This Is Not a Test-Courtney Summers

This Is Not a Test


Courtney Summers

St. Martin's Griffin, Jun 19 2012, $9.99

ISBN: 9780312656744



When her older sister Lily fled from their physically abusive father, she left her younger sibling Cortege High School junior Sloane as his only victim. With mom buried, six months since Lily betrayed her when she abandoned her, Sloane increasingly considers suicide.



Her “To be or not to be” contemplation ends when the world ends. Sloane and five other teens (Harrison, Grace, Rhys, Cary and Trace) are trapped inside the high school prison while outside zombies over run the town. The sextet easily converts the building into a fortress knowing that for now they have plenty of food and water. As they struggle to survive in an oasis surrounded by hell, power fights occur while Sloane thinks of what she will say to lily when they next meet.



This is an intriguing young adult zombie thriller that focuses on staying alive rather than on the nightmare outside the school; ergo the action is limited while how the characters behave during the crisis is the prime storyline. The six protagonists have different personalities though we meet them through Sloane’s melancholic filter or in-fighting; Harrison showcases her lens as the readers learn almost nothing about him compared to the others except in Sloane’s mind he is a weeping non. Dark with a sort of On the beach (by Nevil Shute) mentality, fans who enjoy a psychological thriller will want to read this fascinating zombie apocalypse now.



Harriet Klausner

Survivors (Morningstar Strain)-Z.A. Recht

Survivors (Morningstar Strain)


Z.A. Recht

Permuted Press/Gallery, Jun 19 2012, $15.00

ISBN: 9781451628821



First seen in Africa, global authorities tried to contain the spread of The Morningstar Strain by quarantining the continent only. The international leaders chose politics over world safety as they ignored US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases expert Anna DeMilio’s suggestion to isolate victims wherever the disease surfaced (see Plague of the Dead). Now billions are infected.



The pandemic is global with the strain turning people into raging zombies. Mankind’s only hope to avoid extinction rests with Anna who has retreated from the growing menace thanks to special agent Mason who rescued her from agent Sawyer and his Reunited States of America military rogue handlers. Sawyer’s orders are to bring the virologist to the Chairman who believes she has the antidote for the disease that is transmitted by bites. Special Forces General Sherman and his unit escort Anna and Mason to a top secret bio-hazard lab in the Omaha area so that the virologist can work on the cure. General Shannon’s friend Commander Harris tries to find them as one of his solders was bitten twice by zombies and proves to be immune to the virus. Sawyer and his army continue their search for DeMilio with no regard to collateral damage.



The third and final Morningstar Strain zombie thriller (see Thunder and Ashes) is an exciting apocalyptic tale as the disease appears to be winning partly because of avarice power mongers with no regard for anyone else. That frailty adds to the creepiness as Z.A Recht emphasizes the Survivors rather than the zombies (who are more in the background) as he makes his key cast seem real while humanity’s existence seems at its end.



Harriet Klausner

The Song of Achilles-Madeline Miller

The Song of Achilles


Madeline Miller

Ecco, Mar 6 2012, $25.99

ISBN: 9780062060617



Prince Patroclus’ father King Menoitius is unhappy with his simple wife and disappointed with his only offspring. The lad cannot compete in anything even against younger children. When he is nine years old his father takes him to court Helen the daughter of King Tyndarus of Sparta. Other royals also arrive while King Odysseus of Ithaca suggests Helens elect her mate so war can be averted. Helen selects Menelaus. Back home Clysonymus tries to bully Patroclus who pushes back killing the lad. Menoitius exiles Patrochlus to King Peleus of Phthia where he meets Prince Achilles.



They become best buddies, which angers Achilles’ mother Thetis the sea nymph. When Agamemnon calls for supporters to recapture Helen from Troy, Patroclus and Achilles join the siege. However, Achilles knows his destiny will soon begin to become the greatest warrior ever; as predicted by his mother and affirmed in a warning by his instructor Master Chiron the centaur. Patroclus plans to accompany Achilles when they begin the latter’s Odyssey.



This is not a direct rewrite of Homer's Iliad at least not until the second half of the plot. Instead the engaging storyline fills in the blanks with the focus predominantly on Achilles and Patroclus (which is not a shocker since the latter tells the tale) though all of Homer’s players are involved. In many ways Troy takes a backseat to the loving relationship of the two BFFs while clever Odysseus steals the show. He sums up love and war in ancient mythological Greece with his saying he has a wife that he has not seen in a decade and whom may be dead but if nothing else he prays he spends eternity with her in the Underworld.



Harriet Klausner

Even White Trash Zombies Get the Blues-Diana Rowland

Even White Trash Zombies Get the Blues


Diana Rowland

Daw, Jul 3 2012, $

ISBN: 9780756407506



Angel Crawford has come a long way in a short time from her felonious teen life in the Louisiana Bayous as a poor white trash delinquent living in a dumpy old trailer. Instead she has overcome her addictions, adapted to dining on brains ever since she became a zombie and survived a serial killer assault (See My Life As A White Trash Zombie). She even has a job as a coroner’s van driver that enables her easy access to take out fast food and shockingly has friends including a romance with her zombie trainer police officer Deputy Marcus Ivanov.



