreams and puts him in danger of losing his family farm.  So what is a scared Nelwyn to do when his children find a Daikini (human) baby one the the river bank?  His first reaction is to push the baby back in and let her float down the river to cause someone else problems.  However fate, and his wife, step in and changes the course of his life forever.

That little baby is actually Elora Danan, the girl of the prophecy who is destined to defeat the evil Queen Bavmorda and when Bavmorda's forces arrive in the village looking for the baby, Willow is forced to flee the village and give Elora to the first adult Daikini he sees.  Lucky for him that Daikini is Madmartigan, who agrees to take the baby in exchange for letting him out of a cage.  Not so lucky for him, two brownies steal the baby from Madmartigan which forces Willow to hunt for the baby once again. 

His journey to protect Elora Danan is one filled with wonder and new friends who help him along his way.  But more than that, his journey is one of self discovery and coming into his own.  By facing his fears head on, Willow is able to save the day, but more importantly he finds the courage to be himself and go for his dreams.  When he returns to his village, he comes as a new man.  A man who is able to hold his head up high, provide for his family, and not be scared of failure ever again.

Mailbox Monday for 7/26/10

Mailbox Monday is a weekly meme hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page

I received a hardcover of The Inheritance by Simon Tolkien but I'm not sure why.  I don't know if it was for a review, a win, or just unsolicited.  Either way I'm going to treat it as a review book.

I received a trade paperbacks of Presidential Risk by Michael Bronte and Homecoming by Jason Garrett for review from Yorkshire Publishing.

I received a trade paperback of A Demon Inside by Rick R. Reed from the author for review.

On my trip to Barnes & Noble I bought bargain hardcovers of Journey To The Center of The Earth and Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea both by Jules Verne.  They were great deals at $1.79 each though the covers I have are not the ones in the pictures.  I went in to pick up my order of two Perry Mason books.  I got The Case Of The Horrified Heirs in trade paperback and The Case Of The One-Eyed Witness in paperback, both by Erle Stanley Gardner.

On A Pale Horse by Piers Anthony

Synopsis From Back Cover:

Shooting Death was a mistake, as Zane soon discovered.  For the man who killed the Incarnation of Death, was immediately forced to assume the vacant position!  Thereafter, he must speed over the world, riding his pale horse, and ending the lives of others.

Zane was forced to accept his unwelcome task, despite the rules that seemed woefully unfair.  But then he found himself being drawn into an evil plot of Satan.  Already the Prince of Evil was forging a trap in which Zane must act to destroy Luna, the woman he loved.

He could see only one possible way to defeat the Father of Lies.  It was unthinkable - but he had no other solution!

This is a reread for me actually, I can't even remember how many times I have read this book or the series it's a part of.  I couldn't even tell you when the first time I read it was.  What I can tell you is that this is a wonderful start to the Incarnations of Immortality series, written by the brilliant Piers Anthony.

The series takes place in a world where science and magic work side by side with each other.  You can take a trip in a state of the art flying car or on a flying carpet.  You can buy a gem to find wealth or love and you better watch out for the dragons as well.  Where this series really sets itself apart though is that basic concepts of Death, Time, Fate, War, Nature, Good, Evil, and Night are actually offices held by individuals until circumstances takes them out of the job.  Death, which this book explores is held by someone who has to kill the previous office holder, who then becomes Thanatos, the living embodiment of Death.

Zane is a down and out young man with no real prospects ahead of him, he is guilty of a past sin that is weakening him until he is no longer able to live with himself.  On the verge of killing himself, he sees Death walk in and instead of shooting himself, he shoots Death.  From there on out his life will never be the same again.  He has to fight Satan, who is a great salesman, for the life of the woman he loves.  The showdown forces Death to go on strike and only wits and clear thinking allows Zane to come out on top.

This is a brilliant book in an even better series and I'm looking forward to rereading the rest of the series soon.

Favorite Fictional Character --- Sue Ellen Crandell

What's a 17 year old girl to do when her mother leaves the country for the Summer leaving a iron fisted babysitter in charge of her and her 3 younger siblings?  Even if she can figure that out, how is she supposed to cope when the babysitter drops dead?

Well if she is Sue Ellen Crandell, she stuffs the body in the trunk of a car and drops it off at the morgue, then she tries to have fun only to discover that being the one in charge isn't all fun and games after all.

When the food runs low and the cash disappears Sue Ellen is forced to get a job to make ends meet.  After a failed attempt at fast food, she bluffs her way into a executive assistant position with a uniform supply company.  Using her wits and a lot of luck Sue Ellen quickly becomes an asset to the company and even ends up coming up with the brilliant idea that will save the company.

During that Summer, Sue Ellen fell in love and did a lot of growing up.  She earned the respect of her boss and got the younger kids to act as a cohesive loving family.  She whipped the family into shape and discovered herself along the way.  When the Summer starts, Sue Ellen is a little selfish and overly impulsive, only thinking of what she can get out of the Summer.  By Summer's end, she is a confident, matured young woman who is starting to figure out what to do with her life after high school.  Of course it didn't hurt that she found a cute boy to share her time with.

Sue Ellen is the perfect example of the American teenager on the brink of adulthood who finds themselves having to grow up in ways they never imagined.  The fact that she does it with a style and wit of her own makes her a character to be remembered for generations to come.