However, her perfect life turns ugly when someone with a gun aimed at Angel steals a corpse from her. Before the kidnapping, Angels sensed something weird about the victim as her olfactory skill failed to smell any brain smoothie. The media rips her head off due to what she claims as farfetched and her criminal history. Distrusting Marcus as she fears he is a double agent working for the Zombie Mafia, Angel investigates the case of the seemingly brainless corpse that got away only to end up in a top secret lab.



Angel has come a long way from when she was a living loser; for as a dead head she has become a productive member of society. This tongue in cheek zombie thriller is much more serious than its jocular first entry as the courageous protagonist comes across some frightening things including the press vilification that have her wanting to throw up the last brains stew she chomped on. Urban fantasy fans will enjoy the latest Diana Rowland take on zombie fever.



Harriet Klausner

The Buffalo Hunter-Peter Straub

The Buffalo Hunter


Peter Straub

Cemetery Dance, Jul 2012, $19.99

ISBN: 9781587672361



Thirty-five year old Bob Bunting has not seen or spoken to his parents in three years until they call to wish him a happy birthday. They use letters to communicate as his relatives live in Battle Creek while he resides with his tall Swiss executive girlfriend Veronica in New York. In fact Veronica is fiction he created as a cross between Sigourney Weaver and a woman on a bus ad. Simply put Bob is petrified of women, but uses a made up GF to keep his parents, his co-workers and his neighbors at a light-year distance from his inner soul. Bob imbibes his coffee and cognac by sucking them from baby bottles and makes up a life of female girlfriends like Veronica who he claims attended the first two acts of Cats with him. His other escape is into novels where he becomes part of the cast.



This is an odd psychological drama of a psychic increasingly losing his tenuous grip on reality. The novella, which was part of the House Without Doors collection, is not for everybody as the protagonist is a weird phobic with crippling obsessions and grotesque fantasies that blur reality especially his use of baby bottles. Sort of having James Thurber’s Walter Mitty fantasizing about life in a psychotic nightmare, fans who relish something radically different will want to read the bizarre strange world of The Buffalo Hunter.



Harriet Klausner

The Soul Consortium-Simon West-Bulford

The Soul Consortium


Simon West-Bulford

Medallion Press, Jul 1 2012, $14.95

ISBN: 9781605423937



Death has been conquered by medical science; when the host body expires, the memories are placed inside a clone. However, an undesired second order effect occurs as ennui leads to indifference which leads to species extinction instead of eternal artificial reincarnation.



Eighty-four quadrillion years since he was a child, Salem Ben is the last existing human because he fears the unknown of death. He lives in the Soul Consortium warehouse where every soul that ever existed is filed. Qod the AI who manages the Soul Consortium operation is his only companion. Qod informs him there are odd aberrations appearing in some of the digital soul records that should not be there. Using WOOM technology that enables him to explore the memories of those dead souls stored in the archives, Salem Ben enters the lives of these oddities that should not have happened. There he encounters Keitus Vieta who is turning the dead souls’ existence into eternal nightmares. Salem Ben must find a way to end the abomination’s spreading infection before the Soul Consortium becomes a chamber of horrors.



With a nod to the Zager and Evans’ song 2525, this is an entreating science fiction starring the last human whose travels into someone else’s history make for a strong tale thriller. The hero witnesses first-hand the horror, but is unsure how to stop the evil from distorting the memories of the souls. Readers will relish journeying with Salem Ben as he becomes a twentieth century serial killer, a sixteenth century Lombard spiritualist, a Castor World monk and the Soul Consortium Creator. However, what grips the reader is the mystery of the malevolent being who is changing humanity’s future by creating a hellish afterlife instead of the cyclical rebirth.



Harriet Klausner

Shadow's Edge- J.T. Geissinger

Shadow's Edge


J.T. Geissinger

Montlake Romance, Jun 12 2012, $12.95

ISBN: 9781612183312



Jenna Moore spent her childhood on the run with her parents who always seemed to look back over their shoulders. She never knew why they hid only her mom became an alcoholic of sorts and her dad seemed always frightened by the shadows. Now she has neither of them as her mom died and her dad vanished and she presumes he is dead too. Never alone before, the scared young woman also is confused by her recent paranormal abilities.



In the forests of England, the Ikati shapeshifters survive in secrecy by deploying a strict code of behavior; those who betray the law die. They recently learned that an offspring of traitors lives in California. Their chieftain Leander McLoughlin heads to the American Pacific West Coast to either kill the “innocent” as most of the tribe prefer or bring her to her people to test whether she can be educated in their customs. When they meet, they are attracted to each other, but she is a chip off the paranoid block of her parents and trusts no one; while he considers invoking the death penalty. Meanwhile in the shadows hides a stalker waiting to pounce on Leander and Jenna.



The first A Night Prowler romantic urban fantasy is an engaging romantic urban fantasy filled with suspense as readers will wonder whether Leander can execute his beloved. The affected dialect of the Ikati anchors the Geissinger mythos with a freshness that needs some adjustment to accept from the audience. The conflict boils down to assimilation as Jenna’s DNA may be Ikati but her nurturing is American while a third party waits to pounce. Fans will enjoy this exciting paranormal romantic suspense.



Harriet Klausner